Yesterday, I attended a service to remember the thousands of men who lost their lives at the Battle of the Somme in 1916. The uniforms, the marching band, the laying of wreaths at the Cenotaph, the lone bugler delivering the Last Post - it was very moving. 

As a writer, my mind tried to imagine what it felt like for those men as they headed straight for the guns and certain death and how this bloody battle impacted on the mothers, fathers, siblings and children left at home. Needless to say, I soon had a full cast of fictional characters in my head. 

As a crime writer, my mind soon had these fictional characters committing deadly deeds. I often toy with the idea of writing historical crime fiction and, with my latest novel almost finished, maybe it’s time to seriously think about it?

I love the idea of criminals being free to act in a time that was, in many ways, much simpler. There were no mobile phones, no internet, no CCTV on every street corner and no worries about leaving a speck of blood or a stray hair at the scene. On the other hand, without DNA and the advancements in technology, solving the crimes becomes much more difficult for our sleuths.  

Years ago, I used to read a lot of historical crime novels. Recently - nothing. I can’t remember the last crime/mystery novel I read that wasn’t contemporary. I intend to rectify that and I thought a fitting place to start would be with the 2011 winner of the CWA’s Ellis Peters Historical Crime Award, The Somme Stations by Andrew Martin. However, as this is book 7 in his Jim Stringer series, it may be a while before I get to it. :)

How do you feel about historical crime fiction? Do you read it? Do you have any recommendations? I'm curious. 

A Historical Mystery

I haven’t written a contemporary mystery for Carina for a while, but I do write them in different genres for other publishers. One of them is the historical.
All my books include some kind of problem for the protagonists to solve, and for the most part I base them on real life stories.
Take the Emperors of London. They’re called that because their parents, who were siblings, called them ridiculous names. And because they are one of the most powerful familial networks in the country in the 1750’s.
Ranged against them are the Dankworths, an equally powerful family who are still recovering from supporting the wrong side in the Jacobite Rebellion, ie the losing side.
That’s the basic premise of the story, anyway, and with every book I write, I’m finding out more and more about the shadowy life of the Stuart family after they were deposed in 1688.
I discovered that the son of James II, called by Jacobites James III, and by Hanoverian loyalists as the Old Pretender, was a melancholic. Probably bipolar, considering his swift changes in mood and his reputation as a brooder with fierce temper tantrums.
He married in 1719, to Maria Clementina, commonly known by her second name. She bore him two children, two sons, and then she left him to enter a convent. Not because she was particularly religious, but because she couldn’t stand living with him any more. Witnesses reported blazing arguments and weeks of sulking, mostly on his part.
So here come the “what if”s. A writer thrives on the “what if” moments!
What if, before he married in 1719, James married another woman, her identity often confused with his official wife, because her name was Maria, too? What if he put her aside when he married Clementina, but after Clementina left him, his advisors begged the shadowy wife to return to him because only she could control his moods? What if they had children? And what if Maria, afraid for the safety of her babies, sent them away to be brought up elsewhere?
I tested every step of the argument, and found it all possible. Marriage was an irregular affair before it was regulated later in the century. James, the Old Pretender, was known to have mistresses, and there was plenty of time for him to sire enough children to make this series possible. He died in 1766, a long and unproductive life, but he remained mired in politics to the end of his days, trying to alter the fate of Europe and building a network of advisors and supporters.
The bombshell about the children gave me the cue for the Emperors of London series. That, and the volatile state of politics in the 1750’s. With the adult Prince of Wales dead, and the new Prince of Wales under the control of his mother and her (some say) lover and close advisor, both unpopular with the people, that gave another party the way in to power.
The Emperors set out to discover the children, and neutralise them. The Dankworths want to find them and marry them off to their own children, getting a foothold in power that way. The Young Pretender just wants them dead.
The three-pronged aspect gives me a great choice of stories, and I can flesh them out with sumptuous romances. The more I discover about this period, the more fascinating it gets. And my scenario becomes more real.

The stage was set. I don’t reveal all the secrets in the first few books, but I do make it obvious for anybody who is interested in the era.

Revenge: What Goes Around Comes Around

This year I’ve been watching Revenge, a television series featuring Madeline Stowe and Emily VanCamp. It’s about a young woman who returns to the Hamptons seeking revenge against the couple who set up her father. Her father was tried and incarcerated for organizing the bombing of a plane. He left papers and documents for his daughter, proving his innocence and detailing the different people who played a part in his imprisonment.

Each week Emily Thorne goes after a different person and tugs on strands of the past, forcing the cast of characters to react. In the last episode I watched, Emily is starting to realize that innocent people can get caught in the fallout. She starts to waver in her pursuit of revenge.

I used the theme of revenge in my historical mystery romance, TheSpurned Viscountess. My hero Lucien is focused on discovering the identity of the men responsible for murdering his first wife. He lets his estranged family organize a second marriage for him, but he’s totally indifferent about his new bride. At the start of the story the only thing he’s interested in is revenge. It takes time for him to appreciate his new wife and come to accept the loss of his first wife.

Revenge is a fairly common theme in romances, and it works particularly well with romantic suspense stories. In most of the stories I’ve read the character seeking revenge usually comes to realize that success won’t change the circumstances or bring the wronged person back. The characters learn to accept and forgive.

I’m not sure how the TV series ends since I’m still watching the show each week. As a writer, I’m enjoying the slow build and the way that each action by the heroine brings consequences. She doesn’t always achieve her goals because the other characters move to their own drummer. I think this makes her seem more sympathetic as a character. We know her father was wrongly accused, and we want her to succeed, yet we don’t want the innocent players hurt either.

So, my questions for you today:

1. Do you enjoy the revenge type plot?
2. Do you think that the character seeking revenge should be successful or should they come to accept that they can’t change the past? Should they move on and embrace the future?