… Do you notice titles?
The was my Big Personal Revelation for the week. As my editor and I were wracking our brains over this latest title, it occured to me that I seldom notice titles on other peoples’ books. Oh, I remember the titles– most of the time– so that’s not the issue. It’s more that title has little effect on why I pick up or reject a new book, since I generally take for granted that the title will have little or nothing to do with the actual content of the book.
I think this is largely because the trend during my formative reading years was to have relatively nondescript titles that had little to do with the actual content of the book. My childhood shelves are packed with “Passion’s Burning Lust”, “Lust’s Burning Passion”, and “Burning Passion’s Lust” (ah, the joys of interchangeable title words). There were all those Amanda Quicks that began with S’s– although I can’t remember now what the actual titles were– and those eternally optimistic Judith McNaught titles, like “Something Wonderful”, “Paradise”, and “Perfect.” Even my mystery novels all sounded the same, with Copenhagen Connections and Camelot Capers running riot through the shelves. Covers were generally a safer guide than title.
I remember titles as a means of identification, but they’re seldom a selling point for me, even the really good titles, like “Through a Glass Darkly” or “I Capture the Castle”. I will admit to a susceptibility, though, not to titles as a whole, but to individual words in titles. Words like “castle”, “king” and “lord” tend to catch my attention (sense a theme?). I always feel very betrayed when these then turn out to be dystopian novels about dysfunctional families in the Bronx in the 1920’s, or something of that ilk.
Do titles have any effect on whether or not you pick up a book? And, if so, is it the title as a whole, or individual words within the title that get to you?
Like some books, some titles are easier than others. Pink V was a Problem Title. We went through a number of flowers and, yes, even wildlife (there was some talk of doves) before settling on the current title.
Henceforth, Pink V shall be… The Temptation of the Night Jasmine.
Huge thanks to everyone who helped out with flower suggestions. Keira, Jessica and Christina, that means you!
Earlier today, I wandered over to Julia Quinn’s website to take a peek at the excerpt of her new book, The Lost Duke of Wyndham. There is, as you may have guessed, a crusty dowager involved, one who, the narrator very quickly informs us, does not have a heart of gold.
This line caught my attention because I’d had a very similar revelation about the Dowager Duchess of Dovedale, reigning crusty dowager of the Pink books, while I was working on Pink V. Despite the dowager’s slighting comments about her granddaughter, Charlotte, in previous books, I had gone into Pink V fully expecting to discover that beneath the dowager’s demoniacal exterior lurked hidden springs of grandmotherly affection. After all, everyone knows that crusty dowagers in novels always have hearts of gold. It’s practically written in the warranty.
Nope.
That’s not to say that there isn’t some gold lurking beneath the Dowager Duchess of Dovedale’s tough carapace. To her credit, the dowager uncritically adores Charlotte’s scapegrace friend Penelope. In Book V, when Penelope gets herself into a spot of bother, it’s the dowager who comes stampeding to the rescue, bullying everyone into place on Penelope’s behalf. But the dowager duchess knows what she likes and she knows what she doesn’t like, and she just plain doesn’t like Charlotte.
Part of it is family history. Every time the dowager looks at Charlotte, the girl is a galling reminder of the marriage the dowager failed to prevent, a marriage between her only son and a mealy-mouthed little vicar’s daughter. The dowager is still gnashing her teeth over that one. It wasn’t just that she had a grand match planned for him (although that rankles, too)—it was that her only child dared to defy her. And was happy having done so. That she can never forgive. It doesn’t help that Charlotte looks like her mother’s people, small and fair.
Even so, had Charlotte been more like Penelope, the duchess would probably have taken her to her rather thorny bosom and enthusiastically coached her as a successor. But Charlotte is the dowager’s opposite in every possible way. Where the dowager is an old-fashioned dynast, Charlotte is a sentimentalist. The dowager reads Machiavelli; Charlotte reads Evelina. Having spent her life fighting, clawing, scheming for the advancement of the House of Dovedale, the dowager looks at Charlotte and sees the expiration of all her plots and plans, all wasted on a little chit who couldn’t say boo to a goose. The dowager takes Charlotte’s reserve for weakness, entirely missing the fact that Charlotte is, without making a ruckus about it, just as stubborn as her grandmother.
