The Tudor period, and King Henry’s wives have been the focus of a lot of novels, movies and TV lately — some of it terrific stuff indeed. 

The Tudors was compulsive viewing, not just because of the costuming, in-your-face sex and titillation and the knife-edge lives those who dared played politics led in those days. The series was also historically spot on, and I really liked the way it portrayed Henry as a “modern” man for his age.  He was a forward thinker, interested in all sorts of cutting-edge subjects.  Science, philosophy, sociology.  Henry had a huge influence on the shaping of England for the next century or so, and his daughter, Elizabeth, inherited his attitude and drive, and further moulded the country and empire.

But Henry’s modern thinking didn’t seem to extend to his wives.

While The Tudors and most other books and shows try to explain why, in reasonable terms, he executed Anne — and it was a convoluted and complex set of reasons, to be sure — ultimately it all seems to boil down to Henry having a hissy-fit because he wasn’t getting his way.  Anne didn’t produce a son on demand.  Everything else stems from that.  He segregated the church of England from Rome so he could marry her after seven long years of courtship, and there were a lot of other church-and-state decisions he made that, broken down to their core, had very little to do with the organ sitting just under his skull.

Because Anne failed to give him the son and heir he wanted, Henry ordered Thomas Cromwell to find a way to get rid of her, as Henry had already moved on to Anne’s maid-in-waiting, Jane Seymour.  Cromwell trumped up charges of witchcraft and adultery which, for a queen, meant high treason.  High treason was an offence worthy of hanging, drawing and quartering.  The four witnesses Cromwell pulled into the courtroom included Anne’s own brother, so the charges also implied incest.  Three of the witness were high ranking peers, and therefore could not be tortured into giving a confession, and they adamantly insisted they were innnocent.  The fourth was a commoner, and was forced into a confession in the court.  It was a weak case against Anne, but it was upheld, and all four witnesses were found guilty and executed the day before Anne.

Henry rescinded the hanging, drawing and quartering, and ordered a “more merciful” beheading.  And rather than allow the commoner’s axe be used, he had a French swordsman brought to London to do the deed.  Under the circumstances, it seems a rather pathetic gesture, especially when Henry announced his engagement to Jane Seymour the same day Anne was executed.

Anne died 476 years ago today, on May 19, 1536.  Her remains were left lying where they fell, and she was buried in an unmarked grave in the Chapel of St Peter ad Vincula. Her skeleton was identified during renovations of the chapel in the reign of Queen Victoria and Anne’s resting place is now marked in the marble floor.

It wasn’t until much later – centuries later — that historians established that Anne was actually innocent and the true extent of her influence on Henry and England was measured.

______________

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We tend to let the name “Alexander the Great” roll off the tongue without thought, but there is a reason he earned his name.

Alexander III of Macedon died on this day in 323 BC, after building the greatest empire the world had ever seen up until then.  He was undefeated in battle his entire life, and modern military scholars still turn to his battle strategies as teaching aids.

He introduced Greek culture to most of the western world, and directly influenced the Byzantine culture that would rise in the centuries following his death.  Because of Alexander, Greek was the lingua franca used by most of the western world for centuries, in order to speak to each other, for commerce, education, medicine, and more, until the rise of Rome eclipsed the Greek influence.

At least five cities bore his name, including Alexandria in Egypt, which has held the name since it was endowed in Alexander’s time.

That’s an astonishing amount of influence and achievement for a man who was just short of his 33rd birthday when he died.

_______________

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Goodies I’ve found from chatting and cruising this week:

Interesting Sites

Indie Authors

Historical romance author Jennifer Blake is now self-publishing.

Various Romance genres.  Carolyn McCray – and you need to see her blog “Dating After 40″ – it’s a hoot.

YA Paranormal Romance.  Cameo Renae.

General Sites

Suspense Magazine

Looks very interesting.  If you’re into suspense and thrills, this might interest you.

Pixel of Ink

Reports on free and cheap books every week, in your genre.

99c Network

Reports and reviews books that are 99 cents.  Also has a section for books that cost a bit more than that — anything up to $2.99.

Blast From The Past (from my archives)

 7 Tailored Uses For Google Alerts

One for the writers this week.  But actually, of use to everyone.  Do you have a favourite genre or writer, or hobby?  You can use Alerts the same way…

_______________

  Have a great weekend!

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I started late on Fringe.  As in, only a few weeks ago, and the show is already into Season 4.  But I’ve caught up already.  The hook bit deep, and dragged hard.

The most frustrating part of that is I’m not really sure why.

The show doesn’t deal with paranormal — or it says it doesn’t.  It deals with what it calls “fringe science” — a psychobabble, pseudo-technical way of explaining what often looks like paranormal and supernatural events as the work of mad scientists — literally.  Dr. Walter Bishop was locked up in a mental institution for 17 years, and most of the villians and events the Fringe Division of the FBI have to deal with are the outcome of his earlier experiments in the seventies and eighties, when he was really pushing the envelope.  Now he’s trying to defeat the bad guys with a sketchy memory and even shakier sanity.

