Alex Marchant's Blog, page 25
October 31, 2018
Halloween – “when the year too dies”… #RichardIII, #ghosts and #afterlives…
While editing the contributions to ‘Grant Me the Carving of My Name’ I noticed a bit of a theme…
Not to put too fine a point on it – death! Well, several ghosts or spirits (kindred or otherwise), stories set in the afterlife, an execution or two, battles with all that they entail… Even some of the lighter pieces had the same theme running through them! 
October 30, 2018
“I will be using this as a class novel”: #RichardIII in schools and a #SpecialOffer
If you’re a teacher or have links with a local school, and would like to introduce them to the real King Richard III, please get in touch with me. I offer a significantly reduced price for supply to schools and libraries (UK and further afield) – you don’t have to pay the Amazon or other retail price!
The full review can be found at mybook.to/WhiteBoar
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‘King Richard’ presenting copies to schoolchildren at Middleham Castle
Important and Engaging
By hshmon 25 October 2018
“I read this book partly because I wanted to see if it would be suitable to teach from (I teach Y4-6) but also because the plot appealed to me as a reader too. I do have an interest in King Richard III and yet at school was only taught about the Tudors and Stuarts. Where are the Plantagenets in school or in children’s literature? I was first introduced to Richard III in Shakespeare’s play and it was only after the 2012 discovery of his grave that I questioned this view of King Richard.
This novel gives children to see an alternative interpretation of his character from a much younger age, from KS2 onwards, and that has really been missing from children’s literature. The writing is high quality and, even as an adult, I really enjoyed reading about Matthew and his friends, looking forward to the next in the series.
If your son or daughter has an interest in historical fiction they will definitely enjoy this, and I guarantee that I will be buying a class set and using this as a class novel as soon as I can plan a half term’s scheme of work around this.”
mybook.to/WhiteBoar
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October 28, 2018
Special announcement! Foreword by popular historical novelist #PhilippaGregory
Well, the crossed fingers last week worked their magic and I’m delighted to make a special announcement regarding Grant Me the Carving of My Name.
Philippa Gregory, author of The White Queen and many other well-loved historical novels – and responsible for bringing a likeness of the real King Richard III to very many people through his portrayal by Aneurin Barnard in her popular TV dramatization – has kindly written a Foreword for our anthology.
[Photo credit: Waterstones]
Her generosity will very likely help bring ‘Grant Me the Carving’ to the attention of many more readers – and through that help raise more money for Scoliosis UK, and also raise awareness of the true King Richard.
A huge thank you to Philppa for her contribution!
October 24, 2018
#Competition Time! #BookReviews #ChildrensBooks
Have you bought The Order of the White Boar and/or The King’s Man for a young relative or friend? Are you yourself the young person who’s enjoyed it? Have you given a copy to a school or library to help spread the word about the real King Richard III?*
I love to hear feedback from my readers, particular from the target age group of 10+, but the problem with Amazon and GoodReads is that children can’t post their views there. So I’m launching a competition to encourage reviews from children and young adults.
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11-year-old Mollie, looking forward to reading The King’s Man, Haworth
If you are a parent, grandparent, aunt or uncle, teacher, librarian, or friend, who knows any young person who has enjoyed the book(s), please ask them to write a few lines about it and send it to me for them (email, post, social media) – and also post it on their behalf on Amazon and/or GoodReads too (with their age mentioned)!
Every three months, I’ll pick my favourite and send a small prize to the winning child.**
I’ll also of course be highlighting any reviews in publicity material, and photos also are very welcome (to be used only with permission, of course).
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A young reader at Bosworth
Reviews on Amazon are vital for sales, particularly for indy authors like me, but any and all reviews are invaluable – and age-specific ones could be really helpful for me in arranging school and library visits (as of course could any from teachers and librarians!)
Book reviews are also a great learning exercise for children (especially in Key stages 2 and 3 in the UK), so could be part of a project.
Please share widely and do get in touch if you need any more details. I look forward to receiving those reviews!
