Ten Years and Still Learning

Last week was a little rough. Joyful, but rough I’ve been writing much of my life. I’ve been publishing for ten years. This year everything ratcheted up a notch. I recently read something from Virginia Heath. She said, “Being a professional writer, I always have a new story on the go and at least another […]

Rambling Through York

Various characters visit various parts of the city, and now York has moved very high up on my real life travel list. I long to wander through The Shambles, view the city from the top of the medieval Clifford’s Tower (and shudder over some of its darker history), gape in awe at York Minster, the […]

Marriage laws in Regency England

Highlighting facts behind Historical Romance with Jude Knight’s research into marriage laws. Most readers of Regency romance have a fair handle on what it was like to be a resident of Regency England, but some of what we think we know is the exception rather than the rule, and some is just plain wrong. Here’s […]

Weary and Sad

The week dawns with your author weary and sad. The end of last week and the weekend brought several phone calls about friends and associates in health crises, some of them covid-related, and the unrelenting drum beat of bad news from California, Louisiana, Haiti, and Afghanistan. It is down right debilitating! But I managed to […]

One Down, One Up

My still-without-title story for next year’s Bluestocking Belles collection ended with the hero and heroine in a coat closet. With nine other sisters in the house and guests occupying every possible space, they had to meet SOMEwhere. Today it is onward with The Ashmead Heirs. The next up, the Forgotten Daughter and I are becoming […]

Her Own Little World

I’ve been working on my story for the Bluestocking Belles’ next collection. Here’s a tidbit for WIP Wednesday, grabbed at random from my choppy draft. It appears right after the riot at a lecture on Habeas Corpus. #amwritinghonest *** Doro you idiot. You should have let him accompany you to find Chloe. You should have […]

Into the Slums with Aldridge

I travel. Sometimes I travel by boat, plane, or automobile. Sometimes I travel by book. Sometimes I explore the real world. This week I rambled through the worst sections of London with the Marquis of Aldridge. I wouldn’t normally dare go to St. Giles, Seven Dials, the Devil’s Acre etc., the lairs of thieves, murderers, […]

Wilfred Bagshott, Portraits

Looking for Wilfred Bagshott’s Portait Booth, Dearie? So is Lady Flora Landrum. The jumble of tents, lean-tos, and shacks at the far end of the ice, where new businesses sprouted up hourly in no particular order, confused Flo. She had left her companion, Lady Georgiana Hayden sipping hot cider and seated inside a marquee, one […]

Keeping in Step

If you don’t participate in the Belles’ Brigade (the Bluestocking Belles’ street team on Facebook) you missed an interesting discussion last Saturday. The topic for Saturday Brunch was group projects—how a group of highly creative friends goes about creating a collection of stories to publish. Let me summarize it. As you can see, keeping everyone […]

Progress

One of the most satisfying things for a writer is typing The End on a rough draft. It isn’t the actual end of the process (layers of fixes, rewrites, comments from beta readers, editing, and formatting lie ahead), but it is the point at which the thing exists. I had a moment like that last […]