He’s helped by his son, Peter, who starts off wildly reluctant to even be in the same room with him, and FBI agent Olivia Dunham, who uses Peter’s shady past as leverage to keep him in Boston, to control his father once she springs him from the institution.

That’s the basis for the beginning of the series.  Surprisingly, it’s one of those shows that sounds hugely unlikely and out there, but it has a high degree of humanity and emotional content in it.  And it doesn’t stay with the weird-experiment-of-the-week format for long.  By Season 2, there are alternative universes, time slips, dopplegangers, and storylines that are absorbing and complex.  This is not a series you can afford to start watching mid-season, or even mid-series.  You’ll be instantly lost.

Right out of the gate, I could see that Peter and Olivia were being lined up as a potential romantic pair.  Even Peter’s father, Walter, was making broad hints about how Peter should ask Olivia out – couched in his colourful idioms.  So right away my interest was piqued, because Peter (played by Joshua Jackson) is ever-so-easy on the eyes and his character is a sort-of reformed bad boy.  Hard to resist.

I figured the producers and writers would do what every series has done time out of mind: toyed with the audience.  Teased and dangled hope as they let the pair dance around each other endlessly, a la NCIS, which has managed to keep the potential romance bereft of even a decent kiss for six years…but is finally starting to piss off fans with the lack of romantic progress.

NCIS, on the other hand, has managed to supply the odd one or two almost combustible pulse pause moments, here and there.

Fringe is an oddity, which is why I can’t figure out why I like it so damned much.  It hasn’t done anything to order.

Peter and Olivia got together as a couple somewhere toward the end of the second season (I think — I watched all four seasons in a seriously compressed period of time — they ran together a lot).  There was no big sweeping romantic moment.  No daring rescue or whole episode devoted to will they/won’t they.  Yes, there were issues holding them back — well, mostly Olivia — but she worked it out, and they got together in a quietly sweet moment when she took Peter upstairs…run closing credits.

So this “Pulse pause” post is actually a bit of a misnomer, because there really hasn’t been any in their relationship.  Yet I can’t stop watching the goddamn show because the pair of them are compulsive viewing.  And I think, ultimately, it’s because their romance is so, well, adult.  They’re two grown-ups, having a grown-up relationship.  Everyone around them naturally assumed they’d get together.  Everyone likes the idea.  Everyone was thrilled when they finally committed to each other.  No one came gunning for one of them, bleeding with rectal envy.

Yes, they have problems from time to time.  They’re still sorting out crap that rears up from their pasts, and neither of their lives is a bowl of cherries, but they love each other, and they keep battling to stay together, to stay alive.  Considering the multi-universes and mega-potent bad guys running around this series, trying to melt down the Earth on a regular basis, or shoving one or other of them into another time, place or dimension, they have to work their dogs off just to be together.

So every clinch and every kiss is a precious one.

It’s such a nice change to see what happens after the “I love you” and see something hopeful and positive.  And really good looking. [sigh]

_____________

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Goodies I’ve found from chatting and cruising this week:

Interesting Posts/Articles

Thirty-Two Shades of Green!!!

Erotic Romance writer Sahara Kelly’s reaction to Fifty Shades of Grey

My Kitchen “Miracle” Cleaner!

For all the frugalists out there.

Top 1,000 Romance Novels of All Time 

Interesting in an intellectual way only.  I lost faith in the list when I saw Gone With The Wind listed at #5.  GWTW is not even remotely a romance novel.  It is romantic, yes, but it is not a romance in the traditional definition of the romance genre.  It doesn’t have a HEA, just to start.  And Mitchell wrote the book as a historical fiction, not a romance.  So…an interesting list, not a guide.

Indie Authors

Maree Anderson

Paranormal Romance Indie Author (and Kiwi)

Evolved Publishing

An Indie Authors publishing cooperative.  This is the first I’ve seen.  I’m sure it won’t be the last.

Do Authors Dream Of Electric Books?

A blog collective (they don’t publish on this blog — not quite the same thing).

Blast From The Past (from my archives)

How I Performed Hara Kiri on My Career

Have a great weekend!

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Joseph Fiennes as Shakespeare in SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE

Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor - THE TAMING OF THE SHREW

I’m almost afraid to mention Shakespeare.  There is a whole generation of readers out there, including my kids, who had Shakespeare in Love shoved down their throats in English class at highschool.  They studied the movie and everything to do with Shakespeare for ten very long weeks, to the point where none of them now will sit still for anything to do with the bard.

I suspect there is a big slice of the general reading population that feels exactly the same way.

Which is a pity.  Shakespeare In Loveis, in my opinion, a great movie, a great romance, and a perfectly accurate portrayal of Elizabethan London.

William Shakespeare was born on this day in 1564, and he died on this day, 52 years later, in 1616.  He was a common playwright, who enjoyed commercial success and the queen’s favour…but his

Sam Worthington in the Scottish play.

Claire Danes, Leonardo DiCaprio, ROMEO AND JULIET

plays, unlike most of his contemporaries (Christopher Marlow, for example), continue to enjoy commercial success even today.

You have to wonder what quality it is about Shakespeare’s plays that makes them so mass-appealing, after so many centuries.  They’re considered great works of literature now, but Shakespeare was writing purely to pay the rent — he wrote what was popular, what the common man want to see.  He wrote to entertain.

