Culling my research library

While we are all thinking about New Year resolutions, I am reminded of the horror with which I contemplated the hideous prospect of getting rid of my books. Moving house became imminent at the beginning of the year and there was no way I was going to be able to take them all with me. But oh, my research books!

I used to have a huge seven foot high bookcase full of material covering all aspects of life, mostly from the 18th Century with a smattering of books on other periods along with my crime library concerning investigations and murder. The move, when it came, was to a really tiny flat, and that bookcase was not going to fit in.

I had to make some crucial decisions. I had room only for one largish bookcase. I managed to create space for a couple of small ones and most of the books that fell by the wayside were novels, I'm afraid. Culling my research books proved well-nigh impossible, but I did get rid of those I decided I was never going to have time to use. I absolutely had to keep the main ones relating to the Georgian and Regency periods, many of which I cannot do without.

The most used is Cunnington’s Handbook of English Costume in the Eighteenth Century, without which I couldn’t function, although I usually leave these descriptions to the editing stage. The great thing about Cunnington is the detail, from fabrics to accessories, with year on year changes for both men and women.

She details everything, from bonnets and hairstyles, to materials used and when they were fashionable, whether women wore ruffles, what colours were worn when to such intimate little gems as false bosoms and using mouse skin artificial eyebrows. What about this little aid to beauty?

"Cork Plumpers were occasionally worn to restore roundness to the hollow cheek."

Invaluable material.

One book on antiques has a useful set of images depicting the way rooms actually looked, as well as individual items of furniture - for which I’ve also got Chippendale’s workbook. Ackermann helps with scenes of London, such as Brooks’s, Astley’s Amphitheatre, Covent Garden and the Pantheon. The Romance of the Road gives two whole journeys from London to Bath and London to Portsmouth in drawings, so you get distances, inns and the likely traffic. I had to hang on to my books on Georgian cookery, and all those books with satirical drawings are wonderfully evocative of the period.

Setting is vital and I’m in love with my book of maps from the late 18^th century covering the entire country. I’ve also got London and greater London A-Z style maps, and a whole raft of detailed Victorian books about London and surrounding districts with interesting snippets, like who lived where, what’s there and the history behind it, plus sketches.

Of course there is the internet, and I will dive into Google for little facts and figures. For example, an expression so common to us now like "mad as a hatter" might not have been current in the period. Google is excellent for little things like that. And for details about old inns, towns and distances from place to place.

Pinterest is a mine of useful images. You can pretty much find out what anything looked like, from a copper foot warmer to how a lady manages the exigencies of ordinary life wearing all those petticoats. I add to my boards all the time, though whether I shall ever be able to find the exact image I need at any given moment is a moot point.

I like images best because they help me picture the scene, and I can garner textual stuff to furnish detail. It’s amazing how it puts me into the period in my head, which in turn enables me to write it for the reader to imagine.

This is what I love about books, and why research is vital. You can’t detail everything you’ve read. Instead you draw the scene in brush strokes of words, letting the reader fill in the gaps. I have to immerse myself in the data, even if only about 10% ends up in the book.

To be honest, I’m far too apt to lose myself in the books and forget what I’m actually looking for. One piece of research leads to another, besides throwing up new plot points I hadn’t thought of. Research for me is as much part of the process of writing as it is exploration of the period.

Just as well I've managed to hang on to most of my precious books!

Happy New Year
Elizabeth Bailey

Consulting the future: Napoleon’s Book of Fate and Oraculum

Our ancestors were no less given to ways of foretelling the future than we are. Whether you regularly read your star sign in the newspaper, consult a medium or have your hand read in the gypsy stall at a fair, you are in good company.

According to a book I acquired long ago, Napoleon is said to have consulted his oracle on every important occasion. The book is supposed to be, it states, “a fac simile of the one used by NAPOLEON” (their spelling of facsimile).

I am not sure how much good it did him, if we are to judge how much poor old Napoleon changed over the years.

Not only does this book contain a complicated oracle, it goes into interpreting dreams, “weather omens, astrological miscellany and important advice”. Also palmistry, observing moles, face reading, lucky days and a whole lot more.

The oraculum starts with rules. What you do is make five rows of lines, making sure there’s at least a dozen on each line. You then count the lines on each row, and if the number is odd, you assign it one dot, and if it’s even, you assign it two dots.

That gives you a pattern, as you can see in the illustration. You can then ask one of 32 questions, and the following pages give you a key. You locate your pattern, run down the column to your question, and find the letter given. Then you go the page for that letter, again find your pattern, and you get your answer.

Highly random, the whole thing. The questions are couched in old-fashioned language, as are the answers.

Let’s do a test. Question 15 seems appropriate to our present.

What is the aspect of the SEASONS, and what POLITICAL CHANGES are to take place?

I’ve done my lines and come up with odd, even, even, odd, odd. The key gives me the letter V. My answer is: “Expect a plentiful harvest.” What to make of that, I really don’t know!

