One of the tricky aspects of writing about a certain historical period is the use of language in dialogue. You want your characters to sound natural to the modern ear, but not out of place within the context of the era they’re living in. The word choices you make are important, because the wrong ones can really jar the reader. In my new historical romance, The Art of Love, for example, most of the action takes place between 1896 and 1903. Men who lived in that era might have used the expression ... VIEW POST
What? There Was a Time When Women Didn’t wear the Pants in the Family?!
It’s 1903. The heroine of my new historical romance, The Art of Love, has been invited on a mysterious outing, and after telling the hero she doesn’t own any trousers, he has a pair sent to her. No big deal today, right? We’d just slip on our most comfortable pants (Mom jeans, anyone?) and head out the door. But back at the turn of the twentieth century it was practically unthinkable for women to wear pants. Evidence from ancient Greek pottery shows that at least some women wore them (okay, ... VIEW POST
Advice from a Pro: Get Real! (even if you made it up)
One of the presenters at this year’s Idaho Writer’s Rendezvous was the novelist Ciji Ware. (http://cijiware.com.) She’s known for sink-your-teeth-into sagas that explore little known, but fascinating female historical figures, like the fourth Duchess of Gordon (Island of the Swans) and the many English women playwrights who flourished in the 18th century (Wicked Company). Ms. Ware was a journalist before launching her fiction writing career, and her attention to the “truth” of a given situation ... VIEW POST
Leaving The Waiting Place
Fans of Dr. Seuss know very well the infamous Waiting Place described in his classic children’s book, Oh, the Places You’ll Go. It’s the state of mind we all get stuck in at some point in our lives—a time of “in between,” where we think we want to move in one direction, but we’re not sure, so we wait for something to happen, or for things to stop happening, before we move. For me, the elusive goal has been fiction writing. For years I worked in marketing and wrote in many forms, none ... VIEW POST
