Canadian Historical Romance with Riana Everly

The Maritimes of Canada is one of my favorite places in the world. The people, the music, the natural beauty and the history. Yes, history. Canada has history, not that you’d know it from the bookshelves. We’re also a pretty lovable bunch, but you never read stories about hot Canadians and the romantic fantasies they evoke. Well, Riana Everly has written a historical romance set in Halifax with ties to Jane Austen. You think I’m letting that go by unexplored? Do you know me at all?

What’s your deal, Riana?

I was born in South Africa, but have called Canada home since I was eight years old. I have a Master’s degree in Medieval Studies and am trained as a classical musician, specialising in Baroque and early Classical music. I first encountered Jane Austen when my father handed me a copy of Emma at age 11, and have never looked back. Now I in Toronto with my family. When not writing, I can often be found playing string quartets with friends, biking around the beautiful province of Ontario with my husband, trying to improve my photography, thinking about what to make for dinner, and, of course, reading!

What’s your story about? It’s got an ingenious hook.

The Assistant is a historical romance, a prequel as it were to Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. Set in England and Nova Scotia in 1799-1800, the novel tells the story of Elizabeth Bennet’s favourite aunt and uncle, the Gardiners.

The story begins when young Edward Gardiner comes across an injured youth while on a business trip in Derbyshire. This youth, Matthew, is a gifted mathematician and Edward takes him on as his assistant. But when Matt introduces Edward to an elusive young woman, Edward discovers his life will never be the same. A sea of mystery surrounds this new assistant: Why is young Matt so reluctant to talk about himself, and who is his friend, who insists on such secrecy? Is there any connection between these two newcomers into Edward’s life and the rumours of a missing heir to an estate in the north and tales of a cruel and usurping uncle? The search for the answers will take Edward and his assistant across the ocean to the colony of Nova Scotia, but will the answers he finds destroy his every hope?

What is it about that time period and place in history that intrigues you?

As a Canadian, I am always interested in both the history of my own country and in how that history relates to British and European history. Nova Scotia in 1800 was at once a distant and wild colony and the centre of Britain’s naval power in the New World. In the aftermath of the American Revolution and in the midst of hostilities with Napoleon’s France, Britain’s control over the massive natural harbour at Halifax and the wealth of timber from both Nova Scotia and the neighbouring colony of New Brunswick were vital to the security of the Empire. By the time my characters set foot in Halifax in 1800, the city was about 50 years old, still finding its character and place, but established and looking towards a prosperous future, buoyed up by the recent establishment of the Naval Dockyards upon its shores.

Nova Scotia did not only provide the Empire with natural resources, but with human ones as well. Thousands of United Empire Loyalists fled the lower colonies in the 1770s and 80s to end up in Nova Scotia, often bringing their institutions with them. The Loyalist masters of King’s College in New York CIty re-established their university in Windsor, about fifty miles from Halifax on the Bay of Fundy, making it the oldest English university in what is now Canada. My hero Edward Gardiner received his education at King’s, and in my imagination he was involved in one of the first hockey games, when the traditional game of hurley was taken onto the ice on the frozen river by the college! And the old King’s in New York? After the dust settled it was re-established under the new name of Columbia University. (Editor’s note. One of my favorite pastimes is telling my American friends the REAL story of the American Revolution from the Loyalist side. It’s fun watching their heads explode in outrage.)

What’s your favorite (or favourite, depending on who’s reading this) scene?

One of my favourite scenes in the book takes place fairly late in the story, when Edward disembarks from the ship which carried him back to Nova Scotia after some years back in England. He remarks upon how the town of Halifax has grown in the time he was away, and upon the multitude of languages he hears on the streets—English, French, Mi’kmaq, and German, to name a few—and the multitude of hues of people’s skin. I did not go into much detail in my book, for the information was extraneous to the story, but I fell into the rabbit hole of research and discovered a wealth of Black history in colonial Nova Scotia, mainly concerning the thousands of former slaves granted their freedom by the British after the American Revolution and transported to Nova Scotia, where they could live their lives as free citizens of the colony. Perhaps there’s another novel in there!

I agree. It’s a fascinating and under-shared story. Where can we learn more about you and your books?

The Assistant can be found at your favourite bookseller through this link:
www.books2read.com/theassistant

You can learn more about me and my books at www.rianaeverly.com. My blog is on the website, and I have some information on another region that is rich in the history of the War of 1812 – Niagara.

Also, please visit me at www.facebook.com/RianaEverly/ to connect on Facebook. I love meeting people and chatting about books and history and whatever else appeals.