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Bess the pup enjoying the book!
* If you’d like to donate copies to schools or libraries, I can offer a special deal on price or one or more. Please contact me direct at AlexMarchant84@gmail.com
**Don’t forget to include contact details when you communicate!
October 20, 2018
‘Grant Me the Carving of My Name’ – full line-up of authors for #RichardIII anthology
I’ve now received all the short stories that will be included in the upcoming Ricardian anthology Grant Me the Carving of My Name, to be sold in support of Scoliosis Association UK (SAUK). And I have to say I’ve enjoyed reading them enormously and am excited at the prospect of sharing them with you.
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Image courtesy of Riikka Katajisko
But of course I can’t do that until publication day – Sunday 2nd December.
But to whet your appetite in the meantime, I’m delighted to let you know the full line-up of authors who have very kindly donated their work for this worthwhile cause – a charity that I’m sure would have been close to King Richard’s heart had he been alive to witness their fantastic work with people with scoliosis and their families.
I suspect everyone reading this will spot a favourite author or two amongst this list of creative people inspired by King Richard – and I hope that you will all find another favourite author or two (or more!) once you’re introduced to them. Most names will have a link in case you’d like to find out more about them and their work before launch day.
In strictly alphabetical order (of course), these generous people are:
Riikka Katajisto (who has generously donated the cover image)
Susan Kokomo Lamb (one-half of Larner & Lamb!)
Joanne R. Larner (the other half of Larner & Lamb!)
Máire Martello
Frances Quinn
And I’m currently keeping my fingers crossed that in a few days I’ll be able to announce another special guest contribution …
Watch this space!
October 16, 2018
Year Zero? My first year as an author! #amwriting #RichardIII #indieauthor
Two weeks ago, as well as celebrating King Richard’s birthday, I also celebrated the first anniversary of publication of my first novel.
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It’s been a year of many ‘firsts’, and a very steep learning curve throughout – both of which look set to continue for the foreseeable future. Life-changing, you might say!
So I put together a little blog for my monthly Authors Electric slot about this most remarkable twelve-month period….
https://authorselectric.blogspot.com/2018/10/year-zero-by-alex-marchant.html
October 15, 2018
‘An interview with Alex Marchant “new Ricardian children’s author”‘ #RichardIII #ChildrensBooks
It’s always fun to revisit blogs and guest blogs from some time ago.
Here’s an interview I did late last year for the Murrey & Blue website. The original can be found at: https://murreyandblue.wordpress.com/2018/01/13/interview-with-alex-marchant-ricardian-childrens-author/
There is a new Ricardian children’s author on the block: Alex Marchant. Alex kindly agreed to an interview:
Q: You’ve recently published your first novel about King Richard III for children, The Order of the White Boar. What made you write about King Richard?
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Alex: I first became interested in King Richard in my teens when my eye was caught by an intriguing title among the books in the school library: ‘The Daughter of Time’ by Josephine Tey. By the time I finished reading the book I was a confirmed Ricardian (even if I didn’t know the term then). I think what piqued my interest was a sense of the enormous injustice this man had suffered after his death – along with the tragedy of that death and of the preceding two or three years of his life. I joined the Richard III Society (I think as one of its youngest members), read as much as I could about the man and visited major sites associated with his life – and death.
I’d always been interested in history and always written stories, including attempts at book-length works throughout my teens. But then life got in the way as it often does – university, career, marriage, kids, house renovation – and it was only a few years ago I returned to writing. And soon after that came the announcement of the dig to find his grave in Leicester, then the momentous press conference that revealed that King Richard had, ‘beyond reasonable doubt’, been found.
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Q: It was quite a day, wasn’t it? What was your reaction to the announcement?
