Tara Chevrestt's Blog, page 24

Theater During the American Revolution: Guest Post & #Giveaway with @DonnaThorland

Publication Date: March 3, 2015
NAL TradeFormats: eBook, Paperback416 PagesSeries: Renegades of the American Revolution (Book 3)Genre: Historical Fiction/Romance


British Occupied Manhattan, 1777. American actress Jenny Leighton has been packing the John Street Theater with her witty comedies, but she longs to escape the provincial circuit for the glamour of the London stage. When the playwright General John Burgoyne visits the city, fresh from a recent success in the capitol, she seizes the opportunity to court his patronage. But her plan is foiled by British intelligence officer Severin Devere.

Severin’s mission is to keep the pleasure-loving general focused on the war effort…and away from pretty young actresses. But the tables are turned when Severin himself can’t resist Jenny Leighton…

Months later, Jenny has abandoned her dreams of stage glory and begun writing seditious plays for the Rebels under the pen name “Cornelia,” ridiculing “Gentleman Johnny” Burgoyne and his army—and undermining the crown’s campaign to take Albany. With Jenny’s name now on the hanging list, Severin is ordered to find her—and deliver her to certain death. Soon, the two are launched on a desperate journey through the wilderness, toward an uncertain future shaped by the revolution—and their passion for each other…

*************Guest Post************
“The Fair Penitent,” he said, “is perhaps not the most politic choice in New York at the moment. Talk of tyrants tends to be divisive. Americans are ready to see one in any man who disagrees with them.” “I might just have to use that line in one of my plays. Are you a regular theatergoer, Mr. Devere?”“Yes,” he said. “It is one of the consolations of urban life. A beguiling contradiction: that a narrow wooden box can open on a myriad of wide vistas, tonight Arcadia, tomorrow Rome.” “Denmark on Wednesdays, when Bobby is in the mood to soliloquize,” she replied. “Rome, alas, is contested territory. The Whigs cry ‘Cassius from bondage will deliver Cassius,’ and the Sons of Liberty sign their letters to the Gazette ‘Brutus’ while the Tories ‘Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war.’”“And whose part do you take?”“If the Rebels have their way, I will be forced to play Cleopatra, and turn to Rome to keep my throne. Congress has banned the theater here. There is no future for a playwright in America. I need a patron with influence in London.”
--From MISTRESS FIREBRAND
Mistress Firebrand is set in the world of the New York stage in the 1770s. The theater is barely mentioned in most histories of the American Revolution, but when you look closely at the participants, so many of them, particularly on the British side, had one foot in the world of the playhouse. Burgoyne wrote for Drury Lane. After the war, British cavalry officer Banastre Tarleton would become the lover of London actress, novelist, and early feminist Mary Robinson. Robert Rogers, who is currently enjoying some notoriety on television as a villain in AMC’s TURN wrote a play about Pontiac’s Rebellion. People on both sides of the Atlantic from all walks of life frequented the playhouse. Trying to paint a picture of the Revolution without the theater is like trying to explain the 20thcentury without the cinema. Most histories of the Revolution that mention the theater at all refer to Congress closing the playhouses. A few talk about British theatrical productions in New York and Philadelphia and Washington’s fondness for camp theatricals at Valley Forge. It was Congress’ ban that struck me as interesting, because no one bans something that isn’t happening…a lot. An outpouring of great scholarship in the last fifteen years made it possible for me to research just how much theatrical activity was taking place in colonial America—and how politicized that stage had become. During the Stamp Act riots in the 1760s, a mob actually tore down New York’s Chapel Street theater. It’s successor, the John Street, which appears in Mistress Firebrand, was fortunately a sturdier affair and survived to the end of the century. In order to bring that playhouse to life in the book, I looked at primary sources, including drawings and descriptions of the theater, but these didn’t offer enough detail to paint a vivid picture. The exterior, though, is well described, and typical of provincial British playhouses of the era, so I looked to the best-preserved example, the Georgian Theater Royal in Richmond, for a model. This richly decorated interior gives you some sense of the glamour of the theater in this period, even in small regional houses, and a taste of the world in which the fictional Jenny and her historical counterparts moved.http://www.georgiantheatreroyal.co.uk

Buy Mistress Firebrand

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About the Author A native of Bergenfield, New Jersey, Donna graduated from Yale with a degree in Classics and Art History. For many years she managed architecture and interpretation at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, and wrote and directed the Witch City’s most popular Halloween theater festival, Eerie Events. She later earned an MFA in film production from the USC School of Cinematic Arts. Donna has been a sorority house mother, a Disney/ABC Television Writing Fellow, a WGA Writer’s Access Project Honoree, and a writer on the ABC primetime drama, Cupid. Her screenwriting credits include episodes of the animated series, Tron: Uprising . Her short fiction has appeared in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine and Albedo One. The director of several award-winning short films, her most recent project, The Night Caller , aired on WNET Channel 13 and was featured on Ain’t It Cool News. Currently she is a writer on the
For more information visit Donna Thorland's website. You can also find her on Facebook, Twitter, and Goodreads.

