Tag: Laurie Alice Eakes


Mar
2025

A Suitable Match, Serial Story Section 1 and a Chance to Win

categories: A Suitable Match, Contests

MatchCoverTo kick off our second year of celebrating Inspirational Regency fiction, we are presenting the serial story, A Suitable Match. At the end of the month we’ll be giving away a fabulous prize package filled with items tied to the story. For a chance to win, find the item mentioned in this section and leave a note in the comments. Details and a list of prizes can be found here. 

Somerset, England
April, 1818

With his black hair drawn back in an old-fashioned queue and a scar running from his ear to his chin, as though someone had tried to slit his throat and missed, all her prodigal cousin needed was a cutlass swinging from his belt to complete the impression that Ross Ainsworth was really a pirate. Then again, Miss Cressida Blackstone decided, with his eyes as black as obsidian and possessing a gaze as penetrating as tempered steel, he didn’t need a cutlass to skewer his prey.

A shiver racing up her spine and out to her fingertips despite the mild April morning, Cressida narrowed her eyes at her childhood nemesis and swallowed so her voice would not croak with the dryness of her throat. “What are you doing here? I was told your grandmother’s coachman would arrive to drive me to London.”

“He cannot drive with a broken wrist. But since I enjoy driving and am headed to London, I assured him I would do the honors.” The smooth, aristocratic drawl issuing from a man with Ainsworth’s piratical visage never failed to startle Cressida.

Since he arrived in Bath for the reading of his grandmother’s will three months ago, a great deal about Ainsworth surprised her—surprised her and raised her suspicion hackles. They had been best friends as children. Then, when she grew old enough to let her hems down and put her hair up, he grew formal and distant with her and departed for foreign parts soon afterward.

He had returned to England in time for the reading of his grandmother’s will–the will that left him with nothing and Cressida, her great-niece everything. The only stipulation was that Cressida must marry within six months. And now Ross Ainsworth was anything but formal and distant with her. No doubt he was attracted to the money, like all the gentlemen who had courted her upon her come-out at eighteen, wanting to wed her for her father’s fortune regardless of the fact that fortune came from trade.

Money made up for a number of flaws in one’s birth if an old family needed an infusion of wealth.

Target for fortune hunters or not, Cressida needed to find a husband. With wealth at her fingertips, she was not about to live her life in the poverty in which her father’s error had left her. In a way, she, too, was marrying for money. Marrying for love was a childhood dream left behind with a broken betrothal, a damaged reputation, and no childhood friend to tease her out of her doldrums.

That childhood friend, Ross, now looked about him as if puzzled. “But I expected you to have a chaperone.”

Cressida flicked a glance at her middle-aged maid standing purse-lipped beside her on the steps of the cottage they had called home for three years. “Knighting is quite enough of a chaperone until we reach London.”

“Not when you are traveling with your cousin distant enough to make me eligible,” He purred, his dark eyes raking over her.

Cressida refused to be intimidated.“Why, Ross, I never knew you were such a high stickler.” She clutched her bulging reticule in one hand and her great-aunt’s jewel case in the other, and headed for the carriage. “Enough of this. We must be on our way.”

Ainsworth threw up an arm to bar her way. “My dear cousin, I would not wish to place you beyond the pale of respectability before you reach town.” He smiled. “Further beyond the pale than you already placed yourself, that is.”

“You.” Cressida ground her teeth. “You are scarcely one to be bringing up the past, Ross Ainsworth.”

Which wasn’t fair to him. He said he had repented of his behavior in Paris after Napoleon’s defeat. His grandmother must not have forgiven him for embarrassing her, though. But if he had truly set aside his scandalous behavior, she should be a lot kinder to him.

She held out her hand to him. “I am sorry. I should not have–”

Muttering something that sounded like, “You may walk to London for all I care,” he spun on his booted heel and stalked to the front of the carriage.

Her apology rejected, Cressida waited until he had climbed onto the box before she called out, “Cousin, you cannot take the coach and team without my permission. They belong to me now.”

He looked at her, and lightning flashed through his dark eyes. “Very well then. Get in. “You win. . .this time.”

Another one of those odd shivers raced along Cressida’s limbs, and she stood rooted to the flagstones with the scent of apple blossoms too strong in her nostrils and her mouth tasting of a copper penny. An invisible hand seemed to pluck at her, trying to draw her back to the haven of the cottage.

