Melbourne Writers Festival: History's Script with Sarah Dunant and Jane Sullivan

This is my wrap up of the second historical fiction session I attended at Melbourne Writers Festival this year.

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The next session for me was History's Script which was hosted by Michael Cathcart from Books and Art Daily on Radio National and featured Sarah Dunant and Jane Sullivan, author of Little People. I really enjoyed the session I attended on Friday where Sarah Dunant spoke so well about Lucrezia Borgia so I was extremely glad that I had the foresight to book into another session with her during the Festival. This session was also recorded for the Books and Arts Daily show and will be played on Tuesday. If I remember I will post the link so that if you are interested you can listen to the session yourself.

The host started by asking each of the authors how they came to history. For Sarah, it started in childhood reading authors like Jean Plaidy, Margaret Irwin and Anya Seton amongst others. Living in post war Britain, historical fiction was a gateway to a far more colourful, more exotic and romantic past and she became obsessed with history. That romanticised view of history was beaten out of her when she went to study history at Cambridge University for three years. It was interesting at Cambridge to see how men and women come to an interest in history differently, something that is often reflected in the way male and female readers come to historical fiction.



Sarah Dunant


Sarah Dunant came to a love of Renaissance History a lot later, it not having been a part of history that she had studied previously and therefore been deromanticised from (my made up word, not hers). Her interest in Renaissance history was piqued when she found herself living in Florence in the early 2000s. Florence is a city where the history is literally everywhere, rich with the past. This had Dunant wondering exactly what it was that happened 500 years ago that turned Florence into a cauldron of change. Even at the time, Florentines were proud of the history that was happening, of the art and more.

For Jane Sullivan, her love of history came through the literature of Tennyson and Keats, or stories like Jane Eyre rather than through history itself. In fact, the thing that she remembers most about history from school is the cartoons that were in the history books. Jane is originally from the UK. When she did come to Australia she was struck by the way the cities must have been new, particularly a city like Melbourne which benefited from the gold rush and was at one point called the Chicago of the South because of how quickly it was growing up. She sees Melbourne as a city full of stories - not unlike Florence for Sarah.

One of those stories was how she came across the characters that were to people her book, Little People. She first found reference to a travelling show of dwarf performers when she was reading a book about poet Ada Cambridge. When the troop of performers were in town, they were feted as rock stars, causing big traffic problems wherever they went. I should also mention that as Jane Sullivan was talking about how she found these characters there were images of them flashing up on the screen which was really cool.

Sarah Dunant's book In the Company of the Courtesan also has a dwarf as one of it's main characters and she shared how she actually found her dwarf in a painting. She knew that courtesans of the day often kept little people as exotic pets and so her main character was born. The moderator noted that often looking at people on the margins help define the centre or norms of a situation. Dunant agreed that this was the case for her book as Bucino was also able to be the eyes and the ears for the courtesan and so was able to expand what the reader could see. For Jane Sullivan, her narrator was a normal sized person but still was in that role of outsider given that all the other members of the troop are little people.

The discussion then moved onto a discussion of what writing historical fiction enables you to do that straight history or narrative non-fiction does not. The first response was around limits of information available, especially seeing as sometimes there can be constructed or controlled history, such as in the case of the travelling troop given that P T Barnum was basically a spin doctor trying to entice the crowds in to the show. It also enables you to make up stuff that is still consistent with what you know.

For Sarah, the narrative comes first from history and then there is the story. History is rich and complex and you need to get the complexities which is sometimes difficult when you are going back 500 or more years. Sometimes you can find hidden bits of history - particularly in relation to women - but not necessarily the full story. For some of her earlier books, she sees it as putting the soil in place from what you know (for example, food, religion or culture) and then build the characters from there. It was different for Blood and Beauty because she had a known person from history as her main character rather than a made up characters, and in the Borgias case we believe that we know their history. She went onto touch on a couple of the issues that I mentioned in my post yesterday about the slander of Lucrezia Borgia's reputation.