********GIVEAWAY*******
One paperback, open internationaly. Giveaway is open for one week, ending the 28th of April whenever I feel like it. Please leave a comment (feel free to share with us YOUR favorite theatre) with your email address to be entered. Winner will have 48 hours to reply to my email. After 48 hours, a new winner will be chosen. Must be 18 or over; only one entry per household.
Mistress Firebrand Blog Tour ScheduleMonday, April 6
Excerpt at What Is That Book About
Excerpt & Giveaway at Peeking Between the Pages
Tuesday, April 7
Review & Giveaway at Flashlight Commentary
Wednesday, April 8
Interview at The Maiden's Court
Thursday, April 9
Guest Post & Giveaway at Susan Heim on Writing
Friday, April 10
Spotlight at Broken Teepee
Sunday, April 12
Review at With Her Nose Stuck in a Book
Monday, April 13
Spotlight, Excerpt, & Giveaway at Passages to the Past
Thursday, April 16
Review at Caroline Wilson Writes
Friday, April 17
Spotlight at I'd So Rather Be Reading
Saturday, April 18
Excerpt & Giveaway at A Dream Within a Dream
Monday, April 20
Review at Book Nerd
Tuesday, April 21
Guest Post & Giveaway at Book Babe
Wednesday, April 22
Guest Post & Excerpt at The Lit Bitch
Thursday, April 23
Spotlight & Giveaway at So Many Precious Books, So Little Time
Friday, April 24
Review at Back Porchervations
Monday, April 27
Review at Just One More Chapter
Tuesday, April 28
Review at Historical Readings & Views
Wednesday, April 29
Review & Giveaway at Unshelfish
Guest Post at Boom Baby Reviews
Thursday, April 30
Review at Bookramblings
Friday, May 1
Review, Excerpt, & Giveaway at Drey's Library
Spotlight at Genre Queen
Sunday, May 3
Review at Forever Ashley
Monday, May 4
Review at A Chick Who Reads
Guest Post & Giveaway at To Read, or Not to Read
Tuesday, May 5
Excerpt at CelticLady's Reviews
Wednesday, May 6
Review at Unabridged Chick
Thursday, May 7
Spotlight at A Literary Vacation
Friday, May 8
Interview at Scandalous Woman

Maud's Line by Margaret Verble: Everyday Life... & Murder in 1930s Oklahoma

I grew up in Oklahoma and I love historicals. Thus, I wanted to read this story.

The heroine, Maud, appealed to me...to a point. I There was much to admire about her. She's on her own most of the time. Her father and brother gone, or worse. She has to take care of her farm, deal with love, see death in many forms, deal with neighbor disputes, take care of her brother when he's around. She's independent, despite the fact she's pretty much surrounded by family. She's generous, having get-togethers when she barely has the food to feed her own crew.

She's a woman a bit ahead of her time, taking men to bed without shame. Her bed isn't cool from the last man before she takes another. And why not? Men do it.

But at the same time, that trait rather put me off her, especially when she began to attempt to "f*** the baby out of her". (I don't feel this is a spoiler. It's obvious pretty quick she's going to get herself in trouble with her behavior. This was very predictable.) She comes across as way too vulgar and crass a character at those moments. By the end of the book, I couldn't stand her.

Moving on...there's a murder! As morbid as this sounds, I liked the murder thrown in. Without the two dead men and the sheriff prowling around suspecting Maud's father, the book would have been nothing but making biscuits, watching a looney brother, washing at the pump, talking about cows, pigs, food, and "sparking" the peddler or Billy. Oh, and the occasional walk to town. To be honest the story itself was pretty dull and while it gave me a good look into the Native American OK farmers' lives in the thirties, there was just a bit too much of it--their everyday mundane lives. Besides that and the fact Maud grated on me at times and was unlikable at others, the telling of the tale is a bit too like a list. She did that. She did this. He went there.... I guess it would be a case of more telling than showing.

In the end, this one wasn't for me.

I received this via Amazon Vine.

The Reading Radar 4/18/2015 @jojomoyes @history_girls @ashleyhopeperez

I'm a huge fan of Jojo Moyes. I've featured a couple of her novels on here, but my favorite was def Me Before You. I just discovered the other day that there is going to be a sequel releasing this September, After You . Naturally I must get my hands on this one. I must! (There's no real blurb yet, but we don't need one. We know it'll be good.)

***THE SEQUEL TO THE WORLDWIDE PHENOMENON ME BEFORE YOU ***

Jojo Moyes says: "I hadn't planned to write a sequel to Me Before You. But working on the movie script, and reading the sheer volume of tweets and emails every day asking what Lou did with her life, meant that the characters never left me. It has been such a pleasure revisiting Lou and her family, and the Traynors, and confronting them with a whole new set of issues. As ever, they have made me laugh, and cry. I hope readers feel the same way at meeting them again."

***
Spotted on the History Girls blog this week thanks to a post that caught my eye... Daughters of Time, a historical anthology from the History Girls authors is on my radar/wishlist.

Be surprised, as you look afresh at the stories of some of history's most remarkable women, as imagined by the finest female authors of historical fiction for children. Be enthralled, as you encounter both famous figures and lesser-known heroines from across the ages, from warrior queens to anti-nuclear activists. But most of all… be inspired. An anthology by members of The History Girls blog.
A reviewer on Goodreads has kindly provided a list of the women you can expect to read about in this book.

***
Spotted on Netgalley and promptly requested (Declined and I don't understand why. My profile has all the stuff on it they claim they need to know...? GRRR.): Out of Darkness by Ashley Hope Perez. I love novels that educate us about real events we may not have heard of. This one releases in September.

"This is East Texas, and there's lines. Lines you cross, lines you don't cross. That clear?"

New London, Texas. 1937. Naomi Smith and Wash Fullerton know about the lines in East Texas as well as anyone. They know the signs that mark them. They know the people who enforce them. But there are some forces even the most determined color lines cannot resist. And sometimes all it takes is an explosion.