“I’ll get the steps down for you, Miss Blackstone.” Knighting’s quiet voice, roughened from a bad cold, snapped Cressida out of her momentary stupor.

“Let me help with the bandboxes since my cousin has not the courtesy to do so.” She set her jewel case inside the coach, then returned to the steps to retrieve one of the small cases that made up her luggage.

She must buy new clothes in London. She must purchase a number of things in London—like a husband if she wanted to keep her inheritance.

A face flashed through her mind, as she tossed boxes into the boot, the visage of the man her deceased father had thought his trade-earned wealth could buy. It would have been a suitable match all around, if Papa had not lost most of his money. Tristram, Lord Chard, needed her money at the time, and Cressida. . . Her heart had needed him.

She shook off the memory and settled herself in the carriage, preparing for a long, tedious journey with her quiet maid and her embroidery. She half expected Ainsworth to refuse to drive the vehicle, but once Knighting closed the door, the carriage lurched forward, then pulled out of the lane and onto the Bath to London road.

It was the best maintained road in England, thanks to the tolls. Ainsworth, however, drove so swiftly the coach swayed and bounced too much for Cressida to ply her needle without pricking her fingers. Nor could she read. Knighting engaged in a brief dialogue about how many gowns Cressida must order for her husband-hunting expedition, then fell asleep deeply enough for her snores to fill the coach. At their infrequent stops to change horses or collect some refreshment, Ainsworth did not speak to her at all.

As twilight drew near, Cressida tried to rest after weeks of sleeplessness. Each time she drifted toward sleep, Knighting’s snorting exhalations startled her awake. When she reclosed her eyes, Chard’s face swooped before her eyes, with its hurt accusation solidifying into anger when she broke their betrothal three years ago.

Then another face joined his, the cold contempt of his friend Miles, Lord Twiford. He had always been against her marriage to Chard, thinking the daughter of a cit was not good enough for a viscount.

A crack like a snapped tree branch resounded through the carriage. The vehicle pitched to one side, sending Cressida slamming to her knees. Pain shot up her thighs, through her body, and into her skull. She gasped and grappled for a handhold. Her fingers scored silky velvet, and she fell against the wall of the carriage. Knighting sprawled across her calves, pinning her in place.

That stupid knock-in-the-cradle of a cousin had landed them in a ditch. And her precious vial of violet scent had broken, soaking through her reticule and clouding the carriage with a choking haze of perfume.

“I. Am. Going. To. Kill. You.” Cressida gasped out each word. “If. I. Ever. Get. Out.”

And, of course, if Ainsworth had not fallen from the box and injured himself beyond repair.

Outside, the horses whinnied, and a number of male voices shouted. Inside, Knighting groaned.

“Are you all right?” Cressida asked her maid in a more temperate tone.

“Yes, ma’am, but I seem to be stuck.”

Not as stuck as Cressida. Her legs were going numb. Her left arm was already numb. And the carriage rocked and tilted further, threatening to turn turtle at any moment. Or worse, it could keep rolling and land them in the River Kennet.

Cressida could not swim. She doubted Knighting could swim. She doubted they could get out of the carriage before they drowned even if swimming were an option.

“Knighting, I apologize if I hurt you, but I must get us out of here.”

Since the men outside seemed more interested in shouting than being useful, Cressida rallied her strength and grasped one of the hand straps dangling from the canted roof above her. With supreme effort, she hauled one leg from under her maid. The leg felt like a wooden peg for all the sensation she experienced. She stomped her foot to bring back some life to the limb, and her heel smashed through the window.

The shouting outside ceased. The carriage door yanked open hard enough to send it crashing against the side and the vehicle tilting another five degrees down the embankment.

“No one told us there were passengers inside.”

The voice sent Cressida’s heart dropping through her stomach and onto an icy bath in the river. Head reeling, she brushed amber curls out of her eyes and stared into the countenance she had feared never to see again, and hoped she would encounter so she could prove him wrong about her.

* Section 1 written by Laurie Alice Eakes, www.LaurieAliceEakes.com *

Did you find the hidden item? Note it in the comments below for a chance to win. 

Don’t forget that the readers will ultimately choose who truly loves Cressida, and whom she loves in return. Already have a favorite? Go vote for him! Want everyone else to vote for him too? Grab a voting badge from the Suitable Match Extras page. 