Jane Sullivan

In a discussion on truth Jane Sullivan mentioned that there are 2 different types of truth. One is of fact - what is learned from research etc and the second is the truth of fiction where you try to create characters who are consistent, interesting and recognisable. This idea of historical truth is also embodied in the fact that historians will select from the various bits of evidence they have available to them to decide what is true, but it is just is likely that what they don't have will actually be the final truth. Novelists use this selection process when building their character but what they are aiming for is to be true to the grand narrative of history but bring them alive through characters and stories.

One of the interesting questions that was addressed during the session was the idea of history repeating itself. While the world moves forward technologically, the fundamentals remain the same. For example, when you are writing about the Renaissance you are talking about the rise of fundamental Christianity and many of today's world conflicts are born out of religious fundamentalism too. Nothing changes in the big roll of history - the hows might change but the big issues tend to be repetitive. The how is where authors needs to be careful because there are fundamental differences. The example given was about pain. Because we have easy access to pain relief our understanding of pain may well be completely different to someone from a couple of hundred years ago. While there are differences, Sarah Dunant pointed out that if you sink yourself in the past you can often find the similarities, but it doesn't necessarily work the other way around. No matter what you write though, your writing is informed by how you are now.

Throughout the rest of the conversation there were thoughts about whether fantasy is displacing historical fiction, particularly with things like Game of Thrones where it is fantasy strongly rooted in actual history, about the importance of afterwords in helping the reader understand which parts of the story were made up, about the difference between male and female gateways into historical fiction (apparently Hilary Mantel has made historical fiction something that men are more likely to read ..who knew!), about the idea of a historical fiction canon (suggested authors to include were Rosemary Sutcliff, Mary Renault, Rose Tremain and Umberto Ecco with the caveat that he is more imaginative than research driven), and about choosing real people as your central characters rather than making them up.

There was so much more that was talked about. Hopefully you might be interested enough to listen to the program when I add the link to the post at some point this week. There were times where I felt that the moderator was displaying a dislike (maybe too strong a word but there was something there) of the genre, so I might give it a listen to see if that comes through in the program too, and to see what I missed as I was madly scrambling away taking notes. You can read Bree's take on this session here.

Whilst I still have at least one more session to attend it will have to be pretty special to displace the sessions I have attended with Sarah Dunant. The Lucrezia Borgia session was absolutely fascinating and this discussion with Jane Sullivan was also very interesting.

Melbourne Writers Festival: Sarah Dunant on Lucrezia Borgia in Italian Art

The Melbourne Writers Festival is currently on here in Melbourne, which means that there are great events for readers and writers to participate in. I have been to a couple of sessions featuring British author Sarah Dunant, so I thought I would share my blog posts of the sessions here. Hopefully some will find it interesting.

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My first session of this year's festival was located at the auditorium at the National Gallery of Victoria Art Galley (NGV) and it was a perfect venue to host Sarah Dunant, author of books like The Birth of Venus and her latest book Blood and Bloody, and Carl Villis, paintings conservator at the NGV talking about Lucrezia Borgia and Italian Art.

The session started with Sarah Dunant talking about Lucrezia Borgia, about how the Borgia name has been slandered through history and how if you look past the gossip at what evidence there truly is about her life, you will see a picture of a very different woman than that we usually equate with her name. As part of her talk she showed a picture of a very young Lucrezia Borgia which until recently was thought to be the only known image of her in a painting.

Dunant talked us through how she first became interested in writing about Lucrezia Borgia. Her first three novels, during which she wanted to answer the question of what it would have been like to be woman in the Renaissance, had taken her on a journey from Florence (The Birth of Venus) to Venice (In the Company of the Courtesan) and then to Ferrara. It was at this point that I realised that I had completely missed reading her novel Sacred Hearts. Whilst researching in Ferrara, she came across a tomb slab dedicated to Lucrezia Borgia and praising her piety. Knowing that the woman had ended her life in a convent and was generally considered by her contemporaries (not her enemies) to be both beautiful and pious, how was it that her name is synonymous with poison, murder and incest 500 years later.