Ashley Hope Pérez takes the facts of the 1937 New London school explosion—the worst school disaster in American history—as a backdrop for a riveting novel about segregation, love, family, and the forces that destroy people.

Innocents of Oppression: Deaf Students in the UK Need A Better Education @nicksturley

I had some background in deaf issues before I read Innocents of Oppression by Nick Sturley.  My most recent related read was Inside Deaf Culture which I reviewed last year on Shomeret: The Masked Reviewer here.  What interested me about Sturley’s novel is that I’ve never read anything about the deaf in the UK.   Apparently the predominance of exclusive oralism in deaf education has continued in the UK.   This doesn’t just mean that lip reading and speaking are encouraged.  It means that signing is prohibited in the classroom.  I wanted to understand why this situation continues unchanged.

                                                         

                                                  Innocents of Oppression dramatizes the impact of exclusive oralism on a group of UK deaf students at a boarding school for deaf boys.  Those that were not totally deaf tended be more successful with the oral method.  All the students were required to wear hearing aids even if they were completely deaf.  Instructors had microphones and thought that they could somehow reach students with no residual hearing by increasing their volume.  Teachers who rely solely on oral communication could shout into their microphones all day and still wouldn’t be heard by the students who had no hearing.    This is common sense.  I can’t imagine what the teachers, or the school administration were thinking.  It’s as if they didn’t know that it’s possible for someone to be completely unable to hear.  It’s like assuming that the blind are just near sighted, and requiring them to wear prescription glasses.  If they were that uninformed, they obviously shouldn’t have been allowed to teach deaf children.
Oralism wasn’t the only barrier to a good education in the lives of these students.  Bullying is a major theme in this novel.   This is why I don’t agree with Sturley’s title.  Students who engage in bullying or who react to bullying with equally violent behavior can’t be considered “innocents”.  While it was certainly true that their backgrounds often motivated their conduct, they were still guilty of harming their fellow students.  Breaking the cycle of abuse isn’t easy, but victimizers shouldn’t be given a free pass because they were once victims. 
Although I was moved by the resolution of the book, there was a long info dump that preceded it dealing with what had happened in the lives of the characters in the thirty years since they’d been together in boarding school.  While it’s very likely that in real life a conversation between two old friends from boarding school would consist of catching up on everyone they knew, fiction should be more entertaining.  I would have preferred selected flashbacks. 
I believe that an earlier info dump on deaf history shouldn’t have been included in the novel in any form.  The narrative purpose was bringing the protagonist up to speed, but the probable purpose of the author was educating readers.   He should have included a bibliography with recommended resources on deaf history, or placed that entire info dump on a web page and given readers the URL.
Nevertheless, I was interested to learn about the first deaf Member of Parliament, Francis Humberston MacKenzie (1754-1815).  The mention of Auslan led me to discover that Australian Aborigine peoples have ancient traditional sign languages that were developed for situations when speech was taboo.  I already knew about Native American sign languages that were used for communication between individuals who didn’t share a spoken language.   I consider all forms of communication intriguing. 
I do wish that Sturley hadn’t mentioned recreational swimming with dolphins.  The capture of dolphins for this purpose traumatizes them.  See this article from World Animal Protection and this article from Right Tourism. My concern for the rights of intelligent beings extends to non-human species. 
There was some good characterization and character interaction in this book and I learned a great deal about deaf education in the UK.  British families who can’t afford to send their deaf children to the U.S. for a better education need more advocacy.  I’m sure that this is Sturley’s central purpose and I applaud him for that.

Website with Video (subtitled) http://innocentsofoppression.com/
Article about the author in Limping Chicken: http://limpingchicken.com/2013/09/12/...

                                                 

Ten Questions from Tara: Interview with Marianne Perry @Stellacollina

Publication Date: November 28, 2012
iUniverseFormats: eBook, Paperback, Hard CoverPages: 280Genre: Historical Fiction/Romance
DOWNLOAD CHAPTER ONE EXCERPT.

The Inheritance tells the story of a family disintegrating from conflicting loyalties in Calabria, southern Italy. Set during the period 1897 to 1913, the region was subject to earthquakes and tsunamis; the land was harsh and poverty the norm. Superstition clashed with religion and a class system ruled the people. Calabria is the perfect backdrop for the tragedy that unfolds in The Inheritance.

Caterina is an atypical woman, and The Inheritance chronicles her life from birth to young womanhood. Born with an inheritance of loss into a society that has predetermined what she can and cannot do, she vows to live a life of her choosing. Caterina refuses to allow the limits of her gender, the constraints of her class and the demands imposed by those in power to stand in her way. Caterina remains steadfast in her commitment to become the woman she imagines. Her decisions ignite conflicts and fuel a chain of events that result in dire consequences for all whose path she crosses.