Who do you think Cressida sees outside the carriage? Read the next installment now. 

THE CONTEST AND POLL ARE NOW CLOSED. Feel free to continue to enjoy and share the story.

Originally posted 2013-02-06 10:00:00.


Mar
2025

How Else to Entertain a Houseguest

categories: A Day in the Life, Education, entertainment, History, Uncategorized

Laurie Alice here: While working on my next Regency, (Zondervan Books, 2014), I ran into a problem—I needed to entertain a houseguest who is in mourning and who is also. . . We’ll be kind and call her distraught rather than whiny. Since I didn’t want them to play card games commonly associated with gambling, such as silver loo or whist, and this lady is not bright enough to play chess, I went to the well of information that is The Beau Monde ladies, the Regency special interest chapter of Romance Writers of America. As usual, they gave me enough information to keep my guest entertained for weeks; therefore, I thought I would share a few of them with you all.

Let’s start with Spillikins.

From Wikipedia (Jeu de mikado photo)

This is a game that is still played today. Sticks of varying shapes and sizes are held upright, then allowed to fall into a random pile. The object of the game is to collect as many sticks as you can without disturbing any of the other sticks. I remember playing something similar to this as a child called “Ker plunk”—or something like that.

Another game that reminds me a little of a favorite childhood game was, A Journey Through Europe, or The Play of Geography. The idea was a race through Europe, reaching the goal first. Players moved their game pieces along a map of Europe according to the toss of a dice. Sound a little like The Game of Life?

Other games included first having to put together what we would now call a jigsaw puzzle which resulted in a board game of some kind. These games—and others—were stored in slip cases for easy storage or taking on long road trips.

So now I need to figure out how I can get the heroine and hero playing one of these games. Or maybe that will wait for another book in this series. All I know is that knowing more about the games of the time makes for far more interesting evenings in the country houses in which I like to place my characters, than the standards of playing cards, chess, or music.

Originally posted 2013-01-21 05:00:00.


Feb
2025

The Mysterious Ms. Darcy

categories: Education, Female authors Regency period, History, Regency Romance, Uncategorized

My first Regency was Charity Girl by Georgette Heyer and got me interested in the Regency time period. The book that really hooked me on the Regency romance, however, was Georgina by Clare Darcy.

Georgina has all the wonderful elements of a romance that absolutely delight me—delight me to the point that I think I have followed a little in her footsteps in my own romances—books that is, not life—a heroine being courted by just the right sort of gentleman when her heart demands she go after the exactly wrong gentleman. Ah, be still my beating heart for Shannon, a disreputable landowner with mystery and rumors swirling around him. Though I knew I would regret doing so in the morning, I stayed up late to finish this story and was delighted and saddened at the end—delighted with the outcome and saddened that the book was over.

Over the next several years, I read every Clare Darcy book I could find. These were what we now call traditional Regencies. Traditional Regencies are those in the true spirit of Georgette Heyer—comedies of manners with no sensuality other than a few subtle comments and maybe a kiss or two, no foul language, and generally appropriate for young women all the way up to old ladies.

All of Ms. Darcy’s books were named for the heroine, except for one named for two females, one I just learned of today, as I did some research on this post. They ranged from countryside frolics, to country house romps, to balls and adventures. The heroines usually had minds of their own without being anachronistic or too much alike, as far as I remember, and the heroes varied in temperament and social position, though all were at least gentry class.

When I started looking at writing Regencies myself, I asked a few people about Ms. Darcy. Who, exactly, was she and why didn’t she gain more acclaim in the genre? I discovered that Ms. Darcy was highly respected amongst true Regency devotees, but her person was  pretty much unknown. Some even hinted she might be a he.

According to Wikipedia now, ten years later, Ms. Darcy was an author from Ohio named Mary Deasy (1914-1978). Her papers are in the Boston University research library. This is the most information I’ve been able to find out about this author who, like Ms. Heyer, died before ever I read one of her books. Also like Ms. Heyer, Ms. Darcy was a powerful influence on me becoming a Regency writer.

If you haven’t yet picked up Georgina, Eugenia, Lydia, Cressida, Lady Pamela, or any of the other delightful books by Ms. Darcy, you are in for a treat when you do.

Originally posted 2013-01-11 05:00:00.


Feb
2025

Trial by Combat

categories: Government, History, Uncategorized

Trial by Combat

Or the Changing Face of Justice

 “Those woods are mine and mine alone for hunting.”

