AnotherHistorical Shaggy Dog Story

I pride myself on my ability to write these up and provide a cartoon illustration. It is a wise thing to take pride in simple pleasures, n'est-ce pas?

Pompeia, the wife of the great Roman general Julius Caesar, was well known for her beauty and her matronly virtues. But did you know she was also known far and wide for a remarkable berry she owned that had been passed from generation to generation in her family and was said to have been given to her distant ancestor by Ceres, the Earth Goddess, herself?

Yes, it was an astonishing piece of fruit, a huge, purple, shiny blackberry that pulsated with light. People came from all parts of the Roman Empire just to see Pompeia's berry. To accommodate the crowds, Julius Caesar caused a marble shrine to be built with open sides so that all who came could regard the berry where it sat on its gold and marble pedestal.

Every day people would come to gaze at the magnificent blackberry, and they would shout,

"How beautiful it is!"

"How large it is!"

"Blessings on the honorable house of she who owns the admirable berry!"

One night, long after viewing hours, the priestess who looked after the berry heard a sound of sandals on the marble floor of the shrine that housed Pompeia's berry.

"That is odd,' she thought. "Everyone knows that visiting hours are day time only." She went to accost the trespasser and tell him to come back during the day.

She found a man standing by the berry's pedestal. Ye gods! He had the berry right in the palm of his hand!

The priestess called to the man, "Sir, put down that berry! You may not touch it. Come back during viewing hours. Then you may look at Pompeia's berry all you wish and join in on the clamor of praise for the sacred fruit.."

The man turned to her with an evil gleam in his eye. "Foolish woman! I came to seize her berry, and not to praise it!"

And he put it in a sack and ran away.

---

Making Light of the Dark Ages: Buried Saxon Treasure

Another Nan Hawthorne cartoon.

And You Thought Braveheart Was Bad...

     I am one of many historical novelists who rolled her eyes and cried "Welladay!" watching the movie Bravehearrt with its wildly fanciful and downright irritating historical inaccuracies. No, William Wallace was not the father of Edward III... I know someone who was told that her recounting of the execution on Blacklow Hill of Piers Gaveston could not be accurate because everyone knows Patrick McGoohan threw him out a window. Read the Randall Wallace novel... it's just as bad, and he admits it's all fantasy and that he thinks it should have happened the way he said, not how it really did. Tell Gaveston that! Heck, tell Isabella that! "Mais non, I will not couchez avec this smelly blue Scottish man!"
     But... given the choice I would rather the kids I know got their history from movies like Braveheart... than from video games.
   That's one thing I learned during my little "Battle of Hastings" party with the neighborhood boys that I wrote about in yesterday's blog. Throughout the video two or three of them kept telling me about scenes in games the movie reminded them of. One boy's brother's name is Jason. I told him about Jason and the Argonauts and how Jason was a famous hero. He replied, "Jason wasn't always a hero because sometimes he fights other good guys." In the game. Another boy proceeded to describe all the weapons a medieval soldier would carry into battle, axes and swords and crossbows and morning stars.. all at the same time. I noticed in the game Stronghold that in the Dark Ages version the otherwise acceptable stronghold has a neat line of latrines and numerous eel pond.
     I never have been an old fuddy duddy when it comes to games. I had an old Sega Genesis once and only stopped playing with it because my eyesight and it were no longer compatible. But I worry about kids' understanding of the history of the peoples of our planet. I can imagine how hard it is to teach history these days.. constantly having to correct peculiar notions of what Beowulf was about or how much of the sort of goofy magic was in a legendary hero's story.
     I don't know what I am proposing.. nothing really. The average parent is not going to be able to sit down with their kids and calmly explain that knights did or did not do this or that. So just be aware as you are writing your novels that you probably will never be able to compete for the 15 year old mind.
     However, if any game companies are interested, my novel of Anglo Saxon England is definitely available for licensing.. Ah, "An Involuntary King: The Game". Splendid.

Succession, Or A Daisy Chain of Engllish Monarchy in Novels

If you read enough historical fiction, and so much of it is about England, you begin to run across the same historical figures over and over. While reading Morgan Llewellyn's Pride of Lions I ran across both Thorfin and Macbeth, who were one and the same person in Dorothy Dunnett's King Hereafter, so I found myself awake at 3:30 this morning following a path from book to book.

I decided to list the royal succession through books I have read. Of course, one could do this by reading Jean Plaidy, whose novels stretch from (primordial) soup to (Hanoverian)nuts. But what you see below are just books I have e read. After all, this blog is called "That's All She Read" not "That's All There Is To Read"!

The Last Kingdom (etc.) by Bernard Cornwell has a protagonist who takes credit for all of those triumphs associated with Alfred the Great. I love the series, but can't forgive the author for the hatchet job on my heroine, Aethelflaed. I know the series will stretch to Uhtred's old age so chances are the Edward the Elder and perhaps even Athelstan may be featured.

I have to skip a few kings to get to the next book.

