Clearly I can’t be taken at my word.

(Traditional Regencies, at least as I write them, are comedies of manners. Low in sizzle. High in humor. Set in early 19th century England.)

Some characters stay with me long after their story has been written. Zoe Loversall — first encountered in An Extraordinary Flirtation – is one.

***

Coming January 9, 2012 from Vintage Ink Press, in the various e-book formats, available at all the usual sites:

ISBN: 978-0-9826239-9-2

At seventeen, Zoe Loversall was the toast of London, with so many admirers that they were known as ‘Zoe’s Zoo’. At seven-and-twenty, she is a runaway Contessa, determined to experience everything life has thus far withheld.

Zoe returns to London, determined to seek her ruin and her revenge. There she sets her sights on Lord Quinton, a man notorious for the women he has bedded, the men he has killed in duels, the amount of liquor he consumes, the fortune he is doing his best to gamble away.

Lord Quinton is bored beyond bearing by females wishful to be rid of their virtue, and so he informs Zoe.

Zoe, however, is not so easily convinced.

***

To read an excerpt, visit my website:

 http://www.maggiemackeever.com/maggiema/Previews.html

And, because I had so much fun with all this, there will be a sequel, Quin, later in 2012.

Filed under: Writing ]]> http://maggiemackeever.wordpress.com/2011/12/05/a-regency-novella-point-non-plus/feed/ 0 mackeever pnp FOR FLYER http://maggiemackeever.wordpress.com/2010/11/21/tyburn-guest-blog-ii/ http://maggiemackeever.wordpress.com/2010/11/21/tyburn-guest-blog-ii/#comments Sun, 21 Nov 2010 02:26:06 +0000 mackeever http://maggiemackeever.wordpress.com/?p=829 ]]> I was asked to write an article for The Romantic Times Book Review blog. It appeared on Nov. 9. They called it ‘Maggie MacKeever and the Dark Side of the English Regency’. Here it is:

I was seduced by Georgette Heyer in the 70’s, and haven’t recovered from it yet. Since then I’ve written forty-three novels, most of them set in the English Regency.

The Regency was an era of contrasts, a time of artistic refinement and cultural achievement; social, political, and economic change; bloodshed and warfare. Regency London was an excellent example of the immense contrast between rich and poor. One street might be lined with noble colonnades, bow windows and gleaming doorknockers; the next with gin-shops, pawnbrokers and broken-down dwellings so squalid they oozed filth.

In THE TYBURN WALTZ, I wanted to show both sides of London, without being grimly serious about the business. Summer 1814 seemed the perfect time. Napoleon was safely ensconced on Elba and the Allied Sovereigns had invaded London, ostensibly to work out the details of the peace. However, Czar Alexander was more interested in sightseeing and basking in public admiration than in discussing affairs of state; his sister the Grand Duchess of Oldenburg was continually proclaiming her dislike of loud noises and music and especially the Prince Regent; Prinny was being driven to fits of frustration, Lord Castlereagh to wonder if the Czar might be half-mad, and Lord Liverpool to remark that people who didn’t know how to behave should stay at home.

The background established, I next needed someone who could pass back and forth between both worlds. Not a West End character slumming, but an East End character crossing the class line.

Ragged urchins swarmed the warren of courts and alleys and lanes that lay between the rookeries and London’s fashionable West End. Such children began to steal as soon as they could walk, frequently on the orders of adults who used them to make off with goods from places were larger thieves could not—food; small items of clothing, especially handkerchiefs; brooches and bracelets, combs and looking glasses from the stalls. Women waiting in the street hid stolen items in their barrows until it was safe to pass them on to a fence, or angling cove.

There were class lines in the rookeries, no less than between rich and poor. A nipper went from stealing apples to filching from stalls, and on to swiping stickpins and handkerchiefs. Natty lads aspired to be lifters and then knuckles, the better class of pickpocket who went to public places and snaffled pocketbooks, watches, and that sort of thing.

