These are my notes from the Beau Monde and Hearts through History First Annual Historical Romance Writers Conference.

Historical Romance author Kalen Hughes wore a day dress from the Regency period and brought in two friends wearing Georgian clothes. Woot! Costumes! Ms. Hughes busted the comfort myth about corsets: in truth they were made to fit, so were very comfortable. It is physically impossible for it to pinch, because there is nothing in the construction that comes together in any way that could pinch or poke. (unless the boning is coming out of its casing.) Georgian and Regency corsets don’t make it impossible to breathe, because the metal grommet was not invented until 1828 and therefore on cannot pull the corset strings tight enough to rearrange ribs (not until Victorian). Corsets are all about creating the right silhouette. The Georgian corset was designed to provide a tube-like body. The Regency corset was all about pushing the boobs up and separating them.

She debunked the Rebel Myth: Ladies did NOT go about without corsets. They would feel naked without them. It would be like a woman now going without a bra – breasts still bounced without support. Women did not feel constrained by their stays because it was an everyday occurrence. Boys & Girls started wearing stays at 6 months. Boys stopped at age 5-8 when they were breeched. Girls continued. Scandalous is girls wearing drawers, which were introduced in the Regency period from France. Not common until Victorian era. Drawers are crotchless to enable urination. They end just below the knee where they button shut

The word “stays” is equivalent to the word “corset”. “Corset” was introduced around 1790 from France, and throughout the Regency the two words were used interchangeably. In the Victorian era only “corset” was used.

Corsets are not uncomfortable, but they do restrict the wearer. The shoulder straps hamper full range of arm motion. A woman cannot raise her arms all the way in a regency corset and cannot bend at the waist. Everything is from the hip. Busks mandate perfect posture. Slouching is impossible. True discomfort can be caused by the shift, which may leave tiny welts that itch when the shift is removed. If a woman loses weight the corset can rub, but if she gains weight it is not a problem, because the lacing can simply be loosened. If the boning works out of its casing it can really jab. Eating in a corset was not a problem until the Victorian era, hense the advent of the 6 hour meal. Women wore stays while pregnant, which had side lacing marked for expansion. There were no pregnancy clothes. Instead things were adapted. Women didn’t not go into confinement till the Victorian era.

Ms. Hughes spoke on Sex and the Corset. At social function it would be quite difficult to remove the corset or stays for a tryst, because it takes 25 minutes to remove. The corset has Spiral lacing, so that it cannot be loosened. The lacing must be completely removed and usually laced up the back, so women could not dress by themselves. Only the Victorian corset had cross lacing that could be popped off.

The shift is worn under corset. It is easily laundered and used to keep the corset clean. The petticoat looks like a pinafore. It ties in back and goes on over the corset. Gives layer between dress and corset. Ms. Hughes told us that there is zero documentation about dampened petticoats, except one letter from a man bitching about debauchery in france. The lower sleeves of a dress could be removable for hot weather. The garters had metal springs.

Hero did not have tight pants: all britches have a big bum so can he can sit down. The shirts have slim sleeves and never buttoned all the way down. (so the stereotypical romance cover with the man in a ripped open shirt wouldn’t have been possible, unless it’s really ripped. The cravat has two removable collars and a cravat pad,

These are my notes from the keynote speech at the Beau Monde and Hearts through History First Annual Conference for Historical Romance Writers.

Jocelyn Kelley (aka Jo Ann Ferguson) noted that we are all searching for the Holy Sale – the one that guarantees our career. From that point forward there will be no more struggles and all characters and plots will flow smoothly. But the Holy Sale is about as close to reality as any Monte Python plot. The best lesson we can learn is that of the knight on the bridge who keeps fighting even when his limbs are cut off. Rejection – It’s only a flesh wound.

She urged her audience, “Never give up, never surrender.”

Ms. Kelley started writing romantic fiction for publication at age 12. In high school she wrote a 600 page “wonder” with characters based on her school friends set in the 1700s. First manuscript serious manuscript she wrote on a typewriter while her three kids were taking naptime. It was rejected by every editor in new york, while she was working on books two and three. She even received a rejection for someone elses book! But she never gave up, never surrendered, and 10 days later she finished book three. That book went on to be her first bestseller, even after an agent said the book was “totally inappropriate for market in which it’s aimed.” One of her books took 14 years to publish, just have to wait until market is ready. Her first contract was for 4 books with option for 14 more, but the publisher died and others took over company. The company went bankrupt after publishing 6 of her books (no more royalties!). Between1989-1992 Ms. Kelley had only one short story published. Multiple publishing lines closed before her books came out, but again she never gave up, never surrendered. She worked on early PAN unemployment program for published authors during this period.