Welcome. You’re here to promote The Inheritance, a historical fiction/romance. Tell me, please, what was the inspiration behind this story? How did it come to you?
A mysterious woman inspired me to write The Inheritance, of course!
My Italian-born grandmother, Nana Caterina was the matriarch of our large family. She left her family behind in a mountain village in Calabria, southern Italy in 1913 when a young woman, travelled in steerage on a steamship across the Atlantic Ocean, landed at Ellis Island, New York and eventually settled in Northern Ontario, Canada where she met and married my grandfather, a fellow Calabrian immigrant. They raised nine children that included my late father and despite an imposing presence; her early life in Italy was shrouded in mystery. As time passed, I became intrigued about her past. She never returned home or saw her parents again and I wanted to find out why! As a result, I began genealogical research, which included obtaining original Italian documents and travelling to Calabria where I visited the mountain village of her birth. In the end, I solved the mystery and though The Inheritance is a work of fiction, its story emerged from my discoveries about Caterina and her probable living conditions during her years in southern Italy.
We focus a lot on heroines here on Book Babe. Tell me what makes your heroine(s) strong.
Strength adopts many forms and acquiescence is not necessarily synonymous with defeat or silence, with agreement. Caterina is a complex character whose strength manifests in many ways. 
For example, Caterina endures tragic personal loss whilst a child yet she retains the capacity to love Lorenzo with unbridled passion and rather than losing herself to him, insists he meet her terms. Though her love for Lorenzo is intense, she does not neglect her girlfriend, Francesca and, instead, demands they help resolve her problems and include her in the new life they’ve planned. As a peasant woman, Caterina opposes stereotypical attitudes, conventional norms and restrictive class structures. In particular, she battles the religious beliefs of the local priest, Padre Valentine for whom she has great respect. Her refusal to concede her opinion and denigrate his, however, honours her character and respects the integrity of their relationship.
Caterina’s determination to live a life of her choosing forces her to maintain a sharp focus and make tough decisions. Her steely persona, however, does not stifle her gentleness towards little children, pale her affection for her pet wolf “Shadow” or lessen her devotion to caring for the affirmed Anna Marino.
Do you see any of yourself in her?
San Michelle Estate is owned by Santo and Anna Marino and Caterina’s family are peasants living on an enclave who work for them. Anna becomes ill and over the course of the novel, Caterina becomes her devoted care-giver. They form a deep bond and Anna gives her a cameo brooch to symbolize her love for Caterina.
My ninety-year old mother has had many health issues and along with my late father, I have always had a responsibility for her care. In particular, she’s suffered from dementia for a long time and after my father was diagnosed with cancer, I quit work to be by his side and look after her. When he passed away, she moved into a longterm care facility. I never returned to work and, with my husband’s support, decided to focus on writing and continue to care for her. My mother inherited an antique cameo brooch from her Sicilian-Italian born father, which she has given it to me. It is amongst my most cherished inheritances.
My devotion to my mother and the cameo brooch, therefore, are reflected in Caterina’s relationship with Anna Marino.
Was there any particular part of this story that was the hardest for you to write? Tell me why.
I live in the country on Lake Superior in Northern Ontario, Canada and revere nature and respect wildlife. Wolves are my favourite animal and I have seen one on our property. They are intelligent, family-oriented and often misunderstood.
A wolf named “Shadow” is integral to The Inheritance. Wolves are endemic to the area in Calabria, southern Italy where the story is set and, hence, Shadow adds an element of realism to the novel. In addition, Shadow helps develop character, illustrate relationships plus injects humour to balance the tragedy in this tale. Without giving away too much, suffice it to say the conclusion with which he meets though intrinsic to the conflict that drives the plot was painful to write.
What kind of research did you do when you penned this novel? Did anything surprising come up in your search?
In order to correctly depict society during the 1897 to 1913 period during which The Inheritance unfolds, I studied the history and geography of Calabria, southern Italy.
Caterina, the heroine, ages from birth to sixteen in the story and I researched my paternal ancestry with emphasis on my Nana Caterina’s life prior to her 1913 North American immigration to understand what she might have experienced.
Names are critical to establishing authenticity in historical fiction and I picked those such as Mafalda, Fiore and Elda for minor characters from Italian genealogical documents of the late 19th and early 20th century.
Place description is also vital to bringing the past alive for readers and my travel to Calabria and exploration of the actual places where The Inheritance is set helped me achieve this.
While conducting genealogical research in preparation for writing The Inheritance, I unearthed a century old land deed for a mysterious piece of property in Calabria no one in my family remembered that had originally belonged to my great-grandparents. Its presence haunted me and I am currently writing another book that stems from the implications of this discovery.
What would you like readers to gain from reading your book? Is there a strong moral? Do you hope they will laugh, learn something about a particular subject/person, ponder a point?
The Inheritance is set in Calabria, a region in southern Italy not as frequented by tourists as Tuscany for example. I hope some readers may decide to travel there and have featured a map for introductory purposes.
I also took the photograph of the crumbling stone cottage on the cover of the book whilst travelling through Calabria. It symbolizes my Nana Caterina’s early life there, is intrinsic to the story plus showcases the area’s lush lavender shrubs and rugged mountain terrain.
While researching my Nana Caterina’s early life, I discovered most families have unsolved mysteries and I’ve included a genealogy reference section in The Inheritance to help people learn how to research their roots.
The word “inheritance”typically conjures up concrete items such as money, jewelry or property and I want readers to broaden their definition of the term to include gender roles, family responsibilities, social expectations, superstitious beliefs and cultural traditions.
I never thought of an inheritance that way, but you are right. 
Your book takes place in Calabria, southern Italy. If I were a tourist, what would you recommend I see in this town/country?
The Villa San Michelle in The Inheritance is fictional but The Grand Hotel San Michele does exist. It is a turn-of-the-century family-operated villa situated on a 124-acre estate overlooking the Tyrrhenian Sea on the western coast of Calabria in southern Italy. San Michele is located near the town of Cetraro and I’ve stayed there twice whilst in Calabria researching my books and investigating ancestral roots. I hope you enjoy the photo I took during a recent visit and invite you to explore San Michele at www.sanmichele.it.
Moving on to personal things...if you could time travel to absolute any time and place in history, where and when would you go and what is it that draws you to this time period? What would you do whilst there?
My maternal uncle was an artist and because of him, an early exposure to classical art stirred a lifelong passion and influenced my writing.
Lorenzo, Caterina’s romantic interest in The Inheritance, is an artist. He studies in Florence, marvels the works of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci and has affinity for the Italian Renaissance. The period 1330 to 1550 was a zenith of cultural achievement and the artist-scientist-inventor, Leonardo da Vinci is my favourite figure from this time. Born at Vinci in the region of Tuscany, Leonardo was the child of Caterina, a peasant woman and Piero, a notary who never married. He lived from 1452 to 1519 and I have viewed his paintings in galleries around the world plus paid him homage at the Chapel of Saint-Hubert at Chateau Amboise in central France where he is buried. To quietly observe this genius whilst he lived in Milan, Florence or Rome for even one day would be a profound experience.
What’s the one thing you hope to accomplish before you die? Your main goal?
Family and travel are my priorities and with our 2014 journey to Antarctica, my husband and I have now journeyed to every continent on earth. We are hoping to continue our adventures with a 2015 trip to Iceland. I am a second generation Canadian-Italian and before I die, wish very much to take my adult children to Italy and show them the country of their ancestors.
Antarctica!! Do I sense another novel in the making? That'd be a great setting.
I’m a dog mom, so I always ask this. Do you have pets? If so, tell me about them and do provide pictures.
Pets were considered family and we’ve enjoyed the companionship of three Cocker Spaniels, a Doberman Pinscher, Golden Retriever, German Shepherd and two Schnauzers.
When my children were in elementary school, they decided to rescue a six-week old abandoned black kitten from the local animal shelter. They named him “Mackie” and he developed a yen for low-fat yogurt and figured out how to open doors. After they moved away to attend university, Mackie and I became “best buds.”
I cherish the attached photos. One shows him napping on my sweater at my desk while I am writing on the computer and the other, posing atop a writing magazine on the ottoman positioned in front of my reading chair that we shared. Mackie passed away July 30, 2013 at the age of fifteen and I grieve his loss daily.
Right now, my husband and I are travelling as much as we can and we do not feel that our itinerant schedule would be fair to a pet. This is the first time, however, that I have been “pet-less” and there is a peculiar loneliness in my life that I find quite distressing. For this reason, I have already picked the name “Otis.” It would suit a dog or cat, I’ve decided, and think a trip to the local animal shelter lurks in the not-too-distant future.
I'm sorry to hear of Mackie's passing, but it sounds like he lives on in your heart. And 15...he must have been very happy. Thank you for sharing this with us and good luck with The Inheritance and your travels.
Buy the BookCanadaIndigo.ca (Kobo Edition (eBook), Hardcover, and Paperback)Amazon.ca (Kindle, Hardcover, Paperback)
US


