Women's costume 1794 France, shifts and nightshifts

Consider Shifts

A shift is what we'd call a 'slip' in the US. The shift lay next to the skin and protected the wearer from the roughness of the outer garments . It protected the expensive outer garments from the body. It was cheaper to replace than the outer clothing, and the shift was washable.

The shift, for all of the Eighteenth Century is a simple garment, cut loose, straight, and ungathered, going to about the knee. It closed at the neck with a drawstring or was bound with a band.

Here to the right is an extant shift in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Drawstring neck. The little ruffles on the sleeve, IMO, would have been intended to show beneath a tight-fitting sleeve on the dress or caraco. This is made in England or France, late C18 to early C19.

The early C18 shift might be somewhat fuller than this example above. After 1785-ish, when the round gown and dresses of thin fabric became popular, the shift began to be cut closer to the body so as not to disturb the line of the dress -- something that wasn't a problem with the robe à l'Anglais or the simple jupe and caraco. The sleeves of the shift, which had been longer and fuller in the first half of the Eighteenth Century, became close fitting or short.

Here's an example of a modern reproduction mid-C18 shift being worn.

A difference between how we regard underwear in C21 and Eighteenth Century is that a shift -- underwear -- was often intended to be seen. It was meant to show beneath the jacket or vest or the neckline of the dress.

See , to the right.

(This is a screen capture from the latest remake of The Scarlet Pimpernel, included here under Fair Use for comment and review.)

I wouldn't go to the stake on the details of this. It looks fairly fancy, compared to the extant examples. Anyhow, what you got here is a C18 chemise being worn over front-fastening stays, and showing at the top.

(The opening scene of the movie, btw, is her getting dressed in petticoat, caraco and jupe, which is interesting to watch. Reminds me of the dressing scene in Les Liaisons Dangereuses. )

The neckline of the dress or caraco was cut low by our standards. This means the shift underneath was cut low too. The neckline of the shift tended to come just an inch or so above the stays, as it does in the picture above.

This left the heavy work of concealing the bosom to the fichu.

Here we got a caricature from just after 1794. This is not reliable as to what was actually worn, but it does illustrate a point about the length of the shift.

The shift wasn't a full-length garment down trailing in the mud and showing lace at the bottom when the dress blew up in the wind. A petticoat or underskirt might do that, but not the shift. The shift was short. You wouldn't see a shift if you raised your skirts some to step over a puddle.

Below we got us some delightful pictures of an extant shift from Vintage Textile which is at home here. This particular shift is listed as 1820 to 1830, but it's similar to what you would have seen in 1790s.

Vintage Textile says of the shift above:

Our chemise is fashioned from coarse linen and is completely hand sewn.

With time and multiple washings, the linen has whitened and softened. The neckline and sleeve edges are trimmed with hand-embroidered scallops. The chemise has a hand-embroidered, monogrammed "AF" in front.

Chemises, particularly in pattern catalogues, are picture flat so that you can see how they are cut. The triangular side panels in the flat pictures give the impression that the chemise stands out from the body on the side. In fact these side panels push the front and back into graceful bias folds.

A late-C18-to-early-C19 shift would be made of linen or cotton. In 1794, it would probably linen for the middle and lower class. Good quality cotton was still a luxury material in France.

There was a slow movment towards cotton for underclothing as cotton got cheaper in the early C19. Perception of linen in shirts and underwear changed. By the time we get to Beau Brummel ... linen was a more upperclass/stylish fabric than cotton. In 1794, linen would probably have been the fabric of choice, but without the same class

The English word 'shift' fell into disfavor after 1800. 'Shift' became regarded as old-fashioned and somewhat coarse. The snazzier French 'chemise' sneaked in to take its place. That's what we did in English for a century or two ... tossed out perfectly good English words and invited French hussies in.

Nightclothes

WARNING: Partial nudity below.

Women's nightclothes closely followed the design of the shift. In fact, one could be used for the other, pretty much.

There are differences The examples of nightshifts I've come across seem to have 3/4 or long sleeves and the shifts of late C18 don't. The nightshifts are often mid-calf length or longer, rather than more knee-ish. So the nightshifts were a specialized garment, similar to but not identical with the shift.

Note the low neckline on these nightshifts below. If that neck isn't tied up carefully with its ribbon or drawstring, the breasts get loose and go showing themselves.

The nightshifts are longer than the shift, but still only mid-calf length. You heroine wouldn't need to hold her hem up as she crept down the stairs, trembling, with a candle in her hand, investigating the noise.

Considering England's -- or France's -- climate, your heroine would be an idiot if she didn't put on some kind of a robe or peignoir so she don't get all clammy and freezing even before the villain has a chance to kidnap her.

The hero seeing your heroine in her nightshift takes on a whole new meaning when you stop picturing it as a floor-length, high-necked Victorian nightdress with 57 little pearl buttons up the front.

This is Baudouin, Le Lever. A bit before our period.

Wheatly gives us Mrs Wheatly Asleep. Close to the 1790s I think. The night cap Mrs. Wheatly is wearing -- see how fancy -- is part of the whole going-to-sleep ensemble.

Here's Blanchet, Perils of Love: Julia Seeks Solace with her Cat above. Again, a bit before 1794, but probably similar to what women were wearing in the decade.

This is Regnault, La Nuit.

And Boucher's famous L'Odalisque is wearing a 1745 shift. It's here, click at the site for a closer view. See the low neckline, mid-length sleeves, and the not-too-long length.

Admittedly, these particular nightshifts are painted largely for an excuse to show off skin, but it does look like nightshifts dipped low at the neck.

Night shifts, like shifts, were white or just off-white, made of cotton and linen.
Not silk. Sorry.

Couple of MLAS Q & A

Kind reader, Eva, writes with some questions about My Lord and Spymaster. I thought I'd bring 'em out and talk about them here. (She says it's ok.)

Eva writes: First- did Adrian ever have feelings for Jess? I can't tell if he views her as merely a friend or a woman that he believes is off-limits to him but has secretly lusted after.
When Adrian first knew Jess, she was only twelve. He was about twenty. Eight years is a huge barrier at that age.
In a way, Adrian never 'reset' that distance between them. Even when she's grown, he sees her as 'the child grown up.'

The original relationship between them would have been . . . smart-mouthed preteen and her very cool uncle or Olympic hopeful and the silver-medallist who's coaching her.
That is to say ... close, but never sexual.

Eva writes: Is Annique the only Frenchwoman that he claims to have loved?

We haven't met Adrian's woman yet.
I think she's going to turn up in Maggie's story.

Eva writes: By the way, I am seriously waiting on pins and needles for Adrian's story...... Hint, hint ;)
I plan to start Adrian's story as soon as I finish up the Maggie manuscript. That'll be early in 2010.
I haven't the least idea what I'm going to write.

Ah well, we wrestle only one alligator at a time.

Eva writes: what role has Eunice played before she began rescuing women? Was she a spy as well? Why is she protected by Lazarus? You drop sooo many hints about her but I'm just not sure if I'm putting the pieces together in the correct way.....
Leesee ...

Eunice is the daughter of a duke. (That's why she's 'Lady Eunice'.)
She was married at sixteen to a very unpleasant man, twice her age, who physically and emotionally brutalized her. He obliged everyone by dying when she was twenty-five.
(May we speculate that she helped him to his reward? That would be so satisfying.)