Her agent recommended she write a traditional regency and in 1992, two days after an RWA conference, Zebra called with their first offer. Since that day she has sold over 90 titles.

Ms. Kelley told her audience not to write what’s hot, because it will be cold before it sees the light of day. She relayed a humerous quote form a Disney Imagination book: “There are only 26 letters in the alphabet. How hard can writing be?”

She told us: “Ideas are easy. Writing is very hard.”

When she first joined RWA in 1985 all but one member was writing contemporary and she had self doubt about if she should be writing historical. She urged her audience not to let others change what you believe you should be doing. Aspiring authors must decide what their motivation is. Is it fame and fortune? Validation for self as artist? Because you can’t NOT write? There is nothing like finding a dream come true to keep ones nose to the keyboard. Too often we think of things so far in the future that we lose track of the steps to get there. It is easy to fail with pie in the sky goals. Aspiring authors should make small achievable goals. An aspiring author is one moving forward on the quest.

The blackest moment happens right before a sale.

Ms. Kelley’s advice – if you can give up writing, you should.

Some people give up because they can’t make the move from writing to sales. We are in sales because we are hocking a product. Rejection is part of the process. Learn from them. Keep rejection letters on a project until the project sells, but don’t obsess.

Ms. Kelley once received a rejection from an editor that said, “this doesn’t work for me, but I like your writing so send me anything else you have soon as possible.” She thought the editor was just being nice, so she threw away the letter. Only years later did she realize she had passed up a really great opportunity. That 600 page wonder from high school? It’s now with an editor who says “this is so fresh and new!” Ha.

She read lyrics by Anne Murray from the song “Children of My Mind,” and left her audience with these words:
“Writing isn’t a quest. It isn’t just what I do. It’s what I am.”

The Beau Monde and Hearts Through History chapters of the RWA are hosting their first annual Historical Romance Writers Conference today, which I am attending. Though the schedule was constructed very late, I am looking forward to the workshops offered.

My day is packed:

7:45 – 9:00AM Breakfast & Registration & Annual Meeting
Golden Gate A2-A3

9:00 – 9:40 Keynote Speaker: Jocelyn Kelley (aka Jo Ann Ferguson):
“The Quest for the Holy Sale”
Golden Gate A2-A3

9:45 – 10:40 Sell that Historical
with Kensington editor Hilary Sares & Michelle Buonfiglio from Romance: B(u)y the Book
Where the genre is and where it’s going! If anyone knows, it’s these two women. So if you’re looking to sell or interested in what is selling, this is the workshop for you.
Sierra H

10:45 – 11:10 Break

11:15 – 12:10 Georgian and Regency Clothing
with Kalen Hughes
Join author Kalen Hughes for a live demonstration of clothing of the 18th and early 19th centuries (if we’re very lucky she’ll even have a male model in full regimentals!).
Sierra F

12:25 – 1:30 Lunch with Jenna Petersen!

1:15 – 2:15 A Gentleman’s Tipple: Georgian, Regency and Victorian Beverages
with Kalen Hughes
What’s the difference between Whiskey and whisky? Sherry and sack? What does Raspberry Shrub taste like? Join author Kalen Hughes and find out (must be pre-registered).
Sierra H

2:15 – 2:25 Break

2:30 – 3:25 Making Your Historical Characters Come Alive
with Megan Frampton, Amanda McCabe & Andrea Pickens
Just because you’re writing in a distant time period doesn’t mean your characters should be distant to your readers. Make your characters come alive through dialogue, attitudes, description and actions, while still remaining true to the period.
Sierra I

3:30 – 4:30 Tea and Silent Auction
Golden Gate A2-A3

5:30-7:30 p.m. RWA Literacy Autographing
(Open to the Public)
Yerba Buena Ballroom

8:45 – 11PM Soiree with Dancemaster
Golden Gate B2-B3

Today is the last day of the auction put on by Eloisa James and Julia Quinn. Many Regency authors have donated more items over the month, including an Advance Reader Copy (ARC) by Colleen Gleeson and a 50-page critique by Joanna Bourne! The money is being raised for a young family in need, so you get awesome autographed books and get to contribute to a good cause. There are a few non-regency offerings too, including an ARC of Jennifer Ashley’s Immortals: The Redeeming. I have her first book sitting in my bookshelf just waiting for me to delve into.