Barnes & Noble (Nook, Hardcover, Paperback)
About the Author Family dynamics, genealogical research to solve ancestral mysteries and international travel are Marianne Perry’s priorities. A second-generation Canadian-Italian, she is the author of The Inheritance, a historical fiction/romance set in Calabria, southern Italy from 1897 to 1913 that was inspired by her grandmother’s early life. With a thirty-year career in education and communications, Marianne holds a Master of Education Degree from The University of Western Ontario (Canada). A past member of the Board of Trustees, the Canadian National Arts Centre Corporation, she has also published non-fiction genealogical articles throughout North America. As a girl, Marianne fell in love with The National Geographic Magazine and dreamt of exploring the world. With her January 2014 visit to Antarctica, she achieved her goal of stepping foot on every continent. The mother of two grown children, Marianne and her husband live on the shores of the St. Mary’s River, which drains Lake Superior on the outskirts of Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, Canada. She continues to research her family’s history and write non-fiction genealogical articles. In addition, she is working on her second novel and planning further adventures.

Marianne blogs about genealogy, travel, family and writing on her website. You can also find her on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Goodreads.

The Inheritance Blog Tour ScheduleMonday, April 13
Spotlight at Unshelfish
Spotlight at What Is That Book About

Wednesday, April 15
Guest Post & Giveaway at Let Them Read Books

Thursday, April 16
Interview at Book Babe

Friday, April 17
Spotlight at Historical Fiction Connection

Sunday, April 19
Spotlight at Flashlight Commentary

Thursday, April 23
Review, Interview, & Giveaway at Virtual Hobby & Coffee Haus
Guest Post at Just One More Chapter

Tuesday, April 28
Spotlight at Broken Teepee

Thursday, April 30
Review at CelticLady's Reviews
Interview at Books and Benches

Friday, May 1
Review at Library Educated
Review at With Her Nose Stuck in a Book
Interview at Dianne Ascroft Blog

Diamond Head by Cecily Wong

This book is like a memoir of three different women. There's the eldest, who is rescued from an abusive father and marries a wealthy man who takes her from China to Hawaii. There's the middle, the poor girl who marries into the wealthy family, rising from a room in a basement that she shares with ten other children. And there's the youngest, pregnant and unmarried in the sixties--who didn't interest me at all because the book took too long to get to her story.

All the stories I did read could have been fascinating, but the narrative style rather ruined it all for me. The fascinating parts were told quickly--such as Hong's tale and the elder's tale of rescue. Hong was the most interesting to me, but she was only briefly there. Her bit was so intriguing, it could be a novel itself. I was disappointed her tale was told and then over so fast.

