Top 16

1. Dance by Judy Cuevas
2. Passion’s Treasure by Betina Krahn
3. Lion’s Bride by Iris Johansen
4. Fair Is the Rose by Megan McKinney
5. The Landower Legacy by Victoria Holt
6. Beast by Judith Ivory
7. Emily and the Dark Angel by Jo Beverly
8. Red, Red Rose by Marjorie Farrell
9. The English Witch by Loretta Chase
10. Crooked Hearts by Patricia Gaffney
11. The Pride of Lions/The Blood of Roses by Marsha Canham
12. Vixen by Jane Feather
13. Shadows and Lace by Teresa Medeiros
14. The Braeswood Tapestry by Robyn Carr
15. The Valentine Legacy by Catherine Coulter
16. Banners of Silk by Rosalind Laker

252

Accountability is the word for the day.

Her Husband’s Mistress is my as-yet unwritten Golden Heart entry. I did have a manuscript in mind for the contest and then realized that it was written in my old mindset–by completing this manuscript I will finally shove aside the last vestiges of the bad habits and patterns I’ve acquired over the last five years or so, and take my writing career 100% seriously. This is no longer a side hobby, or something that looks fun to do or to dream about. Real life is kicking my ass and I realize that if I want to achieve the things I desire, it will take work and a genuine effort. Things that formerly fell into my lap will no longer do so and it is immature to believe that is how life operates. I am also not ashamed to refer to my WIP as a “Golden Heart Award-winning manuscript”–why not view the book in that light?

The basic details are thus: it’s a Cinderella+Ugly Duckling story, with a bit of revenge, a lot of golf and fashion, and is partially set in Newport, Rhode Island.

Hero: John Sheridan, known as “Sherry” (Robert Montgomery is my inspiration)

Heroine: Estelle Warriner (Kay Francis)

Some Funny

A list of words that have led people to Edwardian Promenade

victorian sodomy (don’t get that. I don’t think I’ve discussed anything close to sodomy in the Victorian era, unless my post on Oscar Wilde’s fashion counts)

alpha kappa alpha secrets (probably some Delta spies, lol)

divorce in the 18th century houses (whaat?)

kip knoll dead or alive (sounds like a video game, but have no idea why this led to my site)

societal veneration beauty (kind of daunting)

1880 prostitute diary (self explanatory)

pictures of theodore roosevelt as a baby (maybe that Alice Roosevelt post)

edwardian sex (I’ve been getting this a lot lately. Maybe that should be a future post?)

current movies being filmed at the waldo (don’t know what this is)

blue room with black window (what? again)

edwardian promenade speed limit dress (I guess they wanted to know how fast women were allowed to walk back then)

stories man wearing tight hourglass cors (a fetish, I suppose)

titanic sex (must be looking for Jack/Rose fan fiction [or perhapsJack/Cal slash?])

what does the saying mean ‘like curants (I get a lot of glossary queries)

Guest Blog at Victoria Janssen

here

The Susan Boyle Story

Unless you’ve been living under a rock (and I discovered today that many classmates indeed do), you’ve heard of Susan Boyle. I watched the video on YouTube around this time last week when the story popped up on one of the UK newspapers I read online and was teary-eyed and touched. Since then, I’ve watched her story explode all over the world and the blogosphere, and Susan Boyle has traveled the talk-show circuit, feted and praised for her voice and for showing us not to judge a book by its cover. I accepted that angle of her story, nodding my head in agreement that we’ve been conditioned to place an emphasis on the correlation between beauty and talent despite the multitude of people filling up celebrity rags who have no talent but happen to be attractive.

However, when my professor used the video of Susan Boyle to make a point in her lecture I saw her story from an entirely different angle. From the hosts’ condescension to the eyerolls and smirks from Simon Cowell, the giggles and catcalls from the audience, I’m sure Susan Boyle knew what everyone thought of her appearance and her (lofty to them) ambitions. But she went along with it all, smiling and chaffing with the hosts and the judges. Then she opened her mouth and sang.

Most people are focusing on Susan’s voice, but the real lesson and inspiration is that Susan ignored the derision because she knew she had a great singing voice. She knew what she looked like compared to the female judge, and all the famous women of yesterday and today. But she didn’t let it faze her. She knew her talent and knew that the opinions of others would never, ever take away her God-given, fantastic talent. That’s something that everyone must learn to achieve, particularly writers.

