Sundays Art: Pre-Raphaelites Mother and Child 1854-57

 Frederic George Stephens 1828-1907

The "Mother and Child" seemed only fitting today to feature for Sundays Art. This piece is abundant in hidden symbolism. The scene of domestic bliss has an underlining commentary on the Crimean War. The war was fought by British soldiers between 1854-1856. The child's toys on the table represent a few things. The lion symbolizes Britain and the solider in the circle is symbolic for Russia. The lion is represented as being far superior in stature. The use of child's toys indicate that Stephens feelings of anger at the conflict and at the way the solders were being used as pawns.

The anguished expression of the mother and the letter in her right hand suggest that her husband has been killed or wounded in the Crimea. The child's futile attempts to offer consolation for something it can't understand and emphasizes the helplessness of the women who were left home alone while their men disappeared to fight a war far away.

Sadly I can relate to this mothers anguish, my younger brother earlier this year returned back home from his seccond tour of duty in Iraq. I had many sleepless nights thinking about his safety. 

On another note today is the two year anniversary of my son's release from the hospital. Upon his release his case was officially labeled misdiagnosis of cancer. Here is to happy year number two and nothing will ever beat my mothers day present two years ago. A healthy happy child that was going to be just fine. When he was sick I was so afraid to leave him that I bought a picture frame that had a voice recorder. I recorded him singing "Twinkle Twinkle little star" so that on the nights that I had (was forced) to go home I remember laying in my bed replaying it over and over until I would fall asleep. A mothers love is a force of nature that makes every fiber of your being cry out to the heavens , thank you for this wonderful chance I have to be a mother. Maybe that is why when in times of distress mothers have been known to have super human powers.

Happy mothers day to all the wonderful mothers out there, I hope you are all having a wonderful holiday with your children.

HFBRT May's Grand Event, The Confessions of Catherine De Medici by C.W. Gortner

Yes finally it is time for the big event, I am so excited about this one I can barely contain myself. The ladies of The Historical Fiction Blogger Round Table are so elated to announce that it is kick off time. C.W. Gortner is one of my favorite authors and I love blogging about him and his wonderful books not just because he is an a prolific author but he is also an amazing person who really is on the ball about everything.

Today on the group website you can enter for your chance to win a finished hardback copy of his new release "The Confessions of Catherine De Medici". There are two copies up for grabs be sure and check it out!

We have planned many wonderful posts from the ladies and not to mentions some killer giveaways that I just know the you readers are going to flip your lid over. But we will have more on that at a later point, for now you can enter to win one of two copies of "The Confessions of Catherine De Medici" by C.W. Gortner.

HFBRT The Charter Members

Hist-Fic Chick

Passages to the Past

Historical-Fiction

The Maiden's Court

Enchanted by Josephine

The Burton Review

All Things Royal

Tomorrow to get things really going is the Book Trailer on the main site, a book review from The Burton Review, and a creative post from Historical-Fiction.

Book Giveaway: Nine Rules to Break When Romancing a Rake by Sarah Maclean

"A lady does not smoke cheroot. She does not ride astride. She does not fence or attend duels. She does not fire a pistol, and she never gambles at a gentlemen's club.

Lady Calpurnia Hartwell has always followed the rules, rules that have left her unmarried—and more than a little unsatisfied. And so she's vowed to break the rules and live the life of pleasure she's been missing.

But to dance every dance, to steal a midnight kiss—to do those things, Callie will need a willing partner. Someone who knows everything about rule-breaking. Someone like Gabriel St. John, the Marquess of Ralston—charming and devastatingly handsome, his wicked reputation matched only by his sinful smile.

If she's not careful, she'll break the most important rule of all—the one that says that pleasure-seekers should never fall hopelessly, desperately in love . . ."

Rules

    * For 1 entry leave me a comment with a way to contact you.
    * For 2 entries follow my blog. If you already do, thanks, and please let me know in the comments. You're eligible for the extra entry as well.
    * For 3 entries blog or tweet this giveaway to spread the word. 

Giveaway is open to us residents only, sorry. It will run until May 11th at 12 pm, on May 12th I will announce winner. This is for a paperback finished copy.

Good Luck all!