The problem I had with the narrative is that it goes all over the place, from person to person, China to Hawaii, time period to time period. And it's not always a smooth transition.

Besides that, the first person narratives are more telling than showing. The third person would have worked fine but it was used solely for the present-tense parts, the funeral, which was not interesting. There are secrets, about love, finances, babies, wives...but they are revealed so late, I'd lost interest by that point. The book is longer than it needs to be, more wordy that necessary, and while I appreciated that the novel tries to show bits of different cultures--Chinese and Hawaiian--it was overdescriptive to the point of boredom.

But I did like the red string theme/story. How their lives and their choices mimic or prove the tale of the red string.

Conclusion: I actually gave up at 75%, (maybe it got better at that point, but I lost patience) but I dedicated days to struggling with it, thus the review and rating. But most people are loving this one. Try it for yourself.

The Masque of a Murderer: A Mystery in the Aftermath of Disaster in 17th Century London

Publication Date: April 14, 2015Minotaur Books/St. Martins PressFormats: Hardcover, eBook Pages: 323Series: Book Three, Lucy Campion Mysteries Genre: Historical Mystery

In Susanna Calkins’ next richly drawn mystery set in 17th century England, Lucy Campion, formerly a ladies’ maid in the local magistrate’s household, has now found gainful employment as a printer’s apprentice. On a freezing winter afternoon in 1667, she accompanies the magistrate’s daughter, Sarah, to the home of a severely injured Quaker man to record his dying words, a common practice of the time. The man, having been trampled by a horse and cart the night before, only has a few hours left to live. Lucy scribbles down the Quaker man’s last utterances, but she’s unprepared for what he reveals to her—that someone deliberately pushed him into the path of the horse, because of a secret he had recently uncovered.

Fearful that Sarah might be traveling in the company of a murderer, Lucy feels compelled to seek the truth, with the help of the magistrate's son, Adam, and the local constable. But delving into the dead man’s background might prove more dangerous than any of them had imagined.

In The Masque of a Murderer, Susanna Calkins has once again combined finely wrought characters, a richly detailed historical atmosphere, and a tightly-plotted mystery into a compelling read.

Lucy Campion Mystery Series TitlesBook One: A Murder at Rosamund's Gate
Macavity Award Finalist Sue Feder Historical Mystery Award (2014)
Barnes & Noble Bookseller's Selection ("Mystery Pick" and "Featured New Arrival")
Chicago Book Review - Best Books of 2013

Book Two: From the Charred Remains (Paperback release on March 17, 2015)
Short-listed for the Bruce Alexander Historical Mystery Award (2015)

Book Three: The Masque of a Murderer (coming April 2015!)
***REVIEW***
I  hadn't read the previous two Lucy Campion novels when I agreed to participate in this blog tour.  After I downloaded it from Net Galley, I decided to read A Murder at Rosamund's Gate for background.  It turned out not to be necessary.  Susanna Calkins provides all the background about Lucy in  The Masque of a Murderer.  Yet readers who are curious about what Lucy's life was like as a chambermaid should pick up that first book.

 I'm more interested in Lucy's unusual apprenticeship to a printer myself.   The only reason why such a thing was possible is because this novel took place in the aftermath of the Great Fire of London.  This disaster wreaked death and chaos on the city of London which brought about social change.  I noticed that it didn't change social attitudes.  Lucy couldn't be admitted to the printer's guild as an official apprentice.  Her master didn't treat her the same way as his male apprentice and didn't have the same expectations of her.  Lucy probably felt that she was lucky to get the opportunity to learn the printer's trade.  She probably also knew that if she demanded official status, she would lose her position.  Attitudes usually change slowly.   Without someone like Lucy working in a printer's shop to show that it's possible for women to enter this profession,  there could have been no progress.

Lucy also showed courage and persistence in her pursuit of the killer.  When the men who become involved in this investigation try to sideline her, she refuses to allow them to stop her.  Her role was crucial because she had access to the Quaker household in which the victim resided, and Quakers were willing to talk to her.

The Quakers of 17th century England were very different from modern Quakers.  They were troublemakers.  They aggressively sought conversions, and probably thought that persecution would bring more people into the fold.  This had been the strategy of the early Christian martyrs of ancient Rome. I expect that toleration wouldn't have suited their aims.  They valued their non-Quaker allies, but seemed to expect that they would become Quakers.  I didn't find these Quakers very sympathetic.  Their missionary zeal irritated me.  Lucy had far more patience with them than I would have had in her place.

The mystery became predictable at a certain point.  The perpetrator  had the same sort of background that we find in contemporary crime novels.  Since I have read so many of them, I found it too easy to spot the pattern.   Then the plot became more about taking the killer into custody than discovering whodunit.

I liked Lucy and several of the other characters, and found the book entertaining, but I don't think it was particularly memorable.  I would definitely be willing to read future books dealing with this protagonist.  As a printer's apprentice  who is exposed to all the latest political and religious tracts, Lucy has a finger on the pulse of her times.   She is certain to get swept up in all sorts of controversies.  This series has loads of potential.

                                             






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About the Author Born and raised in Philadelphia, Susanna Calkins lives in Highland Park, Illinois with her husband and two sons, where she is an educator at Northwestern University. With a PhD in history, her historical mysteries feature Lucy Campion, a 17th century chambermaid-turned-printer’s apprentice. Her first novel, A Murder at Rosamund's Gate, was a finalist for the Sue Feder Historical Mystery Award (Macavity). The second in this series, From the Charred Remains, is currently a finalist for the Bruce Alexander Historical Mystery Award. Her third, The Masque of a Murderer, will be released in April 2015.