Eunice was left a widow with a miniscule income, an irreconcilable split from her family, and a burning desire to right the world's wrongs. By sheer force of will, she became a power in charitable London. Check out any well-run orphanage or home for wayward women; she's probably on the Board of Directors.

Standish is the love of her life.
(How could he be otherwise?)
She met him when she was in her late thirties and long past any thought of falling in love with anyone. He was doing a 'dig' of a Roman site in a ditch in East London. When they met, he was firmly -- if somewhat ineffectively -- protecting his pottery shards from the local disadvantaged youths who were sure he'd uncovered gold.

As to Eunice and Lazarus.
Eunice amuses Lazarus, which is reason enough for him to let her play in his part of town.

There's some practical reasons as well.
When he identifies himself with a force that brings food, clothing and medical care into his territory, Lazarus plays the good guy, and wins approval in the hood. That's the same reason he protects the Reverend.

Also, Lazarus doesn't want the daughter of a duke killed on his turf. He's tolerated by the authorities, in part, because he keeps that sort of thing to a minimum.

He finds Eunice useful as an object lesson. Having a place girls can run to is a salutary lesson to pimps who batter the merchandise.

And when he protects Eunice, Lazarus places a limit on the power of the most brutal and stupid of his gang. She becomes, symbolically, his power to do any damn thing he wants. It's a symbol that costs little to maintain since she's already well protected by her connection to the British aristocracy and, in later years, by Sebastian.

I think Lazarus is maybe a little cowed by Lady Eunice. She's intimidating when she sets her mind to it.

Now Eunice was never a spy. She's a flaming radical and has dicey intellectual ties all over France, but she's not really a political animal. She's a hands-on, practical sort.

Because of these ties, she's an excellent source of what we'd now call intelligence. She's first to hear the latest intellectual news from Paris. She's on an in-your-face framiliarity with half the criminal element of London. And she's related to everyone powerful in and out of government in England. (She's Galba's second cousin on his mother's side.)

Meeks Street uses her when they need a safe place for women who are hurt or on the run. She's willing to provide introductions to British Service agents who need to move into the fringes of the 'ton'.

Eva writes: why is there so much animosity\anger between Josiah and Lazarus? Aren't they related?
Josiah and Lazarus came to London as young men to seek their fortune. They worked together, getting rich and trusting each other and being rivals a little bit.

What drove them apart was Jess' mother. Lazarus had her. Josiah took her away.

After some serious conflict, they patched up an uneasy tolerance. For years, Lazarus envied Josiah his little family. Envied him the extraordinary child that Jess became.

Then Josiah was out of the picture. Lazarus stepped in.

In the years she was with him, Lazarus was training Jess to be a master thief and part of his gang. Someday, if she got strong enough and mean enough, he would have made her his successor. He thought of all this as 'teaching her the trade.'
He's not a nice man, but he wished her well. He loved her in his way. And because he loved her and the world is a dangerous place, he didn't cut her any slack when it came to following the apprenticeship he'd set her.

Family quarrels are the bitterest. But it's still family. Despite his words, Lazarus wouldn't have let Josiah hang. He helped Jess when she came to him. He would have intervened more directly if Josiah had actually come to trial.

Now ... as to why he scared her to death when she came to him for help ...

Jess betrayed him. She chose Josiah instead of him. He's pissed off at her, and he's hurt.

From a practical standpoint -- Lazarus is good at seeing things like this -- Jess isn't really safe walking the streets of London unless she's a true part of his 'gang' again. He can't just decree that she is. He needs to sell it to his people. Her fight with Badger is a 're-initiation' into the gang. It is the ordeal that transforms her from spoiled-aristocrat-outsider-who-deserted-us into 'one-of-us'.

And ... Ummm ... wandering into deep theoretical, pseudo-literary territory here ...
Jess' return to the padding ken is a symbolic death and rebirth. Lazarus (the name indicates rebirth from death ... ...) is the past that must be conquered and reconciled with. She makes this passage through the underworld in the company of Sebastian, (who is named after the saint who restored sight and speech and freed prisoners.)

Eva writes: And the woman who Lazarus had hostage until she was practically in labor- does he actually care for her? Why did she go back to him with the baby?
Second question first. She went back to Lazarus because women are such fools.

First question. Yes. Lazarus does love her.

We only see one moment of a long, tumultuous relationship, and we only see if from the outside.

She's going to 'reform' Lazarus in the end, I think, and he'll call her 'Fuffy' even when she's old and grey. They end up in Baltimore, become respectable, and their many descendents brag about their aristocratic roots.
If only they knew

Eva writes: I truly loved MLAS but I would have liked another intense, passionate scene between Jess and Sebastion.
I wish I'd had a little more time with MLAS. I write slowly, and there's stuff I didn't have time to get quite entirely right. I would have liked another sex scene, too.

Eva writes: firmly believe your books would make fantastic movies.
From your lips to Hollywood's ears ...

The problem with writing . . .

The problem with writing the WIP is that you have no time to read.

This is what I want to be reading . . .

and it looks like great fun and I am falling further and further behind.

(Click on the picture to see what I am missing.)

This, on the other hand, is what I am reading . . .

which is not as much fun.

Da Bwaha

Dear Author and Smart Bitches are Romance review sites where they talk about Romance and genre books. They hold a competition for the fans every year -- the melliflously-named Da Bwaha.

In Da Bwaha, folks pick the 2008 book they like best.
They also pick the book they think is going to win the competition.


This is two processes.
Separate processes.



(See the diagram to the right for the philosophical overview.)






Apparently in sports competitions there is a kinda bracket thingum to show eliminations in different rounds.




(see bracket to the right.
Daunting, isn't it?

This is used by jocks, though, so it cannot be too hard.)


Da Bwaha does this for books.
It is very clever of them.


Part One of Da Bwaha works like this:


Folks use a set of those brackets to guess which book is likely to be the more popular
when it goes mano a mano
against another other book.


(Last year I couldn't figure out how it worked. This year I figured it out.)


I am getting smarter and smarter.











If you want to enter the elimination tournament and take a guess as to who is going to win the popular vote, you go here.

You have to do this before Wednesday March 18, which is three days from now.

If you want to vote for the books you like
you have to register before March 18.
I think.

(Ahh ... you may have to switch to firefox and disable scripts and light a votive candle to make the site work. I know I did.)

Anyhow, when you finally get to the page to load -- which may work first shot, who knows? -- you go to the left column and pick your favorite from each of the pairs.

Your pick will just automatically show up on the next round competition
which is in a box just to the right.
Then you pick favorites in that second round box.

There are six rounds and you keep picking till you get to the end.

-- Then you go to the top right and put in your handle and your e-mail address.
-- Finally, you go down to the bottom of the page and click where it says, 'select picks'.

This allows you to move on to
(Remember, I told you there were two parts.)
Part Two:

which starts on March 19, which is next Thursday.

You will be able to pick the books you actually like.
That voting will take place here.

You have to register to do this. I don't know what the deadline for registration is. But I think it is March 18.