A: My first thought – after surprise and delight – was ‘This is a unique opportunity to restore Richard’s reputation. What can I do to help?’ I knew I wasn’t a campaigner – the sort of person who writes letters to important people or stands up to speak in support of a cause. But perhaps I could write a children’s book that could communicate Richard’s story to a new generation. At that point I was editing my previous book, ‘Time out of Time’, in hopes of publication and was also partway through a second book for children, so I was uncertain whether I should move on to something completely new. But when a little research showed that there really weren’t any books aimed at my target age group (10–13) showing Richard in a positive light, I realized this was a gap in the market that needed to be filled.
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A young reader at Bosworth 2018
Q: Were you surprised about that?
A: To be honest, yes. I found that there were several such books for adults (a number that has increased over the past five years), but even an approach to the Richard III Society librarian only turned up a couple for children – neither of which was a straightforward story of his life. One was a timeslip book, ‘A Knight on Horseback’ by American author Ann Rabinowitz, which follows the adventures of a twentieth-century boy who gradually learns the true story of Richard III after his initial exposure to the Tudor myths and Shakespeare’s version. The other, ‘A Sprig of Broom’ by Barbara Willard, is a beautifully written evocation of early Tudor England – but Richard appears only in the prologue, which takes place on the eve of Bosworth. The rest tells the story of Richard of Eastwell – at least the interpretation that has him as Richard’s illegitimate son. And by the end, the main character decides he doesn’t want to be known to be related to King Richard….
With the nationwide excitement at the finding of Richard’s grave, I thought there were bound to be other books for children on the way – as has proved to be the case – but by that time my lead character Matthew was hammering on my door, demanding that I write his story, and it was very hard to say no. So I put my half-finished Scottish book on the back burner for the time being, and set to work researching Richard and his times while I finished editing ‘Time out of Time’.
Q: You say none of the previous books for children was a straightforward telling of Richard’s life. In ‘The Order of the White Boar’, you didn’t choose to take that course either, preferring to concentrate on his final years and viewing them through the eyes of a fictitious character. Why was that?
A: I suppose partly because Richard’s life has been brilliantly told already through adult fiction, in books that have been very influential in terms of changing people’s minds about him: Penman’s ‘Sunne in Splendour’ and Hawley Jarman’s ‘We Speak no Treason’ for example are often mentioned as having shown people the way beyond Shakespeare’s monstrous depiction towards the real history of the man. And maybe because I thought those books that were likely to be in the publishing pipeline after the rediscovery of his grave would offer the straightforward story – as has been the case with a couple that have appeared. Perhaps most importantly, I felt that a young narrator who was an outsider – as Matthew is, being just a merchant’s son, rather than a noble – would be able to offer a different perspective – a view of Richard that hasn’t been seen before.
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Young Matthew Wansford family home is in York
Q: In one of the early reviews of the book, the writer says that, rather than portraying Richard as a warrior or romantic hero, as in most adult novels, ‘The Order’ shows him ‘as a master, as a father, as a family man and as a decent, kind-hearted adult . . . He feels much more human than he usually does in historical fiction.’ Is that what you were aiming for?
A: Very much so – and I’m delighted if readers think I have managed it! My intention was always to show ‘the real Richard’ – the man who served his brother in administering the north of England, did the job well, treated the people fairly, was a cultured family man as well as a soldier. And who, in the spring of 1483, when faced with the tragedy of his brother’s early death, had to deal with a difficult and dangerous situation. My aim was to use the contemporary sources as much as possible to lay the foundations for exploring his motivations and reactions when navigating the potentially explosive events of that time. The traditional histories seem to me to struggle with explaining how this loyal, steadfast brother changed into the murdering, usurping tyrant so beloved of the Tudor-created legend. I hope that seeing Richard’s character and behaviour through a child’s eyes in both domestic and more public situations allows the reader to work out for themselves who he was and what his actions mean.
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Much of the action of The Order of the Wite Boar takes place around Richard, Duke of Gloucester’s primary home in Wensleydale
Q: You mention the death of King Edward IV in the spring of 1483. While hoping not to give too much away about ‘The Order of the White Boar’, it does in fact end at that time. Do you think readers will be disappointed at that?