For more information and to subscribe to Susanna Calkins' newsletter please visit her website. You can also follow her blog, and connect with her on Facebook, Twitter, and Goodreads.



The Masque of a Murderer Blog Tour ScheduleMonday, March 16Review at Bibliophilia, PleaseTuesday, March 17Review at Flashlight CommentaryGuest Post at Bibliophilia, Please Wednesday, March 18Interview at Flashlight CommentaryFriday, March 20Spotlight at Historical Readings & ReviewsMonday, March 23Review & Interview at Oh, for the Hook of a Book!Wednesday, March 25Review & Interview at The Emerald City Book ReviewTuesday, March 31Review at With Her Nose Stuck in a BookWednesday, April 1Character Interview at Boom Baby ReviewsThursday, April 2Review at Just One More ChapterMonday, April 6 Review at Ageless Pages ReviewsTuesday, April 7Spotlight at The Genre Queen Thursday, April 9Review at The Lit BitchGuest Post at A Literary VacationFriday, April 10 Review at Book NerdMonday, April 13Review at CelticLady's ReviewsTuesday, April 14Review at Book Babe Thursday, April 16Review at Jorie Loves a StorySpotlight at Layered PagesFriday, April 17Spotlight & Giveaway at Passages to the Past

Ten Questions from Tara: Interview with Amalia Carosella

Welcome. You’re here to promote HELEN OF SPARTA, a historical fiction novel. Tell me, please, what was the inspiration behind this story? How did it come to you?

Readers, here's the blurb:

Long before she ran away with Paris to Troy, Helen of Sparta was haunted by nightmares of a burning city under siege. These dreams foretold impending war—a war that only Helen has the power to avert. To do so, she must defy her family and betray her betrothed by fleeing the palace in the dead of night. In need of protection, she finds shelter and comfort in the arms of Theseus, son of Poseidon. With Theseus at her side, she believes she can escape her destiny. But at every turn, new dangers—violence, betrayal, extortion, threat of war—thwart Helen’s plans and bar her path. Still, she refuses to bend to the will of the gods.

A new take on an ancient myth, Helen of Sparta is the story of one woman determined to decide her own fate.

In 2009, I was running kind of short on time to prepare for National Novel Writing Month, but since I graduated with a Classical Studies degree, I knew my myths pretty well, and I figured I could squeeze in the research I needed to bring one to life. Helen of Troy seemed like the most logical choice. Certainly it was one of the most familiar. But the more reading I did that October, the more I realized just how much of Helen’s story I didn’t know. Everything before she’d gone to Troy was a mystery to me, and when I started researching the events that came before, I found a story I hadn’t expected – her early abduction by Theseus, the great hero-king of Athens. Once I found this footnote in Helen’s history, I couldn’t let it go – and so often, Helen is portrayed as kind of feckless, but suddenly, I could see a totally different perspective, a woman who ACTED, rather than just being acted upon. From there, HELEN OF SPARTA was born.

We focus a lot on heroines here on Book Babe. Tell me what makes your heroine(s) strong.

Helen is nobody’s plaything. She isn’t content to sit in her room and wait for her fate to find her, whether it’s determined by her father or the gods. When she starts dreaming of a war, caused by her impending marriage, she doesn’t waste time. She’s a princess, the heir of Sparta, and she takes her duty to her people very seriously. Helen is willing to go to incredible lengths to protect her city and her loved ones – and she isn’t afraid to make huge personal sacrifices when they’re called for.

Do you see any of yourself in her?
I think pieces of myself work their way into my fiction without my realizing it, mostly. But maybe I see myself most in Helen’s struggle with her gods. She isn’t sure what to believe or what she WANTS to believe, and that’s something I can I definitely identify with, personally. Was there any particular part of this story that was the hardest for you to write? Tell me why.

The ending. And I don’t want to spoil it, so I’m not sure I should explain why, but any readers who know their myths can probably guess!

What kind of research did you do when you penned this novel? Did anything surprising come up in your search? 

I read and reread a lot of classical source material including The Iliad, extensive passages of The Odyssey, translations of Hesiod’s works and the Cypria Fragments, Pseudo-Apollodorus’s The Library, Ovid’s Metamorphoses and Heroides (which are absolutely fantastic), Plutarch’s Life of Theseus, the relevant plays by Euripides, and also Mary Renault’s Theseus books, and Margaret George’s Helen of Troy, in order to get a handle on what had already been done. Pretty much everything I could get my hands on! And the thing that surprised me, and really stuck with me, was Theseus. His character, his entire life story, his role in the book, his bff relationship with Pirithous. All of it kind of blindsided me. (Theseus is one of my most favorite heroes, now, because of all the reading and research I did for this book!)

What would you like readers to gain from reading your book? Is there a strong moral? Do you hope they will laugh, learn something about a particular subject/person, ponder a point?

I hope they see Helen as more than just a beautiful woman to be stolen and traded and blamed for a war. I think she deserves better than to be treated as a prize in our retellings. But I wouldn’t say this book presents any kind of moral, so much as it is just an exploration of an often overlooked piece of myth, legend, and history. If readers are inspired to read a little bit more about the myths or Mycenaean Greece, the way other works of historical fiction have inspired me to read up on new historical periods I hadn’t been interested in before, then I’ll feel like I’ve done my job exceptionally well!