In giving us some background to the Borgia family, Dunant explained part of the reason for the level of vitriol against the Borgia family is that they were outsiders, a Spanish family that was trying to infiltrate a world that is dominated by powerful Italian clans. When Rodrigo Borgia was made pope, he was ambitious, determined and had four marriageable children which he was happy to use to build alliances with these families, including 12 year old Lucrezia who is married into the Sforza family. It is when that alliance is no longer necessary and the pope needs to marry Lucrezia into another family that the incest story starts after an annulment is granted on the grounds of impotence, something that the husband vehemently denies. A comment made by a man scorned soon wings it's ways all through the courts of Europe and it takes very little time for the story of Lucrezia being a whore and in incestuous relationships with her father and brother makes it into common usage. Mud sticks.

Sarah Dunant

A second marriage follows, once again for political reasons,  in which Lucrezia gives every appearance of being happy, but once again political alliances shift and her family wants Lucrezia to be married elsewhere, but she fights it. Given that she will not give up the marriage, her husband is murdered, leaving the still young woman to marry again, this time into the court at Ferrara.

Lest it sounds as though Dunant is a Borgia fan through and through, she does make it clear that there is no doubt that Rodrigo is an unashamed womaniser, comparing him to former Italian prime minister Sylvio Berlusconi during the question and answer section of the presentation, and that Cesare was pretty much a sociopath, but that the evidence just doesn't add up to support Lucrezia's vile reputation.

The second part of the session was focused on a painting that is housed at the NGV (click on the link to see the painting) which was for many years the subject of much speculation around who painted it, when it was painted and who the sitter was including whether they were female or male After many years of painstaking research and analysis, Carl Villis has been able to identify exactly who the painter was, and more importantly for the purposes of this talk, that the sitter was in fact Lucrezia Borgia.

Villis talked us through the evidence that he has found to suggest that the painting was done by Dossi Dossi, court painter only at the court of Ferrara during the years that Lucrezia was Duchess, including the type of preparation he used on the canvas, and the shape of the painting which is very unusual for that time in art history. In addition, there were the clues in the painting itself - the hairstyle which identifies the sitter as female, the dagger which seems to be representative of the Roman story of Lucrezia, the myrtle bushes in the background which are symbolic of virtue and beauty as well as the inscription on the painting.

One of the most fascinating aspects of Villis' talk was when he talked about the facial recognition technology that was undertaken by Victoria Police to compare the painting to a bronze medal which was cast for her second wedding. By comparing various points in the faces on the painting and the medal, the evidence confirmed that there was a very high probability that the two faces were portraying the same person. Fascinating, fascinating stuff! Whilst I wouldn't normally buy a non fiction book on the identification of a painting, the presentation was so interesting I will most likely be keeping an eye out for Carl Villis' book on this painting when it comes out.

During the question and answer section that followed, there were correlations made between the bad PR or spin that the Borgias received and the idea of modern celebrity where we love someone until we don't any more and how it is difficult to rehabilitate a personality once the mud slinging starts, about the Borgias TV series (which Dunant isn't a fan of), about how authors have to make a psychological decision on a character based on the evidence they have available and more. I seriously could have listened to these two speak for another hour quite easily and there was so much more content in what they did say that I haven't even touched on yet in this post!

Of course, after hearing this absolutely fascinating talk I had to go and look at the painting for myself, housed in a part of the gallery that I didn't previously know existed even though I have visited the building many times before.


You can read more about my Melbourne Writers Festival experiences here. Later in the week I will put up my post about the historical fiction session I went to which featured Sarah Dunant and Jane Sullivan.

