May 29, 2018 by judeknight

Tea with Will and Henry

A sober young woman whose firm chin and intelligent blue eyes marked her as a twig of the remarkable Grenford family tree led William Landrum, the Earl of Chadbourn, through French doors in Her Grace’s sitting room and out into a sunny garden filled with the hum of bees and the scent of roses. He followed her down a stone path, around towering lilac bushes, into a sheltered bower paved in flagstones and bordered with flowers in lush profusion

He had known Eleanor Winshire since boyhood, and had come to count her a friend in spite of the difference in their ages. Her immediate response to his request for an interview pleased him. That she invited him so early in the day, hours before her formal calling hours, gratified him even more.

“The Earl of Chadbourn, Your Grace,” the young woman announced, bowing out. The earl hesitated. She wasn’t alone. A tall gentleman with silver hair and the upright bearing of an officer, but dressed in impeccable civilian clothing, chatted happily with the duchess, sobering when the earl interrupted their tête-à-tête.

The topic that weighed on his mind involved family secrets and deeply personal worries. He didn’t know Brigadier-General Lord Henry Redepenning well, not as he knew the duchess. Will hesitated.

“Will! I’m delighted you could join us. Come and try some of the cook’s berry tarts. He has outdone himself.”

The Haverford chef enjoyed renown for good reasons. Will sat and helped himself. “Thank you for responding so quickly Eleanor.”

“Of course! Don’t hesitate due to Henry’s presence—you know Brigadier-General Redepenning; I know you do. He can be trusted with absolute discretion. I presume you wish advice about Charles.” She glanced pointedly at the black band on his sleeve.

Charles Wheatly, the Duke of Murnane, and, what is more to the point, Will’s nephew endured the loss of his only son six months past, casting him into a hell of grief and despair. Will looked over at the general, and seeing only sympathy, came to a decision. He brushed crumbs from his waistcoat.

“It’s killing me, Eleanor. We lost Jonny, and for the first month I thought we were going to lose Charles too. My Catherine goes about pretending she has regained her spirits, but I know she worries for him still.”

“Charles always struck me as a sensible sort,” Lord Henry commented. “But any man may turn to the bottle after the sort of loss he endured.”

Eleanor nodded. “But Charles has never been the sort for dissipation. “

Will shrugged. “He’s tried every form of dissipation he could, except laudanum. He hates the vile stuff. None of them lasted. I’m not certain how much he eats or sleeps.”

“Has he gone out home to Eversham? He hasn’t been seen in town,” the duchess asked.

“Briefly. Fred has the place well in hand, however, and he doesn’t feel needed.” Will glanced at the general and plunged ahead. “They settled the matter of Jonny’s paternity, thank God, and all is well between them, but I think the sight of Fred’s and Clare’s growing brood running about the place depressed him.”

“Happy memories can wound as deeply as bad ones when one is being strangled by grief,” General Redepenning suggested.

“I suspect spending much time with those two didn’t help either. At least I assume Fred is still besotted with the beautiful woman he married,” Eleanor murmured. “That can’t help in Charles’s situation.” Thankfully she didn’t directly mention the duke’s dreadful estranged wife.

Will nodded morosely. “He is back in London, haunting my house, his own, and Sudbury’s like a wraith, saying little, refusing all invitations, and pacing the drawing room. He throws my children into miseries whenever he comes. He’s lost, Eleanor, just lost.”

The duchess glanced at her friend the general. “Henry and I were discussing it before you came. He can’t be allowed to wallow in grief until it makes him ill, you know that.”

“But what am I to do?” Will snapped. “I’m at my wit’s end.”

“He needs work. He allowed his career to languish these few years while he attended to Jonny. He needs work, and England needs his talent.

“I thought of encouraging him to find a position in the foreign office, but I don’t see that haunting Whitehall will be an improvement over my drawing room.”

Eleanor smiled at him. “Perhaps not, but he would be out from underfoot.”

“Getting away from places that bring his son to mind might help,” General Redepenning put in.

“Precisely!” the duchess replied. “What he needs is a mission, preferably something overseas.”

Will brightened. “That might do the trick, but what?”

“Why don’t you speak to your friend the Duke of Sudbury. He keeps an oar in for all his party is out of power. He’ll know of something.”

“He might at that,” Will said. “I feel better.” He sat back to enjoy the duchess’s excellent tea.