A shifting lad or lass seldom lived to an old age. His (or her) friends often accompanied him to the gallows, lending him support so that he might die game, and have his last speech written down and sold, and be talked of for a week.

We first meet our heroine in Newgate Prison, disguised as a boy. She is, she thinks, fourteen.

So that Julie can gain access to exclusive establishments, there to practice her pick-pocketing skills, she learns to act the lady, or at least sufficiently ladylike (she’s prone to lapses) to serve as companion to the real thing.

Julie journeys back and forth between the two worlds, in one moment sitting meekly as behooves her position at the back of a theater box; in the next shimmying up and down drainpipes, scurrying across roofs. Part of the pleasure of writing this story was seeing these contradictory Londons through her eyes, and watching her change her opinions about a great many things, most especially the ‘nobs’.

Julie removes items from Lady Jersey’s ballroom; from Carlton House, right under Prinny’s nose; from drawing rooms and bedrooms all around the town, not because she wants to, but because she has no choice.

From a certain earl she steals not only an ugly statue and his pocket watch, but also his heart.

Just as she stole mine.

I always feel sad when it’s time to say goodbye to my characters and send them out into the world. I’m hoping that readers will fall in love with Ned and Julie too.

GRAND DUCHESS CATHERINE OF OLDENBURG

In the course of doing historical research, one encounters intriguing characters. One of my current favorites is the Grand Duchess Catherine of Oldenburg.

In June of 1814, the allied sovereigns of Russia and Prussia arrived in London on a visit to the Prince Regent. With them came the two sons of the King of Prussia and a large number of victorious field-marshals, generals, princes, dukes, barons and the like.

They were a colorful cast of characters. Among them was the Grand Duchess of Oldenburg, favorite sister of Czar Alexander of Russia. She had actually been in London since March.  On her arrival, the wife of the Russian ambassador, Countess Lieven, immediately foresaw trouble. ‘The Grand Duchess has an immoderate thirst for authority and a very high, and possibly excessive, opinion of herself. I never saw a woman so possessed of the need to stir, act, put herself forward and eclipse others’.

In other words, the Grand Duchess was a pill.

She was also politically influential and during 1812-15 formed and paid to outfit a special regiment of chasseurs. She dominated a reactionary political group. In 1812 a group of conspirators unsuccessfully planned to depose Alexander and put her on the throne as Czarina Catherine III Pavlovna.

She was ‘seductive in glance and manner’, had ‘a dazzling brilliance and freshness of complexion, a bright eye, and the most beautiful hair in the world… She expressed herself directly, with eloquence and grace, but she never abandoned the tone of command. Her mind was cultivated, brilliant and daring; her character firm and imperious’.

Catherine had a fondness for personal adornment. ‘She was dressed in the most magnificent pearls I ever saw – scattered all over her head in large bunches and drops. She wore a necklace of egg-shaped pearls of enormous size.’

At the time of Catherine’s arrival in London, the Regent was anxious for a match between his daughter Charlotte and the Prince of Orange. Such an alliance was regarded with alarm in St. Petersburg. Some believe that the Grand Duchess had been sent to London on a secret diplomatic mission, and that she was instrumental in the match being called off.

Another theory is that she came to England to cement the Anglo-Russian alliance by a second marriage. However, though impressed by Britain’s material achievements (particularly the steam-engine) she was less enamored of its reigning house. The Dukes of Clarence and Sussex struck her as uncultivated boors. She and Prinny took each other in immediate dislike.

Her brother agreed. Alexander called the Regent ‘a poor sort of prince’.

The Grand Duchess derived great pleasure from putting Prinny in positions of acute embarrassment. She stirred up trouble with regularity and created countless scenes; for example, leaving the room immediately the Prince’s orchestra struck up. She was also subject to fainting fits. Her nerves had allegedly been ruined during the burning of Moscow, during which she was confined in a palace along with her youngest child.