Your book takes place in Bronze Age Greece. If I were a tourist, what would you recommend I see in this town/country? 

Pylos and Mycenae are probably the two best Bronze Age archaeological sites to visit in Greece itself. But Knossos on Crete would definitely also be on my must-see list! Just the realization that these walls are still standing after 3000-3500+ years is mind blowing.

Moving on to personal things...if you could time travel to absolute any time and place in history, where and when would you go and what is it that draws you to this time period? What would you do whilst there?

This is hard – I would love to go back to the Bronze Age, both in Greece and Scandinavia, and find out what was really what. I’d love to sit down with whoever Homer was, in Homeric Greece, and learn how much of his epics were fact and how much were fiction. I’d love to go back to Bronze Age Athens and find out if there really was a king named Theseus. I’d love to walk through the palaces in Athens and Mycenae and Pylos and at Knossos and see them in all their newly-made glory. The thing that fascinates me so much about the Bronze Age is how advanced these people were, and how often we overlook their history. We’re still only just putting some of these pieces together to understand what their culture and their world looked like – and for me as an author, that makes a fantastic backdrop for storytelling.

What’s the one thing you hope to accomplish before you die? Your main goal?
Keep writing books. Becoming an author has been my number one goal in life for a very, very long time. But aside from that, I think my next big dream is fluency in Icelandic, with a side order of a masters in Old Norse Religion and a trip to Iceland.

I’m a dog mom, so I always ask this. Do you have pets? If so, tell me about them and do provide pictures.

I do! We have two cats, a black long-haired named Maya, and a gray/silver short-haired tabby named Baldur. They’re both about 3 years old, and still learning to get along, but they’re doing a fantastic job of keeping the mice from invading the house (and keeping me on my toes.)




Amalia Carosella graduated from the University of North Dakota with a bachelors degree in Classical Studies and English. An avid reader and former bookseller, she writes about old heroes and older gods. She lives with her husband in upstate New York and dreams of the day she will own goats (and maybe even a horse, too). For more information, visit her blog at www.amaliacarosella.com.

She also writes myth-steeped fantasy and paranormal romance under the name Amalia Dillin. Learn more about her other works at www.amaliadillin.com.

The Reading Radar 4/11/2015 @KirstyBooks @CescaWrites

Spotted on Netgalley but not open to U.S. residents, The Vintage Guide to Love & Romance by Kirsty Greenwood caught my attention. I love vintage stuff--clothes, movies, books...and from the reviews, it promises some laughs. Release: just this last week, but not on Kindle yet it appears--not, at least, in the U.S. in English.

Jessica Beam is a girl who knows how to party. Only lately she's been forgetting to turn up for work on time. Or in clean clothes. Down on her luck, out of a job and homeless, Jess seeks the help of her long-lost grandmother.

Things aren't going well for Matilda Beam, either. Her 1950s Good Woman guide books are out of print, her mortgage repayments are staggering and her granddaughter wears neon Wonderbras!

When a lifeline from a London publisher arrives, the pair have an opportunity to secure the roof over their heads – by invigorating the Good Woman guides and transforming modern, rebellious Jess into a demure vintage lady.

The true test of their make-over will be to capture the heart of notorious London playboy Leo Frost and prove that Matilda’s guides still work. It's going to take commitment, nerves of steel and one seriously pointy bra to pull this off...

***
And you know those Goodreads recommendations..."readers also liked" things to the right when you look at a book? Whilst looking at the title above, I discovered this one: The Silent Hours by Cesca Major. Why it interests me? It features a mute heroine and promises to surprise me and move me. It's also a debut. Release date: June 2015.

An epic, sweeping tale of love and loss inspired by heartrending true events in the Unoccupied Zone of wartime France.

The Silent Hours follows three people whose lives are bound together, before war tears them apart:

Adeline, a mute who takes refuge in a convent, haunted by memories of her past;

Sebastian, a young Jewish banker whose love for the beautiful Isabelle will change the course of his life dramatically;

Tristin, a nine-year-old boy, whose family moves from Paris to settle in a village that is seemingly untouched by war.

Beautifully wrought, utterly compelling and with a shocking true story at its core, The Silent Hours is an unforgettable portrayal of love and loss.

@WomenOn20s Fighting for A Woman's Face on a Twenty-Dollar Bill in 2020. You Can Too!

So I just read an article on Yahoo that got me all excited. There is a group of women--Women on 20's-- who started a petition to get a woman on the 20-dollar bill. 20 because in 2020, it will be 100 years since the 19th amendment passed.

I've said on here before that we need a woman's face on a bill.

Apparently they started with 15 women candidates and had women vote on which woman they wanted to see on the twenty. (I cannot believe I'm just now hearing about it!) It's down to four now and I just cast my vote. You can too if you follow the above link. Who's it down to? Eleanor Roosevelt, Rosa Parks, Harriet Tubman, Wilma Mankiller (what an awesome name!).

Check out the article on Yahoo, also linked above, to read more about the choices. Or read about the candidates directly on the website. Who would you vote for? I'd love to know. Actually, I hope you do go vote for whoever it is, so who WILL you vote for?

The website fully explains why it's down to these four women, why Andrew Jackson should get the "boot", and what you can do to help make this happen. I encourage each and every one of you to take the time to do some reading up on this. The site is very informative and helpful.

You can also follow them on twitter and make sure you stay up to date.