The Tudor Secret/The Tudor Conspiracy by C W Gortner

I have long been a fan of C W Gortner, not only because of how much I enjoy his books, but also because of the gracious way in which he interacts with his readers. I really enjoy the way that he has previously focused on not necessarily unknown characters but rather lesser known characters from European history like Juana, queen of Spain (sister to Catherine of Aragon), or Catherine de Medici. Right from when I first read him I have enjoyed his voice and his portrayal of powerful, flawed women.

Both The Tudor Secret and the sequel The Tudor Conspiracy bring something new to Gortner's established readers. This time his canvas is the Tudor court of England, a picture that has been painted many times before. Rather than straight historical fiction this is mystery, and his main protagonist is a male character although there are plenty of female characters in the mix, including Queen Mary and Princess Mary.

Whilst this post is ostensibly a review of The Tudor Conspiracy, I do want to talk briefly about The Tudor Secret, which is the first book in the series. Because I have to read a series in order, I made sure to read The Tudor Secret first but I am unlikely to write a whole post so I just wanted to touch on a couple of things before moving onto the second book. I will also try to avoid spoilers for the first book as much as I can.

The Tudor Secret was originally self published nearly a decade ago.The author has polished it up ready to be republished by a major publisher but, as someone who has read most of his books, I can definitely see improvements in his writing in his later books and particularly in relation to the second book in this series.

Whilst I didn't not like The Tudor Secret, there wasn't a lot that stood out for me. I have mentioned before that I often feel Tudored out and so when I do read something with a Tudor setting I want it to stand out. The Tudor Secret wasn't really that book for me. It was a good read, it introduced an interesting enough character, played with a question of identity in a way I have kind of seen before and we saw all the familiar players like Princess Elizabeth, Robert Dudley and wily Lord Cecil as well as some secondary characters like Peregrine the stable boy who quickly attaches himself to Brendan.

By way of introduction, Brendan Prescott was a foundling who was abandoned as a baby. He was entered into the Dudley household where the boy was educated to quite a high level, mainly because of his own curiosity and determination. He is called to court to perform the duties of Robert Dudley's squire and quicker than he could say "will that be all my lord?" he is drawn into a world of spies and subterfuge, and into questions like who will rule the realm should sickly King Edward die. With the Dudley's scheming to get Lady Jane Grey to be the next ruler and Lady Mary and Lady Elizabeth being kept waiting in the wings things are going to get very touchy in the Tudor court. And we haven't even talked yet about Brendan's search for his true identity!

Earlier in this post I said that if I am going to read a Tudor set book then I want something that stands out. Where the first book in the series fell a little flat to me, the second book, The Tudor Conspiracy most definitely did not.

After the events of the last book, Brendan has been living a quiet life in the country. When Lord Cecil calls for him to return to the court to help protect Princess Elizabeth, he doesn't hesitate for too long before agreeing to go undercover. His challenge is to infiltrate the court of Queen Mary and the employ of the powerful Spanish envoy who is exerting a great deal of power over her. The rumours are flying thick and fast that Mary plans to marry Philip of Spain, a prospect that scares the general populace as this will most likely mean that England will be expected to return to the Catholic Church and religious intolerance will spread even more. The possible marriage could also have dire implications for Princess Elizabeth who continues to defy Mary on multiple fronts, most especially to do with religion, and is thus incurring her wrath. Brendan must work to find out if Elizabeth is in imminent danger and protect her as best he can. In the meantime he must also be seen to work for the queen in proving that Elizabeth, Edward Courtenay, Earl of Devon and perhaps others including Robert Dudley are involved in a conspiracy to bring Elizabeth to the throne. Gortner brings the conspiracy that leads to the eventual Wyatt rebellion to life with historically known details and imagination combining perfectly.

For Brendan, it proves very difficult to juggle two identities and to be serving different masters who all have different, competing agendas, and that is before we add the fact that he is still trying to determine exactly who he truly is as well!