The Grand Duchess outdid herself during a banquet held by the City of London at the Guildhall on June 18th. The occasion was supposed to have been exclusively masculine, but Catherine insisted on attending. When the musicians struck up a tune, she threatened to pitch one of her fits. Prinny was forced to beg that she allow the national anthem to be sung. At length she conceded, causing Lord Liverpool to remark that if people didn’t know how to properly behave, they should stay at home.

No one was unhappy when the Grand Duchess departed English shores.

Catherine Pavlovna of Russia was the fourth daughter of Czar Paul I of Russia and Princess Sophie Dorothea of Württemberg. In 1809, she married Duke George of Oldenham, who died of typhoid in 1812. While in England she met Crown Prince William of Württemberg, who was married to Princess Charlotte of Bavaria. He divorced his wife and married Catherine in 1816, thereby making her the Queen of Württemberg.

She had two sons with her first husband and two daughters with her second.

Catherine died in January 1819 of a bacterial skin infection complicated by pneumonia. She was forty years old.

Ned expects he will die on the battlefields of the Peninsula, hanged as a spy.

But then Julie takes on the trappings of a lady, and Ned unexpectedly becomes an earl, both players in a deadly game that will take them from the heights of London society to the depths of the Regency underworld — a game in which not only necks are risked, but hearts as well.

EXCERPT:

Her hands were tied in front of her. Wisdom dictated that he leave them safely bound. Surprisingly elegant hands they were, the fingers slender and graceful underneath their dirt.

Ned set aside his firearm, unfastened the cords that secured her ankles, rubbed the soft flesh where the bonds had chafed. Her bones were small, delicate, finely formed. She cursed and tried to kick him. He experienced an absurd impulse to pick up this defiant scrap and hold her safe from the world.

Well, why not? If he could hardly hold a housebreaker safe, he could certainly still hold her. Ned untangled his captive from the chair; scooped her up, drapery and dirt and all, and sat her on the desk. The fabric parted, revealing one smooth and slender shoulder, and the curve of one plump breast. She clutched the curtain closer and scowled.

Here was a female unimpressed by his title. Ned trailed one finger down her soft cheek. “Tell me your name.”

She turned her head and bit his wrist; at the same time planted her bare foot in his groin. Abruptly, Ned released her. “Point taken,” he said and then cursed as she grasped the ugly statue in her bound hands and aimed it at his head.

Caught off-balance, Ned stumbled backward. The thief scooted off his desk. He grabbed for her, caught the curtains. She brought the statue down, hard, on his skull. Tangled up in dusty draperies, Ned crashed to the floor. He’d not soon forget his last glimpse of the housebreaker, scrambling mother-naked out his library window, clutching his ugly statue in her hand.

Damned if he’d enjoyed anything so much since he departed the Peninsula. When Bates returned to the library, he found his master holding a bloody handkerchief to his head, and laughing like a loon…

Coming November, 2010 from Vintage Ink Press

ISBN 978-0-9826239-3-0

Genre: Historical Romance

Trade paperback, 281 pages

Price: $12.99

Distributed by Ingram Books. Available online through Amazon, Barnes and Noble, The Book Depository

Ebook versions: epub, pdf, Kindle

Excerpt Copyright 2010 by Gail Clark Burch

Filed under: Writing ]]> http://maggiemackeever.wordpress.com/2010/09/30/the-last-best-romance/feed/ 0 mackeever The Tyburn Waltz http://maggiemackeever.wordpress.com/2010/08/02/going-on-hiatus/ http://maggiemackeever.wordpress.com/2010/08/02/going-on-hiatus/#comments Mon, 02 Aug 2010 22:16:19 +0000 mackeever http://maggiemackeever.wordpress.com/?p=800 ]]> Too little time, too little inclination–

Too many other things to do.

