Subscribe to feed- Let Them Eat Brioche! | A Guest Post by Leslie Carroll October 18, 2011
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- Author Interview | Ellen Horan, author of 31 Bond Street June 23, 2011
- Julia Morgan and A Race to Splendor | A Guest Post by Ciji Ware June 16, 2011
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BBAW 2010 Nomination: Best Historical Fiction Blog
HFRT February Event
Monthly Archives: February 2010
The Scandal Sheet: Did Elizabeth I’s lover Robert Dudley have his wife killed so he could marry her?
I saw this article from The Daily Mail posted by Michelle Moran on her blog History Buff. I have always been curious about the background surrounding Amy Robsart’s death and whether or not Dudley had a hand in it in order to clear the way for him to marry Elizabeth. The morbidly ironic part about this potential murder (which is not mentioned in… Continue reading...
The History of Carnevale
Today I’d like to talk a bit about the Venetian festival Carnevale that takes place every February and is celebrated with music, dancing, food, drink, and of course, those beautiful Venetian masks. The Secret of the Glass took place during the time when Carnevale was at its zenith. Many of the scenes in the novel took place during Carnevale, and it was interesting to read about how the Venetian… Continue reading...
Posted in Donna Russo Morin, HFBRT, Italy, The History of...
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Review | The Secret of the Glass by Donna Russo Morin
Read a synopsis of The Secret of the Glass here.Review
The Secret of the Glassby Donna Russo MorinI tend to really enjoy historical fiction that deals with a specific craft, especially crafts of artistic merit. Take The Queen’s Dollmaker for example. I loved learning about the details of 18th century dollmaking and all the techniques involved in achieving what… Continue reading...
Leslie Carroll in The New Yorker
(reposted from The Book Bench at The New Yorker online)THE EXCHANGE: NOTORIOUS ROYAL MARRIAGESPosted by Thessaly La Force
Notorious Royal Marriagesby Leslie CarrollThomas More’s father once said that marriage was like putting “your hand into a blind bag full of snakes and eels together, seven snakes for one eel.” (It helps to know that eels were a staple of Renaissance diets.) In other… Continue reading...
Posted in Leslie Carroll
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The Sunday Salon: Medieval Madness
The Historical Fiction Round Table’s Donna Russo Morin Week event is upon us! Click here to view the announcement post over at the main site which also includes a GIVEAWAY! I’ve been reading The Secret of the Glass and have found out many interesting tidbits about the Venetian glassmakers of Murano. There will be lots of reviews, insightful creative articles, and giveaways (of not… Continue reading...
The Tudors Season 4 on Showtime
Henry’s run out of wives! As many of us have heard, this will be the fourth and final season of Showtime’s entertaining period romp, The Tudors. I reviewed the series and posted about Jolie Richardson stepping up as Henry’s sixth and final wife Catherine Parr, and although I’ve been hard on the show in the past for its many unnecessary glaring historical inaccuracies, I… Continue reading...
Currently Reading…Our Hart: Elegy for a Concubine
by Lloyd Lofthouse
Synopsis: “Our Hart: Elegy for a Concubine is the sequel to the award-winning historical fiction novel My Splendid Concubine, and this second book shows Robert Hart in action as he becomes the ‘Godfather of China’s Modernism.’ Hart not only became famous as Inspector General of Chinese Maritime Customs, but he was also behind the building of China’s railroads, postal… Continue reading...
The Winner of O, Juliet is…
Congratulations, Emma! You’ve won O, Juliet by Robin Maxwell! An e-mail is on its way to you now. Thanks to everyone who entered!!
Posted in Giveaways, Robin Maxwell, Romeo and Juliet
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The Sunday Salon: Happy Valentine’s Day!
Happy Valentine’s Day! If you’re celebrating the holiday, I hope you have a fun day with your someone special or surrounded by good friends! Today Ron and I are going to spend Valentine’s Day visiting some museum exhibits, and tonight he is taking me out to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants in our area. If we have time, we may go see the… Continue reading...
Saturday Satire: “Merry Making on the Regent’s Birthday 1812″
George, the Prince Regent of England, drunkenly dancing and openly flirting with another man’s wife.Satirized by: George Cruikshank (1792-1878)Title: “Merry Making on the Regent’s Birthday 1812″Date Published: 1812Context: The libertine Prince of Wales (later George IV of England) was known for his womanizing debauchery, something that made him an especially favorite target of political cartoonists of the day. One can understand… Continue reading...