There were two aspects of this book that felt more assured to me. Firstly, there was the writing and secondly the characterisation. While reading The Tudor Conspiracy I felt completely engaged in the action whether it be when Brendan finds himself trying to escape from deadly situations or feels that he is being watched as he crosses over the crowded London Bridge, I was there with him willing him to beat his opponents, gasping as he comes within a swords slash of being maimed or murdered, feeling his fear as he tangles with the scarred man who works for the Earl of Devon, Mr Scarsgill, grieving as he loses somebody close to him (I could not believe that the author killed off that character!) and screwing up my nose so that I can't smell yet another set of clothes that he has ruined! He is very hard on his clothes!

I think that the thing that impressed me most about the main character of Brendan Prescott in this book is the author has made him so human. Gortner is not afraid to have Prescott show his fears (which include water, confined spaces and more), his fallibility or his emotions, even as he continues to place the character in dangerous situations. There are things that Brendan did in this book that should not be glossed over easily, and they aren't, but the author has taken the time to make sure that the reader sees clearly Brendan's own thought processes and, in some cases, guilt as he works through the mystery that he is wrapped up in and tries determine who exactly is trustworthy in the pit of vipers that is the court of Queen Mary.

There are crosses and double crosses, murders, conspiracies, distrust and enmity between family members, secret identities and oh, so much more. Gortner manages to keep all of the various plot points deftly in hand, providing the reader with a heart in mouth reading experience as you try and race through to the end of the book just to see what happens next!

I liked that in the authors note, it is clearly spelled out what where history and imagination crossed paths, and I was glad to see that there will be more adventures featuring Brendan Prescott in future. There are surely many more adventures that await him in the complicated worlds of Queen Mary initially, and later with Queen Elizabeth. I am very much looking forward to reading them.

Ratings:

The Tudor Secret 3.5/5
The Tudor Conspiracy 4.5/5

Tour Details

Link to Tour Schedule: http://hfvirtualbooktours.com/thetudorconspiracyvirtualtour/
Twitter Hashtag: #TudorConspiracyTour
CW Gortner's website.
CW Gortner on Facebook
CW Gortner on Twitter.

About the book

Hunted by a shadowy foe in Bloody Mary’s court, Brendan Prescott plunges into London’s treacherous underworld to unravel a dark conspiracy that could make Elizabeth queen—or send her to her death in C.W. Gortner's The Tudor Conspiracy

England, 1553: Harsh winter encroaches upon the realm. Mary Tudor has become queen to popular acclaim and her enemies are imprisoned in the Tower. But when she’s betrothed to Philip, Catholic prince of Spain, putting her Protestant subjects in peril, rumors of a plot to depose her swirl around the one person whom many consider to be England’s heir and only hope—the queen’s half-sister, Princess Elizabeth.

Haunted by his past, Brendan Prescott lives far from the intrigues of court. But his time of refuge comes to an end when his foe and mentor, the spymaster Cecil, brings him disquieting news that sends him on a dangerous mission. Elizabeth is held captive at court, the target of the Spanish ambassador, who seeks her demise. Obliged to return to the palace where he almost lost his life, Brendan finds himself working as a double-agent for Queen Mary herself, who orders Brendan to secure proof that will be his cherished Elizabeth’s undoing.

Plunged into a deadly game of cat-and-mouse with a mysterious opponent who hides a terrifying secret, Brendan races against time to retrieve a cache of the princess’s private letters, even as he begins to realize that in this dark world of betrayal and deceit, where power is supreme and sister can turn against sister, nothing—and no one—is what it seems.

Why I Love Edith Wharton by Jennie Fields

Today we are pleased to welcome Jennie Fields here to Historical Tapestry as part of her blog tour to celebrate the release of her novel The Age of Desire.