(1) Lee And The Squirrel. I feed the critters, Lee feeds the birds — and, consequently, the squirrels. We have several feeders hung in the olive tree. One squirrel in particular (known as That Little Shit) is forever climbing down the chain to get at the bird seed. He climbs down, Lee gets up to chase him away, he climbs up into the tree and waits for Lee to sit back down in his chair, at which point he climbs back down the chain. This can go on indefinitely. One day I walked outside to see TLS scamper across the patio, up Lee’s pant leg, and into his lap. It turns out Lee has been feeding him stale almonds. Yep, Lee really hates those squirrels.

(2) Possum On The Fence. I was in the bedroom reading one night and heard the dog next door having fits. I went outside and discovered the dog had a young possum trapped on the wood fence between our yards. The dog was jumping on the fence, trying to knock the possum off, I guess. (It’s an old fence; he was as likely to knock the whole thing down.) The dog barked; I yelled louder; Lee, who’d been watching tv, came outside to see what was going on. We tried various things to attract the dog’s attention but the possum wouldn’t move. Finally the neighbors came out (I suspect they’re all partly deaf; there’s a teen-aged drummer in the house) and took the dog indoors. Several minutes later the possum unfroze itself and went on its way along the fence. I felt like cheering it.

There weren’t many critters around during the winter, other than the cats. Since we hadn’t finished rebuilding the car port — it was a mere ninety years old — we put up plastic sheets in lieu of the missing gates. The animals didn’t like the plastic. I think it made too much noise.

Prior to putting up the plastic, I looked outside one night and saw a possum and a raccoon eating out of the same food dish. The possum ambled off and another raccoon showed up. Then a cat wandered by. It was Grand Central Station for a while.

The gates are up now, and the possums are back. I haven’t seen any raccoons yet. I hear there’s a raccoon epidemic in Long Beach. Maybe my raccoons moved on.

What I have seen is a new feral cat, a bob-tailed tuxedo kitty. I knew there was a short-tailed tom in the neighborhood, but didn’t know if he was a Manx or if he’d lost most of his tail in an accident. Apparently he’s a Manx. This little guy is probably less than a year old and has been adopted into the feral family. Lee named him Bob. He was real skittish when he first showed up, but hangs out with us now. Someone has had him fixed; one of his ears is clipped.

Bob’s a jumper. This morning I was later than usual feeding the cats and he was up on the ledge outside the kitchen window, peering in at me.

It was a very difficult book for me to write, because — aside from the no onstage erotica rule — I had no boundaries, not even an outline to follow, because I sold the story from a one-page treatment that dealt with the playing-against-type idea. I’d never tried to write anything paranormal before, and the process was both confusing and confronting. The turning point came during a conversation with Lee. I said ‘I don’t know if I can have them do this.’ He said, ‘They’re vampires. You can have them do anything you want.’

So I did.

I’d intended to write a trilogy: Val’s story (WALTZ), Andrei’s story, and then Cezar’s story, which would answer any remaining questions raised in the first two books. But Zebra closed down their traditional Regency line and I wound up without both a publisher and an agent, and that was that. Or so I thought. But then I started getting email. I owe a huge thank you to everyone who contacted me saying, “Where’s the sequel to WALTZ WITH A VAMPIRE?” Without that email I doubt I would have ever gone on to the next book.

VAMPIRE, BESPELLED — Andrei’s story — is written now, and an interesting journey it was, because I couldn’t repeat what I did in the first story yet couldn’t stray too far afield. An uncooperative heroine complicated the process, but she finally persuaded me to her point of view. An couple interesting new characters popped up, and a story twist I hadn’t anticipated.The second book was no easier to write than the first. This time, I didn’t expect it to be.

VAMPIRE, BESPELLED should be available through bookstores next month. It’s already listed on Amazon and Barnesandnoble.com. Amazon changes its mind daily about the book’s availability — one day it supposedly ships within 24 hours, and the next it’s 7-13 days.

One thing I think everyone will probably agree on. This cover is way better than WALTZ.

WALTZ is available now in a Kindle edition, which is kind of cool.

Update: as of 6pm 3/24, both Amazon and Barnesandnoble.com have the book listed as immediately available.

