My books aren’t historical romances. They don’t focus on love, nor do they have traditional happily ever after endings. That said, some of the finest work in historical fiction today is being done by romance authors. I’d like to introduce my readers to one of those writers here.

A new release from Eliza Knight! A Lady’s Charade, a medieval romance novel, is now available in electronic format from Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Smashwords!

Book Blurb…
From across a field of battle, English knight, Alexander, Lord Hardwyck, spots the object of his desire—and his conquest, Scottish traitor Lady Chloe.
Her lies could be her undoing…
Abandoned across the border and disguised for her safety, Chloe realizes the man who besieged her home in Scotland has now become her savior in England. Her life in danger, she vows to keep her identity secret, lest she suffer his wrath, for he wants her dead.
Or love could claim them both and unravel two countries in the process…
Alexander suspects Chloe is not who she says she is and has declared war on the angelic vixen who’s laid claim to his heart. A fierce battle of the minds it will be, for once the truth is revealed they will both have to choose between love and duty.

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Excerpt from Chapter One…

South Hearth Castle
Border of Scotland and England
September, 1415
“Allure! My lady! Ralentir!”
Chloe laughed when she turned around on her speeding horse to spy her French maid. Poor Nicola clutched the hood of her headdress with one hand, her hands scrambling to maintain the reins of her horse, and her bottom bounced up and down at a rather humorous pace.
She conceded her old nurse and slowed her horse to a trot until Nicola could catch up.
“My lady, shame on you. You know better than to ride with such… such… imprudence!”
“Oui.” Chloe chose to concede once more. There was no point in arguing with the woman. Especially when she was sure Nicola would only have the last word.
But she just couldn’t help riding hell bent for leather! They’d been waiting on the coast of France for nearly a fortnight before the ship could safely take them across. Then an entire week had been spent cramped inside a small ship’s cabin, with the swaying and rocking of the vessel. She felt like the nearly three weeks past had been consumed by sitting still, and now that they’d reached Scotland she only wanted to be free. To feel the fresh, clean, crisp air wash over her skin as she rode at break neck speed toward home.
Nicola gave her a disapproving look, but nodded anyway, silvery blonde curls falling out of her headdress. Whether or not she believed Chloe’s apology was sincere, she was accepting of it, it seemed.
They were not alone of course. A dozen of her father’s guard surrounded her, none of them willing to contradict anything Chloe said. Why? She wasn’t sure. Mayhap because she’d been on the continent for so long, they knew not what to expect of her, or perhaps it was simply that they too wanted to reach home. And yet again, it could be that her father had told them not to argue with her. Whatever the reason, she was glad they’d let her have a bit of fun for however fleeting it was.
Chloe turned to the guardsmen who appeared to be in charge. “How much further?”
He looked about himself for a moment before turning back to her. “South Hearth is not much further, mayhap another day. Shall we make camp now, my lady?”
Chloe narrowed her eyes. “South Hearth?”
“Aye, my lady.”
“We are not going to Fergusson lands?”
“That we are, my lady.”
“But you said South Hearth. My family has not held South Hearth for…” She trailed off remembering the last time she’d been at the border holding. Jon had been alive then.
“Nigh on five years now, my lady, but his lordship, your father, has once again proven we Scots shall prevail.”
So, her father had taken siege of the castle again? A lot had happened since she’d been sent to serve the French queen five years ago, at the age of thirteen. She couldn’t say she was surprised, or really upset about it. In fact, she was a little elated. South Hearth was home. She’d grown up there. Hadrian’s Wall was her playground. But the fact remained, if her father had retaken the castle—someone would want it back.
“Let us make camp then.” Chloe tried not to giggle at the look of pure relief that crossed her nursemaid’s face. The woman’s rump must be burning.
The following morning they set out at a slower pace, just after sunrise. They broke their fast with pears and cheese as they rode, all of them eager to reach South Hearth walls. As the sun rose high in the sky, the turrets of the keep were visible over the crest of a hill.
Home.
Chloe broke out into a wide smile, and ignoring the protests of Nicola and her retainers, she prodded her horse into a canter down the road toward the gate. When she arrived, the guards not far behind her, and Nicola bouncing her way painfully down the hill, her smile faded. Guards circled the top of the battlements. The drawbridge was up, the portcullis down, and gate door closed tightly. They expected trouble.
Just as she’d thought. Someone would most definitely be coming to take back the castle. But when was the question.
Before she could open her mouth to order the men to open the way for her, they did so. Calls to her escort were tossed over the walls, and the men she traveled with answered back. As the gates opened, the sounds and smells of the city assaulted her senses. Loud clanking, banging, shouting. Smells of cooking, rubbish, and animals. It all mixed together, and she longed for the French chateau of Queen Isabeau with its pretty smells, and enchanting music.
They rode into town, up the rode past merchants, peasants, clergy and guild workers toward the keep stairs. South Hearth had seemed such a grand place when she was young. Now it only seemed a fort of sorts, not a home.
“My child!” A tall woman atop the steps to the keep came rushing forth.
Chloe recognized her mother immediately. “Maman!” She sped up her horse until she reached the bottom of the keep stairs and then ignoring the hands offered by the guards, leapt to the ground and into her mother’s arms.
It’d been two years since she’d last seen her mother. The Lady Fergusson, had stayed with her for her first few years in service to the French queen, her mother’s cousin, before returning to her husband in Scotland.
Chloe breathed in her mother’s scent, and tried to blink away the sting of tears in her eyes.
“Come, inside. You must be in need of a bath and something to eat.”
Chloe nodded. As they reached the tops of the steps, Nicola finally drew up to the courtyard, a harried looking knight beside her. The maid had probably given the man a good tongue lashing, only because Chloe herself wasn’t there to receive the punishment.
“It is so good to be home.”
“Oui, I am glad you finally arrived. We were beginning to worry. Your father and I expected you over a week ago.”
She threaded her arm through her mother’s as they made their way up the spiral staircase to the upper chambers. “There was a storm, and the sea was not safe. We had to wait nearly two weeks before boarding the ship.”
“Ah, I see. At least you have arrived safely. If you hadn’t come by tomorrow a search party was going to be sent out.”
Chloe gasped. “Did you not get my missive?”
“Missive?” They stopped walking and her mother turned toward her, her brows drawn together in concern.
“Oui, Maman. I sent a message to warn of our delay.”
“I received no such warning.”

