I've always loved the fantasy crime stories of Randall Garrett, sadly only published in the US. I managed to get all the Lord Darcy novels about 12 years ago from a second hand bookshop in Tucson. However, whilst I loved the setting and the characters, the writing sometimes annoyed me as did the fact that I could spot the perpetrator 8 times out of 10. With a love of English history, especially the Tudor era and an addiction to crime novels, it seemed natural that I would want to match the one with the other. Then Lord Darcy tapped me on the shoulder and I just had to add an element of magic.
I say an element of magic, because my protagonist is Luke Ballard,apothecary and elemancer, working in the Outer Green of Hampton Court Palace - for those of you who know it, Luke's house and shop are roughly where the ticket office is today. Elemancers perform magic using the power of the elements. To aid them, each elemancer has a greyspring - a greyhound crossed with a springer spaniel. Greysprings are the only breed sensitive enough to know when their elemancer is going into a trance and they provide protection until the trance is over. The arch enemies of elemancers are sunderers, usually elemancers turned bad. They feed off chaos and strife and do their utmost to upset the balance of the universe.
The history is a little skewed, too. In my Tudor world, Queen Anne Boleyn did not miscarry her boy child in 1534 and he is now Henry IX. I have taken the witchcraft accusations thrown at Anne and made her an elemancer, too.
'Duty of Evil', the first book in the series, is almost ready for sending out into the cold world of agents and publishers. England is the prize and the life of the new young King is the price. Luke must use all his medical and magic skills to find the traitors and bring them to justice and he must do it in secret.
Treasons, Stratagems & Spoils is the second book in the Luke Ballard series. I have plenty of ideas, lots of scribbled notes and quite a bit of research, but this blog is to share the trials and tribulations of writing what I know will turn out to be a complicated and twisting plot. Come on the journey with me. Keep me company and keep my nose to the grindstone. Please.
Luke Ballard, Detective, Apothecary and Elemancer keeping the Tudors safe at Hampton Court Palace
I come bearing gifts: a whip & a chair for lion taming. Will that do?
ReplyDeleteSounds an engrossing premise, but for those of us whose history does not extend as far as the Tudors, nor has ever been to Hampton Court, can I please request a map of the place, even an odd pic, in the r/h column, so when you are waxing lyrical we know what you are about?
I don't know how you think of these things! It already sounds fascinating and HC awaits any time you need to visit! perhpas you should buy a yearly pass!!x Janet
ReplyDeleteJanet, I love the place so much, as you well know, that I would be happy to visit it every week if I could. I have no idea what pulls me towards it, it is almost as if it is home. Yes, that's it, I think. I feel at home there.
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