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If you’re like 75% of Americans, you were forced to read Ethan Frome in high school and you hated it. Therefore you think that reading Edith Wharton will be a dreary chore. I don’t know why Ethan Frome became standard high school fare, except that it’s short enough that teenagers can read it and still get their algebra homework turned in on time. But what a pity, because Ethan Frome is the least typical of all Edith’s novels. And brilliant as it is, it’s far too grim for sixteen year olds who have other things on their minds.

So, having swallowed that bitter Ethan Frome pill, it wasn’t until I was in college and taking a course on “American Women Authors” that I read The House of Mirth and fell madly in love with Edith. The first thing that struck me about The House of Mirth was how modern it is! Having read plenty of Henry James, I couldn’t believe that Edith and Henry lived in the same era! Again, Henry James is brilliant, but some of his sentences are so ponderous you could drink an entire cup of tea getting through a single one. Edith’s writing is crisp, funny, ironic and cruel. It could have been written yesterday. It moves. It sings. Sure, society has changed, but people haven’t. And Edith captured them all with all their foibles, vulnerability and charm. I stayed up all night reading her cautionary tale about a women who possesses beauty but no money amidst a society poised to bring her down. The House of Mirth is tragic in a unique way: Lily Bart, its main character, is undone by her better instincts, not her wicked ones. Because her conscience ultimately doesn’t allow her to do what she’s expected to do -- marry a wealthy husband even if she finds him dull or odious -- she falters, and in the end, falls in a rather spectacular way.

Next, I encountered The Age of Innocence, the book that made Edith Wharton the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1921. A story about passion vs. duty, amidst the strangling power of a tight-knit society, it haunted me for weeks. (The experience of endless longing that Edith described so achingly in The Age of Innocence could never have been written if not for her affair with Morton Fullerton I later discovered.) But there were so many more Edith Wharton candy boxes yet to open. The Custom of the Country is the story of the most hateful main character I’ve ever encountered, and yet, you can’t stop turning the pages to discover what becomes of her. The Mother’s Recompense is a tale about a woman whose much younger and still beloved ex-lover pursues her daughter. In another author’s hands, it could have been a soap opera. In Edith’s, it’s a heartbreaking account. Oh, and have you ever read Edith’s ghost stories? I bet you didn’t know that she secretly wrote erotica! And war correspondence. And travel tales. And even a decorating book. In her lifetime, Edith Wharton wrote forty brilliant volumes.

So why do I love Edith Wharton? Because all these years later, she still speaks to us, moves us, challenges us. For me, there’s no writer better at making me feel the wondrous breadth of human existence. And no writer has matched her yet for breathtaking pinpoint prose. If you’re still healing from an early encounter with Ethan Frome, stop by your local bookshop today (if God-willing there’s still one near you) and pick up a writer who will rock your world.

Tour Details

Link to Tour Schedule: http://hfvirtualbooktours.com/theageofdesiretour/
Twitter Hashtag: #AgeOfDesireTour
Jennie Fields' website
Jennie Fields on Facebook
Jennie Fields on Twitter.

About the book

For fans of The Paris Wife, a sparkling glimpse into the life of Edith Wharton and the scandalous love affair that threatened her closest friendship.

They say that behind every great man is a great woman. Behind Edith Wharton, there was Anna Bahlmann—her governess turned literary secretary and confidante. At the age of forty-five, despite her growing fame, Edith remains unfulfilled in a lonely, sexless marriage. Against all the rules of Gilded Age society, she falls in love with Morton Fullerton, a dashing young journalist. But their scandalous affair threatens everything in Edith’s life—especially her abiding ties to Anna.

At a moment of regained popularity for Wharton, Jennie Fields brilliantly interweaves Wharton’s real letters and diary entries with her fascinating, untold love story. Told through the points of view of both Edith and Anna, The Age of Desire transports readers to the golden days of Wharton’s turn-of-the century world and—like the recent bestseller The Chaperone—effortlessly re-creates the life of an unforgettable woman.