For more information, check out my website.  http://www.maggiemackeever.com/maggiema/Previews.html

Unfortunately, there’s a lot of that sort of thing going around. It’s the equivalent of me reading a Dan Brown book and saying the story’s bad simply because I don’t enjoy that kind of thing. In reality, what I do or don’t enjoy reading has nothing to do with whether or not the book is ‘good’. Generally, I don’t care much for best sellers. That hardly means the books are ‘bad’.

‘I liked it’ or ‘I hated it’ doesn’t make a decent book review. Neither does ‘it wasn’t what I expected’, which implies that the author is supposed to figure out ahead of time what a particular reader wants to read, and then write that book instead of what’s in his or her heart.

The book of mine so recently panned was a Traditional Regency, basically a comedy of manners set in early 19th century England, with no onstage sex. It’s a genre that few publishers handle any more. So now, twenty-five years after it was published, a reader picks up the book, doesn’t understand it, and informs the world that it’s ‘bad’ when it’s actually a pretty good example of what it was supposed to be.

I’m tempted to say, Bite me. But, really, what difference does one  person’s opinion make?

Update, two days later. Another Google Alert, another review of an old book. This reader got it. She gave me five stars.

Did Jane Austen say ‘rug rats’? Did Georgette Heyer?

They did not.

According to the Dictionary of American Slang, no one said ‘rug rats’ before the 1960′s. How does an author justify plopping 1960′s American slang into a novel set in early 1800′s England? How did her editor let it pass?

I surely can’t be the only person who notices this sort of thing.

Reviewers used to notice. One of my novels made it to the Los Angeles Times Book Review — a big deal, because the Times Book Review concerned itself with Serious Literature, not Amusing Bits of Fluff. (Some arm twisting was involved.) The reviewer said absolutely nothing about the story itself. The entire review focused on nailing me for using ‘throw a spanner in the works’, and my editor for missing two conflicting descriptions of a house.

At least ‘throw a spanner in the works’ sounds like it might date to the early industrial revolution. I’ve discovered since that the phrase is usually attributed to P.G.Wodehouse, 1934.

‘Rug rats’ doesn’t even vaguely sound like it belongs to the English Regency.

The problem with anachronisms is that they distract the reader from the story. This one annoyed me so much I almost didn’t finish reading what was otherwise a very enjoyable book.

We’ve been rebuilding the carport — where I put out the dry food for the critters — and still have the big car-sized gate to go. I’m worrying about Pauly Possum and Mozart the Raccoon being able to get to the food once the area is totally closed in. The cats can and do slip under the smaller gate.

I voiced my concern to Lee, who said: Possums and raccoons can climb. They’ll be fine.

I said: Have you seen them lately? These guys don’t look very athletic to me.

Lee: We’ll build them a ladder. Put up some lattice work.

Me: Better anchor it firmly to the fence.

The critters are thriving on dry cat food. Pauly Possum has become positively portly. All he needs is a waistcoat and a gold watch chain draped across his tummy to be the most dapper possum in town.

There’s a carpet-covered cat tree in the carport, with a cat bed on top. Patches usually sleeps there. She was in her bed when Mozart brought a friend by for dinner a few nights ago. Patches opened her eyes, watched the raccoons for a minute, and then went back to sleep. They pretended she wasn’t there.

I knew the ferals got along just fine with the possums, but I thought they’d give the raccoons a wide berth. Apparently some sort of truce has been arranged.

We don’t have so many stranger cats stopping by now that everyone’s been fixed — ‘everyone’ being BB, Nose and Patches, who hang out in the back yard; Squirt, and Sundance. I haven’t seen Bad Ass for a long time. I’m hoping that someone has provided him a spot so comfortable that he isn’t tempted to wander off. Squirt was gone for a while, but the last few days he’s been here for breakfast. I hadn’t seen Sundance for so long that I was beginning to wonder about her, but she showed up yesterday for lunch.

The kids are coming home for Christmas.

Happy holidays to us all.

Bad Ass, napping in the old carport