Book Review: WATERMARK by Vanitha Sankaran

An unexpected treat this read was, it like nothing I have ever read before mysterious and mystical all in one. I am really beyond help in this new medieval obsession I have going on. This was not my typical read about the trials of my favorite royal figure heads instead “Watermark” focuses on one family that would be what we deem today as the working middle class.

Set during the 14th century in a village in southern France in a town called Narbonne. Auda made a dramatic entrance into the world within the first few pages of the read and that was all it took for me to be hooked in. I could not put this read down. A violent birth, the loss of her mother and Auda was in the hands of the vile healers assistant who stole off with her and cut the poor babe’s tongue out “to protect her from evil”. In reality Auda was not cursed but what today we would deem a medical marvel, she was an albino. Lacking complete pigment in her skin, eyes, and hair but what she lacked in pigment she made up for in heart.

With her mother gone Auda formed a very tight knit family with her older sister and father. Her father was constantly working on his developing trade of making cloth paper; usually it was a trial and error process. It was his thing and Auda loved the paper she was basically his apprentice. Since her father at one time was a scribe he taught the girls to read and write. During the early 14th century that was a phenomenon all in its self most of the women of the time who knew their letters were the highborn nobility. After her older sister Ponca married her father Martin was forced to come to grip with the reality that his special youngest daughter was going to have to have a future in the world. In a flux of events her father starts to fill orders of cloth paper for the Vicomtess. Her father shocked her by including Auda’s services as a scribe in the paper deal telling his beloved daughter “you can not hid forever”. 

During her time with the Vicomtess she managed to seek off and find the hottie artist she had met at her sisters herb stall in the market. Jamie was the first person outside of her family that talked to her not at her. The town’s peace is shattered when the Inquisition starts surrounding the town on all sides and is slowly closing in. No one is safe, gypsies, Jews, and defiantly not the one thought to be “the white witch” of Narbonne. Stunningly this read was really unpredictable and the intrigue aspect of the book had me hooked from the beginning. The Inquisition never touched Narbonne before but this time the town would not be left unscathed.


5/5 Highly recommended, a light read, that was very interesting, I would recommend this to anyone who is looking to stay within their favorite time periods and places but wants something a bit different. Besides this to die for cover it is a very pretty book even on the inside. Scrolls with quotes and medieval font really gave the book a real feel for the times. Since I got an ARC in the mail and it is not the final cover I have to go and buy this one. The cover is just too pretty not to have the final version in my library.

Thank you, Vanitha for sending me your wonderful novel I am so glad you did and I look forward to more from you in the future. 

Amazon-Watermark: A Novel of the Middle Ages 

Sundays Art: Pre-Raphaelites, Fair Rosamund and Queen Eleanor

As I had mentioned before it is time to get into some of the darker Pre-Raphaelites. I figured that starting with this one that has my new favorite leading lady Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine would be perfect. Since I just finished reading "The Queen's Pawn" by Christy English, this is the best starting point to explore some of the darker, more sinister Pre-Raphaelites. Fair Rosamund is not a leading character in "The Queen's Pawn" but is briefly mentioned in Eleanor's thoughts. I would eventually love to read a book on Rosamund but at this moment nothing has peeked my interest.

"Fair Rosamund and Queen Eleanor" 1862

Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones 1822-98

Pen and ink, watercolour, gouache and gum on paper

"Burn-Jones manages to convey Rosamund's very real terror as she realizes she is unable to escape. Her face, swollen as though with tears, demands sympathy from the viewer; Eleanor's face, determined and cold, only serves to create in the viewer  a dislike for he queen. The artist required the viewer to feel sympathy for the mistress, not the wife; this is in  direct opposition to the prevalent Victorian attitude. Similarly contrary is the artist's decision to clothe the king's mistress in a virginal pale gown, and his wife in witch-like black".

"Burne-Jones treated the story of Fair Rosamund several times in the early 1860s. According to legend, King Henry II created a hidden chamber for his mistress, Rosamund, at the centre of an elaborate maze. There she was discovered and murdered by her rival, Queen Eleanor. While he was a student at Oxford, Burne-Jones visited Godstowe, the presumed site of Rosamund's grave. But a fresh impetus for his group of pictures came from Swinburne's verse drama of 1860, which enacts the confrontation of Rosamund and the Queen". The Tate Gallery

I am unsure if the one below is a Pre-Raphaelite but it is by my favorite Pre-Raphaelite artist and I just could not leave it out of this post. 