Bidding ends TONIGHT, Friday, June 27th at Midnight, EST (that’s 9 pm to those of us on the Best Coast).

Check out the auction here.

I must point out that the autographed ARC of Mr. Cavendish I Presume by Julia Quinn is currently only going for $80. Some rabid fan paid over $300 for it on Brenda Novak’s auction, so you’re getting a steal.

***

And in other news:

I WON A BOOK AT THE BOOK BINGE!!!

Title: Pleasure Unbound
Author: Larissa Ione
Series: Demonica, Book 1
Publisher: Forever, June 2008
Genre: Paranormal Romance

Yay! It looks good. The Book Binge gave it 4.5 out of 5 and you can read Casee’s review here. Even more exciting? Author Nalini Singh says “What a ride! Dark, sexy and very intriguing, this book gripped me from start to finish. I can’t wait to read the next in the series!” Nalini is a goddess, so you know it’s gotta be good.

I started off looking for a photo of a Regency kitchen and ended up finding two jolly good quizzes for your Monday Morning entertainment, not to mention this lovely picture of The Romantic Hero paperdoll.

Are you a Vulgarian?

It matters not whether you are a pillar of society or the scum of the earth: everyone likes to speak the language of the gutter. It’s big, and it’s clever. In Regency times, vulgarity was employed and enjoyed by people from all walks of life – just as it is now. Assess your standing as a vulgarian by answering these questions on the vulgar tongue of the early nineteenth century.

Q: She may have been a modest young lady, but on Sunday afternoon she could be seen on the village green spanking her tits. A likely scenario?

My score: 6/15, Oh Dear, you poor cub! You might have to roughen your edges a tad if you’re to make it through a raucous evening without blushing.

Are You a Regency Catch?

In Jane Austen’s World, who would you have been? Our quiz places you in the Regency era at the height of the age of romance. Would you have been a Mr. Darcy or a dissolute rake, a Miss Elizabeth Bennet or a shameless jade? Find out by playing the quiz…

My result: Good day Maria Bertram! You lack a moral centre! Personally, I blame the parents. The love of a good man might just save you, but I fear we’ve come to this turnpike too late. Like Mansfield Park’s frankly wayward Miss Maria Bertram, you may sacrifice your reputation for sex and ultimately be more at home on continental soil.

Sweeeeet.

With eager anticipation I have been researching places to go and things to do during my upcoming pilgrimage to the holy land of the Regency Romance genre.

The Travel Book Search

Frustratingly, there seem to be London guidebooks for most other literary genres, but not romance. There are numerous books on London through the eyes of Shakespeare, Virginia Woolf, Oscar Wild, Sherlock Holmes, and Charles Dickens, and one genre travel guide to the Mystery Reader’s Walking Guide: London. There are half a dozen books on literary guides to London written during the late 19th and early 20th centuries – much good would they do guiding a reader through the much-changed 21st. At least a Dickens’ guide would help me identify locations in Lisa Kleypas’ Victorian-era novels, but where is London for Georgette Heyer Lovers? Stephanie Laurens’ London: Mayfair and Beyond? The Traveler’s Companion to the London of Julia Quinn? The closest I have come are travel guides to Jane Austin’s England and Bath, but not, specifically, London.

Which leads us back to writing our own.

Walking Tours of Regency-Related London

London Walks is a company that has approximately ten walking tours a day for only 6 pounds each that all look fabulous and have been enthusiastically recommended to me. A few of them relate to our topic:

- Old Mayfair – The Best Address in London!: During the 19th century, anyone who was anyone had a town home in Mayfair for the Season, including all our monied and titled heroes and heroines.

- The London Walk: Westminster and the West End: “Big Ben, Parliament, Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace, the Changing of the Guard, our loveliest Royal Park, 500-year-old St. James’s Palace, clubland, Piccadilly Circus, Leicester Square, Trafalgar Square, Admiralty Arch…” All the sights our characters witnessed.

- The Literary London Pub Walk: “Shades of Dickens and Thackeray; Oscar Wilde and G. B. Shaw; Virginia Woolf and the Bloomsbury Circle (who lived in Squares and loved in triangles); George Orwell, W. B. Yeats and T. S. Eliot – how they were flesh and blood men and women who lived, loved, laughed, caroused, quarrelled and spun ‘words so nimble, so full of subtle flame…’.”

I will be there over October 31st, most likely sampling the Apparitions, Alleyways & Ale: the Halloween Ghostwalk Tour!!!

Map Me Baby

A recent find: an online map of London from 1827.

