Christine Trent – Victorian Gothic

Christine Trent’s addictive mysteries edge into the dark and Gothic – Victorian England through the eyes of Violet Harper, the undertaker heroine of the Lady of Ashes series, or the nightmare of the Crimea as seen by Florence Nightingale. Hi there, I’m your host Jenny Wheeler and today Christine talks about the mentor who inspired her to write, and where’s she’s performing Lady of the Lamp, her one-woman show on Florence Nightingale’s life.. Six things you’ll learn from this Joys of Binge Reading episode: Why Christine says she’s been ‘lucky’ as a writer How British kindness helped her survive Sept 11 Queen Victoria’s role in making mourning “high fashion” Bringing Florence Nightingale to life in books and on stage The passion she shares with Thomas Jefferson The best lesson she’s learned  as an author Where to find Christine Trent:  Website: http://www.christinetrent.com/books.html Facebook: @ChristineTrentBooks What follows is a “near as” transcript of our conversation, not word for word but pretty close to it, with links to important mentions. Jenny: But now, here’s Christine. .  Hello there Christine and welcome to the show, it’s great to have you with us. Christine:  Thank you for inviting me! Christine Trent – Mystery author Jenny:    Beginning at the beginning – was there a “Once Upon a Time” moment when you decided you wanted to write fiction??  And if so what was the catalyst for it? Christine: Well I actually do have a story like that. I have always been a reader – as a young child, I was a big reader. In fact, my mother used to get so annoyed having to read to me all the time that she taught me to read very early just so I could leave her alone and go and read my own books! But writing had never occurred to me until much later in life. I had gone to a University book store, and there was a sad little box of books sitting on the floor. It said “any book $1”. Inside that box of books, there was a cover that attracted me. It was very royal, it looked like a palace on the front of it. I picked it out and it was a book called To Dance With Kings by an author going by the name of Rosalind Laker. It was just a lovely book- it was historical, it was romantic; it was just wonderful. Very few books make me cry, but that book made me cry. I was actually inspired to try and find that author. Fortunately I’ve got a sister in law who works as a librarian, and she tracked down that author’s agent. As it turned out, she lived in the UK and I wrote to that author – I had never done such a thing in my life. Then the author wrote back to me, and that started a friendship whereby my husband and I travelled to the UK and visited her. Christine and her mentor, Rosalind Laker I just got inspired to write by sitting with her and talking with her. She had had a long career herself with probably 25 books; that was actually the inspiration to begin writing myself. Jenny: What a lovely story! Now from that, you’ve got two historical mystery series, Lady Of Ashes and Florence Nightingale and you’ve got some historical romance “standalones” as well. Why did you choose historical fiction for a start, and then mystery secondly? Christine:  Well as I mentioned, Rosalind Laker – whose real name was Barbara Ovstedal  – most of her books were historical romance. She did write some modern things, but most of them were historical romance. I adored them. Just from picking up her books, I had always read historical type books because it always interested me. I think a lot of historical readers out there would agree that it’s a fun way to learn history, especially when it’s done well and done right. That was really what got me started on historical in general. But the reason I got into historical mystery was because of my fourth book, Lady of Ashes. I actually wrote that as a piece of stand alone historical fiction, and then my editor came back to me and said “I think this idea of a Victorian era undertaker would make for a great series. We think that she could solve mysteries herself- make that happen.” So I did! Jenny: Oh fantastic! That whole thing about having an undertaker as your key character- I thought that was very brave because a lot of people probably think it morbid and wouldn’t want to go there. What gave you that idea? Lady of Ashes Christine: Well believe it or not, I have a writer friend. She lives out in Oregon on the West Coast of the United States. We were at a writing conference together one day, and it might have been a little too much chardonnay, I’m not sure! But she looked at me and she said “a great piece of historical fiction would be something where an undertaker was the heroine of the story.” At first I thought it was peculiar myself, but the more I thought about the idea, the more I embraced it. It is an unusual topic; I don’t think anyone has done this before. So I ran with her idea. Jenny: Yes. Had anybody done it before; have you discovered that since? Christine: I couldn’t find that anyone else had done it before. Jenny: No, that’s right. There were women undertakers actually working in those years weren’t there? Christine: Well, typically what would have happened – as you can imagine moving a dead body (and when they say dead body I mean a dead weight) would have been difficult for a woman to move on her own. What would have been more likely to have happened was the woman would have worked in the business with her husband and her husband would have done the “heavy lifting” in the business and the women would have done other things. But women worked alongside their husbands in businesses all the time. If she had owned it on her own, that would have been a little more difficult. But for those who read the series, you will see how Violet goes from doing it with her husband to doing it on her own. I’ve been really amazed at how people have embraced the idea of it. I do get questions about whether a woman would have done it or not, but people generally embrace it. The only time I get push back is when people say it seems a little odd, or peculiar of a topic, particularly when I’m doing book signings or events that aren’t mystery. Mystery readers totally embrace it and get it from the moment I’m into it. Jenny: Yes, it’s interesting. Just a little aside – I was doing some research on Sacramento and looking through the rolls of people and occupations of the 1860’s in Sacramento. I was particularly looking for an undertaking firm. There was a mother and son, and the husband had died. What had happened is that the mother and son had taken over the business, so I’m sure it happened all over the world – that kind of transition. Christine: Absolutely. Even today, undertaking businesses or funeral homes as