"Fair Rosamund" 1917
John William Waterhouse 1849–1917(1849)(1917)

Oil on canvas

Stay tuned next Sunday for more Pre-Raphaelites and I hope you all enjoyed this one. 

Mailbox Mondays

Another lovely Monday, not really but hey what are you going to do you have to start somewhere. For this past week only two books showed up in my mailbox and one of them is for the Plaidy obsession from Amazon and the other just showed up from publisher. I am glad it did show up I have had it on my wish list ever since I had gotten wind of it. 

Loyal In Love by Jean Plaidy 

"The daughter of Henry IV of France, Princess Henrietta Maria, becomes a pawn in a political strategy to stabilize relations between two countries when her father marries her to Charles I of England. Sent abroad, she finds herself living in a Protestant country that views her own faith—Catholicism—with deep suspicion.

Yet her new husband is a man of principle and integrity, and Henrietta and Charles fall deeply in love. Henrietta is passionate about her faith, however, and soon politically powerful people, namely Oliver Cromwell and his Puritans, turn her loyalty to her religion into a focal point for civil war. As the royal couple watch the fall of Thomas Wentworth, first Earl of Strafford, the rise of Puritanism, and Englishmen fight Englishmen, they are undeterred in their dedication to each other and in their belief in the divine rights of king and queen—even as spies lurk in their very own household.

Loyal in Love offers an inside look at an unforgettable time in England’s history and at the life of a queen whose story of devotion and bravery has gone untold for too long". 

Eleanor The Queen by Norah Lofts 

"Eleanor of Aquitaine rules as a modern heroine in the twelfth century, in this beloved classic of royal fiction from renowned author Norah Lofts.

At a time when a woman’s value was measured solely by her wealth and the number of sons she bore, Eleanor was the high-spirited, stubborn, and intelligent heiress to the vast duchy of Aquitaine.

Her leadership inspired the loyalty of her people, but she was continually doubted and silenced by the men who ruled beside her—the less wise but far more powerful men of the church and court who were unwilling to lose power to a woman, regardless of her rank or ability.

Through marriages to two kings, two Crusades, and the births of ten children— including the future King Richard the Lionhearted—Eleanor solidified her place in history. In Eleanor the Queen, Norah Lofts brings to life a brave and complex woman who was centuries ahead of her time".

Book Review: THE QUEEN'S PAWN by Christy English

I have been waiting what feels like an eternity to read this book. I have had the ARC since the beginning of the year but because of my tight reading schedule I was not able to get to it sooner. Finally I have done it I have read it and I really enjoyed it. Christy English is by far one of the nicest authors I have ever come into contact with and I am so glad that she found me and offered me "The Queens Pawn" for review. Since I am new to this whole medieval time period of the 11th century I genuinely can say that this is a period that I am falling in love with. It started first with Elizabeth Chadwick and now continues on with Christy English.

Alais, Princess of France was the daughter of Louis VII. Louis was married to Eleanor of Aquitaine but as many know that did not work out and Eleanor left him for the King of England Henry II. Alias’s father married her mother after Eleanor left and sadly her mother died when she was a baby. It is hard for me to think of any child growing up with out a mother but for girls it is so much harder. They need that extra maternal devotion and when Alais was sent to England to marry Eleanor and Henry’s son Prince Richard she was immediately taken under Eleanor’s wing as a true daughter. The two women shared a deep kinship more like kindred spirits of a special kind. Eleanor saw in Alais some of her own defining qualities and took on an instant unconditional love for Alais.

It was a mess what Alais walked into in England, Eleanor and Henry’s relationship had already turned sour and the whole family were on the verge of war. It was a good thing for Alais that at one point she spent some time in a nunnery when Eleanor was being shady to the king. The whole book took a drastic turn when Alais went to court at Whitehall to be with Eleanor and Richard. I believe Alais deeply loved Richard and that since she had been so sheltered in her life at France she had no idea that when Richard swore his oath to her that it might not all be true. She wanted real love and would not accept anything less.

As we all know revenge is a dish that is best served cold but Alais made her revenge a steaming hot plate of deceit. An unexplainable force drew her to the king and she reacted out brashness and made the biggest mistake of her life. Turning her back on Eleanor and Richard she destroyed all that was in her path. Alais rejected Richard and Eleanor’s love and only accepted the Kings. Hum lets see bad idea or good idea? To love a man that locked his wife up for over 20 years, and who easily turned on his own children. It just made me wonder what she saw in him.