There’s a warning that it is improper to ask TWO questions on the same day, so I can’t do another one. Instead, let’s have a look the second Oraculum or Book of Fate, which has a slightly different system of four rows of dots and only 16 questions.

I had a peculiar dream the other day, so let’s ask “What does my dream signify?”

Oh my sainted aunt! The answer is: “Signifies trouble and sorrow.” Argghh!

Enough of that already. What about moles? I have about 500 of them I think, so this should be good. I’m going for the biggest one on my face. The closest is upper lip, which shows happiness in marriage. Well, that’s better, though it’s a bit late for me.

Without our amazing Met Office, I daresay the weather omens would come in handy. Spiders seem to figure strongly, but how about these for omens of foul and wet weather, which is pretty standard for the UK most of the time?

If the crows make a great deal of noise, and fly round and round.

If worms creep out of the ground in great numbers.

If the owl screech.

If asses shake their ears, bray, and rub against walls or trees.

Ah, here’s one most of us ought to be able to notice:

If cats lick their bodies, and wash their faces.

We won’t go into face reading, or you'll be off in the mirror checking out your eyes!

To finish, I will wish you fortunate dreams:  of baking, of catching birds, of camels, clocks or cheese, of apricots, milk, leaping or – and what could be more dream inducing? - the moon.

Speaking of which, I will leave you with this moon charm to discover your future husband.

Elizabeth Bailey

You read trashy romances? What’s wrong with you?

As a romance writer, you rapidly get used to being put down rather than praised by the general public. Romance readers, knowing this tendency to be called out for their reading tastes, used to be known for hiding their romance paperback inside another “literary” novel, or wrapped in brown paper. If you talked about it, you said it was a guilty pleasure.

Thankfully, the rise of kindle changed all that. Nobody knows what you’re reading in that electronic contraption. I’m convinced the huge boost to romance since the advent of ebooks is down to that – at least to some extent. You can read whatever you like and no one is going to diss you for it.

But the idea that romance is easy to write (and therefore not worth anything) because it’s light entertainment and (often) trash, persists to this day. Yet romantic films abound, love songs roll down the years, and reality shows about love and marriage keep on coming. But pen a romance and you’re for it.

It's nothing new. Romance has been under fire ever since the 18th century when such novels (including the gothic) were trashed as systematically as they are in our time, and were thought to be injurious to the feminine mind, filling it with false expectations and foolish dreams. What's wrong with dreaming, say I. And millions of women agree.

It is getting better these days, since so many romance writers have become huge best-selling authors due to the ebook indie publisher revolution. But the stigma is still there and a romance writer develops a thick skin. When I was writing for Mills & Boon, my fellow writers and I could expect nothing but scorn and derision from the literati, especially literary journalists.  A diet of catcalls and rubbishing epithets has led the general public to regard Mills & Boon as junk food for the sexually deprived.

A typical conversation would go something like this:

Interested party:  Oh, you’re a writer. Are you published?

Me, bracing for it:  Yes.

More interested:  Really?  What do you write?  Have I read any?

Me [thinks: How the heck should I know?] (politely through false smile):  I write for Mills & Boon.

Party's expression changes to blank:  Oh.  (pause while suppressing laughter)  My mother used to read those.

Me (gritting teeth):  Really?

Party (no longer interested):  Oh, yes.  I tried to read one once, but it’s not my thing really.  All that panting and deep looks stuff.

Me:  Well, I write historicals, actually.

Party (openly grinning):  You don’t!  What, those bodice ripper things.  (laughing like a hyena)

At this point, if the party is a man, he will say with a leering look:

“Do you do your own research?”  (nudge, nudge, wink, wink)

And that’s about the level of respect. Thank you. Much obliged. Is it any wonder romance writers are reticent about saying what they do, except to other writers in the genre?

Actually, that’s not entirely true.  People are usually impressed you’ve had a book published at all, and once you’ve got a longish backlist you can crush even the most hardened critic with numbers. That usually shuts them up. There is also some evidence that not all journalists consider us a legitimate target for jeering brickbats. A few articles dealing more fairly with the genre have been seen these last few years, so there is hope for us yet.

Meanwhile, I am finding my shift into Regency mystery, even though laced with heavy doses of romance, is a step on the road to respectability. Apparently, if you write detective fiction, you are allowed to be considered a "proper" writer!

Elizabeth Bailey

When Emily Fanshawe, Marchioness of Polbrook, is found strangled in her bedchamber, suspicion immediately falls on those residing in the grand house in Hanover Square. Emily’s husband - Randal Fanshawe, Lord Polbrook - fled in the night and is chief suspect – much to the dismay of his family.

Ottilia Draycott is brought in as the new lady’s companion to Sybilla, Dowager Marchioness and soon finds herself assisting younger son, Lord Francis Fanshawe in his investigations.

Can Ottilia help clear the family name? Does the killer still reside in the house? Or could there be more to the mystery than meets the eye…?

http://getbook.at/GildedShroud