“I am afraid, sir, that you are mistaken. Thos woods belong to my family and have been for six hundred years.”

“The deed to the land says otherwise.”

“My sword says more otherwise than the deed.”

“En guard!”

With clashing swords and combat to first blood or death, trial by combat, whether criminal or civil, was not an uncommon way to settle disputes in England in the Middle Ages. In fact, the issue arose in 1818 when someone demanded to settle a dispute in such a manner.

“Are you saying that is still on the books?” One can hear the authorities exclaim. “But we are civilized now. We have a different system.”

Yes, indeed, it was still on the books, though hadn’t been used for hundreds of years.

By the Regency, England’s courts had evolved from the days of trial by ordeal or combat or simple pronouncements from on high. They had become a complex and loosely jointed system of magistrates, justices of the peace, and circuit judges for the assizes.

How the system evolved from the days of Anglo-Saxon rule until the Regency is a complex system on which entire books have been written. This is a brief description of the duties of the men who handled around ninety-five per cent of England’s criminal cases during our time period. It changed again in 1830, and then again in 1971, and we don’t need to fret about those because this is its own era.

Who were justices of the peace and magistrates? They were usually gentlemen who sat in the various offices in London, hearing criminal trials brought to them from various sources. Coroners for murder, for example. Bow Street is the most famous of these offices, and possibly the most famous of the Bow Street magistrates is Sir John Fielding, brother to the eighteenth century author and also a Bow Street magistrate.

Fielding, Sir John, was called the Blind Beak of Bow Street. A “beak” in street cant, was a respected man. Sir John was blinded serving in the royal Navy, but legend has it that he recognized the voices of 3,000 criminals.

Outside of London, we had justices of the peace. These were gentlemen, but not peers. If a peer was a justice of the peace before gaining a peerage, he could keep the post, and peers did not take on the role. JPs performed the same duties of hearing cases as did magistrates. They were simply outside of London. Both sent serious criminal cases up the chain to higher judges.

On a side note here, neither magistrates nor justices of the peace could perform weddings at this time. That fell solely under the jurisdiction of the Church of England.

Outside of London, circuit judges traveled around the country and held trials at the assizes. Assizes occurred twice a year. That meant an innocent man accused of murder could languish in prison for up to six months until the next meeting of the assizes.

Inside London, serious crimes such as murder were heard by the Court of the King’s Bench.

Sadly, corruption, taking of bribes, and other forms of misconduct by judges was not uncommon. In some eras, though I haven’t found much evidence of it during the Regency, judges were removed and even sentenced to death for corrupt practices.

Regardless of these slips into sin, a trial before a judge and jury proved far more effective than trial by combat or ordeal.

Originally posted 2012-11-30 10:00:00.


Feb
2025

Interview with Cheryl Bolen

categories: Author Interview, New Release, Regency Romance, Uncategorized

Laurie Allice Eakes (LA) invites you into an Interview with Cheryl Bolen (CB), author of Marriage of Inconvenience from Love Inspired Historical.

Cheryl Bolen, author of Marriage of Inconvenience

LA: What drew you to write about the Regency Time Period?

CB: My World War II book—the fourth complete book I’d written but not found a publishing home for—won a lot of contests, but publishers kept saying it didn’t fit into a genre. The final editor judge in one contest told me if I wrote a historical romance that took place before 1900 she would like to look at it. The only period I liked was the Regency England Georgette Heyer had introduced me to. I hadn’t read many of the contemporary writers of Regency because I found some of them not understanding the era as well as I thought I did. That’s when I had a light bulb moment. I can write that! I began A DUKE DECEIVED, and months later that senior editor at Harlequin Historical bought it.

LA: Tell us what year your book is set in and why you chose that particular time.

CB: My newest release is set sometime after Waterloo but before 1820. I actually picked that time because it was a continuation of a series that began earlier and which locked me into a particular time. (The first books in the series, however, were written for a secular publisher, but readers had been clamoring for me to tell this proper miss’s tale.)

LA: What’s your favorite, unique Regency aspect of the novel, something you wouldn’t be able to include in a novel set in another place or time?

CB: Definitely the clothes—both men’s and women’s. Love the elegant, feminine lines of women’s but especially love that the men wore knee breeches, neckcloths—and unlike men later in the century, they were clean shaven!