Here are the books

• You Know Where to Find Me by Rachel Cohn
• The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
• Graceling by Kristin Cashore
• On the Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta
• Audrey, Wait! by Robin Benway
• Need by Carrie Jones
• My Most Excellent Year by Steve Kluger
• Impossible by Nancy Werlin
• Flat Out Sexy by Erin McCarthy
• Blue Eyed Devil by Lisa Kleypas
• Just One of the Guys by Kristan Higgins
• Scream for Me by Karen Rose
• Tribute by Nora Roberts
• A Virgin River Christmas by Robyn Carr
• Blame it on Paris by Jennifer Greene
• Unlawful Contact by Pamela Clare
• Hidden by Eve Kenin
• Pleasure Unbound by Larissa Ione
• Cry Wolf by Patricia Briggs
• Mine to Possess by Nalini Singh
• Demon Bound by Meljean Brook
• The Darkest Pleasure by Gena Showalter
• King of Sword and Sky by CL Wilson
• Dark Desires After Dusk by Kresley Cole
• elicious by Sherry Thomas
• Private Arrangements by Sherry Thomas
• The Spymasters’ Lady by Joanna Bourne
• Duke of Shadows by Meredith Duran
• Your Scandalous Ways by Loretta Chase
• Price of Desire by Jo Goodman
• Broken Wing by Judith James
• A Lady’s Secret by Jo Beverly
• A Christmas Wedding by Tracy Wolff
• Public Scandal, Private Mistress by Susan Napier
• The Chef’s Choice by Kristin Hardy
• Unleashed by Lo
• he Money Man’s Seduction by Leslie La Foy
• Redeeming Gabriel by Elizabeth White
• Shaken and Stirred by Kathleen O’Reilly
• His Secret Past by Ellen Hartman
• Wicked Burn by Beth Kery
• The Mark of the Vampire Queen by Joey Hill
• Seduced by Magic by Stephanie Julian
• Show and Tell by Jasmine Haynes
• Undercover by Lauren Dane
• Be With Me by Maya Banks
• Forbidden Fruit by Eden Bradley
• Tempted by Megan Hart
• Grimspace by Ann Aguirre
• Silent in the Sanctuary by Deanna Raybourn
• The Sharing Knife: Passage by Lois McMaster Bujold
• The Sugar Queen by Sarah Addison Allen
• The Serpent’s Tale by Ariana Franklin
• Magic Burns by Ilona Andrews
• Iron Kissed by Patricia Briggs
• Kushiels Mercy by Jacqueline Carey
• Rough, Raw, and Ready by Lorelei James (Samhain)
• Uneven by Anah Crow (Torquere)
• Collision Course by K.A. Mitchell (Samhain)
• Love Ahead by Madeleine Urban and Abigail Roux (Dreamspinner)
• Handyman by Claire Thompson
• Mexican Heat by Laura Baumbach and Josh Lanyon (MLR)
• Lord John and the Hand of Devils by Diana Gabaldon
• Captain’s Surrender by Alex Beecroft

I would say that is a lot of books,
but they are all -- at least all the ones I've read -- great books.

(cough) I'm in there, about halfway down. (/cough)


Edited to add --

I just wanted to add something really neat that I just discovered about that list of books and writers above.

Bit of background: In lots of writer websites, if you click on the link you can go to Amazon and buy their book and the author makes a couple small coins of money.
Enough to take the kid out for a popsicle maybe.

Writers operate mostly on what is technically called 'a small profit margin' or 'no appreciable money at all', so the price of a popsicle is welcome.

When you put up a link to somebody's book, you can send folks to their website,
(and the author maybe ultimately makes a trickle more profit on their book,)
or you can send folks straight to Amazon,
(and you make the little trickle of profit.)

You see that list above?
Dear Author and Smart Bitches have linked to the author websites.

Back on line

All is well.

The computer has gots its head, (and everything else,) together.

It's feeling much better and is fluttering around in a fluffy pink bedgown, cooing over the get-well cards. Its innards have been desoldered with desoldering braid and lovingly resoldered. Everything connects where it should.

Ah. Connectivity.

There were a dozen screws left over when the final parts clicked together. I have put them into the little bitty box the new DC power jack came in. I will keep them, on the offchance they will someday be needed.

Actually, eleven screws.
I just counted.

The DH says, "It works out that way sometimes."

Having trouble with your droid?

Computer problems.
I has them
My laptop is sick.
Very, very sick.
These things are sent to try us.

AAR Readers Poll for Best Book of 2008

Oh look. Lookit! Lookit! Lookit!!

I got nominations or interim results or something. But Lookit!!

The AAR Readers Poll. I'm mentioned. Somebody likes me.

Here.

Even if I don't get anything in the final results, this is so cool.



EDITED TO ADD

Ok.
*jo hyperventillates*

Turns out I didn't have to rush in and post the interim results
so I could brag about the nominations.

I get to brag about WINS !!!!

*happy dance*

This is so wonderful.
Look. It's here.

I'm going to quote some of it because it's so nifty I can't help myself.

Ahem:

This year's break out winner was The Spymaster's Lady by Joanna Bourne. It was the overwhelming winner for Best Romance, earning a stand-alone win. In addition to Best romance, Ms. Bourne won Best Historical Romance Set in the U.K., Best Heroine, and Best Couple, also recieving an Honorable Mention for Best Hero. Ms. Bourne's My Lord and Spymaster also received votes in a number of categories ...


See. That's me. Spymaster's Lady. Me. My book.!!!!
How did this happen?


OK. Just so I can still fit into my favorite fishing hat, let me quote another line:

Every one of the top books in the Best Romance category also had at least a few votes for Worst


Oh. Oh. Let me put in everybody who won, because they are all great books.


Best 2008 Romance Novels

Best Romance.......................The Spymaster's Lady, Joanna Bourne

Best Contemporary Romance..........Blue-Eyed Devil, Lisa Kleypas

Best Romantic Suspense.............Death Angel, Linda Howard

Best Paranormal Romance............Lover Enshrined, J.R. Ward
(Honorable Mentions - tie)................Mine to Possess, Nalini Singh
..........................................Dark Desires after Dusk, Kresley Cole

Best Hist Rom Set in the U.K.......The Spymaster's Lady, Joanna Bourne
(Honorable Mention).......................Private Arrangements, Sherry Thomas

Best Hist Rom Not Set U.K..........Your Scandalous Ways, Loretta Chase

Funniest Romance...................Not Another Bad Date, Rachel Gibson
(Honorable Mentions - tie)................Like No Other Lover, Julie Anne Long
..........................................The Lost Duke of Wyndham, Julia Quinn
..........................................Just One of the Guys, Kristan Higgins

Biggest Tearjerker.................Blue-Eyed Devil, Lisa Kleypas
(Honorable Mention).......................Broken Wing, Judith James

Best Love Scenes (tie)..............To Seduce a Sinner, Elizabeth Hoyt
....................................Your Scandalous Ways, Loretta Chase
(Honorable Mention) .........................To Taste Temptation, Elizabeth Hoyt

Best Debut Author...................Sherry Thomas

Best Series Romance.................A Most Unconventional Match, Julia Justiss

Best Chick Lit/Women's Fiction......Just One of the Guys, Kristan Higgins
(Honorable Mentions - tie)...................Queen of Babble Gets Hitched, Meg Cabot
.............................................Remember Me, Sophie Kinsella

Best Erotica........................Wicked Burn, Beth Kery
(Honorable Mention)..........................Dangerous Secrets, Lisa Marie Rice

Best Romance Short Story..........From This Moment On in It Happened One Night, Candice Hern
(Honorable Mention).......................Spellbound in It Happened One Night, Mary Balogh

Guiltiest Pleasure Romance.........Lover Enshrined, J.R. Ward


Best 2008 Characters


Best Romance Hero................Hardy Cates in Blue-Eyed Devil, Lisa Kleypas
(Honorable Mention).....................Robert Grey in The Spymaster's Lady, Joanna Bourne

Best Romance Heroine..............Annique in The Spymaster's Lady by Joanna Bourne

Best Romance Couple...............Annique and Grey in The Spymaster's Lady, Joanna Bourne

More plogging

This is me plotting










I've been plogging, (i.e. plotting + slogging,) my way onward in MAGGIE.

