What Motivates the Novelist?

Please see the poll on the right.  I am looking for your number one motivation only.

I have been adding books on Smashwords to medieval-novels.com and am impressed by the sheer variety and freedom of the authors.  Satisfy my curiosity. 

Thank you!  If you are looking for the Round-up, it is right below this.

Historical Novel Roundup for February 2011

Yep, pardner, it's that time again, time for you to show us what you got.  Just click on the "Comments" link below and add your title, name, blurb about your book and a link where folks can mosey on over ad get a copy. 

(Hey, I come by this folksy talkt honestly... I was born in Nevada.) 

Just new releases?  Nope.  Any book you want to crow about is mighty fine with us.

So whaddya waitin' for?  Saddle up and skedaddle!

How to Get Filthy Rich as a Novelist

I know a sure way to make a ton of money writing a novel.

Write a novel about some amazing crime.  How about robbing a casino or Fort Knox or a multinational bank.  Come up with slightly outrageous but lovable characters, an impossibly complex plot and gorgeous and exotic settings.  Spend a lot of time setting up the plans and the relationships between the characters.  Make sure there are lots of close calls.  But this is terribly important: make sure your mastermind gets away with it.

This is also important: do all your own research, meticulous and real world.  Do this by actually committing the crime.  The novel may not make a dime, but at least you will have the proceeds from your remarkable research.

If you get caught and thrown into jail, hey, I said you would be rich, not free to move about the world.

[Book Review] The Last Cavalier: Being the Adventures of Count Sainte-Hermine in the Age of Napoleon, by Alexandre Dumas

The Last Cavalier: Being the Adventures of Count Sainte-Hermine in the Age of Napoleon

Alexandre Dumas

The story about the discovery of this novel is almost more interesting than the novel.  It seems it has puzzled Dumas experts for years that with all the novels he wrote about French history he had left out a novel about one of the most exciting periods.  It turned out he did not, but the novel, which appeared in installments in one of the journals of the day, was first never finished and second, lost in the journal's archives.  Once rediscovered The Last Cavalier: Being the Adventures of Count Sainte-Hermine in the Age of Napoleon has been reassembled, all 110 plus chapters of it, and though pretty much nothing in the novel ever gets resolved , it was published in 2008.  The copy I "read" was a download from the National Library Services for the Blind and was a cool 34 hours long.

I won't even begin to pretend to review  a novel this old by a novelist so enshrined in history.  There's no point, really, but I will give you a sense of what you are in for if you pick it up and start to read it.  To start with, you don't even meet the title character until well into the novel.  The entire first section is all about Napoleon Bonaparte, his wife's debts, his enemies, his personality, his plans.  When we finally meet Count Sainte-Hermine we find him falling in love and getting married.. almost.  It seems he is the last of a line of royalists and I mean last... the rest were all at best exiled and at worst guillotined.  Loyal to their memory, the young Count leaves his wedding and his bride in tears to go and rejoin the resistance.  He is caught and imprisoned and then forgotten by the author for a while.  To make a long, long, long story shorter, he has a friend in a high place, no not Napoleon, who gets him released and makes him choose either to be a common sailor or a common soldier.  You soon learn he is anything but common as he faces dangers beyond imagining and reckoning in his Elerde-like desire to get himself killed.  His elaborate suicide attempt takes him into the crew of a famous corsair, then to Burma to fight tigers, and after that to Trafalgar where he is the marksman who kills Nelson.  Returning to Paris much lauded, he comes out as a royalist to Bonaparte himself and instead of reaping richly deserved rewards he gets sent down to help the Emperor's brother Joseph rid Italy of brigands as colorfully as possible.  That's apparently when he died.. no not the Count, but the author. 