4/5 I really enjoyed this read but I have this little nagging feeling that other avid lovers of this period might not enjoy it as much as me. For the only reason that maybe since I am new to this period that I might just not have enough of the whole history to really understand if things were left out or events changed. I would highly recommend this book to newbies of this time period. All in all it was a easy read that was not complicated and flowed very nicely. No confusion here which is very important to me. Plus I love this beautiful cover the ladies are just too pretty in those dresses.

Thank you Christy for sending me this wonderful book I really enjoyed it. I can not wait for the next one on your ladies!

Mailbox Mondays and Claude and Camille Giveaway Winner

Another lovely mailbox Monday. This one has been a long time coming, forever I have been waiting to get these books and since I had the money this time I just did it and I do not regret it. The Plaidy's are the food for one obsession and the others have been recommended by readers like yourselves. So here we go with the biggest mailbox Monday ever mind you they came through out the last week, really it is all books I have received since April 7th.

I have been working on my Plaidy collection for almost 2 years now and I love the older modern reprints that have the paintings. I want to be like the Jean Plaidy button last year and line them all up and have all the queens! My problem is now I have 2 sets going one of the older reprints and now I have a few of the brand new reprints. 

This is what I am working on now,

Mary Stuart Series
The Royal Road to Fotheringay Vol. 1 Older reprint
The Captive Queen of Scots Vol. 2 Older reprint


James I
The Murder in the Tower

Charles II Trilogy
The Wandering Prince Vol. 1Older reprint
Health Unto His Majesty Vol. 2Older reprint
Here Lies our Sovereign Lord Vol. 3Older reprint
Charles II Vol. 1,2,3 Older reprint

Combined as the loves of Charles IIP

Queens of England Series
Myself My Enemy Vol. 1
Queen of this Realm Vol. 2
Victoria Victorious Vol. 3
The Lady in the Tower Vol. 4
The Courts of Love Vol. 5
In the Shadow of the Crown Vol. 6
The Queen's Secret Vol. 7
The Reluctant Queen Vol. 8
The Pleasures of Love Vol. 9
William's Wife Vol. 10
The Rose Without a Thorn Vol. 11

Newer Reprints

 
These lovelies up above were bought from various places mainly Amazon but "The Captive Queen of Scots" I had to buy at Barnes and Noble because Amazon does not have this cover. I happened to get "The Kings Confidante" at Target in the tiny HF section of books. Yes Target has  a tiny shelf dedicated to only HF.  Pope Joan I had to buy because once again I made the  mistake of  lending it out and it has disappeared.  Marrying Mozart I got because I loved Claude and Camille and just know I would love Mozart too. I also got the Target version of Nefertiti and The Heretic Queen by Michelle Moran. 

 
These ones showed up from Powell's Bookstore and man I am so glad I went in there. 

"Katharine of Aragon's marriage to her beloved King Henry VIII is threatened by powerful people in her husband's court who spin webs of intrigue regarding whether or not she can bear the king a son".


From PBS wish list
Rivals for the Crown by Kathleen Givens


"1290: Turmoil erupts when the seven-year-old queen of Scotland perishes en route to claim the crown. Two bitter foes -- John Balliol and Robert Bruce -- emerge as possible successors, but England's Edward I has his own designs on Scotland.

In London, Edward has expelled all Jews from his kingdom. Rachel de Anjou is heartbroken to leave behind her best friend, Isabel de Burke, and travel with her family to the Scottish border town of Berwick. Danger is everywhere, but the tall, dark Highlander Kieran MacDonald presents a risk of a different sort.

Isabel, appointed as lady-in-waiting to Edward's queen, Eleanor, is soon immersed in a world of privilege and peril where she attracts the notice of two men -- Henry de Boyer, an English knight, and Rory MacGannon, a Highland warrior and outlaw. Isabel and Rachel are soon reunited in Berwick, but as the enmity between Scotland and England reaches its violent peak, each woman must decide where her loyalty -- and her destiny -- lies".

From Publishers:

Congrats also to Angie for being the winner of the Claude and Camille by Stephanie Cowell Giveaway! I hope you enjoy it as much as I did! It is a wonderful book that I think many readers will fall in love with.