LA: What are the biggest challenges to writing in the Regency Period?

CB: Some vocabulary is peculiar to the Regency, and you want to use it in a context that won’t confuse readers.

LA: Why did you choose to write Regencies for Love Inspired?

CB: I was honored that the senior editor of Love Inspired Historical came to me and asked me to write for her. I was thrilled because I’d developed a love of inspirational romances. Deeanne Gist is a friend of mine, and I love her award-winning books.
LA: What is your favorite Regency Food, aspect of dress, and/or expression?

CB: I don’t get into food a lot in my books because I don’t think modern readers would like to read about the excessive gluttony of the period! I love the wonderful formality and manners of the upper classes in their speech of the period. I really don’t like it when I read a book where an earl says, “Call me John.” This simply wasn’t done. Ladies were always Miss Lastname even to their closest friends.
LA: What is your favorite Regency setting; e.g., London, country house, small village?

CB: For my own books, I like a mix of the two. I’ve been to London many times and like to describe it as I believe it looked in the Regency, but there’s nothing like those grand country estates, and I like my readers to get a taste for that, too.
LA: What makes your hero and heroine uniquely Regency?

CB: In my newest book, the hero is in Parliament, and it plays a particular role in my book. They both favored reforms to benefit the lower classes.

LA: Tell us about your book.

CB: It’s actually sort of funny that in the same month I’ve got two new releases, and both of them are G-rated. As an ebook only, I’ve got CHRISTMAS BRIDES: 3 REGENCY NOVELLAS.

Marriage of Inconvenience, Love Inspired Historical: Proposing to the Earl of Aynsley seems a sensible—if unconventional—solution to Miss Rebecca Peabody’s predicament. As a married woman, she will be free to keep writing her essays on civil reform. Meanwhile, the distinguished widower will gain a stepmother for his seven children and a caretaker for his vast estate.

But the earl wants more than a convenient bride. He craves a true partner, a woman he can cherish. To his surprise, the bookish Miss Peabody appears to have every quality he desires…except the willingness to trust her new husband. Yet despite his family’s interference, and her steadfast independence, time and faith could make theirs a true marriage of hearts.

Cheryl Bolen’s Bio: A former journalist who admits to a fascination with dead Englishwomen, Cheryl is a regular contributor to The Regency Plume, The Regency Reader, and The Quizzing Glass. Many of her articles can found on her website, www.CherylBolen.com, and more recent ones on her blog, www.CherylsRegencyRamblings.wordpress.com. Readers are welcomed at both places.

Cheryl holds a dual degree in English and journalism from the University of Texas, and she earned a master’s degree from the University of Houston. She and her professor husband are the parents of two sons, one who is an attorney, and the other a journalist. Her favorite things to do are watching the Longhorns, reading letters and diaries of Georgian Englishmen, and traveling to England.

Originally posted 2012-11-07 06:00:00.


Feb
2025

Get to Know Our Own Laurie Alice Eakes (And win that gift basket!)

categories: Author Interview, Contests

If you’ve been reading Regency Reflections for a while then you already know a lot about Laurie Alice Eakes. Today I’m chatting with Laurie Alice to learn a little bit more about what she thinks about Regency England and her new book, Flight of Fancy.

Be sure to check out the trivia question at the end of the post for another chance to win that amazing gift basket!

Laurie Alice EakesIf you were to travel back in time to Regency England, what do you think would be your favorite part?

Hmm. About a dozen flitted through my mind here, from hot chocolate brought to my bedroom before I got up in the morning, to gentlemen being gentlemen, which sounds sexist to our contemporary views, and still seems appealing.

What would you miss the most?

Cleanliness. No question about that. We gloss over it in our books, and, in truth, things weren’t terribly clean back then, not by our standards.

Ballooning is a large part of your new book, Flight of Fancy. Did you have the opportunity to go up in a balloon while you were researching it?

Unfortunately no, and I interviewed many people who have. It’s still something I intend to do.

What’s your favorite, unique Regency aspect of the novel, something you wouldn’t be able to include in a novel set in another place or time?

The Luddites are so uniquely Regency. They symbolize the stirrings of the consequences of mechanization and the burgeoning Industrial Revolution. The Luddite rebellion signifies how the world was beginning to change, one of the things about the Regency that endlessly holds my fascination. Although other riots occurred over other industrial innovations, the Luddite rebellion is unique, as men and women struggled against losing their way of life to a massive degree, to the extent soldiers had to be called in, and both rebels and soldiers died.