Perhaps that’s the secret.

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I actually am bummed at not going to RT.  It’s my second year I’ve missed.  Money is the primary issue – the conference is always thousands of miles from me, and it’s an expensive sucker to attend in the first place.  But I have a ton of friends I only ever get to see at RT and the conference pretty much stopped being business about five years ago.  It’s more of a week of parties and talking.

And you have to understand…parties, drinking and talking isn’t something I do a whole hell of a lot of, most of the time.  In order to get books written and published, I do the day job, write, and get some necessary chores completed in between. And sleep.

I have a few non-writing friends — they understand my pecularities.  Most of them are readers, who devour books and movies by the cartload, and get the obsession.  But my real friends…ah, well, most of them I met, or met in the flesh, at RT or some other conference, and it is there that actually going to a party and drinking and talking starts to make sense.

So, I’m hanging out at The Romance Studio over the weekend, to take off some of the sting.  TRS are giving away prizes (including one of my books), and there are dozens more authors (who also aren’t going to RT) who will be chatting as well.

Come on over.

______________________

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I’ve fought Twitter for the longest time, because at first it seemed so damned pointless.   I’m a novelist.  I couldn’t see how anything worthwhile could be discussed in 120 characters.

But the explosive popularity of Twitter, and texting in general, proved me wrong.

I’ve embraced Twitter conditionally.  We’re working partners for now.  I still don’t really get the appeal that it seems to have for lots of people, because it’s more of a summarising agency than a real gathering place, such a Facebook.  But with the help of a few tools, like Tweetdeck, Twitter does become a little more manageable.

Especially if you exploit hashtags, like I’ve recently learned to mine the depths of properly.  Hashtags are really useful little buggers, aren’t they?

If you, like me, haven’t really taken to Twitter, then allow me to explain that if you’re using a application/platform/program like Tweetdeck, that will permanently search and sort Tweets with specific hashtags, then hashtags start operating like Groups on Twitter, and these days, that’s what a lot of hashtags are used for: Group chatting.

Here’s some of the more common hashtags used for romance novels and their genres.  If you set up a permanent search/sort for these tags, you can start chatting with like-minded tweeters on your sub-genre of choice, and pick up news and tips about new titles, free titles, reviews, and more.

Some of these are used individually, but some of them are also used in combination.  For instance:  #romantic #suspense — instead of #romsus, which is used almost exclusively by Harlequin Romance to push their latest category titles.  You can also get mega combinations:  #romantic #suspense #free #indie #kindle #ebook — although one could ague the author of that tweet could have saved themselves 6 characters by dropping the #ebook tag off….

It becomes quite fascinating watching some of the more obscure tags come through.  Depending on the program you’re using to monitor Twitter, you can often click on a hashtag within a Tweet, and another column will open up with all Tweets for just that hashtag will appear.  If it’s a popular tag, you’ll quickly see lots of Tweets.  If not, you can shut down the column.

#paranormalromance
#amreading
#romance
#fridayfinds
#goodreads
#kensingtonbooks  (and most of the other big publishers, and major authors, too)
#soulmate
#freereads
#darkfantasy
#magic
#urbanfantasy
#99cents
#ebook
#vampires
#werewolves
#lovestory
#demons
#erotica  (good in combination with romance)
#angels
#IndieKindle
#bookreview
#suspense
#historical
#western
#chicklit
#amreading  (a reader’s haven)

Beware…following your nose sucks up mega amounts of time…but it’s fun!

__________________________

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I like my shoes.  I really like my shoes.  But these shoes are beyond…anything.

Be boggled. :)

So…what pair(s) would you buy?

_____________

No related posts.

Top Five Posts for March

1. Reading Romances Birthday Party Giveaway Hop

This one is likely to be a transitory winner.

2. Damn Good Romance IV – Emotional Intensity

Up from #3.

3.  Recommended MMF Books. (I was mad. Mad, I tell you…)

New for this month.

4.  Pulse Pause Moments – Anthony DiNozzo II

And another new entry!

5.  Damn Good Romances – Part 1

This was number 4 last month.

______

Top Five Pages for October

1. Trilogies & Series

And still champeen…

2. Byzantine Heartbreak

Up from #5

3. Bannockburn Binding

Holding steady.

4. Lucifer’s Lover

Down from #3.

4. Books by Category

From #3 last month.

5.  Complete Booklist

Returning to the list.

___

Top Five Articles for October

1. MM and MMF – Let’s Try Again. Why Do Women Like Men Who Like Men?

And #1 for yet one more month.

This one has slid down in the rankings.  It was top in all categories last month, but it was down the list a little, overall, this month.

2.  Recommended MMF Romance Titles

New this month as an article and new to the list.

3. What Is Urban Fantasy, Anyway? Urban Fantasy in the Romance field Defined.

Holding steady.

4.  Finding The Best E-Publisher For Your Novel

New to the list.  And this is an oldie-but-a-goodie…

5.  The Difficulties of Writing Really Old Erotic Historical Romances.

And this one returns to the list.

___

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