Avalon, by Anya Seton is a far ranging novel takes place during the the reigns of Edgar, his son Edward the Martyr and his other son Ethelraed, later to be called the Unready, meaning ill counseled.

Breath of Kings, by Gene Farrington covers three dynasties, starting with Ethelraed the Unready, then going on to the short reigh of Edmund Ironsides, Ethelraed's illegitimate son, and the takeover by Danes, starting by some accounts with Sveyn Forkbeard, but definitely covering the great King Canute. Canute's son by a Saxon woman to whom he was handfasted before marrying Emma was Harold Harefoot, who grabbed the throne briefly Canute had set her aside to marry Ethelraed's Norman widow Emma and Harold was succeeded by their son Hardicanute, whose death by choking on food is illlustrated in Breath of Kings. The main character of the novel, Edward the Confessor, came to the throne of his father, Ethelraed the Unready, when Canute ran out of sons.

An interlude here to acknowledge good old Macbeth.

As I mention, in Pride of Lions, the novel of Brian Boru's sons Morgan Llewellyn has a sojourn to the Scotland of Malcolm, the grandfather of the ill fated Duncan of Shakespeare's "Scottish play". There we meet the young rambunctious Duncan and Thorfin, both grandsons of the king. Mention is made of a granddaughter of the man Malcolm assassinated in order to be king, this woman married to a man named Macbeth. Dorothy Dunnett contends Thorfin was just the Norse name of Macbeth, whose name means "son of llife", and her novel, King Hereafter is about this man. I can also mention that Breath of Kings has Emma visiting Scotland and meeting Macbeth.

Pride of Lions brings in Earl Godwin of Wessex, who is prominent in Breath of Kings as well. His son Harold Godwinson shows up in the latter and in Judith Tarr's historical fantasy, Rite of Conquest. But I am getting ahead of myself.

The King's Shadow by Elizabeth Alder is an extremely affectionate novel of Harold Godwinson and a mute Welsh boy. The novel of Harold's accession to Edward the Comfessor's throne takes him to his death at the Battle of Hastings and had this Harold-lover distraught for days.

Rite of Conquest by Judith Tarr has William of Normandy the reincarnated King Arthur and Harold Godwinson the slavish defender of Christianity's effort to rob Britain of its holiness. That's all I'm gonna say about that.. except that it's a wonderful novel if you can overlook its theme -- and even I could it's that good.

Robin and the King by Parke Godwin takes over with William the Conqueror, and also gets us started with his successor William Rufus.

King of the Wood by Valerie Anand has the same take on William Rufus, that he was homosexual. It also brings in Henry, who would be "the First", the youngest son of William the Conqueror.

With The Lion of Justice this Jean Plaidy thrown in here to cover Henmry I, we go on to a spate of Sharon Kay Penmans.

When Christ and His Saints Slept takes us from the death of Henry I and the war between his nephew, Stephen of Blois, and his daughter, Maud. The first peek at Henry Fitzempress is in this novel.

That Henry, better known as Henry II, shows up again in Penman's Time and Chance, largely about Henry's wild marriage to Eleanor of Aquitaine.

The third novel in this series is The Devil's Brood about their fractious and colorful children.

Here we have brought you to Richard the Lionhearted.. and a good place to break. We will return to this daisy chain in a future blog post.

Now don't freak out. I know there are lots more than the ones I have listed so far, and you should feel free to mention them in Comments below. I chose one comprehensive example for each period.

We Solve All Historical Mysteries - Every Last One of Them!

This is indeed an oldie, having been originally posted on the blog Booking history a couple years ago. Hope you agree it's a goodie. To see how old it is, just check the dates on the leftover comments.

With James Patterson's ostensibly nonfiction book, The Murder of King Tut: The Plot to Kill the Boy King - A Nonfiction Thriller, which is full of rather fanciful "facts" and as a result is climbing in sales rank on Amazon.com, Brandy Purdy and I decided it was time to put all those historical mysteries to rest. We know all the answers. I bet you can supply a few yourself!

Who killed the little princes in the Tower?

That wasn't a hunchback after all, but Richard III's conjoined midget twin. During one of Richard's many opium induced trances, the midget killed the princes. Richard awoke with no memory of the event.

What happened to King John's treasure?

No, it was not lost in the Wash. It has been in a numbered Swiss bank account for nearly 800 years. It is on hold for when King Arthur finally gets around to waking up to save Britain.

Who was Jack the Ripper?

No, not the Prince of Wales. In fact, not even a man. Lizzie Borden, in Europe for her Grand Tour, killed the prostitutes when they rebuffed her lesbian advances with scornful accusations of "Unnatural!" She killed her parents because they found out.

Who killed the Lindbergh baby?

Nobody. He was kidnapped by his real mother and raised by her in isolation on an island in the South Pacific. Her name was Amelia Earhart.

Who was the woman who claimed to be the daughter of Czar Nicholas, Anastasia?

Just look at her! It's Ingrid Bergman. Who else? Sheesh.

Was Richard the Lionhearted gay?

No, it was just an army recruiting campaign that was wildly successful.