Eliza Knight is the multi-published author of sizzling historical romance and erotic romance. While not reading, writing or researching for her latest book, she chases after her three children. In her spare time (if there is such a thing…) she likes daydreaming, wine-tasting, traveling, hiking, staring at the stars, watching movies, shopping and visiting with family and friends. She lives atop a small mountain, and enjoys cold winter nights when she can curl up in front of a roaring fire with her own knight in shining armor. Visit Eliza at http://www.elizaknight.com/ or her historical blog, History Undressed, http://www.historyundressed.blogspot.com/

I’m about to do something ill-advised. I’m about to pick a fight with a blogger. I don’t do this to be disagreeable. It’s just that I’ve decided not to shy away from my claim that Historical Fiction Doesn’t Have to be Good For You.

Hopefully, The Pen & Ink Blog will forgive me for using their comment as a springboard for discussion. The comment at issue extolled the virtues of historical writers like Mary Renault for “a fanatical desire to pack into every word accurate historical detail that makes the story real. In contrast, I feel the large majority of historical fiction is closer to the bodice-ripping romance novel which puts me to sleep. When a newcomer to historical fiction finds mostly the latter available in bookstores and libraries, is it any wonder that the whole genre suffers from a lack of interest?”

Now, first, I’d like to argue the point that historical fiction suffers from a lack of interest. It seems to be on the rise; it’s just that historical fiction suffers in comparison to teenaged vampire romances.