A: I hope not, although I can understand it if they are. But I hope they’ll take on board the note at the end, saying that a second book of Matthew and his friends’ adventures is coming soon. ‘The Order’ doesn’t end on a cliffhanger as such, rather at the start of a journey – one which represents the closing of one chapter in Matthew’s life and the opening of another. And the same can also be said for Richard – in some ways, the death of his brother was the start of a very different part of his life. The next book, ‘The King’s Man’, tells the story of the next two years or so – from a few days after the end of ‘The Order’ through to the fateful days of August 1485.
A: You say the second book is ‘coming soon’. How soon, and how does it build on the foundations laid in ‘The Order’?
Q: If all goes to plan, ‘The King’s Man’ will be published in spring 2018 – so not too long to wait (although it may well seem ages to my younger readers!) It’s finished, but needs some final editing before production starts. As I say, it takes up the story again as Richard and Matthew travel south to meet with the new boy king, Edward V, and catapults them into the political intrigues and manoeuvrings on the road, in court and in the cities of London and Westminster. We meet again some of the characters (historical and fictional) encountered perhaps only briefly in the first book and see the effects and influences they have on the lives of both Richard and Matthew.
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Of course readers, both adults and children, who have a knowledge of the history of the time will know where the story ultimately leads, and the challenges and heartbreaks along the way. ‘The King’s Man’ is overall a much darker book than ‘The Order’. But I hope it offers not only a flavour of the times, but also a worthwhile exploration of how and why events played out as they did.
Q: Where will you go next? Back to your half-finished Scottish book? Or, as many of us who write about him find, will you be drawn back to Richard?
A: I’m not sure Drew – the main character of the other book – will be pleased to hear this, but no, I’m not finished with Richard yet! (Poor Drew – I’d already abandoned him once before, to write ‘Time out of Time’…) I’ve already started preparing a third book in the ‘White Boar’ sequence that takes the characters (at least those who remain) beyond the events of August 1485. There are events that stretch years beyond that date which, to me, are still part of Richard’s story. In some ways, of course, that story continues to today – to the many people around the world who are still fighting for a reassessment of his life and reputation in light of what we now know about him and the lies that were told in the decades and centuries after his death. But the story I’ll tell will be that of people who knew him personally and sought to defend him in living memory.
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Q: It sounds like we’ll have to wait a little more than six months for the third book in the series.
A: I’m afraid so. My track record isn’t great on finishing books quickly! My first took three and a half years, my second two and a half – although I suppose you could say it was just over a year as I wrote both ‘White Boar’ books one after the other in that time, treating them as a single story at first. But I plan to self-publish ‘Time out of Time’ while working on the third ‘White Boar’ book. I hope that readers who enjoy ‘The Order of the White Boar’ will similarly enjoy it, although it’s rather a different beast. It’s a mixture of timeslip and ghost story, drawing on my former career as an archaeologist. The Scottish book is also a sort of ghost story based around an archaeological dig – that was one of the main reasons I decided to write straightforward historical fiction when it came to Richard’s story. Although at first I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to immerse myself properly in the fifteenth century in order to write from the point of view of a fifteenth-century boy!
Q: But you did manage it?
A: Perhaps too well. For months after I finished the book I missed my characters enormously, they’d accompanied me for so long on my dog walks over the local moors! I’m looking forward to reacquainting myself with them – well, some of them anyway – over the next few months as I make a start on the new project.
Q: I very much look forward to reading it when it’s finished – and of course ‘The King’s Man’ in the new year. Thank you, Alex, for speaking to us today.
A: Thank you.
October 12, 2018
Current representative of the #HouseofYork in #RoyalWedding and awareness of #scoliosis
I’ve just been told that Princess Eugenie, daughter of the current Duke of York, who was married today at historic St George’s chapel at Windsor Castle, deliberately wore a dress that was cut low at the back to show the scar that she has following surgery at age 12 to correct her scoliosis.