Subscribe to my newsletter and get a chance to win a signed paperback copy of Acre’s Bastard.  Each month you’ll receive links to interviews with great authors, news about upcoming events and previews of my work in progress, Acre’s Orphans. Look at the bottom left of the page for the sign-up sheet. No spam, just once a month updates and a chance to learn about great new Historical Fiction of all types from around the world.

Barbary Pirates and Scottish Lasses with Josanna Thompson

Most of us think pirates and we immediately go to yo-ho-ho and rum and all that. But the Barbary Pirates were no joke. Today’s interview is with Josanna Thompson, who gives us a gripping tale of Algerian pirates and sweet Scottish lassies.

So, Josanna, what’s your deal?

Hi!  I’m Josanna Thompson, and I’m the author of A Maiden’s Honor.  I’ve been weaving stories for as long as I can remember. I’ve always loved history and learning about how people lived way back then. I’m also an avid traveler and was fortunate enough to explore many of these distant lands in my stories. When I’m not traveling, I live a quiet life with my husband in New England.

 

What’s the story behind A Maiden’s Honor?

It’s complicated to say the very least. What can I say, it’s not in me to write a simple tale. A Maiden’s Honor is no exception.  In fact, it’s two stories. The primary part follows the journey of Sarah Campbell. The other follows the journey of my villain, Naa’il Dhar. Their stories eventually intertwine.

Raised by her Scottish father and the natives of a remote island in the South Pacific, Sarah and her father embark on a perilous journey to Scotland. She knew that her life would change when she left her beloved island. Never did Sarah imagine that she would be sold into a harem. With her father murdered and everything that she had ever known gone, only Hassan Aziz, the most feared pirate on the Barbary Coast can save her. But is Hassan willing to jeopardize his secret mission and risk his life and the lives of his crew to shield this intoxicating maiden from slavery?

Naa’il is the Dey of Algiers, a man who has everything including, wealth, power, wives, slaves, concubines. Drawn to two beautiful American captives, Naa’il tests their loyalty to each other. Little does he know that his game will have devastating consequences… especially for him.

What’s your favorite scene in the book?

One of my favorite scenes takes place between Sarah and the hero, Hassan Aziz. Sarah’s father had died early that morning. Hassan returns to his cabin and finds Sarah sitting beside the window looking reverently at her trunk filled with “treasures” from her life on her island. Hassan can tell she is sad, he sits beside her. She opens her trunk and pulls out four objects, a bamboo comb, a flat shell, a sharks tooth and a mat. Hassan gives into his curiosity and asks her about the purpose of these objects. Sarah proceeds to tell him about her life on her island while demonstrating the use of each one.

I love this scene because it’s such a sweet interlude between these two strangers. This is the beginning of their love affair.

 Where can we learn more about you and your work?

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Maidens-Honor-Woman-Eden-Book-ebook/dp/B076FQ27S8

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/JosannaThompsonAuthor/?ref=bookmarks

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/17238374.Josanna_Thompson

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theglobetrottingtiari/

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/josannathompson/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/JosannaThompson

Look me up. I always enjoy chatting with readers.

Oh, I have a killer website. I built it like a DVD and packed it with lots of extras, including, a blog, interviews with characters, and articles about my research. I also give readers an opportunity to ask my characters questions. They are very chatty and would love to hear from you. (Click on the link below.)  Check back from time to time. I’m always adding to it.

My website:

www.josannathompson.com

 This is kind of a cool idea. Josanna has a feature on her site that says “Ask my character a question:” What would you ask her? I may steal this idea.

http://www.josannathompson.com/your-questions-for-the-characters

 Thanks for interviewing me, Wayne.  I had a great time answering your questions!

Subscribe to my newsletter and get a chance to win a signed paperback copy of Acre’s Bastard.  Each month you’ll receive links to interviews with great authors, news about upcoming events and previews of my work in progress, Acre’s Orphans. Look at the bottom left of the page for the sign-up sheet. No spam, just once a month updates and a chance to learn about great new Historical Fiction of all types from around the world.

 

WW2 Romance from Clare Flynn

I’m not sure how it happened, but suddenly Canadian guys in European wars are a hot commodity. First it was the Newfie boys in Jeff Walker’s “Not One of Us the Same.” (Read my interview with him here...) Now it’s a different world war, but Clare Flynn brings us her romance set in the English seaside, “The Chalky Sea.”

So, what’s your story, Clare?

I live on the south coast of England – Kipling’s “Sussex by the Sea”, in Eastbourne, a seaside resort with a Victorian pier and a beautiful seafront bandstand built in 1936. I moved back here just over a year ago from London. I spent my teenage years in the town and always loved the South Downs and the sea – both of which are outside my windows and I can hear the screams of seagulls as I write this. I have used the town as the setting for my latest book, The Chalky Sea – although I had not planned to do that when I moved here.