“One other thing,” Eleanor said, this time more sternly. “He needs to deal with his marriage mess. He’ll be lost until he does it. Now that the boy is gone, it’s time. I know you use Sudbury’s network to keep an eye on the woman. What do you know about her whereabouts.“

Will choked on his tea. “Julia? Yes, well as it happens we heard she sailed for India with some baron she met in Baden.”

The general looked at the duchess, amusement impossible to conceal. “You want to send him on a mission to Madras?” he asked, laughter in his voice.

“It wouldn’t hurt,” she answered primly. “You and Sudbury will think of something Will.”

They passed an hour in pleasanter conversation until the earl rose to depart. Before he could take his leave, Eleanor spoke again. “One other thing, Will. Sudbury’s heir is becoming a byword. Tell the duke I would be delighted to chat about some ideas for that boy as well.”

About the Book: The Unexpected Wife

Children of Empire Book 3

Crushed with grief after the death of his son, Charles Wheatly, Duke of Murnane, throws himself into the new Queen’s service in 1838. When the government sends him on an unofficial fact finding mission to the East India Company’s enclave in Canton, China, he anticipates intrigue, international tensions, and an outlet for his frustration. He isn’t entirely surprised when he also encounters a pair of troublesome young people that need his help. However, the appearance of his estranged wife throws the entire enterprise into conflict. He didn’t expect to face his troubled marriage in such an exotic locale, much less to encounter profound love at last in the person of a determined young woman. Tensions boil over, and his wife’s scheming—and the beginnings of the First Opium War—force him to act to rescue the one he loves and perhaps save himself in the process.

Zambak Hayden seethes with frustration. A woman her age has occupied the throne for over a year, yet the Duke of Sudbury’s line of succession still passes over her—his eldest—to land on a son with neither spine nor character. She follows her brother, the East India Company’s newest and least competent clerk, to protect him and to safeguard the family honor. If she also escapes the gossip and intrigues of London and the marriage mart, so much the better. She has no intention of being forced into some sort of dynastic marriage. She may just refuse to marry at all. When an old family friend arrives she assumes her father sent him. She isn’t about to bend to his dictates nor give up her quest. Her traitorous heart, however, can’t stop yearning for a man she can’t have.

Neither expects the epic historical drama that unfolds around them.

The Unexpected Wife, will be released on July 25.

Here’s a short video about it:

https://www.facebook.com/carolinewarfield7/videos/924791187669849/

About the Author

Traveler, would-be adventurer, former tech writer and library technology professional, Caroline Warfield has now retired to the urban wilds of Eastern Pennsylvania, and divides her time between writing and seeking adventures with her grandbuddy. In her newest series, Children of Empire, three cousins torn apart by lies find their way home from the far corners of the British Empire, finding love along the way.

She has works published by Soul Mate Publishing and also independently published works. In addition she has participated in five group anthologies, one not yet published.

For more about the series and all of Caroline’s books, look here:

https://www.carolinewarfield.com/bookshelf/

October 4, 2015 by judeknight

The harem on wanton weekends

If you want a harem, you really need to talk to my friend, fellow Bluestocking Belle Caroline Warfield, aka Carol Roddy, who has just release her book Dangerous Weakness. In Dangerous Weakness, the heroine spends part of her time in the seraglio at Istanbul.

But here’s what I know. The harem in Ottoman society was the woman’s quarters. Muslim men were permitted four wives (if they could afford them). Wealthy men also kept concubines – whose main job was to join their master in his bed.

Those weren’t the only inhabitants of the harem, however. The female relatives of the head of the household lived there, too: his mother, who was usually the head of the harem, his wives, his unmarried sisters, his daughters, and many, many female servants whose job it was to look after the women of higher status.

Concubines were an important part of Ottoman social structure. Wealthy and powerful men married to make alliances between families, and wives were suspected of remaining loyal to their birth family. Slave concubines had no such lineage, and could—so the theory went—be relied on to reproduce without bothersome politics.

And even a concubine could become the most powerful female in the household if the son she bore became the next master. Perhaps, if the household was that of the Sultan, the most powerful female in the Empire.

August 5, 2015 by judeknight

Cover reveal for Dangerous Weakness, by Caroline Warfield

Today, I welcome Caroline Warfield to the blog. Caroline is a fellow Bluestocking Belle, and author of Dangerous Works and Dangerous Secrets, both of which I love. And today, she is sharing with us the cover of her next book in the series. Caroline, the stage is yours.