I do this thing I think of as 'post plotting', which is where I go writing along, saying to myself ... "This isn't working. This isn't working. This is crap " ...
which isn't the most efficient way to go about it, but heck, we all have our method and suddenly I'll go
==Head desk ==
and see how to do it and zip back and move things around and slip in some new material.

Which is what I did today.

I've been having this knock-down-drag-out fight with myself for a couple months now over which beginning to use -- the book roasting scene or the rabbit scene.
So this morning I thought,
"Why not use them both?"
which is either brilliant or comes from having the flu.

AND while I was working out how I could use both beginnings I finally saw the action+emotion scene I needed to slip in just before the H&H canoodle.

So, anyhow,
a good and useful day was had by all, unless this turns out to be a virus-induced delusion in my little pea brain
in which case I'll read what I've written tomorrow and it will make no sense whatsoever like those notes you write on a scratch pad when you wake up in the middle of the night and in the morning it turns out to be something about a dwarf and leg waxing.

Recognition -- All About Romance

I have been greatly honored by All About Romance. Oh wow.

AAR has chosen Spymaster's Lady as winner of the 2008 Reviewer's Choice for Historical Romance.

Their kind comments here.

Oh wow. Oh wow. AAR. Wow.

An American Library Association recognition

I have some just unbelievable recognition here.

I have been named by the American Library Association's Reference and User Services as a Reading List winner.

The Reading List is one book chosen in each of eight genres (sci fi, thriller, mystery, woman's lit, horror, fantasy, romance, historical fiction,) as both good and of interest to the general adult reader.

I got the one for Romance.
here.

The shortlist for Romance here. was

"The Spymaster's Lady" by Joanna Bourne;
"My Lord and Spymaster" by Joanna Bourne;
"Private Arrangements" by Sherry Thomas;
"The Seduction of the Crimson Rose" by Lauren Willig; and
"Your Scandalous Ways" by Loretta Chase,

which is a hell of a short list, isn't it?

Last year, Natural Born Charmer won.
SEP, of course.

Oh my bobalinks and bananas, what am I doing anywhere near that company?

Spymaster's Lady at Bookshare

Spymaster's Lady and My Lord and Spymaster are available at Bookshare -- the site that makes digital books available to those with visual impairments or dyslexia.

Here.

I am so happy to see them there.

An out-take from MLAS

Here's an outtake from My Lord and Spymaster.
I refer to it in a later post. Here it is, in full, for anyone who wants to see it.

In a much modified form, this scene made it into the book.

***************

Adrian was propped against the wall in the stuffy closet they used as a listening post, reading from a black, bound notebook. He crooked a finger in invitation and kept reading. "Close the door."

There wasn't room for three in the cubbyhole. He slid in behind the table, the rack of pistols on the wall poking into his back. Trevor, the spy in training, sat at the table, his ear pressed to a brass ear trumpet that emerged from the wall and wrote, scribbling fast. The only light in the room came from the dark lantern at his elbow. Three sides of that were closed, the fourth open. In the bright oblong it cast, his pencil made a manic, dancing shadow across the page. Three books, like the one Adrian held, lay to his left. Another dozen were stacked and ready.

This was where the British Service watched and listened to what went on in the library. Jess was right -- the walls were full of rats.

He waited till Adrian looked up. "Don't question her again."

"Ah." Adrian gave him the same meditative consideration he'd been using on the book. "You're feeling protective."

"I can't deal with her when she's so scared she can barely think. You're making it worse."

"Naturally. We are, in our own small way, His Majesty's government.[which caps?] " Adrian shrugged. "We didn't haul out the bastinado, [date, sp] you know. Fletch chatted with her once, politely. Pax coaxed at her as if she were a kitten hiding under the sofa. Galba attempted reason. Reason is always a mistake, I feel."

"You've put this in my hands. Leave her to me. No more badgering."

"Our attempts to badger were, if I may say so, water off a duck's back. Do you want to see her badgered? Let's take a look at that interesting reunion next door." An angry rumble vibrated the walls, coming from the study. It had been going on for some time. "That's Josiah, disapproving of her recent exploits."

"Or he's annoyed she didn't follow his orders well enough."

"I don't think you're a fool. Do try not to disappoint me." Adrian flipped back to the beginning of the book he held. "Here are today's notes. Eight o'clock -- breakfast with Galba, discussing the market for fake antiquities." He thumbed forward. "Macleish, at ten, much incensed over problems in inventory and complaining about Pitney. He is followed by Pitney, at noon, complaining about Macleish. Pitney then enlivens everyone's day by peaching on Jess, who has been a very naughty girl. You must curb her tendency to climb four-storey buildings. [check hyphen]"

"I intend to. Let me see that." He helped himself to the book. To give him credit, Trevor wrote a clear hand and filled in later what he missed the first time through. "Damnation. Pitney knew what she was up to and didn't stop her. She took a bloody ferret with her. Can no one control that woman?"

"Good men have tried." Adrian reached across and turned forward a dozen pages. "This is what you want to see. At three o'clock, matters become interesting. Sergei Orkoff visits. What do you know about Sergei?"

"Attaché with the Russian Embassy. [check legation? Check possible titles] Smooth. Amusing. I see him at Claudia's soirees, hanging on the fringes of the Foreign Office and War Ministry crowd, listening. Very friendly to men who talk more than they should. My guess is he's in your line of work."

"Discerning of you. He is also an old friend of Josiah's.

"Orkoff is everybody's old friend."

"Too true." Adrian watched him read. "You will see they greet one another with glad cries, in French. That is to keep us on our toes. Some discussion of where to get decent pastry in London. The rain. Orkoff reminiscences of bordellos in Heidleburg."

And there was page after page of it. "Why did you let him in?"

"The Russian Embassy asks us to. And I was curious. Next -- you'll come to it -- Josiah discusses bordellos in Munich. In German. Sergei relates a filthy but inventive story involving animals and a Prussian Grand Duke [check title margravane]. Trevor finds this all very interesting. One seeks to educate the young."

"Fascinating." He turned the page. "They've switched to ... what? Russian."

Trevor stopped pretending to take notes. "That's because Orkoff's Russian. Or ... koff. Russian."

Adrian said, "Russian isn't one of your languages, is it? I'll have Trevor do a translation tonight."

The stripling looked mutinous.

"Tonight, Trev." Adrian's voice was gentle.