I am now writing full-time, after a long career in Marketing and then as a strategy consultant with my own business. My career took me to some wonderful places – I lived in Paris, Brussels, Milan and Sydney and did a lot of travelling all over the world for both business and pleasure.

I write historical fiction, often about displacement and with a strong sense of place. The Chalky Sea is my fifth novel and I have also published a collection of short stories.

What’s your book about?

It’s the wartime story of two people.

Gwen is a thirty-something Englishwoman whose husband has just headed off to war. She is stranded in Eastbourne – by choice, working for the Women’s Voluntary Service and training as a fire warden and subsequently as a translator of German signals. The war gives her a purpose her peacetime life has lacked. Gwen appears emotionally cold, having bottled up her feelings for years.

Jim is a young Canadian farmer from Ontario. He joins up on the spur of the moment after an unpleasant discovery that makes him want to get as far away from home as possible. He arrives in England expecting to fight and caring little if he dies ­– only to find himself kicking his heels in Aldershot like most of the Canadian army, performing endless exercises far away from the front. Eventually the two story strands come together and we see how the war changes each of them. These are people who in normal circumstances would never have met.

Ah yes, because when you think romance, Canadians leap immediately to mind…. Besides our natural magnetism, what is it about the time period or the story that intrigues you?

I never intended to write a book set in the `Second World War. In fact I’d always shied away from it. It seemed too big and in some ways too recent – my father was a pilot in the RAF and my Mum was evacuated as a child. When I moved to Eastbourne I discovered that the town had a little known significance in the war – noted for being the most frequently raided in the south-east of England. Almost two hundred people, mostly civilians, lost their lives in bombing raids and there was wholesale destruction of homes and many notable buildings including the town’s library, fire station, two churches and many shops. German bombers even machine-gunned people in the streets and one of the worst raids happened while people were doing their Christmas shopping in Marks & Spencer – completely destroying the store.

The other little known fact was that Eastbourne was home to thousands of Canadian soldiers during the war, with troops moving in and out of the town and its surrounds constantly from July 1941 until just before D-Day. I discovered that the Canucks of the 23rd Field Regiment used to drink in both my two local pubs, the 31st and 46th Batteries preferring The Ship with the 83rd Battery favouring The Pilot, which they treated as a second home. They used to park their tanks on the local streets (destroying much of the old Victorian brick paving) and there was an officers’ mess in one of the houses in my road. The first German plane shot down over the town during the Battle of Britain landed in the playing field of the school down the road. How could I resist?

Good point. Without giving away the store, what’s your favorite (or favourite) scene?

Oddly enough it was a scene I wrote in my final revisions. It happens in the nearby port of Newhaven on the day of the ill-fated and tragic Dieppe raid in which around nine hundred Canadians lost their lives. My scene is at the harbour as the ships return bearing dead, wounded and survivors. I had “under-written” this, skating over it too quickly, despite one of the key characters being directly involved in the raid. Fortunately my editor called me on it – I immediately knew she was right and still can’t understand why I had missed something so obvious. I sat down to rework the scene and I hope that this time around I did it justice.

I also enjoyed writing a lot of the Aldershot scenes. When I realised some of the book would need to take place there I wasn’t exactly thrilled. Aldershot was another place I once lived in (aged about seven!) and it was singularly unmemorable – basically an army garrison town. As the poor old Canucks nearly went out of their minds with boredom there, I thought I would too – but I ended up really enjoying writing the Aldershot chapters. A character, who was meant to feature briefly in one scene, elbowed me out of the way and wouldn’t get out of the book. She has now forced her way into being a main character in the sequel I’m working on now, set in Canada.

Where can we learn more about The Chalky Sea and your other books?

The Chalky Sea is available as a paperback (ISBN 978-0-9933324-3-2). Online as an e-book it is exclusively on Amazon at the moment http://mybook.to/chalky sea

You can find out about me via my website which is http://www.clareflynn.co.uk

Or my Amazon author page http://author.to/clarefly

Goodreads https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6486156.Clare_Flynn

And Twitter https://twitter.com/clarefly

Chicago History and Mystery with Michelle Cox

One of the things I love about living in Chicago is the insane pride people take in the history of this city. Not just the big things; the fire, Capone, blues music, but the growth of the town from lonely fur outpost to whatever it is today (Carnage Central, Hub of the Midwest, the City that Works… pick one.)

Today’s author, Michelle Cox, writes romance mysteries set in Depression-era Chicago.

So, Michelle, what’s your deal?