The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman

Over recent years I have read several books that have all won prestigious book prizes. With many of them I have wondered just what the hype was all about, or was I being a complete philistine and missing the point, or not reading deep enough.

Then about two weeks ago a librarian and member of my book group presented me with my reserved copy of the Devon libraries summer read; The Light Between Oceans.

I started reading over the weekend and feel very tired today as I was awake finishing this book into the early hours.

The scene of the story is set when Tom, a decelerated war hero from the First World War returns to Australia and is given the chance to work temporarily at a lighthouse situated off the Australian coast, on a fictitious island called Janus.

Tom is ready for the peace and quiet of island living.Coming to terms with his war time terrors and survivors guilt he sets about living for months on the island, where the methodical process of keeping the lighthouse functioning becomes his anchor.

On a period of leave a few months later he reacquaints himself with a local girl from the shore and they spend much time together, and eventually the decision is made, Tom will marry Isabel.

It is during their time on the island that they encounter a rowing boat upon the rugged coast line of the island. The inhabitants are a dead man and a young, breathing baby. Isabel has had numerous miscarriages and this seems to her to be divine intervention. A baby for them to love and care for.

Tom struggles between duty to the procedural issues of the lighthouse, to his wife and to his own happiness. Ultimately Tom's struggle with his own conscience and doing the right thing tears his and Isabel's life apart, but once the wheels have started to turn there is no going back.

This was a beautiful book, with a lovely well researched story. There is much more that I could share with you, but I won't. Locate a copy and read it! For me this has the wow factor that many of the books that win prestigious book prizes lack. The book not only was well researched, but delivered a moral and ethical dilemma and as I turned the pages I wondered what I would have done in Isabel and Tom's shoes.

C W Gortner on Mary and Elizabeth

Today we are pleased to welcome C W Gortner to Historical Tapestry as part of his blog tour to celebrate the release of The Tudor Conspiracy, his second Tudor mystery.

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Mary and Elizabeth: Sisters and Rivals

There is something fascinating, and disturbing, about family members who turn on one another. The Tudor dynasty is no exception. Though Henry VIII did not sire many children, considering how often he wed, history has perhaps no sisters more famous for their rivalry than his two daughters, Mary and Elizabeth.

Born of the king’s marriages to his first and second wives, respectively, Mary and Elizabeth were both declared bastards in turn after Henry divorced Mary’s mother, Catherine of Aragon, and had Elizabeth’s mother, Anne Boleyn, beheaded. The rivalry between the two mothers, each determined to hold onto their crown and defend their child, set the stage for a legacy of mistrust between the daughters, who were as different in temperament as any sisters could be.

The eldest by seventeen years, Mary went from an adored childhood to a horrifying adolescence in which she saw her beloved mother supplanted by another. Humiliated and relegated to the status of a servant in her baby sister Elizabeth’s household, the scars of Mary’s teenage years can’t be underestimated.

Elizabeth, on the other hand, was barely three when her mother died and she was made illegitimate. A famous quip from this time is attributed to her when informed of her new status: “How is that yesterday I was Princess Elizabeth and today only Lady Elizabeth?” Young as she was, Elizabeth had a keen grasp of her situation. She grew into womanhood surrounded by danger and became adept at the rules of survival, aware that one misstep could lead to her doom, her mother’s example always before her.

Both sisters understood the perils intrinsic to royal life, but while Elizabeth learned to play the cards dealt to her, Mary remained steadfast in her right to stand above the crowd. They both had courage but their experiences couldn’t have been more disparate. Elizabeth was born into, and raised, in the Protestant Faith; like their brother Edward, she embraced it. Mary resisted, both from a deep-seated belief inculcated in her as by the rigidity of her own character, which was not given to change even when circumstances called for it. In the end, whatever rapprochement the sisters found as outsiders uncertain of their place, denigrated into savage rivalry when Mary became queen against all odds and they found themselves pitted against each other.

