A wonderful post from Sue Vincent that shares her love of books including the books of Georgette Heyer, a prolific and versatile author of detective stories, general fiction but also of outstanding Regency romance. Sue explores the amount of research that went into recreating the era, culture and environment of the period and looks at our own need to research our work. Please follow the link to read the complete post.
Romance and research… a writer’s gift to a reader
Once upon a time…and all the very best stories start that way… there was a little girl who read her way through every book in her mother’s library. It wasn’t a proper library, with mahogany shelves and great leather chairs… but once she was curled up with a book, the space under the stairs was the best library in the world, because it was hers.
The little girl grew up loving books and learning from them in all sorts of ways, some of which she would not even begin to realise until her blonde curls had deepened to caramel and thence to grey. Her library had grown over the years, but many of her mother’s books still had a home in the bookcases and, every so often, she would pick one up to read. The familiarity of the stories made them ideal reading at bedtime, when only a few pages would be turned before her eyes began to close and the associated memories were comfortable. So comfortable, in fact, that the realisation of one thing she had learned from them was quite startling…
The value of research.
Amongst my mother’s favourite books were the novels written by Georgette Heyer. Although she wrote detective stories and novels covering many periods of history, she is best known for her Georgian and Regency romances. I have read her books so many times over the decades that I know them pretty much by heart and hers are the only romances I will voluntarily read, mainly because the romantic element is delicately and discretely done and takes second place to the detailed drawing of a portrait of time and place.
Heyer was a good writer. Her use of language and her portrayal of characters both historical and fictional is masterly, she handles humour with intelligence and wit and although her plots may appear light they are incredibly detailed. But, above all, her knowledge of the era is phenomenal.
Please head over to enjoy the rest of this excellent post.
Thank you very much for sharing, Sally. I have known and loved her books for a long time and the depth of her immersion in her favorite era shows on every page. xxx
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It is amazing how some of the writers of books from our formative years still remain vivid. hugsxx
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A great many have done so for me…and I still have many of the books from those eyars too 🙂 xxx
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We lost about 700 books in a flood in our house in London.. we have replaced most of them but I lost some of my childhood books and ones from my teens. Thankfully my Wilbur Smith books were in another room. But devastating. xxx
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Oh I can imagine! Many of mine were lost moving countries… you know what that is like!… and many left with my mother never found their way home. xxx
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Thank you for sharing. I’m not native english speaker and it’s so interesting to improve language with good books 🙂
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Thanks Sara and having lived abroad and learnt new languages I actually started with the best of the children’s books.. and then moved on to well known authors and you are right it does improve your skills.
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Off to investigate this author. Beautiful post. ❤ xxx
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I agree Debby ♥
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Terrific post!!
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I thought so Jennie..hugsx
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Hugs to you, Sally! 🙂
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Thank you for featuring this article.
I am a huge fan of Georgette Heyer
Both Recency romances and detective fiction
I am re-reading one right now
It is called Envious Casca
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Fantastic.. glad the post hit the spot..
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😃
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Great post!
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I agree Lizzie.. xx
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