Was Marie Antoinette guilty in the notorious affair of the stolen diamond necklace?

Though Marie Antoinette was accused of stealing it and a trial full of shady characters followed, now the truth can be told: Wanting to impress her Swedish lover, Count Fersen, Marie Antoinette wore the necklace one time to an intimate little dinner, but the "lady" delegated to return it stole and dismantled it instead. Leaving Marie Antoinette in a predicament. She could not reveal the truth without revealing her liaison with Fersen.

What happened to the Lost Colony of Roanoke?

An Indian shaman turned all the settlers into deer then gave a huge feast where the venison was served with a rich delicious bordellaise sauce.

What lies within the Bermuda Triangle?

A squared hyponews which is equal to a squared bee square.

Was Elizabeth I really a man?

Yes. Wanting to prove that women were just as good as men, proud Anne Boleyn concealed the fact that her "daughter" was actually a son and brought him up as a female, bribing trusted like minded nursery attendants to keep the secret. Even though this duplicity cost Anne her life when she failed to provide Henry with a male heir, she was vindicated by her "daughter's" greatness in the end. Amy Robsart was silenced because she knew her husband, Sir Robert Dudley, was having a homosexual affair with the "Queen".

Why were the Knights Templar destroyed?

It was a banking scandal. They had invested in sub prime mortgages and derivatives and were bankrupting the country. The Frecnh Royal Reserve decided they were too big to fail, so King Philip took all the money and nationalized the Templars, which just means he did not have to share the money, and the CEOs of all the Templar banks were burned at the stake. They were tied to the stake face forward, thus the origin of the expression "stakeholders".

Did the Donner Party revert to cannibalism when they were lost in the snow?

When their pastor died in the Sierra Nevada, they found among his belongings a book called To Serve Man. They had thought it was a work about charitable acts. it turned out to be a cookbook.

What happened to Atlantis?

Thanks to the popularity of hundreds of fast food restaurants the population became immensely fat. This sank the fabled city but enterprising entrepreneurs managed to escape and centuries later founded MacDonald's. The golden arches are actually a replica of the golden arches that topped Atlantis' finest eatery, the last thing it's proprietor saw as it sank beneath the sea.

---

But, you cry, some of these things happened at quite different times and involve people who could not have been there at the same time! We reply, what's that got to do with book sales?

About your historical sleuths

Brandy Purdy is the author of The Confession of Piers Gaveston, and of The Boleyn Wife which is due to be released by Kensington Books in January 2010.

Nan Hawthorne is the author of An Involuntary King: A Tale of Anglo Saxon England and Alehouse Tales, due out Winter 2010..

Can you prove that it did not happen? You can? Well, so what?

Stuck For a Solution To a Plot Dilemma?

For Creative Writers!

Please cross post wherever you want.

This is just for fun, OK?  Not all that serious, though you may find inspiration here.

Join here: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/plot_solutions

The way it works is that writers who are stuck for where a plot should go pose a question, bare bones information, one sentence only.

Then anyone else on the group may supply the solution, funny, serious, whatever.

For example, someone might post this plot question: "How will Sully come to realize that he is in love with Cleve?"  That's all.. no more information, just the barebones of the situation.  Since the group will be 100% moderated anything longer or more involved will be deleted.

Then everyone else can offer a solution.  Any solution.  So for instance, these possibilities:

"Sully drives away then starts to feel just how much he will miss Cleve."
"Sully sees a photo of himself and Cleve and it makes him cry."
"Sully finds himself gazing at Cleve without realizing it."
"Sully realizes how much Cleve reminds him of his favorite teddy bear he had as a child."

The answers might make you laugh, they might make you shake your head, or they might just offer the key to your writing dilemma.

We will wait until we have at least a dozen members before we approve the first questions.

All genres, so don't get distracted by the example here.

Enjoy yourself!

More lyrics: Kings and Queend of England

Kings and Queens of England

(c) Vic Gammon

Now Charles II had eleven bastard children
And George III went mad
And Edward VII they thought was Jack the Ripper
But Richard III weren't as bad as Shakespeare thought he was
Victoria lay back and thought of England
Charles I lost his head
Well the best thing about those Kings and Queens of England
Is that most of them are dead.

Singing
Rule Britannia
Britannia waives the rules
Kings, Queens, Jacks and Knaves and tyrants
Cheats and fools.

Now William III was a protestant and Dutchman
And James I was a Scot
And George I spoke nothing else but German
What a mixed-up, inter-bred lot.
And William I was a grasping Norman bastard
Believe me, it's no lie.
Well there hasn't been an English king of England
Since Harold got one in the eye.

Chorus

Now she was a well-heeled blue-blood Cinderella,*
Him Prince Charming with big ears,
But he has a thing going with the ugly sister
So it ended all in tears.
So arise now ye ghosts of old Oliver Cromwell,
Brave Harrison and Tom Paine.
Won't you rind our land of this monstrous carbuncle
And bring sunshine after the reign.

Chorus

* I take it the well heeled Cinderella and prince Charming is Diana and Prince Charles?