I am in love. With books. With Romance Novels. With Regency Romance Novels. With Stephanie Laurens and Julia Quinn and Lisa Kleypas and Elizabeth Boyle and OMG I need MORE. How on earth can I take the time to write book reviews when there are so many novels just waiting for me to sink my teeth into? I am completely, hopelessly, utterly addicted to a well-written Regency Romance. I want to go to a ball. I want to ride a horse in Hyde Park. I want to cross verbal swords with witty gentleman rakes and see plays on Drury Lane and stroll through Vauxhall Gardens and tiptoe through the hallowed halls of Whites and dance through Almack’s and READ MORE. Laugh all you want (and I did because these “10 Things No One Would Say in a Regency Romance” are hilarious and undeniably true), but I am head over heels for them.

Please note I wrote a well-written one, though I suppose the purpose of a book review is to help steer you towards the gold. Indeed, when I first started reading romance novels I ran across a few atrocious ones that put me off the Regency sub-genre completely. If you have found yourself in a similar unfortunate predicament, please do not despair. Here are some authors that, if given the chance, you will truly adore. Allow yourself to taste the sweetness of a well-turned tale and discover new authors that tempt and seduce by trying one of the following anthologies:

Hero, Come Back

Don’t let the boring book cover fool you – these tales are charming. The three authors write short stories of beloved secondary characters from their full-length novels. I enjoyed all three of these emensely.

- Lost and Found by Stephanie Laurens

Reggie Carmarthen, the best-guy-friend of the Cynster twins Amanda and Amelia, opens his eyes to another “good-friend”, spinster and do-gooder Anne Ashford.

- The Third Suitor by Christina Dodd

Harry Chamberlain, Earl of Granville from Lost in Your Arms, discovers the very spunky Lady Jessica climbing through his bushes to escape a suitor. This one made me laugh.

- The Matchmaker’s Bargain by Elizabeth Boyle

A bit of magic helps the wounded ex-rake James Reyburn find that love can heal his soul.

Where’s My Hero?

Another boring cover, but I credit this book with my discovery of the fabulous Julia Quinn and Lisa Kleypas. Unfortunately Kinley MacGregor (aka Sherrylin Kenyon) pales in comparison to the deft prose of the other two.

- A Tale of Two Sisters by Julia Quinn

It’s not just that Julia is brilliant enough to live in the BE-A-U-TIFUL Pacific Northwest, or that she’s a fellow Ivy Leager (though Harvard is no Penn). It’s that she makes me laugh out loud and I don’t do that often enough. Her truly excellent writing style and dialog are a wonder to behold and I plan to read everything ever published with her name on it. In this short story Ned is engaged to one sister because she’s perfectly acceptable as a wife and he will never be in danger of falling in love with her. During the week’s festivities leading up to the wedding, though, he meets her younger sister, Charlotte, and it becomes apparent that he has much more in common with the sensible girl than with her sister. I really liked Charlotte. She was straightforward and liked the out-of-doors and I had the feeling we could be great friends.

- Against the Odds by Lisa Kleypas

I also plan to read everything ever published by this fabulous author. This story was my favorite of the three, because Dr. Jake Linley is deeper than the typical dashingly handsome rakish hero. Jake is passionate about his work, not just the usual drinking, gambling and seducing. Lydia is engaged to marry an earl who she has chosen because he is acceptable and, surprise, surprise, she will never be in danger of falling in love with him. Her romantic mother sneakily locks her in the cellar with Jake, with whom she has always had a tempestuous relationship. Turns out they fight because they like each other.

- Midsummer’s Night by Kinley MacGregor

In the Brotherhood of the Sword series, Simon, the Wraith, is Stryder’s right hand man. He started writing letters to a Scottish Lassie in Stryder’s name, but when she shows up at a tournament set on wedding Stryder, the cat is out of the bag. Predictable and slightly boring tale.

The Further Adventures of Lady Whistledown

This anthology is fun because the four tales interweave around a theater performance, a winter ice skating party and a Valentine’s Day Ball. The characters see each other during their respective stories. The tales are further tied together through Julia Quinn’s delightful Lady Whistledown gossip column.

- One True Love by Suzanne Enoch

- Two Hearts by Karen Hawkins

- A Dozen Kisses by Mia Ryan

- Thirty-Six Valentines by Julia Quinn

Ah, Regency Romance. As I told my seat neighbor on the airplane back from Sweden when he laughingly asked how I liked my book: True Love. Happily Ever After. What more could you ask for in a novel?