I have to say that in this publishing industry, the negative outweighs the positive. We’ve learnt to be “humble” because of all the horror stories passed around of “arrogant, delusional” writers who query agents and editors thinking they are the best thing since sliced-bread–and some even go on to (gasp) self-publish and “inflict” their delusions upon a mass audience. We’re told that the business is so “subjective” that the there’s an equal chance of both the best and worst of writers never selling to NY. We’re told to never give up, all the while someone inserts an aside that maybe you should put away that book you’ve been writing for the past five years and work on something else–as truly good writers are prolific. We’re told that we have to run the gamut of industry professionals in order to be considered a good writer, that we’ve got to go this particular route to write well and/or sell. And so on and so on.

All of the aforementioned things can be wise advice–if handled right–but to me it all looks like subtle ways to undercut one’s confidence. Susan Boyle breezed into the audition (yes, she has probably spent years honing her voice) and sang her heart out, ignoring the proper packaging of a good singer. With writing, this is comparable to an assured, confident author knowing their strengths and not letting anyone or anything–agent or editor–, the Market, writer friends, past experience, etc attempt to take the tiller. I myself have been long insecure of my vision and my talent because of outside influences that pushed and pulled at me. So I’m going to do like Susan Boyle and know what I can do, what I can bring to the table, and what I can accomplish despite the somewhat deceiving exterior (an example, an “unmarketable” setting).

Researching the Contemporary

Urg. If you didn’t know already, I’m writing a contemporary romance. My first after five years of writing historicals. Not that I’m abandoning historical romance, but this contemporary feels right to be written at this moment. Which brings me to something I never had trouble with as I wrote and plotted my historicals: research. I love it to death, but with the contemporary romance, there are actual people alive–millions of them–who can email me and tell me I got something wrong. Sure, people may email me to zing me on a historical point, but no one today is actually alive and living in say, 1904 New York City, or 1893 London, to ring me up and point out “that street is one way and you made it two way.”

The contemporary–and the one I have planned after it–are both set in my area, but as I begin to research I begin to realize how much I don’t know about my setting! And the most difficult part is deciding where my characters are living, and where they work. 1) My heroine’s family is wealthy. Okay, if this were 1900s NYC or London, I would just put them in a mansion along Fifth Avenue or Park Lane, respectively. But this is 2009 and wealthy neighborhoods aren’t built that way any longer. My first inspiration had the book set in NY and Long Island after coming across a website devoted to the mansions dotting Long Island’s Gold Coast, but I’ve never been to NY in my life and would completely, utterly, entirely bungle it. So I moved it to the Bay Area. Except now I have to go house hunting to find a house that fits the plot.

2) My heroine is a doctor. So the hospital in which she works, um, actually exists, so it has to be right. She can’t go flouncing wherever, and I’m definitely not going to do my research on what she does from Grey’s Anatomy! So…I’ve been emailing doctors like crazy for info.

I’ve got the clothes down. And the cars. And everything else normal. It’s just those two nagging details that have me freaked.

Portrait to Story

The wind swept cold across the damp cheek of Mrs Davenport. Her fingers trembled over the hastily-opened missive from her lover. How dare he! The nerve of him! Lord Milbanke’s bold, lazy scrawl of regret mocked her where she paused in the act of crossing the leaf-strewn garden at the rear of the earl’s Thames-side bungalow. The sound of the luncheon table being cleared by the butler further enraged her, and Mrs Davenport quickly, deliberately tore the note into a dozen tiny pieces and scattered them to the four winds. A sob tore at her throat and she bit the knuckle of her left hand to dampen the sound, which emerged unbidden as a low whimper, a keen actually.

She could just feel the eyes of the servants on her back, their pointed fingers, their whispered confidences. Lord Milbank’s engagement to the very fair and very young Miss Edwina de Choate of Manchester had been announced in The Times just yesterday, promptly demoting Mrs Davenport from her status as the Earl of Milbank’s trusted confidante and unofficial hostess to that of a discarded coat. And worse, a discarded old coat. At forty-nine, Mrs Davenport was not vain, as she had never been considered pretty or attractive: her skin was too sallow, her expression too forbidding, her manner direct and unresponsive to frivolous lovemaking. But she was intelligent and shrewd, with hidden, passionate depths deserving men had been pleased to discover. It had been this, coupled with their shared interest in rare books, that formed her five year attachment to the widowed Earl of Milbank. Now it ended–and because of a mere chit of a girl!