And perhaps, just perhaps, part of the problem is that the duchess is a born manager—and Charlotte won’t let herself be managed. Sometimes, hiding in a book can be a more effective (and irritating) means of rebellion than shouting back. In her own quiet way, Charlotte gives as good as she gets.
Perhaps we can say that the Dowager has a heart of… brass?
It is a truth universally acknowledged that when an author has a new book to write, other peoples’ books suddenly become much more attractive. In other words, I went on a Barnes & Nobles spree yesterday. I should be working on Book VI this weekend– but I have a feeling I’ll be reading these instead:
1. A Model Summer by Paulina Porizkova (about a young model on the loose in Paris in the 1980’s).
What I know about models and modeling wouldn’t fill a small thimble, and books written in the present tense usually make my teeth grit together in a painful and dentally disadvantageous way, but I happened to tag along after a friend to Porizkova’s reading last week. I was hooked by the time she finished reading the first excerpt. She has a gift for evocative metaphors, such as comparing the face of an aging model to “a 1950’s glamour shot that had been crumpled into a ball and smoothed out”.
2. The Courtesan’s Secret by Claudia Dain (marital shenanigans in the drawing rooms of London).
This is another case of felicitous happenstance. Yesterday, Dain appeared on History Hoydens to speak about her current book. Intrigued, I wandered over to the bookstore, flipped it open, and found this line: “Hawksworth, for all that could be said against him, had a most even and agreeable disposition. It was his finest trait. It may also have been his only trait.” Enough said. Since she also has a backlist of previous books, I see further bookstore trips in my future.
3. To Taste Temptation by Elizabeth Hoyt (Georgian romance).
This has been on my list to buy for a while, since I loved Elizabeth Hoyt’s previous series, The Raven Prince, et al. Perfect for a rainy weekend.
4. A Song for Summer by Eva Ibbotsen (a young girl’s coming of age in 1930’s Austria).
Ever since a friend gave me A Countess Below Stairs, I’ve been slowly doling out Ibbotsen books to myself, trying to make them last as long as possible. As early 20th century comedies of manners, they remind me a bit of Angela Thirkell, Nancy Mitford, and L.M. Montgomery, but they also have a lovely, deep strain of romance. Since this is my last unread Ibbotsen, I may continue to hoard it for a bit rather than reading it this weekend.
What are you reading this weekend?
Right after I posted the latest foreign covers of Pink Carnation and Black Tulip, a package arrived for me in the mail with the very first of the foreign editions of Emerald Ring– in Portuguese. So here it is! Looks rather familiar, doesn’t it? 
We have the winners to last month’s contest on the Contest page! Check back next month for a chance to win a copy of Crimson Rose.
The Pink Carnation– in book form– has been making inroads across the globe. Take a look at the Books page for editions of Pink Carnation and Black Tulip from Germany, Portugal, Spain, Holland, Russia, and Korea. Which foreign cover do you like best?
Hi all! I’m absolutely thrilled to announce a groundbreaking change in the Pink Carnation website– I can now post updates myself. I know this doesn’t sound like such a huge deal, but, being the complete techno-disaster that I am, up till now every single update had to go through my webmistress (a lady of immense talent and patience), which meant rather lengthy stretches between updates. It was a bit like writing letters before the days of the modern postal service; I would hoard all my news and save it up for one big post. But now that I have been unleashed upon the internet, I will be popping in at least once a week with practical news (like release dates), meanderings about the progress of the Pink novels, and all that sort of thing. Even more fun, there’s now a space for comments, so you can reply to whatever I post, right here on the site. I’m still getting the hang of all this, so please bear with me if the formatting and all that is a little bit wonky from time to time….
Hi, all! Sorry for the long delay between web updates. Between book tour and Book V (almost done but still untitled!), I’ve been off in authorial never never land. In short, there’s a lot to catch up on.