One of the fascinating things about this novel is that it breaks every rule in the How To Write a novel Book.  As I am tempted to believe all those hard and fast rules are largely some one's persnickety idea rather than actual I got a big kick out of this.  "Show, Don't Tell"?   Not only does the author tell you what is going on all the time, he doesn't even confine the telling to the story at hand.  Dumas isn't shy about telling.  Some of the most interesting chapters, and there are tons of them, have no direct bearing on the protagonist's story at all.  There is one about what was doing on the Appian Way fifty years before the birth of Christ, another on a Breton island famous for its corsairs, several in a row about Chateaubriand travels in America.  "Point of View"?  Dumas doesn't hesitate to jump from character to character, leaving the Count in the dust numerous times.  I am sure if I had paid close attention I would have heard speech tags other than said and asked all over the place.

You realize fairly quickly that this "novel" is really a serial.  Clearly Dumas was being paid by the installment, as he was far from finished after well over 100 chapters.  As a result the resolution remains elusive, no return to his betrothed, no kiss and make up with Napoleon,  and I can't say if these resolutions would ever have come through, though Dumas does appear to presage them.

One must remember that this man wrote The Three Musketeers and The Man In the Iron Mask, to mention just a couple of ins swashbuckling novels, when watching the Count shoot better,k fence better and more nobly, give his millions away right and left, tear up romantically when anyone reminds him of his sorrows, dress impeccably, know the right wine to have with the fish course,  run faster than a speeding locomotive and leap high buildings in a single bound -- well you get the point.  I couldn't help but feel sorry for the man who apparently is a virgin still at the end of the romance (sic).  Women fall for him of course, but his true love back in Paris is his one and only.. and having never had the honeymoon ...  oh merd.

Major commitment, readers.. I confess I skipped two chapters, both asides from the main story.

What People Are Looking for in Medieval History



Leading searchers astray.

 This is always interesting, looking over what search terms people are using that lead them to a site. In the following instances, they all found themselves at Today In Medieval History... whether they learned what they wanted is anyone's guess, but we can speculate.

medieval nun england

Lots to choose from, of course. My guess is that the person was either looking for a story or novel they once read or perhaps want to know more about how nums lived them. What is your guess? I can’t tell you much about what they found. It was an image result on Bing with a link to an old archived set of posts. When I did the same search on Google I found much more germane results. Perhaps they just wanted to make a costume?

"today in medieval history"

There were several of these, and I hope I don’t flatter myself when I choose to believe they were all looking for my blog.

astronomer dies 2010

I am afraid all this person discovered at TiMH is astronomers died before 1600 also.

23 october 1066

Rather specific, as are some of the the following. In this case it looks like they learned that just one week before Harold Godwinson died at the Battle of Hastings.

1487 Ireland

I expect lots of things happened that year in Ireland, but one significant event was the arrest of Lambert Simbel, one of the pretenders who claimed to be a Prince in the Tower.

1407 – A truce between John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy and Louis of Valois, Duke of Orléans is a

I am just impressed that someone even knew about this. Even more impressive, there were two separate hits the same day from different people! What the rest of that sentence, “is a”, will forever remain a mystery.

politics middle ages 1251

Middle Ages and 1251? What they found on the blog was the birthdate of Marco Polo.. not a lot of political content in that natal event.

news in 30th december 1170

“This just in: Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas a Becket slain by unknown assailants during the celebration of mass. Four barons seen leaving the precincts on getaway steeds. News at 11.”

saladin today

What is this, a celebrity magazine or something?

September 1187

Perhaps they wanted a back issue of “Saladin Today” since this led two others to the retaking of Jerusalem.

This is just one of the many things you can find on a statistics tool like the one I use, Statcounter.com. For instance, the two people concerned about that truce about an hour and a quarter apart and using the same precise words were in Ashalnd and Columbus, Ohio. Our “Saladin Today” readers were in Brisbane, Australia, Derby, UK, and Rugby in the UK and the searches were conducted over two days the week before the anniversary of the event. At least one can follow the thought process there. Our nun seeker was at SUNY in New York, our possible Lambert Simnel fan in Hendersonville, Kentucky and it was someone in Tulsa, Oklahoma who was worried about politics in 1251.   Perhaps the filibuster is still going on.

Less encouraging is the information that most of these people clicked through and then skedaddled immediately, their stays totaling 0 seconds each! At least it was comforting that one of the people looking for “today in medieval history” muyat have really wanted the blog as the stats say “Multiple visits spread over more than one day”..