"He's not going to read it." Trevor [some action]. "The Captain's made up his mind. He's not here about Whitby. All he's doing is bullying Jess into bed with him."

"Then Jess will slice him stem to stern and laugh girlishly while he writhes in his own blood. Nonetheless, you will deliver the full translation to his house tonight." Adrian let that settle in. "A careful translation."

The mutter might have been, "The hell I will." Or it might not. Fortunatly, Trevor was Adrian's problem. [look for echo in earlier scene]

"Just tell me."

"Always the practical man. Let's see." Adrian took the book and turned it into the light. "We continue in the same vein. Customs officials in Athens. Cheeses. An anecdote concerning the Swedish legate [check] in Vienna."
Adrian laid the notebook on the table, held flat under his spread fingers. "And here, in passing, Orkoff mentions the transfer of a tourmaline from Josiah to a certain Levgenny Gregoritch Petroff Romanovski,[check Russian names]. For safekeeping."

He felt a dry prickle across the back of his neck. A warning of danger. "A Romanoff?"

"A minor, but perfectly genuine, Romanoff. He has vast estates overlooking the Black Sea." [check political geography] Adrian waited.

"Whitby doesn't deal in jewels." It took a minute. "The tourmaline is Jess."

"Regrettably, yes."

Trevor's hands, on the table, clenched into fists. "She won't do it. I won't let her."

"How nice for you both. Let us see what Sebastian has to say about this, shall we?" Adrian smoothed his way along Cryllic [caps?] letters with his fingertips [check frequency of fingertips]. "Reading between the lines ... the Russian Embassy [ambassador, legate, legation] offers to intervene on Josiah's behalf with his His [cap?] Majesty's Government. Josiah leaves the country. His holdings in England are forfeit to the [devolve? confiscated] crown [caps?] -- that's the sweetener for the Foreign Office [what office deals with treason?] -- and Jess marries a minor Romanoff. That's the payment to the Russians."

Jess, God help her, would marry a syphilitic dwarf if Josiah told her to. But it wasn't going to happen. Even in the first blank instant of rage, he knew that much. "Damn the Czar anyway."

"Amen."

"Whitby wouldn't live six months."

"He would meet some elegantly Byzantine end. The Russians are so good at that sort of thing."

"Whitby dead. Jess inherits half the shipping in the Eastern Mediterranean. Quite a coup for the Romanoffs."

But Jess wasn't destined for some Russian lordling. That wasn't what Adrian was warning him about. He did a quick mental tour of the labyrinth of Russian Imperial politics and didn't like what he found. "It's not ships the Russians want."

"Not ships. Not the indecent pots of money. Not warehouses. It's the [arabic word or turkish word for 'contacts'] prestige. The influence. Whitby knows everyone. He has a network of spies and commercial agents from the Crimea to Khartoum."

"It's the Whitby name they want."

"I can almost hear the Russians slavering."

That was the East. He'd sailed those waters for a decade. Every trade, every encounter, was an intrigue of boxes nested within boxes, wheels within wheels, layer after layer of subtlety. England played intricate, rough games in the ports and palaces. So did the French and the Austrians and the Russians. "It changes the balance of power. The Foreign Office can't allow it."

"They'd see the company, and both the Whitbys, destroyed first."

"Both Whitby's. They'd have to destroy both of them." Jess did collect enemies, didn't she?

He rubbed his chin, feeling the beard. He'd been up all last night searching the Whitby warehouse and he hadn't shaved. He looked like a pirate and Jess still didn't even have the sense to be scared of him. "No wonder she doesn't trust the government. Did the Foreign Office frame Whitby?"

"I think not. Probably not." Adrian closed the book. "They are not, strictly speaking, that clever. And Whitby's has heretofore presented no problem."

"They'll find out Orkoff was here."

"Certainly. They will eventually figure out why. Some bureaucratic popinjay will then panic." Adrian met his eyes. "He will fix upon one of the two obvious solutions. That is why Jess will return to your house every night, mon ami. Your footmen will stick to her like so many nautical mustard plasters [date] every day, and my own men will lurk in the shadows lending just that soupçon [check]of official support. This is the last time she gives us the slip. She must not fall into the hands of the Foreign Office."

Behind the wall, in the study, the grumble of a man's voice continued, words muffled to unintelligibility. Jess was getting yelled at.

Outside, the real storm was gathering. He could protect her against Cinq. Could he protect her from his own government? "The Foreign Office doesn't want her dead. They want her married to an Englishman."

"To their chosen Englishman. I doubt Jess' consent is considered strictly necessary. Sit down, Trevor." That was directed at the boy. "There is insufficient space for strenuous heroics."

Trevor subsided, muttering.

The boy was right about one thing. "They can't make her do it. Not Jess."

"I will back Jess against triple her fighting weight in Foreign Office lackeys. And Josiah's been diddling the diplomatic service for years. I suggest we listen intelligently to what he has to say to Jess." Adrian set his hand on the small, square panel in the wall behind him.

This wasn't what he'd come for. "I don't –"

"... You don't listen at keyholes. Have I ever told you how much I admire gentlemanly scruples? You read the transcripts. You pass a quiet hour pawing through her bedroom. But you won't eavesdrop. These distinctions escape me. Douse the lights, Trev."

Without a word, the boy closed the door of the lantern and threw them into total dark.

"Sebastian, they know I'm watching. They expect it. Think of it as a sort of game." The sound of tapping fell into the darkness. That would be Adrian's fingers, restless on the table or the edge of the chair. "I specialize in betrayals. I assure you, this hardly qualifies."

"You and Josiah are playing games. Jess isn't."

"Then it's time she did." Adrian was still a moment. "Josiah knows what I am. Eventually, Jess will. Do you know, there are times I do not find being Head of Section at all amusing. Shut up, now. When I open this they can hear us."
***************

If you want to go back to the post where I was talking about this, it's here.

Images of the Sinti, circa 1800

I'm working on a scene in MAGGIE with a brief appearance of French gypsies in it.
I don't know whether the scene will stay in the manuscript.

The Sinti / Manouche / Bohemians / Roma / gypsies
are HARD to research in this period. There's just about no solid history on them.

The good part is I get to make stuff up.
The bad part is I have to make stuff up.

Here's some images.

I don't have a date on this one. The clothing is interesting. Striped skirt, unbound hair, long scarf over head and wrapped around, some sort of quilted shawl over shoulders and pinned in the front. There's something with sleeves under the shawl.

This is late C19, so I can't use it for details of clothing. But it's interesting.

We get -- lookit -- see the dishevelled, curly hair of the girl children. This appears in many pictures.

Here's 1750 London. See the loose red cloak. I find this red cloak over and over again for the whole century. I'm begining to think this may have been a long-term commonality.

The fortune teller is casting coffee grounds. I mean, how weird is that?

Close up view of the picture is here.

This one is from 1764. The print is Amsterdam, but I don't know where the scene is. It shows both male and female gypsy dress. And we got a cloak and head scarf on the woman. Hat with brim on man. Larger picture here.

Here's one from 1855. German, I think. The clothing is really irrelevant, so far from my date, but we got the hair loose. This seems to be a commonality, that long dark loose hair. Close up here.

Here's one from before 1818, probably in the north of England. This is very close to my target date of 1794.