Flight Of FancyYou include a lot of historic events in your novels. Do you enjoy the research? How much time do you spend researching versus writing?

I’d say the time is equal. I knew little about ballooning or the Luddites before starting this book, so had to read a lot of books and original documents to get a true sense of both aspects.

Do you share any personality traits with your heroine in Flight of Fancy?

I’m not as nerdy—or as smart—as she is, and I can be a bit nerdy, esp. over history. And then there are the aspects of forgiveness, self-forgiveness that is, and inner healing with which she has to cope, that I related to sometimes so much it was painful to write.

What makes your hero different from other great gentlemen you’ve written before?

He has a few aspects that are different such as his closeness to his mother, and his own interests and skills with mechanical devices. I’ve also never written a story where the hero and heroine have had a long-standing relationship before the book begins, one that makes things worse between them than better.

What was your favorite aspect of writing Flight of Fancy?

Getting these two to grow up not only in maturity about relationships, but also in their relationship with the Lord. They were particularly aged walnuts with shells terribly difficult to crack, so I had to torture them both a great deal, break them so I could show them healing. Like a limb that was broken before and wrongly set, the Lord has to break some of us to get us to healing.

 

Now it’s your turn! Answer the following question in the comments for a chance to win a Flight of Fancy gift basket. See details here. And don’t forget to check out Monday’s post to learn more about balloons and two additional chances to win the basket.

Trivia Question #4:

In A Flight of Fancy, Cassandra Bainbridge is the oldest unmarried daughter of a baron. How should she be addressed?

A: Lady Cassandra
B: Lady Bainbridge
C: Miss Cassandra
D: Miss Bainbridge

 

This contest is now closed. Please see the final post for answers to the trivia questions. 

Originally posted 2012-10-10 10:00:00.


Feb
2025

Taking to the Sky

categories: Education, History, Regency Romance, Uncategorized

To celebrate A Flight of Fancy, we’re running a special week-long contest. Starting October 5, 2012, through next Friday, October 12, we’ll feature Regency quiz questions at the end of each post. To enter the contest, you’ll need to correctly answer the questions in the comment section below. For every correct answer, your name will be added into the drawing for a Regency Food and Frolic gift basket. There will be five questions in all, which means your name can be entered up to five times (if you get all five questions right). The deadline to answer ALL CONTEST QUESTIONS will be Saturday, October 13 at midnight.

Photo on Scenic Reflections

A Flight of Fancy has a heroine who would be considered a nerd nowadays. For fun, she reads Greek and Hebrew, translates ancient documents into English, and executes mathematics. She regrets not being able to go to university, but since she cannot, she determines to make her mark on the world through creating a balloon one can steer.

Balloons could not be steered except per the caprices of the wind currents. These change at various heights of the atmosphere, so a balloonist had to raise and lower the gas—hydrogen—level in the balloon to affect their direction. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it did not. Usually it did not. Sails and paddles were employed in an attempt to create steerage to greater or lesser success—mostly lesser.

Considering one had to go aloft with live fire to create the hydrogen, and the car or basket was not all that large, limiting the quantity of fuel, long journeys in a balloon without touching down were simply not possible. Decades later, Jules Verne’s book, Around the World in 80 Days, was considered fantasy. It was the science fiction of its day. (He is, of course, the founder of steam punk, a steam punk author told me.) But I digress.

How grand getting from London to Lisbon, sailing over the heads of the French enemy, sailing high enough to be out of range of their guns, would be! Much safer from the enemy than taking a ship.

Unfortunately, steering was the first problem with long-range travel, and having enough fuel to keep gas in the balloon was another problem.

It doesn’t mean people did not attempt, and come close, to sailing long distances. Sophie Blanchard, a famous French balloonist, sailed across the Alps. No problem. Balloons could go extremely high; therefore, getting over the mountains was not a problem for her. She was also not sailing over enemy territory, being French.

During the Regency, Mr. Sattler decided to fly from Ireland, across the Irish Sea, and to England. He did so with great success. Several times, he had to raise and lower his level to catch favorable currents, but the coast of Cumberland drew into his sites.