I actually came across a search I knew about. A woman who was trying to remember the Justin de Quincy mysteries titles I found on another blog’s stats, using logical search terms and finding and track-able through medieval-novels.com . So in this case it was no longer a mystery, I guess!

Some Medieval Jokes

Some Viking friends of mine went on ahumor raid and brought these back to me.

edieval Jokes:

A king was preparing to ride off on a quest. Before he leaves, he locks up the queen with a chastity belt and calls in his most trusted knight and hands him the key. "Sir Percival, here is the key to my queen's honor. Should I fall in battle, it is to you to release her from her belt so she might marry again." He then leaves on his journey. At the top of a hill, he turns back for one last look at his castle and is surprised to see Sir Percival riding breakneck in pursuit. "My lord, my lord....wait! You have given me the wrong key!"

ing Arthur was preparing to go out on an expedition and would be away from Camelot for an indefinite period of time. King Arthur was worried about leaving Queen Guinevere alone with all those Knights of the Round Table. So he went to Merlin for some advice.

After explaining his predicament to Merlin, the wizard looked thoughtful, and said that he’d see if he could come up with something, and asked him to come back in a week.

A week later, King Arthur was back in Merlin’s laboratory where the good wizard was showing him his latest invention. It was a chastity belt, except that it had a rather large hole in the most obvious place. “This is no good, Merlin!” the king exclaimed, “Look at this opening.. How is this supposed to protect m’lady, the Queen?”

“Ah, sire, just observe.” said Merlin as he searched his cluttered work bench until he found what he was looking for. He then selected his most worn-out wand, one that he was going to discard anyway. He then inserted it in the gaping aperture of the chastity belt whereupon a small guillotine blade came down and cut it neatly in two.

“Merlin, you are a genius!” said the greatful monarch, “Now I can leave, knowing that my Queen is fully protected.”

After putting Guinevere in the device, King Arthur then set out upon his Quest. Several years passed until he returned to Camelot.

Immediately he assembled all his knights in the courtyard and had them drop their trousers for an informal ’short arm’ inspection. Sure enough! Each and every one of them was either amputated or damaged in some way. All of them except Sir Galahad.

“Sir Galahad,” exclaimed King Arthur, “The one and only true knight! Only you among all the nobles have been true to me. What is it in my power to grant you? Name it and it is yours!”

But Sir Galahad was speechless…

 medieval astrologer prophesied to a king that his favorite mistress would soon die.

Sure enough, the woman died a short time later.

The king was outraged at the astrologer, certain that his prophecy had brought about the woman's death.

He summoned the astrologer and commanded him: "Prophecy, tell me when you will die!"

The astrologer realized that the king was planning to kill him immediately, no matter what answer he gave.

"I do not know when I will die," he answered finally. "I only know that whenever I die, the king will die three days later."

he knight returned to the king’s castle with prisoners, bags of gold and other riches from his victories. “Tell me of your battles,” said the king.

“Well, sire, I have been robbing and stealing on your behalf for weeks, burning the all of the villages of your enemies in the north.”

The king was horrified. “But I have no enemies in the north,” he said.

“Well,” said the knight, “you do now.”

edieval pick up line:  "When the Inquisition put me on the rack, my limbs weren't the only thing they stretched."


Raided fron http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php?topic=58578.0.

[GAME] Can You PUt These Events in Chronological Order?

A bit of a game for you... no cheating!

Put these historical events in the order in which they occurred.

1. Battle of Stamford Bridge
2. Signing of the Magna Charta
3. Death of William Rufus in the New Forest
4. Building of Offa's Dyke
5. Battle of Merzivan Plain
6. Marriage of Henry V of England to Catherine Valois
7. Death of Roland at Roncesvalles
8. Birth of Edward II of England
9. Battle of Clontarf
10. Saladin retakes Jerusalem
11. The Bonfire of the Vanities
12. Viking raid on Lindisfarne
13. Birth of Alfred the Great
14. Coronation of Henry IV of France
15. Eleanor of Aquitaine's divorce from the King of France

Find the answers in the page tabs on this blog above.