I am delighted to reveal the cover of Dangerous Weakness from Soul Mate Publishing, which will be available for preorder in September. I hoped also to tell you more about the hero, Richard Hayden, the Marquess of Glenaire and heir to the Duke of Sudbury, but characters can be elusive. They often have depths they show only reluctantly, even to their authors. Richard is particularly private about his life. I had to enlist the help of the interview fairies.

We managed to corner him in a reflective mood one afternoon in Saint James Park. When we took a place next to him on the bench and assured him nothing he said would be published until the distant future, he opened up, at least a bit.

What are you most proud of about your life?

“Pride?” he sputters. “I come from a family that has raised it to an art form. My father wraps himself in it like a coronation robe and my mother? My mother floats into any room she enters on a river of pride. No one in the kingdom, she believes, has more consequence than a Hayden, except perhaps the royal dukes, and she isn’t sure about them. Is that what you wanted to know?”

His tone is bitter, as if that kind of pride blights his life. When we suggest that is not precisely what we asked, he looks weary and appears to give the question more thought.

“A job well done gives me satisfaction,” he muses. “You might call that pride. I always put England first. I oversaw intelligence gathering during the Peninsular Campaign. I’ve managed the czar and his entourage, kept the Ottomans from provoking revolution, and helped negotiate the Treaty of Paris. I know my duty and I do it, even at personal cost.” A faraway look comes over him. “Even at cost,” he repeats.

He brightens somewhat. “I always do my best for my friends. I’m proud of that. I gathered information that brought Will, the Earl of Chadbourn, and the lady now his wife together. I managed to smooth my sister’s path to marriage with Andrew, though I may have erred earlier in their relationship. I am supporting Jamie, Baron Ross, who has inherited a tainted title and bankrupt estate, although Jamie has made himself scarce lately. The foolish man needs someone to keep him out of trouble. Is that what you had in mind?”
We nod and move on.

What are you most ashamed of in your life?

“Sometimes duty to friends suffers when duty to country demands it. I sent my best friend, Andrew, the brother of my heart, on a dreadful mission knowing he might fall into French hands. He found the vital intelligence but was captured and tortured. By the time we got him out he bore horrific scars, some visible on his person, some deeper.”

We suggest that incident sounded like the cost of duty. Is there nothing else? He looks ashamed for a moment.

“I’ve always treated women with care—with discretion at least. I have never been tempted beyond control until lately. I ruined an innocent. I’m ashamed of that. When I attempted to make it right, the woman threw my proposal in my face. It leaves a scar on my honor.”

Assured this interview will not see the light of day until long into the future he added, “It leaves a scar on my heart as well. I don’t understand it.”

In response to a raised eyebrow he went on reluctantly, “I may have been a touch managing about the matter. I offered to make her a marchioness. Does she need romance too?”

What impression do you make on people when they first meet you?

“They call me “the Marble Marquess,” in drawing rooms and gentlemen’s clubs. I must strike people as a cold fish. I can’t think why.”

Do you think you have turned out the way your parents expected?

“I’ve given my parents no reason to criticize. I do my duty by the estate, meeting monthly with His Grace and his man of business to stay abreast of affairs. I create no scandal. I never challenge either of them overtly. When I disagree, I do it discretely and they pretend not to know.”

We suggest that is an odd answer and ask for an example.

My sister, Georgiana, defied them openly and created what they consider a scandal when she published Poetry by the Female Authors of Ancient Greece, and allowed her authorship to be made public. She compounded that by marrying beneath her in their opinion. She ceased to exist as far as Her Grace is concerned. They don’t acknowledge her.”

“I offered to support her, but she refused my help. She married my friend Andrew Mallet and the two of them do very well. I see them often. My parents pretend not to know.”

What is the worst thing that has happened in your life? What did you learn from it?

“I might have said there was no such thing a year ago. Perhaps I would have believed it. Every privilege and deference has been given to me since birth. My family name smoothed the way for me in school, society, and even government. (Although I pride myself in having risen on my own merits.) In an odd way the lack of catastrophe is itself the worst thing. Rank can be a gilded cage. While my friends fought for king and country, I had to play my part behind a desk.”

