Creating an interesting world
Some time ago, I started a story based on a story I’d been told when I was full force into my genealogy. An interesting tale about a powerful man who impregnated a maid in his household. He made a request of the son of his housekeeper, asking that the man marry the young maid and raise the child as his own.
The man of whom the request was made was my 5th great-grandfather. That child, supposedly, was my 4th great-grandfather. Of course, I have no idea if the story is true or not, but it does beg a story. However, in writing the first 20k of that book, brought to mind a series of stories, using the grains of tales as the catalyst for each of them.
And so the seeds of a new series were planted. I put the Revolutionary War-era story aside, and started researching the French and Indian War.
I’m one writer who absolutely loves the research I do for my novels. Some of my favorite stories are those which weave historical events and figures into the stories, using their characters as members of, say, Rogers’s Rangers or the British elite.
I research endlessly as I prepare to start writing. I knew I where I wanted to start, but I had to get my facts in place. Since I don’t create alternative universes, I have to play on a well established playground. At the moment, my living room is littered with books on Robert Rogers and Rogers’s Rangers, on Stockbridge Mohicans, and several books on Abenaki Indians. I have read the history of the French and Indian War, British military as well. From these, I have woven together the story of the French and Indian War, as it affected my characters.
The intention for this story and the others in the series is that there will be four or five novels, with the time spanning from 1764 to 1865. Each story will be about the descendants of the characters in this first book. Yes, they will be romances. I’ve had a good chuckle this week with my husband, thinking about all the romantics I grew up around (none.) I shall infuse the area of my birth with romance!
The stories will be set within a very small geographic area, that being the towns of Peterburgh and Stephentown, New York. The latter is where my mother grew up. I hold a special affinity, still, for the town where so many of my ancestors lived, worked, and died. My mother’s generation was the first to leave the area, en masse, spreading far and wide, from California to Boston. Now, out of my mother’s five siblings, no one lives in the old area. Two live elsewhere in New York, one in Vermont, one in the south, and two, including my mother, have passed away.
I’ve gained a great deal of respect for my ancestors, through knowledge I uncovered while studying my genealogy. The hardships they endured will form the basis of many stories. I do hope my readers will enjoy reading them, because I will certainly enjoy writing them.
In other news, I’ve received my first pre-release review for For Men Like Us. It will appear on Guilty Pleasures Book Reviews. The reviewer says it’s “A Great Read!!!” I couldn’t be more pleased.