Mrs Davenport squared her shoulders, having no recourse but to regroup and retreat. She had her books, her own home, and an ample security against financial hardships from her third husband’s will. She more importantly had her unassailable political position and salon through which the statesmen of the age tread carefully lest they offend her lese majeste. What need had she of a man who deceived himself into youth by taking a young girl to wife? Yes, she had no need of him. Mrs. Davenport turned and to the astonishment of the servants (who would later gossip that in her departure, the stately widow looked quite alluring) she called for the butler to summon her carriage. In her reticule lay dozens of invitations to country house parties and letters from dear friends and even dearer enemies. Fie on Lord Milbank, and may heaven preserve Miss de Choate!

(Short One of “Portrait to Story” my little impromptu exercise in the adage “a picture says a thousand words.”)

Golden Heart Nominees

All the attention is on who and who didn’t get nominated for the RITAs and everyone has forgotten about the Golden Heart nominees. So I went on a google spree and have pulled the books I want published now!!!

Jeannie Lin’s Butterfly Swords. Historical romance? Chinese setting and characters? I’m there.

Xenia Navarre’s The Devil’s Virtue. After reading Ariana Franklin’s Mistress of the Art of Death, am dying for a medieval romances.

Vivi Andrews‘ Easy Money. I’m a sucker for caper plot.

Elizabeth Bemis‘ (writing as Gracie Chase) Lights…Camera…Marriage! I’m in the mood for a good romantic comedy.

Laurie Kellogg’s The Great Bedroom War. The title sounds intriguing.

Diane O’Brien Kelly’s Death, Taxes, and a French Manicure. Once again, great title.

Darynda Jones’ First Grave on the Right. Ditto above.

I did it, with much gnashing of teeth: I put Edwardian Promenade on a schedule.

Upcoming Posts

March 30 – The Bradley-Martin Ball of 1897

Apr 6 – The Four Hundred

Apr 13 – The Social Season

Apr 20 – The American Country House

Apr 27 – The Waldorf-Astoria

I hesitated to do so for a while because I liked the freedom and flexibility of posting whatever, whenever. But that worked fine when EP was a small site originally used to get all the research info clogging my head into some sort of “resevoir.” EP has had over 120,000 visitors within the past year or so, and it gets apprx 60o+ unique visitors daily.  A drop in the bucket compared to the big blogs, but it’s pretty damn good for a niche blog I like to think. That freedom and flexibility has ended up becoming a chore as I’ve grown accustomed to blogging when I felt like blogging–which, now that I’m knee-deep in real life, has become less of a priority, hence the twitter activity–which leads to a semi-abandonment of EP. So there it goes, a schedule for the last week of March and the entire month of April.

And it has a theme: Edith Wharton’s New York! To commemorate this new theme,  the header for this blog was changed to a screen shot from the movie adaptation of one of the books that have changed my life, The House of Mirth.

(So you can tell what I’m presently writing about in my WIP. *g*)

Navigating Social Landscapes

The latest thing in social interaction over the internet is Twitter. I’ve had my account since January and have but recently begun to utilize it on a regular basis. And just in time for Twitter has exploded in usage not seen since the early days of Myspace and Facebook. But as with those social hotspots, Twitter is rife with drama and you need your wits about you to wade in its waters.

First, don’t tweet about what you’re eating. No one cares unless you’re tweeting meals because you’re a chef or a foodie.

Secondly, just as with blogging, find your niche.

Thirdly, don’t tweet only to promote your books.

Fourthly, don’t friend everyone. It’s tempting to get swept away in friending the “cool kids” but  those “cool kids” end up with 3000 followers and follow only 15 of them.

Fifthly, sort of goes with number four. If you follow someone whose blog/website/etc you admire, initiate conversation a few times and they don’t respond back, don’t waste your time. Twitter can be a way to network, but it can also be a way for a tight circle of only friends to keep in contact with one another.

Sixthly, tweet regularly. If you don’t like twitter, don’t set up an account and have months go by with nary a tweet. Count it as an internet activity you aren’t too keen on and don’t allow peer pressure to convince you to give it a go.

Seventhly, maintain a reasonable level of tweeters you follow. If you start following hundreds of twitter feeds, the website grows redundant.

Eighthly, you aren’t obligated to follow those who follow you, but if they tweet you, it’s polite to follow them.

Ninethly, use your twitter wisely. Tweets every two seconds of a connecting idea is a waste of time. If you have a subject you want to write about, blog it, don’t tweet it.

Lastly, have fun with twitter. It is great for on-the-minute info from conferences, meetings and conventions (don’t tweet court proceedings however)–and on that note, it’ll be easier for those who attend the various writers’ conferences to keep track of what’s going on in workshops and panels they hadn’t time or room to attend.