Events

Join me on Tuesday, 13 July, 10:30 am PDT
Register here.

Historical Novelists:
Transporting Readers to the Past

Patricia Bracewell and Candace Robb
share the stories behind their stories

The Face of a Queen: Novelist Patricia Bracewell spent fourteen years researching and writing about Emma of Normandy, the twice-crowned queen of England. In this presentation she uses images pulled from medieval times and from modern day to illustrate the events that took place in Queen Emma’s life and that have been re-imagined in detail in the pages of her trilogy about this remarkable 11th century queen.

Reimagining 14th Century York: Candace Robb has spent decades bringing 14th century York to life in her Owen Archer and Kate Clifford mystery series. The city of York is a favorite stop on tours of England for its grand medieval cathedral, city walls, and narrow cobbled streets showcasing many late medieval buildings. But it’s a bustling 21st century city, not a museum. What was it really like in the time of Chaucer? In this presentation Candace will demonstrate how she cobbles together the bustling 14th century city and guides readers through the narrow streets and the everyday lives of medieval city dwellers from the powerful archbishop to the poor who live in ramshackle huts outside the city walls.

Author bios

Patricia Bracewell: Her debut historical novel, Shadow on the Crown, was published in 2013 in the U.S. and Britain, and has been translated into Italian, German, Portuguese and Russian. Its sequel, The Price of Blood, continues the gripping tale of the 11th century queen of England, Emma of Normandy, during a time when England was under near-constant siege by Viking armies. Her research has taken her to France, Denmark and Britain, including a summer course on Anglo-Saxon history at Downing College, Cambridge. Patricia has served as Writer-in-Residence at Gladstone’s Library in Wales and has spoken to numerous book groups and school groups about her novels and the history that infuses them. The final book of her trilogy about Emma of Normandy, The Steel Beneath the Silk, a novel that Kirkus Reviews lauds as “a thoroughly researched and realized novel,” was released in March. www.PatriciaBracewell.com

Candace Robb: Since doing her graduate work in medieval history and literature, Candace has been engaged in bringing to life the rich culture of the late medieval period, from the arts to the politics. She is the internationally acclaimed author of 19 crime novels featuring medieval sleuths Owen Archer (13 books, most recently A Conspiracy of Wolves, A Choir of Crows, The Riverwoman’s Dragon-in 2021), Kate Clifford (3, most recently A Murdered Peace), and Margaret Kerr (3 most recently A Cruel Courtship). PW says: “Robb effortlessly integrates the era’s intrigues into a whodunit framework and peoples the plot with a wide array of characters readers will come to care about.” She is also the author of 2 historical novels about the women in King Edward III’s court, The King’s Mistress and A Triple Knot (writing as Emma Campion). Candace lives in Seattle, where she sings in the Medieval Women’s Choir. She frequently travels to the UK for research and inspiration. www.candacerobbbooks.com