Welcome to the first penitential season of the year. It was Shrove Tuesday yesterday and today is Ash Wednesday. “Shrove” is past tense for “shrive,” an archaic term “to confess.” It was a day to be absolved, to prepare for the penitential season of Lent ahead. This day is more recently known as “Fat Tuesday” because … Read more
My guest-poster today is Kathleen Kaska. She writes the award-winning Sydney Lockhart Mystery Series, the Kate Caraway Animal-Rights Mystery Series, and the Mystery Trivia series, which includes The Sherlock Holmes Quiz Book published by Lyons Press. Her Holmes short story, “The Adventure at Old Basingstoke,” appears in Sherlock Holmes of BAKING Street, a Belanger Books … Read more
Sometimes you come across something that peaks your interest. And the bobbin hat is certainly one of them. I was watching an episode of BBC’s The Repair Shop in which everyday British people bring in family heirlooms that are treasured by them; a metal toy car from when they were a kid, a doll received … Read more
Sometimes, I really agonize over what name I will give a character. Two factors are involved, especially in my historicals but it also counts for contemporary stories regionally; Is the name appropriate to the era, and for the country (England) or region in any contemporary novel set in the United States I might be writing … Read more
I care. Perhaps I care too much. But I get invested in my characters. Why shouldn’t I? I mean, my readers get invested in them, so I owe my readers that. I care about the lives of my characters, all the details of their backstory and all their hopes and dreams, some of which only … Read more
Do you know your vampires? Do you know what they look like, what their characteristics are? My former Baker Street Irregular Tim Badger set up a detecting agency with friend and partner-in-detecting Ben Watson, under the mentorship of Sherlock Holmes. They encounter a man who claims his village neighbors are harassing him since they believe … Read more
Whenever there are historical things about, there are people who know nothing but myths, people who THINK they know, and people – like me – who have actually researched it. Henry was a difficult man to parse. There is the outer Henry, the one most of us see in history books or depicted for good … Read more
Q: Haley Walsh, tell us about the Skyler Foxe Mystery series. Where did the idea for the series come from? Haley: It came from several directions. Sometime in 2005 I stumbled upon M/M romance/erotica and wondered where the hell THAT had been all my life. I was thus challenged by my gay friends to do … Read more
In my fourth King’s Fool Mysteries, DEVIL’S GAMBIT, Henry VIII weds his fourth wife, the German gentlewoman Anne of Cleves. It would have been an arduous journey to come to England, meet the king to see if he liked her, to be accepted…or sent back in disgrace. Instead, Henry’s court painter, Hans Holbein the Younger, … Read more
Yes, the iconic fast food of fried and battered fish served with hot chips (or what we would call French fries) served wrapped in newspaper, is a symbol of Great Britain. It excluded from rationing during WWI and WWII as it was a universal favorite and in order to keep up morale it was given … Read more
Author of Medieval Mysteries, Historicals, and Paranormals