Second, I’d like to address Mary Renault and her ilk. I’m not sure that a fanatical desire to pack accurate historical detail into every word accounts for their success; certainly, in Mary Renault’s case, lush prose and an eye for the telling remark may have helped. But let’s concede this point for the sake of argument; after all, this is the commenter’s perception of what worked in these books. I think Mary Renault is brilliant, and as it happens, I applaud readers who know exactly the kind of fiction that pleases them best.

What I don’t like is contempt for fiction that doesn’t conform to one’s own literary fetish. It is all fine and well to acknowledge that the “bodice-ripping romance novel” is not your cup of tea–and may even bore the snot out of you. However, to then infer that the best-selling fiction genre in the history of the world has somehow contaminated historical fiction and lessened its commercial prospects strikes me as illogical.

To the contrary, I’d argue that the explosion of commercial works in the historical fiction genre has come mostly at the hands of female writers tackling issues of concern to women. Yes, we may all mock those headless heroines who grace historical fiction covers, but they serve as an important cue to readers–many of whom are looking to historical fiction to fill in the gaps of women’s history, a sorely neglected subject in schools today. Those same issues of concern to women are also tackled by historical romance novels. (Here, I would point in the direction of books by Tessa Dare and Courtney Milan, both of whom write very socially aware Regency Romances.)

So let us turn, then, to women in history. Much like the lives of women today, the lives of these women revolved around relationships. Relationships with their parents, with men, with children. Their primary value to society was often judged by the very bodice that is allegedly ripped. In short, matters of lust, love and family have always been denigrated throughout history as being women’s concerns, and therefore less legitimate for scholarly discussion than battles and coup attempts.

That this attitude still persists astonishes me, because any historian can name empires that have fallen for lust, battles won for love, dynasties forged through intensely personal relationships. It seems to me that romance isn’t trivial to history but central.

Certainly the era I write about–Augustan Age Rome–is the veritable poster child for soap-opera dramatics. Obsessions, divorces, remarriages, adulterous affairs, assassination plots, incest, and interpersonal intrigues aren’t merely the color behind the early Roman Empire–they are the backbone of the story. And I would argue it’s precisely these historical scandals that make the time period so interesting.

My historical novels aren’t romances and I have an obsession with historical accuracy that has sometimes prompted interventions from my husband and my agent. (My plan to ferment rotting shellfish in my backyard so as to reproduce Tyrian Purple Dye was met with round condemnation.) I spent more than three years researching my debut novel and by the time I’m done with the trilogy, I’ll have spent the better part of a decade amassing knowledge about a single thirty year period of Roman history.

But I never forget that I’m a novelist, not a biographer.

I’m generally of the opinion that if historical fiction ignores the romantic lives of its subjects, it renders an incomplete picture. It falls to the historical fiction writer to speculate about these human elements, because otherwise a biography would do just as well. Books that imagine the inner lives of historical figures in a way that stretches beyond the record does a public service. In fact, I’d argue that any historical novel that teaches a reader something new deserves respect. And that includes historical romance novels.

What do you think?

November is a really idiotic month to write a novel. It’s clear to me that the people who started National Novel Writing Month were not married at the time, had no responsibilities whatsoever for the upcoming holidays, and were probably living in their mom’s basement.

However, complain as I might, November is the month, and the motivation that the group project provides is worth the trouble. But for an ESTJ, I can somehow be a big rule-breaker. I like to do things my way. Last year, I used Nanowrimo to finish Rites of Passage. (A big no-no according to the rules, but a smashing success for me.)

This time, I’ll be starting early. In addition to holiday insanity, I’ll be going on a cruise to the Western Carribean in November and though I’m contemplating bringing my laptop I don’t anticipate doing work. So, Nanowrimo starts for me, today. Here’s my progress so far on my new book, the working title of which is Primary Partners:

981 / 50,000 (2.0%)

If the Nanowrimo Police want to arrest me, I am my own lawyer.