This week for our How I Write series, my accountability group asked, “Could you be best friends with any of the heroines you’ve written. Is she/Are they someone you would hang out with? Why or why not?” I don’t know about BFFs, but my heroines are definitely the kind of people I’d hang out with….
If you’ve ever come across the phrase “She was at sixes and sevens” in a historical novel and wondered what it meant, you may be surprised to learn it originated from the game of Hazard and generally is used to mean in a state of chaos or agitation. This popular dicing game has been around…
Many historical romance novels feature card rooms at balls, clubs or dinner parties and gaming hells where rakes wager over the turn of a card or toss of a dice. Many games that are no longer familiar to us are rattled off: hazard, piquet, faro, and whist. Often, the games chosen have meaning for the…
Last week in my accountability group’s HOW I WRITE series, we talked about 3 Things I Love About My WIP. This week we’re talking about why we write in a particular genre and what attracted us to it. Also, we were asked if we like to read any genres we don’t or can’t write? Why? And…
Last week in my accountability group’s HOW I WRITE series, we talked about 5 Steps from Dreams to Completed Goals. This week’s topic is “Share at least 3 things you like, love, enjoy, make you excited to work on your current project.” So for anyone out there who doesn’t know what a WIP is, it’s a…
In the last entry in the Regency Primer Series we learned three ways to tie a Regency era cravat. This week, we’re going back in time to the last last frost fair. The last time the River Thames was frozen solid and the ships stood still and Londoners organized an impromptu festival in the middle…
The last entry in the Regency Primer Series wrapped up our look at Twelfth Night and Wassailing which signaled the end of Christmastide during the Regency Era. This week, we’re going to take a closer look at some ways to tie a cravat. Three knots in which a gentlemen (or his gentleman’s gentleman or valet)…
The Twelve Days of Christmas Conventionally on the Western Christian calendar, the twelve days begin the day after Christmas, on Boxing Day. When the tradition began, days were counted from sundown to sundown. So Christmas evening is First Night. This means that last night, January 5th, is what has been known as Twelfth Night since…
Christmastide Christmastide (the Christmas season from Christmas Eve or First Night through Twelfth Night and Epiphany) during the Regency Era seems to be more easily defined by the differences in traditions and what they didn’t have or do at the time rather than the specifics of what they did or didn’t. A quick survey of…
The topic of lawyers in the Regency Era often raises lot of confusion along with the privileges of peers in the British Legal system. It wasn’t until quite recently that the historical differences between what type of lawyer you were dictated where you could practice, what types of cases you could take and even if…