And we got some cloaks, including two red ones, and the wide-brimmed, flat-crowned hats that we keep seeing. And we got dogs and a donkey.

The clothing, aside from the hats and the cloaks, looks pretty much like ordinary English country clothing of the period.
One can get a closer view here.

I took a look at Pyne's Microcosm. (I'll see if I can scan in pictures some time.) That dates from 1806. Microcosm shows English gypsies in the clothing of English country laborers.

In this painting we got a gypsy woman in England in 1839. This is sentimentalized and therefore not reliable as to clothing, but ... see the red cloak and the stripes and the loose hair. These would seem to be the stereotype that says 'gypsy' to sentimental painters.

For upclose here.

Another British painting here,

This one I can't copy to the blog, but you can track it down. We got with the donkey and the baskets on the donkey and, yes, a red cloak.

Nice set of period donkey baskets on this one.

And this cloak seems to have fringes on it.

Takes all kinds.

Moving along ...

This one was painted in England fairly close to the period. Red cloak again.

And lookit, lookit, lookit! see the baby strapped to the back under the cloak.

Oh my, yes. Good.

(They do this all over Africa today. It's how I used to carry the kid around when I was in Africa. Now I know the Rom did it. Yes! Lovely detail.)

Closeup view here.

Tents

The 1794 gypsies would have used 'bender tents'. here.

Here's a bender tent in use. This is loooong after 1794, of course, but the photo shows the form of the tent in detail.

These bender tents are typically shown in C18 and early C19 paintings with the fire built next to the entrance. There's a couple of paintings on this posting that show the tent and the fire next to it with a tripod and a pot.

They could also put the fire inside, which seems counter-intuitive.

(I had a period picture with a flap on top of the tent so the smoke could escape. My blog seems to have lost the image for me. I'll try to find it again.)

Here's a photo from 1910 or so with a 'double bender' tent on either side and the fire in between.

View of a two-wheeled cart as well.

Original here.

Here's a painting, England, 1797, so it is right on the dot in time. Red cloak. Turban sort of hat on the woman. A donkey.

Vardos

The traditional painted-wood, curved-top, live-in gypsy wagon described so well by Dickens in 1840 evolved roughly between 1810 and 1830.

(It's fairly easy to find exterior shots of late C19 vardos, but I haven't seen any C19 interior photos. It's after my period a good bit so I haven't pursued. One could start here, if fascinated.)

Before the 1830 wooden vardo, they had cloth- (canvas?) topped wagons.

These canvas-covered wagons were in use right up to C20. Canvas-tops and wood vardos were used by the same groups.

Here's a sentimental, undated painting, place unknown, but it looks European. Might be 1790 to 1830, going by the gentleman's outfit. And we got ourselves a canvas-covered wagon with four wheels. A larger version of this here.

These canvas-covered wagons were not 'living spaces' with windows and doors, stoves and built-in beds, like the vardos. The 1794 wagons and carts would have been enclosed from the rain and would have been used, along with the bender tents, for sleeping.

This is Czeck and far far later than the period, but it's how the cloth-covered wagons would have been used. See a larger, clearer version here.

In this painting from Van Gogh, 1888, we have both the traditional wooden vardo and a canvas-covered wagon.

And another mid C19 painting that shows a canvas covered wagon. Larger version here.

Here's an illustration from Guy Mannering, showing -- not very clearly -- a line of gypsies and their wagons. Publicaton date of the novel was 1815, but I don't know the date of the illustration.

Again, this is sentimentalize, so I distrust the details.

And here's a modern version of the canvas-covered wagon.

What's interesting about this photo ... the cart is two-wheeled. It's operating in a context of good roads. This implies that a four-wheeled cart is neither necessary nor universally desirable.

Interesting.

Now, am I justified in giving my French gypsies covered carts in 1794?


I have English gypsies with cloth-topped carts in the period.

So some gypsies had these carts.
And I have paintings of C18 French farmers with just exactly this type of two-wheeled covered cart.

So the technology was there.

But there's a plethora of pictorial gypsies without any carts at all.

Now, these are the Romantic paintings of 'Gypsies in a Woods' or 'Giving Alms to the Gypsies' and they tend to have a picturesque donkey curled to the side and no clutter anywhere and I just don't trust them on the workaday details at all.
(Pyne also doesn't show carts, but I think that's because he's concentrating on human figures at work.)


In the end, I have to make some guesses.

I'm also going to assume prosperous groups or large groups would have a cart or two. Small, poor families might not have carts.

I'm going to go with the assumption that French Rom had pretty much the same technology as English Rom and German Rom, etc.

(Records from the period show that about one-third of Gypsy men
condemned to the French galleys in C18 had been born outside France. So there was obviously much to-ing and forthing across borders.)

So I'm going to give my people carts.
Yeah!

Technical Topics -- 'First Meeting' scenes

For a while now, I've been pondering on the 'first meeting' scene of MAGGIE in a futile, disorganized, uncomfortable way.

Romance genre contains the story of a love relationship at its heart. The H&H tend to meet early so this central story gets underway.
One doesn't vamp indefinitely beforehand.

When I have nothing better to agonize over, lately, I've been looking and relooking at the first 5000 words of MAGGIE and asking myself when and where and how I should position this 'first meeting' scene.
At the opening of the ms?
A couple thousand words in?
And how do I coordinate this 'meeting' scene with the beginnings of the other six or seven stories I'm telling in the ms?

So last night I was mulling over 'first meeting scenes I have known' and naturally started thinking about Lucia St. Claire Robson's classic, The Tokaido Road.

Tokaido is not genre Romance, of course, since the stage ends up strewn with corpses at the end of Act V, a la Hamlet, and heaps of still-twitching corpses piled from horizon to horizon is a clue you're not in a Romance.

Tokaido is interesting to the great world of Romance, however, because it's the story of a love relationship where the H&H don't actually meet for most of the book. They exchange letters.

Tokaido differs from, for instance, Kinsale's My Sweet Folly, because in Folly the letters, though vital, are presented more or less as backstory and the 'first meeting' is an early and intrinsic part of the on-stage action.

So, anyway, I was uselessly pondering on all this last night.

My mind goes wandering off this way instead of doing serious work and I hold onto the pommel and kick my heels into its flanks,
(note to self -- 'Are those flanks that get kicked or is it some other part of the horse?')
and hope I'll wind up on the trail again, eventually.

Then a movie came on TV -- the Lake House -- where the structure of the on-going action is the H&H exchanging letters.

Hmmm ... says I. Synchronicity.

Now it happened that I picked up Hot, by Julia Harper, out of the TBR pile because I don't generally give movies my whole attention and Hot was on top of Julia Ross, Nights of Sin, rather than under it, so Hot it was.

(Hot is funny and well-done. It's on some 'Best of 2008' lists and deserves to be.)

Now I'm a third of the way through Hot, and the 'first meeting' has still not come down.

The H&H are exchanging cell phone calls, cell phones being the new letters, which will deprive future generations of untold literary correspondence, won't it?

Anyhow, synchronicity squared.

So now I'm wondering if I might use this idea of webbing together 'relationship at a distance' later in the story when Maggie and Doyle are in Paris.

But maybe not. Probably I'll file this under 'cool stuff I can't use', which is a whole drawer in my mental filing cabinet.

Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

Have yourself a Merry Little Chrismas

The sun, and its place in reality

Do you have a window that faces southwest?
You can keep track of the universe from your window.

Today is the winter solstice. This evening, at sunset, look out your window and see where the sun sets.

Is there a tree or a telephone pole or a house chimney or a notch in the hills or ... I dunnoh ... the flag pole of your favorite Italian restaurant ... just to the north side of the setting sun?
(That's the right side of the sun if you're in the northern hemisphere.)

There's nothing there?
Heck.
Well, go out and drive a big stake in the back yard or something.

Next June, on the 20th, come back and stand at the window at sunset. Mark the spot just to the south of the sun when it sets.
(That's left. You with me so far?)

You have created a net. Now you can play pingpong with the sun.

The sun will set between those two marks, every day, forever. The cradle of its setting travels slowly north. Then slowly south. Then slowly north ...

Your pre-societal ancestors saw the sun doing this and it filled them with dread and wonder. They knew then that the universe was not chaos, but a realm of law and rules, because -- look -- there was the very sun itself, obeying them.

When the sun got to the cold north end of its yearly bounce, everybody would
light bonfires,
(Yeah!!! Longer days coming!!! Warmth!!! Tender young lambs!!)
and get drunk
(Ale!!! Mead!! Wine!!)
and party
(Buxom wenches!! Studly dudes!)

We have responsibilities. Life is uncertain. We have to check the universe every once in a while to make sure it's running right.

If we stop paying attention, it might stop.

Sun ping pong.
You have to play to win.

Fresh Fiction and Romance Novel TV bragging

Me: But nobody will KNOW if I don't tell them.
Myself: It's bragging.
Me: If I ignore it, it's almost insulting. Like nobody told me. Like nobody noticed.
Myself: It's bragging. One does not flaunt oneself.
Me: It's an item of interest. It's informational.
Myself: It's bra--
I: Will you two stop it already and just SAY it.

Me (taking deep breath):

Fresh Fiction published
The Best Gift Books for 2008 according to Fresh Fiction Staff Members.

And the books are ...


Woman's Fiction -- Searching for Paradise in Parker, PA by Kris Radish

Paranormal Romance -- Nightkeepers by Jessica Andersen

Contemporary Romance -- Natural Born Charmer by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

Chick Lit -- This is How It Happened by Jo Barrett

Historical Romance -- Spymaster's Lady by Joanna Bourne
(See. See. See. That's me!! Lookit!)

Erotic Romance -- Art of Desire by Cherie Feather

Romantic Suspense -- Take Me If You Can by Karen Kendall


Myself: You had to go and do it, didn't you?
Me: It's my blog. I get to put stuff like that on my own blog. I'm just saying it.
Myself: You are so bragging.
Me: I put in all seven names. All Seven. That makes it informational. And I'm in the middle so it's modest.
Myself: You put yourself in bold type. Why not just hire a flossing billboard?
I: Will you two just shut up? Jeesh. I can't take you anywhere.


Edited to reiterate:

I have been deeply honored by Michelle Buonfiglio at mylifetime here. She listed Spymaster's Lady as best book of the year.
I truly do not know what to say.

So I perform a modest and restrained ...
*Snoopy Dance*


Edited again to add:
The Wonderful people at Romance Novel TV here have nominated Spymaster's Lady among the Best of 2008. They've said such cool things.

And edited yet again:

RNTV didn't pick me for any titles. *pooh*
But I'm still pleased to have been nominated.

I got a nod from Romantic Times too.
*Yeah*

Kindly praise

I have been deeply honored by Michelle Buonfiglio at mylifetime here.

Oh my. What does one say? What does one say?

Technical Topics -- Talking Heads II

In My Lord and Spymaster, I had a dozen nuggets of backstory to pass along to the reader. So I wrote a Talking Heads scene. Adrian and Sebastian search Jess' bedroom.

How do you make a Talking Heads scene slightly less horrible than it might otherwise be?


-- Best choice is you turn the action of the scene into plot action. (i.e. You make it 'not' a Talking Heads scene. )

So, instead of folks sitting around the kitchen table, talking,
which does not change the outcome of the story and is not story action or even plot action,
you change it into folks sitting around the kitchen table building a bomb or performing an emergency lobotomy or cutting letters out of the newspaper for the ransom note
all of which are at least plot action.

-- Failing important plot action, you do the next best thing.
You liven things up with 'stage business'.

Stage business doesn't advance the plot, but it's interesting. Folks bend spoons with their psyches or learn to play the fiddle or get hiccups.

What else do we do to take the edge off a Talking Heads scene?

-- You layer on sensation, of course, as you would in any scene. Give visuals. Blow whistles. Waft forth the smell of brownies in the oven.

-- You make sure there's real info to share. That is, they don't already both know what's being said. ("As you know, Bob ...")

-- Your characters interact with each other. You enrich, expose and develop the characters. You might even sneak some story in this way.

-- And, most especially, your characters react to the information that's being conveyed. They wouldn't be talking about it if it weren't important to them.

OK. Coming to one of my specific instances of Talking Heads.

In the search-Jess's-bedroom scene I want to convey the backstory factoid that Jess had an old boyfriend.
Sebastian and Adrian do not sit at a table and swap info.

You got yer stage business
and yer visuals
and yer interaction between Sebastian and Adrian
and you got yer character reaction to what's being said.

Here's the scenelette:

Adrian tapped the letters together and looped the blue ribbon around them and made a jaunty bow. "Gods. I was never that young. I'm glad Jess was, for a while."

"It wasn't tied like that."

"I'm showing her somebody's been in here." He set the letters carefully back in the box and closed the lid. "Not a sparkling correspondent, young Ned, but I don't suppose she noticed."

That was the name written in the front of the Odyssey. "Who's Ned?"

Adrian was up, wandering the room, leaning to peer in at the fireplace. He waited just long enough to be annoying. "The Honorable Edward Harrington. She was fifteen. He was bright, likable, ambitious and quite sickeningly in love with her."

"A paragon."

"It has given me considerable satisfaction, over the years, to think of Jess, out in the straw in a horse barn, bestowing her virginity on that boy." He ran his thumb along the carving of the fireplace. The mantel was black marble and the design was scrolled leaves. "He had the face of a young Apollo."

Jess's lover. The one who'd put knowledge in her eyes. "What happened?"

Adrian shifted the firescreen aside. "Genuinely bad luck. Josiah shipped him out as supercargo, to see what he was made of. Edward Harrington died heroically off the Barbary Coast, saving the lives of two of his shipmates. He was seventeen." Adrian rolled up his shirtsleeves and knelt on the bricks of the hearth. "Jess spent the next year constructing Europe's best accounting system. I don't think she slept at all for a couple months."

"I see." He wasn't sure what he saw, except that he was jealous of a boy, half his age and dead.

"He was a better man than either of us." Adrian twitched a knife from its sheath on his left forearm. "And look here. Jess has been sloppy."************

What do I do to make the Talking Heads marginally palatable?

*****************

Adrian tapped the letters together and looped the blue ribbon around them and made a jaunty bow. That's stage business and visuals. "Gods. I was never that young. I'm glad Jess was, for a while."

"It wasn't tied like that."
There's human interaction. Sebastian is annoyed at Adrian. That's what interests the reader right now, not so much what was in the letters ... though that's supposed to be intriguing too.