“Worse, they all married for love, something I was raised to call maudlin. Seeing them now I’m not so certain. Women see me as a title to be coveted, wealth to be acquired, an ornament to be displayed. I can’t help what I am, but I can wish to be desired for myself rather than my prospects. Only one woman I ever met saw beyond those things, and she won’t have me. Lily Thorton’s rejection may be the worst thing. I’m still trying to learn what to do about it. Why can’t women be as easily managed as the affairs of state?”

How do you feel about your life right now? What, if anything, would you like to change?

In recent months I almost allowed myself to be drawn into my parents’ machinations regarding marriage. My mother wants a protégée and my father wants more land, more money, and more prestige—as if he didn’t already have more than he needs. They pressured me about it over dinner last night, each in their own way.”

“It came to me then: I don’t want a future duchess. I want a wife. I want family. I want what my friends have found. I have to try with Lily one more time. If she won’t have me, I have to find another woman who will see me for what I am. I refuse to live my parents’ life.”

Alas poor Richard was unaware at the time of this interview that his efforts to protect her had failed and Lily had already disappeared. If he wants to try again, he will have to pursue her.

To find out what happens, you will have to wait for Dangerous Weakness.

For Georgiana and Andrew’s story, read Dangerous Works.

For Baron Ross’s story, read Dangerous Secrets.

The Earl of Chadbourn’s story will be in “A Dangerous Nativity,” in Mistletoe, Marriage, and Mayhem available for preorder in October.

And here it is, folks: the cover!

If women were as easily managed as the affairs of state—or the recalcitrant Ottoman Empire—Richard Hayden, Marquess of Glenaire, would be a happier man. As it was the creatures—one woman in particular—made hash of his well-laid plans and bedeviled him on all sides.

Lily Thornton came home from Saint Petersburg in pursuit of marriage. She wants a husband and a partner, not an overbearing, managing man. She may be “the least likely candidate to be Marchioness of Glenaire,” but her problems are her own to fix, even if those problems include both a Russian villain and an interfering Ottoman official.

Given enough facts, Richard can fix anything. But protecting that impossible woman is proving almost as hard as protecting his heart, especially when Lily’s problems bring her dangerously close to an Ottoman revolution. As Lily’s personal problems entangle with Richard’s professional ones, and she pits her will against his, he chases her across the pirate-infested Mediterranean. Will she discover surrender isn’t defeat? It might even have its own sweet reward.

Meet Caroline Warfield

Caroline Warfield has at various times been an army brat, a librarian, a poet, a raiser of children, a nun, a bird watcher, an Internet and Web services manager, a conference speaker, an indexer, a tech writer, a genealogist, and, of course, a romantic. She has sailed through the English channel while it was still mined from WWII, stood on the walls of Troy, searched Scotland for the location of an entirely fictional castle (and found it), climbed the steps to the Parthenon, floated down the Thames from the Tower to Greenwich, shopped in the Ginza, lost herself in the Louvre, gone on a night safari at the Singapore zoo, walked in the Black Forest, and explored the underground cistern of Istanbul. By far the biggest adventure has been life-long marriage to a prince among men.

She sits in front of a keyboard at a desk surrounded by windows, looks out at the trees and imagines. Her greatest joy is when one of those imaginings comes to life on the page and in the imagination of her readers.

Caroline’s social media—use as it suits your purpose

Visit Caroline’s Website and Blog http://www.carolinewarfield.com/

Meet Caroline on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/carolinewarfield7

Follow Caroline on Twitter @CaroWarfield

Email Caroline directly warfieldcaro@gmail.com

Subscribe to Caroline’s newsletter http://www.carolinewarfield.com/newsletter/

Dangerous Weakness Pinterest Board http://bit.ly/1M1Fgls

Play in the Bluestocking Bookshop http://on.fb.me/1I7MRe4

She can also be found on

LibraryThing http://www.librarything.com/profile/CaroWarfield

Amazon Author http://www.amazon.com/Caroline-Warfield/e/B00N9PZZZS/

Good Reads http://bit.ly/1C5blTm

Bluestocking Belles http://bluestockingbelles.com/

Caroline’s Other Books (on Amazon)

Dangerous Works http://amzn.to/1DJj0Hi

Dangerous Secrets http://tinyurl.com/ph56vnb

April 7, 2015 by judeknight

Tropes and storytelling

Today, I’m pleased to welcome Caroline Warfield to my blog, to post about tropes and storytelling, and to tell us a little about her latest release. And read to the bottom for news about her giveaway!