Hi, Wayne!  I write the Henrietta and Inspector Clive series, the first installment of which, A Girl Like You, debuted last April.  Book two of the series, A Ring of Truth, is publishing in April.  Besides working on the manuscripts for the series (I’m currently toiling over book four!), I also write a weekly blog about Chicago’s forgotten residents, entitled “Novel Notes of Local Lore,” and another blog that pokes fun at the publishing industry called “How to Get Your Book Published in 7,000 Easy Steps – A Practical Guide,” both of which can be found on my website.  I live in the Chicago suburbs with my Liverpudlian husband and three kids.  Oh, yeah, and I have a BA in literature from Mundelein College in Chicago, if that matters to anyone!

I’ll swap you that for my Associates Degree from BCIT any day. What’s your series about?

A Girl Like You is the start of a historical fiction series, set during the Depression era in Chicago.  It’s a mystery, really, but there’s a pretty strong romance thread running through it, too.

Essentially it’s about a young woman, Henrietta Von Harmon, who has to provide for her mother and siblings when her father kills himself after losing his job due to the Depression.  The book starts off with her working as a 26-girl at the local tavern.  She’s not making enough, though, so she is persuaded by a friend to become a taxi-dancer at one of the big dance halls.

Not long after she starts there, however, the floor matron is murdered, and an investigation led by the aloof Detective Inspector Clive Howard begins.  Impressed by Henrietta’s beauty, Inspector Howard convinces her to go undercover for him as an usherette in a burlesque house, where he suspects the killer is lurking, all the while not realizing that Henrietta is much younger and more innocent than she pretends.

Henrietta quickly gets absorbed into the seediness of the place, meeting all sorts of strange characters, as she attempts to discover the secret behind the “white feather club,” which she believes is connected somehow to the murder and the disappearance of young women.  So that’s the mystery part.

Meanwhile there’s a little bit of comic relief in the character of Stanley Dubowski, the love-struck neighborhood boy who thinks of himself as Henrietta’s protector and continues to follow her around, annoyingly popping up at rather inconvenient moments.  Not only is he worried about Henrietta working at such a dangerous place, but he’s threatened by what he sees as a growing attraction between the Inspector and Henrietta.  And that’s, of course, where the romance part comes in, but I’ll leave it at that for now.

What’s your fascination with that time period in Chicago?

I’ve always been very drawn to the ‘30’s and ‘40’s—the music, the clothes, the cars, the Great Depression, the wars.  People lived through so much in such a short period of time and there’s so much there to write about – drama, intrigue, romance—you’ve got it all!

In the early 1990’s I found myself working at a nursing home on Chicago’s NW side, and I heard literally hundreds of these types of stories from that era.  So when I decided to write a book, I actually picked out one woman’s story, let’s call her Adeline, and used some of the details of her life to create the character of Henrietta.  There are many parts of the book, then, that are actually true:  Henrietta’s extreme beauty, all of the strange jobs she procures, the family history of the Von Harmons, the character of Stanley, and, believe it or not, the lesbian characters that befriend her at the burlesque house.

Of course, I had to fictionalize most of the book, including the murder mystery and all of the other characters, but it gave me a great foundation to start with.  Adeline was quite a character, and she used to follow me around the nursing home, telling me – frequently – that once upon a time, she had had “a man-stopping body and a personality to go with it!”  That’s classic!  So I tried very hard to capture that same spunky spirit and give it to Henrietta.

I know you love all your children equally, but do you have a favorite scene in the book?

There’s so much going on in Chapter 7.  We’ve got a little comedy with Stan roughly being escorted out of an abandoned apartment, the building suspense of the mystery as Henrietta and Clive discuss certain chilling aspects of the case, followed by an unexpected scene of domesticity as Clive sits quietly musing and watching Henrietta sew.  He takes the opportunity to ask her more about her sad story, and they both become a little more vulnerable.  This naturally lends itself then to a sort of sexual/romantic tension as they realize that they’re alone in an empty apartment without a chaperone.  Clive is obviously attracted to her, but it torments him, as he sees himself at thirty-five years of age as being much too old for this young girl of eighteen.  Henrietta, for her part, is also attracted to this older man, whom she possibly sees as a father figure, but doesn’t believe anyone so good as the inspector would ever be interested in “a girl like her.”

So as you can see, there’s lots of drama and intrigue and romance going on in this scene, and it’s deliciously fun to see what unfolds, not just in this chapter, but the whole book, if I do say so myself!

Anything you want to say to the giant throng of people reading this?

I hope you’ll check out the next book of the series, A Ring of Truth, due out in April!  It picks up right where the first book ends.  You can read more about it (including the whole first chapter!) on my website:  http://michellecoxauthor.com/

You can also connect with me on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/michellecoxwrites/ or Twitter: https://twitter.com/michellecox33