"I'm showing her somebody's been in here."
Which is Adrian's reaction right back.
The Talking Heads don't just talk. They snipe.

Information comes to the reader under cover of these two guys being annoyed at each other. The reader doesn't have to care about the info. She can care about the two characters on stage.


He set the letters carefully back in the box and closed the lid. Stage action. "Not a sparkling correspondent, young Ned, but I don't suppose she noticed."

See the character interaction?
Adrian lures Sebastian to ask questions. Adrian , for reasons of his own, obviously wants to convey information.

The way the info is released becomes important. The characters have a reason to talk about the info. They have an attitude toward the info.

One of the dangers with Talking Heads is we can set them to chattering about stuff they don't really need to discuss.
So in a Talking Heads scene you always ask yourself -- why this info? Why between these two people? Why now?

... Here, it's because Adrian has something he wants to say.
That was the name written in the front of the Odyssey. "Who's Ned?" 

Adrian was up, wandering the room, leaning to peer in at the fireplace. He waited just long enough to be annoying.

Adrian doesn't just lay the information out for Sebastian like he was dealing cards. There's an ebb and flow to it. Adrian teases Sebastian with what he knows. Sebastian pulls info out of Adrian.

"The Honorable Edward Harrington. Ned. She was fifteen. He was bright, likable, ambitious and quite sickeningly in love with her." 

"A paragon."

"It has given me considerable satisfaction, over the years, to think of Jess, out in the straw in a horse barn, bestowing her virginity on that boy."

This is Adrian's emotional truth. The factoids are just slathered all over with meaning.

The way Adrian says this shows Adrian's awareness of who he's speaking to. Adrian wouldn't say this, this way, to anyone else.
Info filters to us through its source. If story facts are not modified in the guts of the man who holds them, we don't have real characters. Likewise, info is shaped towards its recipient.

We don't just 'tell a fact'. We tell the fact we see and understand. We tell it to our audience.

Our characters have to do this too.

OK. OK. This is true in any dialog.But it's especially important to keep the basic dialog rules in mind when we do Talking Heads. T.H. tempt us to forget everything we've ever learned about dialog.

He ran his thumb along the carving of the fireplace. The mantel was black marble and the design was scrolled leaves. Visuals. Stage business, too, I guess. "He had the face of a young Apollo."
Adrian's emotional reaction to the factoids.

We transfer the emotional punch of these old factoids into the present. The T.H. do not merely tell the old story; they experience that story now.

This is not an exchange of info. It's a replaying of old events and old truths with the character's current reactions.

Current reactions hold the reader's interest. Sometimes, they're story.



Jess's lover. The one who'd put knowledge in her eyes. That's the internal from Sebastian. "What happened?" 

Adrian shifted the firescreen aside. "Genuinely bad luck. Josiah shipped him out as supercargo, to see what he was made of. Edward Harrington died heroically off the Barbary Coast, saving the lives of two of his shipmates. He was seventeen." Adrian rolled up his shirtsleeves and knelt on the bricks of the hearth. "Jess spent the next year constructing Europe's best accounting system. I don't think she slept at all for a couple months."
That stuff above ... here's a minor technical.I'm doing the big long run of straight backstory here. I get it out of the way, all in one lump. What I've done ... I've laid big dollops of emotion before and after, and I'm hoping like mad that the reader doesn't get bored while I real quick-like slip all these little facts past her.

"I see." He wasn't sure what he saw, except that he was jealous of a boy, half his age and dead.

And we got us some internals.
Internals go with Talking Heads like Burns with Allen.
Sebastian thinks about what he's just been told. He reacts. He feels.
This is the necessary ingredient. This is what mitigates Talking Heads and all this factoid dropping. The human reaction pulls the reader through the scene.

"He was a better man than either of us." Adrian twitched a knife from its sheath on his left forearm. "And look here. Jess has been sloppy."

At this point, Adrian grabs us and jumps onto the next bit of stage business. We leap from past to present, from interior to exterior.
We go on to do an interval of solid, visual stage business. That's our respite before the final set of factoids lands like wet dough onto the floury board of the scene.

Technical Topics -- Talking Heads I

When to use 'Talking Heads'?

I brought up a message and response down in the comments trail that deals with one specific use of Talking Heads.


I stopped by to comment on MLAS (aka Jessamyn). I just started reading it . . . and was wondering if you kept the scene about Sebastien rooting through Jess's bedroom (I recall it from a previous post . . . and although it's a little different, it's still there!)
Yah! Why did you think an editor would cut it?


A raft of Really Cool Scenes got cut out of the manuscript. I had to write other stuff to replace them.

The searching-Jess's-room scene managed to escape the slaughter.
This pleased me.

Putting the matter in a philosophical teacup --

All scenes have to justify their existence.
Scenes that do not contain the H&H interacting really have to justify their existence.

At heart, the structure of the search-Jess's-bedroom scene is Talking Heads Exchange Information. Sebastian and Adrian are -- I hope -- interesting Talking Heads, exchanging vital information and doing nifty stage business while they're at it.
But they're still Talking Heads.

This is a weak structure for a scene. An easy, self-indulgent structure.
You have to ration yourself to maybe one or two Talking Head scenes per manuscript.
This kinda scene is the first to get chopped if your pacing is slow or you need to lose words. Rightly so.

So ... why is this scene in the final book?

I think the search-bedroom scene survived the cuts because it was truly about character revelation. (i.e. it was not using 'character revelation' as an excuse for taking up space.)
The scene 'told' stuff about these three characters that would have been difficult to 'show' in any reasonable length of time . . . which is one of the justifications for Talking Heads.
The scene is short.
It found a spot where I could afford to slow the pacing.
And it made an efficient framework to reveal character.
I let Sebastian look at Jess's possessions and straightforwardly tell the reader what they 'said'.

You'll say this sort of scene isn't so much 'efficient' as 'bloody obvious' and 'heavy handed'.

Hmmm ... yes ....

This is a survey

Does anyone see a light blue column covering half the message on the left hand side of the blog?

Does anyone not see one?

This is one of those weirdnesses.

My screen looks like this ....











Well .... not the moire patterns part. That seems to be part of taking photos of your computer screen.



UPDATE

Ah. This is my very OWN Internet Explorer problem.
How exciting.

Stupid computer.

Thank you all for helping me to track down the culprit.

My Lord and Spymaster in Russian

A fine bit of news. My Lord and Spymaster will be translated into Russian. The publication date is estimated at eighteen months from now.

I do not look a gift horse in the mouth. I am grateful to the Berkley subsidiary rights folks. Yeah, subsidiary rights!!

But why Russian?

I had never thought about this one way or the other, you understand, but is Russia full of Romance readers?

... oh
Since I've got the message open,
the status report on Maggie is:

18400 / 120000 words. 15% done on the second rough draft!

I think Maggie is going to end up at 120,000 words. I've figured out how to simplify a plot point or two late in the story. And I de-created a minor character.
Poof.

I stopped today halfway through Chapter Eight. Tomorrow I should finish refining that, and then Maggie and Doyle (and Hawker,) take to the road.

The rabbit scene still lingers within the manuscript, glaring defiance, daring me to extract it.
I have not.
This is weak of me.