Jude has written eloquently about the classic tropes, archetypes, and storylines that underlie storytelling in general and romance novels in particular. It made me pause a bit to consider which ones influence my own writing.

Both of my published books and my work in progress are have English characters and are set in the Late Georgian/Regency era. It might be easiest to begin with what I don’t write. I avoid very young virginal heroines. I avoid the “marriage mart.” I have little interest in the reformed rake. I have also avoided impoverished orphans, inheritance issues and compulsive gamblers, at least so far. While some of my characters have titles, none of them could be defined in terms of power and its uses and abuses, as is often the case. Each of the books, however, uses a classic story line.

Dangerous Works could be called a spunky bluestocking story, except Georgiana’s pain as a frustrated scholar runs deep and her dedication is fierce. The classic story is that of the hero (or in this case heroine) who is repeatedly foiled but keeps trying. She pushes forward for years in the face of family resistance, a system that excludes her from so much as a decent library, and the academic snobbery of Cambridge. Ultimately, with the help and love of Andrew, the hero, she succeeds.

Another classic storyline is the one in which actions in the past by the hero or heroine eventually catch up with them, and they must pay their debt. In Dangerous Secrets a terrible mistake haunts the hero, Jamie from the very beginning. He runs as long as he can. His love for Nora actually makes him run harder, but it catches up with him in the end and he has to resolve it. This story does have some common story elements: a wastrel father, a stern vicar, a widow recovering from a bad marriage, a wise older woman friend, and an evil count.

In my work in progress, Dangerous Weakness, the hero, Glenaire, is forced to journey in search of Lily who is pregnant with his child. It is certainly a hero in search of treasure story. However, the oh-so-perfect marquess is thrust into one alien situation after another, peeling off layers of London refinement. He has to fight his way back to normal life, and, of course, redefine what he wants that life to be.

There are no new stories in any genre. My job as an author is to create flesh and blood, imperfect characters that come to exemplify the traits of true heroes and succeed in completing the challenges presented to them by the storyline. I hope my readers find that I’ve succeeded.

About Dangerous Secrets

When a little brown wren of an Englishwoman bursts into Jamie Heyworth’s private hell and asks for help he mistakes her for the black crow of death. Why not? He fled to Rome and sits in despair with nothing left to sell and no reason to get up in the morning. Behind him lie disgrace, shame, and secrets he is desperate to keep even from powerful friends in London.

Nora Haley comes to Rome at the bidding of her dying brother who has an unexpected legacy. Never in her sunniest dreams did Nora expect Robert to leave her a treasure, a tiny blue-eyed niece with curly hair and warm hugs. Nora will do anything to keep her, even hire a shabby, drunken major as an interpreter.

Jamie can’t let Nora know the secrets he has hidden from everyone, even his closest friends. Nora can’t trust any man who drinks. She had enough of that in her marriage. Either one, however, will dare anything for the little imp that keeps them together, even enter a sham marriage to protect her. Will love—and the truth—bind them both together?

Available on Amazon

US http://tinyurl.com/ph56vnb

UK http://amzn.to/1Gd9Im9

Canada http://amzn.to/1bbDxde

Euro http://amzn.to/1LrSLru

About Caroline Warfield

Caroline Warfield has at various times been an army brat, a librarian, a poet, a raiser of children, a nun, a bird watcher, a network services manager, a conference speaker, a tech writer, a genealogist, and, of course, a romantic. She is always a traveler, a would-be adventurer, and a writer of historical romance, enamored of owls, books, history, and beautiful gardens (but not the act of gardening).

Social Media Links

Web http://www.carolinewarfield.com/

FB https://www.facebook.com/carolinewarfield7

Twitter @CaroWarfield

LibraryThing http://www.librarything.com/profile/CaroWarfield

Amazon Author http://www.amazon.com/Caroline-Warfield/e/B00N9PZZZS/

Good Reads http://bit.ly/1C5blTm

Bluestocking Belles http://bluestockingbelles.com/who-we-are/caroline-warfield/

To enter Caroline’s prize giveaway, go to: http://www.carolinewarfield.com/dangerous-secrets-blog-tour-2015/