So he decided to go down to Liverpool, and that’s when he ran into trouble. He caught a strong current. The waxed canvas tubing that carried the hydrogen from the beaker of acid and iron shavings, to the balloon, began to tear away from the balloon, causing him to lose altitude at an alarming rate.

Mind you, he reports that he was around three miles in the sky. Plunging from that height would have been rather frightening, not to say deadly.

With great risk to life and limb, he managed to affect repairs while poised above a live fire and that beaker of acid and iron shavings to make the hydrogen. I won’t say how because I use this incident for the basis of an important scene in A Flight of Fancy.

Mr. Sattler ended up in the sea near Liverpool. A flock of sea birds attacked him for the food he had carried with him, and several ships sailed past him. Eventually, as night fell, a naval vessel stopped and picked him up.

That Lord Whittaker is against Cassandra going aloft in a balloon makes a great deal of sense. Men and women, including Sophie Blanchard, died because of their fascination with taking to the sky in a balloon. Cassandra, however, is like thousands of men and women throughout history, who risked their fortunes and their lives to bring us new inventions and scientific discoveries—she will not let the danger stop her from trying to improve balloon flight and make it a practical form of transportation.

For more details on how balloonists made hydrogen and why they went aloft with a live fire, read my article at: http://englishhistoryauthors.blogspot.com/

Today’s questions:

1: How did aeronauts steer a balloon?

A: They used sails.

B: They used paddles.

C: They used wind currents.

D: They used the balloon itself.

 2: Which of the following was not used to make hydrogen for the balloon.

A: Fire

B: Acid

C: Wax

D: Iron

This contest is now closed. Please see the final post for answers to the trivia questions. 

Originally posted 2012-10-08 06:00:00.


Feb
2025

More Than Conquerors

categories: Devotion, Personal Stories

“No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.”

Romans 8:37 NIV

A few months ago, a friend betrayed me. The pain slashed shockingly deep into my soul. Never had I imagined that she would take the step she took. Every time I see her name now, I want to cry for the loss of a friendship that was important to me and, I thought, her too.

A few days ago while at a conference, someone was shockingly rude to me on an elevator. She was a stranger to me, and still her  behavior hurt me. Just this morning, when telling my husband about it, the mortification from her words cut into my heart.

My human reaction is to lash back, hurt the other person as I was hurt. How dare this person treat me like this? I want to fight.

Yet I need say nothing, take no action. The fight is already won. Romans 8:38-39 tell us that nothing—NOTHING!—can separate us from the love of God. That means that no matter how rude someone is to us, no matter how many people betray us or snub us or treat us like we are less important than we think we are, We are bonded to the Lord through His great love.

We are more than conquerors. In our hearts, through the one who loved us so much He died for us, we are greater than those who seek to destroy us.

Romans 8:37 has become my life verse because I need this reminder when my humanness wants to lash back at those who hurt me. I don’t need to because Jesus has already paid the price and made me more than a conqueror over the sins of the world that strive to separate me from His love.

Originally posted 2012-09-28 10:00:00.


Jan
2025

Bride Cakes

categories: Uncategorized

The multi-tiered extravaganzas with frosting flowers and sometimes fanciful designs we now associate with wedding cakes are a Victorian invention, as are most of our modern wedding customs. That does not mean, however, that wedding cakes did not exist before Victoria and Albert’s 300 pound confection.

Cake at a wedding dates back at least to Roman times when a cake of wheat or barley was partially eaten by the groom, then broken over the bride’s head, followed by the crumbs being tossed into the crowd. This represented prosperity and fertility and good fortune.

In various forms, the custom continued through the middle ages and into our time of the Regency. Some evolutions took place along the way. Wheat poured onto the bride’s head replaced the cake breaking, though some evidence reports that an oat cake was broken over the bride’s head in Scottish weddings well into the nineteenth century.

In the Regency, bride cakes ranged from what sounds like what we recognize as fruit cake such as those passed around at Christmas, though much, much larger, to flour cakes stacked and held together with icing.

Stacking cakes was a more modern form of the “stack” a pile of wheat rolls piled high to represent prosperity over which the bride and groom kissed. Cakes replaced the rolls, but piling them together created the problem of keeping them piled, making sure they did not crumble away, and keeping them from going stale. Frosting them together seemed like a natural way to solve this problem.

Not too long before the Regency, bride pies became the custom. This was a savory, not a sweet pie. A glass ring was baked into this pastry, and the lady who received the piece with the ring was sure to wed within the next year, rather like the ring in a Christmas pudding.