Mary could not forgive the insults tendered to her by Anne Boleyn and in time, she came to see Elizabeth as the very incarnation of her late mother. In turn, Elizabeth began to recognize the stony threat that Mary’s hatred posed to her and her fragile position as the sole hope for the Protestant cause in England. Their pasts had made them who they were; and their struggle for supremacy would divide the country, sisters and rivals unto death.

This rivalry is the core of my new novel, THE TUDOR CONSPIRACY. Thank you for spending this time with me. To find out more about me and my books, please visit me at: www.cwgortner.com

Tour Details

Link to Tour Schedule: http://hfvirtualbooktours.com/thetudorconspiracyvirtualtour/
Twitter Hashtag: #TudorConspiracyTour
CW Gortner's website.

CW Gortner on Facebook

CW Gortner on Twitter.

About the book

Hunted by a shadowy foe in Bloody Mary’s court, Brendan Prescott plunges into London’s treacherous underworld to unravel a dark conspiracy that could make Elizabeth queen—or send her to her death in C.W. Gortner's The Tudor Conspiracy

England, 1553: Harsh winter encroaches upon the realm. Mary Tudor has become queen to popular acclaim and her enemies are imprisoned in the Tower. But when she’s betrothed to Philip, Catholic prince of Spain, putting her Protestant subjects in peril, rumors of a plot to depose her swirl around the one person whom many consider to be England’s heir and only hope—the queen’s half-sister, Princess Elizabeth.

Haunted by his past, Brendan Prescott lives far from the intrigues of court. But his time of refuge comes to an end when his foe and mentor, the spymaster Cecil, brings him disquieting news that sends him on a dangerous mission. Elizabeth is held captive at court, the target of the Spanish ambassador, who seeks her demise. Obliged to return to the palace where he almost lost his life, Brendan finds himself working as a double-agent for Queen Mary herself, who orders Brendan to secure proof that will be his cherished Elizabeth’s undoing.

Plunged into a deadly game of cat-and-mouse with a mysterious opponent who hides a terrifying secret, Brendan races against time to retrieve a cache of the princess’s private letters, even as he begins to realize that in this dark world of betrayal and deceit, where power is supreme and sister can turn against sister, nothing—and no one—is what it seems.

Historical Fiction Reading Challenge August Reviews

July was another great month in the challenge with more than 110 reviews linked up which means that we already have nearly 900 reviews connected up for the challenge so far this year! Wow! What an awesome effort from all of the challenge participants! If we keep this up we will have more than 1500 reviews for the year!

If you haven't already signed up, it's not too late! The sign up post is here.

Just to recap what participants need to know. At the beginning of each month we will put up a post which will have a Mr Linky embedded into it for you to add your link.

Please remember...

• Add the link(s) of your review(s) including your name and book title to the Mister Linky we’ll be adding to our monthly post (please, do not add your blog link, but the correct address that will guide us directly to your review). A direct link to your Goodreads review is also acceptable 
• any kind of historical fiction is accepted (fantasy, young adult, graphic novels...) 
• if you have time, have a look some of the other links that are present. You never know when you will discover new blogs or books! 

Please leave your links for your August reviews in Mr. Linky below or if you don't have a blog, in the comments below

*Note: if you missed posting your links last month, please always post "late" links in the current month's Mr. Linky. For example, if you forgot to post a link in June, please post it on this Mr. Linky in this post.

Thursday Threads - Inspired by Fiction?

The County library service has for the last few years selected a "Summer Read".

This year, the book of choice is The Light Between Oceans by M. L. Stedman.

When I was at the book group a week or so ago, I was handed a copy in response to my reservation.

I started the book a day or so ago and love it. I can see why it has had some great reviews and one will be published here soon.

Within a few pages I had to remind myself to look a few things up on Google, and so my question this week is...

Do you find yourself inspired by fictional reading?