"Beloved Pilgrim" Has a Gorgeous Cover!

My upcoming novel of the Crusade of 1101, Beloved Pilgrim,  which should be available  in a matter of a few months in paperback and on Kindle, has a stunning new cover!  When I hired Dave Graham to do the cover, I knew he would do a great job, but he exceeded my wildest expectations.    He so perfectly achieved my vision for the two characters and the setting and gives such a succinct artitsic rendering of the theme of the novel, I simply could not be happier.  I will share his contact information with you soon.

Beloved Pilgrim is the story of Elisabeth von Winterkirche, a young noblewoman in Bavaria who rejects the role her time and class have set for her of passivity and homely skills.  After her twin brother's death, she dons his armor and weapons and, with his former squire who was also his lover, heads for Constantinople for a crusade led by Raymond de St. Gilles, Count of Toulouse.  She learns early on that she can pass for a young man as, "People see what they expect."  What she herself did not suspect was what she would learn once embarked on this doomed pilgrimage, that honor is not always where you expect it and that love can come in the person of another woman.

Pictured is, mounted on Gauner, Elisabeth aka the Ritter Elias, and the half Turkish, half Greek Maliha with the walls of her home city, Constantinople, in the background.

The book is dedicated to the cover artist's own father, Jack, who has provided so much quality advice to me on battle and related matters in both my novels.

This is my second novel, after An Involuntary King: A Tale of Anglo Saxon England, which came out in 2008.  It is in paperback, on Kindle and at Smashwords.com, and you can find reviews on this blog.

My first book was published by Delphi Press in 1992 and is a nonfiction book on women, body image and sexuality, Loving the Goddess Within.  I am in the process of arranging for it to be reprinted.

I am excited to see Beloved Pilgrim nearing release by Shieldwall Books.  It is a novel about honor and friendship and a gentle love story.

The Development of Anglo Saxon Towns, and More From TMC

The early English peoples gathered in at most small conclaves of self sufficient farms, and few of the old Roman towns survived. But slowly opportunity made way for people creating and expanding places where many people could live and work.

See a brief overview at the latest The Medieval Chronicle in my article, "The Development of Anglo Saxon Towns".

"Canterbury, London, Winchester, and, in the north, York were thriving communities, enabling the English economy to expand and thrive, and for the new found problems of sanitation and the spread of disease in densely populated communities to become part of the familiar urban history of the Middle Ages."

Also in this issue:

• St. Vitus and St. Vitus Dance, in And the Saints Go Marching, Denise Donning
• A Day in an Animal's Lilfe, by Neia Leja
• Those Architectural Cistercians, by Anita Gordon

Preview all issues online!

Things Amazon Could Do To Improve the Kindle's Accessibility

I adore my Kindle 3.  For the first time in about 35 years I can read books that came out recently, pretty much impossible if one is reliant on recorded books "for the blind". 

I believe Amazon is desirous of making the Kindle as accessible a tool as possible.  They have come a long way.  I would like to offer some recommendations of what they can do to improve it further.

• While I am less into the Amazon Storefront on the Kindle able to be read aloud, it being so much easier to buy books on the web site and have them sent to my device, it would be great if some of the tools, like notes, for example,  were also able to use text-to-speech.
• Improve the text-to-speech application the device uses.  I don't so much mean the tone or inflection as get rid of some of the pronunciation quirks.  My Kindle always reads "lunged"  with a hard "g" and the word "mar" as "march".  Granted, som of the presumptions are downright entertaining, like "a fox in a chicken cooperative",  but a little of that goes a long way.
• Put together something to give to publishers and authors who are reluctant to allow text-to-speech on their books that explains that no one who does not have to would choose to listen to the digital reader rather than buy the audiobook, and that disabling text-to-speech prevents people like me from reading their books.  I would be happy to back them up on this.
• Go back through some of the existing content, out of print books for example, and get them onto the Kindle.

I know blind people yell at you all the time.  Not me.  Your wonderful reading device has made a huge improvement in my reading life, my life in general, and I thank you.

Nan Hawthorne