Many cake customs had not died by the Regency. One that seems to have survived was the cutting the cake into small pieces to distribute through the guests. Young women took their pieces home to lay beneath their pillow. They thought this would help them dream of the men they would marry. Other brides carried this further and the piece of cake had to be drawn through the wedding ring as many as nine times before it would reveal the recipient’s future spouse.

Here is a recipe for bride cake from an 1818 housekeeping book by Elizabeth Raffald.
(Note: I have changed the s that look like f to a modern s for ease of reading.)

To make a Bride Cake.

TAKE four pounds of fine flour well dried, four pounds of fresh butter, two pounds of loaf sugar, pound and sift fine a quarter of an ounce of mace, the same of nutmegs, to every pound of flour put eight eggs* wash four pounds of currants, pick them well, and dry them before the fire, blanch a pound of sweet almonds, and cut them lengthways very thin, a pound of citron, one pound of candied orange, the same of candied lemon, half a pint of brandy: first work the butter with your hand to a cream, then beat in yeur sugar a quarter of an hour, beat the whites of your eggs to a very strong froth, mix them with your sugar and butter, beat your yolks half an hour at least, and mix them with your cake, then put in your flour, mace’, and nutmeg, keep beating it well till your oven is ready, put in your brandy, and beat your currants and almonds lightly in, tie three meets of paper round the bottom of your hoop to keep it from running out, rub it well with butter, put in your cake and lay your sweetmeats in three lays, with cake betwixt every lay, after it is risen and coloured, cover it with paper before your oven is slopped *ip: it will take three hour* bakings

To make Almond-Icing for the Bride Cake.

BEAT the-whites of three eggs to a strong froth, beat a pound of Jordan almonds very fine with rose water, mix your almonds with the eggs lightly together, a pound of common loaf sugar beat fine, and put in by degrees; when your cake is enough, take it out, and lay your icing on, then put it into brown.

To make Sugar-Icing for the Bride Cake.

BEAT two pounds of double refined sugar with two ounces of fine starch, sift it through a gauze sieve, then beat the whites of five eggs with a knife upon a pewter dish half an hour; beat in your sugar a little at a time, or it will make the eggs fall, and will not be so good a colour, when you have put in all your sugar, beat it half an hour longer, then lay it on your almond icing, and spread it even with a knife ; if it be put on as soon as the cake comes out of the oven it will be hard by the time the cake is cold.

Originally posted 2012-08-13 12:04:09.


Jan
2025

Abasing Oneself in Society

categories: Dinner Party, Faith, History

 “For whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.” Luke 14:11 KJV

(Read Luke 14:7-11.)

This passage often comes to mind when writing about the Regency. The notion of sitting at the lowest place, of abasing oneself in society is an anathema to what we show amongst the peoples of the Regency. Getting the highest honors, marrying the highest ranked man or the richest heiress was what the world was all about, or at least what the world we portray was all about. And yet we write Christian Regencies, which means our characters must have a Christian world view while living in a society that insisted upon promoting one’s social standing and/or wealth—politely, of course. On the one hand, they are not supposed to raise themselves up if they are to be serious followers of Christ. On the other hand, they cannot move through the halls and balls of even the gentry without looking, acting, and simply being the best in an attempt to attract the best.

Rhubarb Restaurant in Edinburgh, Scotland allows you to dine regency style today. Seated here, even the lowest place at the table is grand.

As I write my characters, I struggle with this dichotomy for them. And then I think how apropos to today’s society are the struggles of my characters.

Nowadays, everything is about networking. To network, we need to promote and promote and then, for a change, promote some more. Get our names out there for the world to see, recognize, respond to, we’re told. Editors won’t buy books from authors who don’t already have a web presence, etc., etc., etc.

Networking Around the World

Hubris is the word that comes to mind. Extreme pride or arrogance. It’s practically de rigueur for a Regency hero to be that way. Yet how can we have an arrogant hero who is a Christian? How can we as Christians be prideful of our work enough to tell people they should select ours above all others?

I’d like to know the thoughts of others on this subject, as it is something with which I struggle for my characters of my books and within my own character. My conclusion is to put others first, uphold others, place them at the head of the table, and let God take care of the rest.

Originally posted 2012-05-25 10:00:18.