In an interview she said of the Royal National Orthopedic Hospital where she had the surgery: ‘I’m patron of their appeal and I had an operation when I was 12 on my back, and you’ll see on Friday, … it’s a lovely way to honour the people who looked after me and a way of standing up for young people who also go through this … I think you can change the way beauty is, and you can show people your scars and I think it’s really special to stand up for that. So that’s one really important one.’
How fantastic! And this in a week when fellow Ricardian authors and I have announced our forthcoming anthology to be sold in support of Scoliosis Association UK. What a boost to awareness of the condition!
https://alexmarchantblog.wordpress.com/…/fanfare-please-an…/
https://www.hellomagazine.com/…/princess-eugenie-scar-roya…/
(image from Hello Magazine)
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Cover image for ‘Grant Me the Carving of My Name’ – available from 2 December via author.to/AlexMarchant
October 7, 2018
Fanfare please! An announcement from #RichardIII inspired authors!
I’m delighted to announce the forthcoming publication of Grant Me the Carving of My Name!
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A group of very talented authors and illustrators – all inspired by King Richard III – have generously donated their work for an anthology of short fiction to be sold in support of Scoliosis Association UK (SAUK).
Entitled Grant Me the Carving of My Name – taken (with her permission) from the poem ‘Richard’ by the poet laureate Carol Ann Duffy, written for King Richard’s reinterment in 2015 and read on the occasion by Benedict Cumberbatch – the collection will be on sale from 2 December. Save the date!
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Image courtesy of Riikka Katajisto
All proceeds from sales of the book will go to SAUK to help their work supporting people with scoliosis and their families throughout the UK. Given the revelation five years ago that the King himself had the condition, we feel that it is a cause that would have been close to his heart. Details of their work can be found at https://www.sauk.org.uk/
The collection will comprise a range of short fiction, from specially written short stories, through flash fiction, to excerpts from longer Ricardian works, some light-hearted, others darker in tone – hopefully something to appeal to everyone! In fact, the ideal Christmas stocking-filler for any Ricardian – or anyone you hope may become a Ricardian!
Authors who have signed up so far include Matthew Lewis (author of fiction as well as the highly-acclaimed new biography of King Richard, Richard III: Loyalty Binds Me), J. P. Reedman (author of I, Richard Plantagenet), Jennifer Wilson (author of Kindred Spirits) and Wendy Johnson (of the Looking for Richard Project). A full line-up will be released closer to publication date.
The anthology will be dedicated to the late Dr John Ashdown-Hill, whose tireless work did so much to further the Ricardian cause.
Loyaulte me lie!
October 4, 2018
What a week! King #RichardIII’s birthday, a #KindleCountdownDeal and a special announcement to come… #WatchThisSpace
It’s been quite a week!
First came the Richard III Society AGM in Leicester – my first – where it was lovely to meet some old friends and some new.
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Thanks to Ian Churchward for the pic
Next came King Richard’s birthday celebrations, with a whistlestop visit to Middleham Castle in celebration of this special day. Many thanks to Gill at the castle for inviting me, and to Rosemary, whose idea it was to mark His Grace’s birthday with a party. I was honoured to be asked to cut the cake on King Richard’s behalf. 
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The entrance building and statue were decked out with banners (birthday as well as white boar) and all visitors were offered some lovely cake (or gluten-free alternative). Thank you to Sarah at the Priory guest house for making it – it really was superb.
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Other special guests included their royal highnesses Queen Amy and Prince Rupert, decked out in their murrey and blue finery, and visitors to the castle from as far afield as Alberta, Missouri and Sydney. Not all were bemused to be asked to celebrate the 566th birthday of a monarch 
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And to cap the week, there will be a special announcement made this coming weekend. Don’t forget to check in at my blog or Facebook page or on Twitter to find out just what it’s all about!
And of course, no author post would be complete without a reminder that ‘The King’s Man’, sequel to ‘The Order of the White Boar’ is on an Amazon Kindle Countdown deal this week to celebrate King Richard’s birthday – starting at just 99p/99c and rising over coming days before returning to its RRP. Grab one for yourself or a friend! 
Loyaulte me lie!
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