Crimson Rose has been named a Fresh Fiction Fresh Pick—huzzah! It also garnered a wonderful review from one of my favorite review sites, Dear Author. In honor of Crimson’s success so far, I’m hosting a new, Crimson-based contest on the Contest page.
Now that “Crimson Rose” is safely out on shelves, here’s the scoop on Book V. Many of you have asked me who the main characters will be in Book V. So here it is. The grand unveiling. Book V is about… Lady Charlotte Lansdowne, Henrietta’s best friend from Black Tulip.
On a bitter cold Christmas Eve, Charlotte’s long-lost cousin (okay, so he wasn’t lost, just misplaced), Robert, Duke of Dovedale returns from India just in time to join the house party at Girdings, the Dovedale estate. As a child, he was Charlotte’s favorite knight in shining armor. The intervening years have only served to render him more dashing. But, unbeknownst to Charlotte, Robert has an ulterior motive of his own for returning to England, a motive that has nothing to do with taking up the ducal mantle. As Charlotte returns to London to take up her post as Maid of Honor to Queen Charlotte, echoes from Robert’s past endanger not only their relationship but the very throne itself.
Over the course of Book V, both Robert and Charlotte find themselves entangled with the Hellfire Club and George III goes mad again. To find out how those events relate, you’re just going to have to wait for the book, but I have been blogging about the background research on History Hoydens. Check out the January archives for a post about Hellfire Clubs and February for musings on the madness of King George.
I’ll be posting title and release date as soon as I have them!
Finally, I’d like to thank everyone who took the time to come and see me on book tour! I very much appreciated it—and huge, huge hugs to the Shippensburg girls, who drove all the way from Pennsylvania to come to the reading in New Haven. You are the best.
It would take too long to do a full travelogue, but here are some of my favorite moments (and pictures) from my ramblings. I’ve also blogged about other aspects of the trip on AccessRomance.
I started off in Boston, where the lovely folks at the B&N gave me and my friends each a red rose to take home. Six of us (five girls and one guy) toddled happily off to dinner where the waitress kept giving us odd looks. Finally, around the time the main course arrived, she blurted out, “You’re on TV, aren’t you?” People have said many odd things to me in my time, but never have I been mistaken for a TV star. “Come on,” she persisted. “You can tell me. You’re on The Bachelor, aren’t you?” The penny finally dropped. Looking around, there we all were, five women with roses and one very confused bachelor. We gently explained that it was pure coincidence, but the waitress spent the rest of the dinner shooting us surreptitious glances and hunting for hidden cameras. A certain gentleman (or should we say bachelor?) of my acquaintance isn’t going to live that one down for a long, long time.
From Boston, I set off for San Francisco, where the plane nearly didn’t take off because someone had brought a snake on board. (No, really.) Having dodged the reptiles along the way, I finally made it to San Francisco, where my reward was getting to have dinner and chat about writing spy series with fellow author Tracy Grant. If you’re fans of Regency-set spy novels—and if you’re here, you probably are—I highly recommend “Beneath a Silent Moon” and “Secrets of a Lady”. I was green with envy for days after reading them, gnashing my teeth and wishing I had written them myself.
In Dallas, an old friend took me to find the Muse—
–before delivering me dinner with the wonderful women of the Dallas Fort Worth Tea Readers Group, and then on to my reading:
On departing Texas, I spent Valentine’s Day in Nashville sharing writing stories and quiche with Tasha Alexander and J.T. Ellison. My absolute favorite moment of that reading occurred when a member of the audience raised her hand to recommend Tasha’s A Poisoned Season—with no idea that the author was sitting right in front of her! A good time was had by all.
As of this month, I am officially a History Hoyden! This doesn’t refer to my behavior (it’s very hard to be a hoyden in a business suit), but to a very talented group of authors of historical fiction who were kind enough to let me join them on their blog, the History Hoydens. Come visit our happy hoyden home at http://historyhoydens.blogspot.com to get the inside scoop on research, writing, and why we spent most of our time in other centuries.