we call them today; they have traditionally been family run businesses, handed down through the generations with their own trade secrets on how they do things. I think that’s correct – you would often see where a wife would have inherited the business. But she would have needed help, as you mentioned the son, with her Sacramento business. She would have needed physical help to do it. Jenny: Yes – as I was reading Book One in the series, I thought to myself what a tremendous amount of research you had done on the funeral traditions and the things they would have done. Did you find it interesting, and a little challenging yourself? Christine: It actually is very challenging research, thank you for asking. The reason why is these businesses tend to be handed down through the generations, and they have their own secrets. Therefore, it’s hard to find those trade secrets. When I say trade secrets, I mean just the different ways that an undertaker might sew the mouth shut or fix the chin, or position the body. They had their own ways of doing things that they weren’t going to share, so it’s difficult to find that information. In fact, I went to interview my local undertaker here in town and even they were reluctant to talk to me about how things were done. Not that anything illicit is being done, it’s just they have their own ways of doing things. They like to be known by their good reputations, and they aren’t willing to share the secrets so it was very difficult research. Jenny: The Violet series – at the end of book one you had her going off to Colorado and I was quite interested to think she might become an American undertaker! But you have said that you didn’t really see it as a series at that point. Then your agent said to you that they’d like to have another book, so you had to send her back to England again. Tell us about what happened in that incident… Stolen Remains – Book #2 in the Ashes series. Christine: Well as you said, my editor would like Violet to turn into a detective and solve mysteries. “So here’s what I want,” she said. “We’re going to leave this book as it is. I want you to return Violet back to England quickly in Book Two. Don’t spend a lot of time on it, just get her quickly back into the country”. So I thought , ‘OK.’ I created a situation in Book Two where her mother was ill and living in Brighton, and she needed to rush back to England because her mother might die. Her mother does make a recovery, but that is how Violet returns back to Great Britain. Because she gets wrapped up solving a mystery, she ends up thinking that perhaps she doesn’t want to return back to the United States. Jenny: So there are now six Violet Harper books and you’ve worked quite a close relationship with Queen Victoria into several of them. I think of them almost as Dark Victorian stories because the presence of Queen Victoria is quite strong in them. In Book One she’s an assistant at Prince Albert’s funeral and in Book Three Queen Victoria’s companion John Brown features quite strongly. Does Victoria hold a special appeal for you? Christine: I would say that certainly Queen Victoria defined the age – you know, having lived so long and having such great influence. But the other thing with Queen Victoria is she bought mourning into fashion after her husband died. Therefore to me, it just seemed like Violet and Victoria belonged together- and hey, they’re names start with “Vi” so how more perfect can it get from that! Queen Victoria and daughters with a bust of Prince Albert – a memorial photograph Victoria was a very interesting character for me. I think everybody has their predisposed notions of what she was like, and what her relationship with Albert was like. I admire her ideas, and I just thought that because she lived for so long, there was time to explore her personality inside books. Jenny: There was a feeling that her almost addictive grief was almost an unhealthy thing – would you see it that way? Christine: I would definitely look at it that way. How I look at it is to the extent that she wanted to do that for herself, it was fine. But she sort of forced everyone around her to do it as well. For the first year or so, it was understandable. It got to the point where she resented her daughters for getting married and having happy weddings, she wanted all her ladies in waiting in mourning, she slept with a giant picture of Albert on an easel next to her bed for the rest of her life. She had his clothes laid out on his bed – servants would have to lay his clothes out for I think ten years after he died, so everybody around her was sort of bought into that. I think that’s where it wasn’t healthy; there was such an impact on everybody surrounding her. Jenny: That’s amazing, I didn’t know those details. And talking about her relationships; there’s the John Brown aspect as well. You say that you don’t think for a moment there was any romance there, but some of the movies and media tended to build that up a bit. Even at the time, there was rumors and whispers. But tell us about your take on that. The Queen’s Dollmaker – Marie Antoinette Christine: My take on it is similar to my take on Marie Antoinette. There were many rumours after Marie Antoinette’s death of her having being involved with a courtier, by the name of Axel von Fersen, who was a Swedish Diplomat. Many people believed she had a relationship with him. I tend to think she did not, for the same reasons as I think Victoria did not have ‘a relationship’ with John Brown in that both of these women were Queens. They were very aware of who they were, if that makes sense. To have such relationships would have been very unseemly to them. Both of them were very proper women – we can go into too great detail about personality flaws and things like that, but they were both very proper in their morality; very traditional and upstanding, and both knew who they were. I just don’t think either one of them had the personality to be doing that. That’s what I think. Jenny: Sure. I know we’ve been talking about Violet, but one of your stand alones is The Queen’s Dollmaker isn’t it, and it focuses on the Marie Antoinette period. Christine: Exactly. In that book, I do have Marie Antoinette involved with Axel Fersen. But in my author’s note at the back, I state that I don’t actually believe she had a relationship; it just helped my story along. Jenny: Are there any highlights of your particular research trips – a moment where you’ve discovered something exciting, or come across something that has helped with a plot point in the story? Just one or two “epiphany” moments that you’ve thought in your research that it was really worth digging in here, or going to this library, or castle or whatever? Marie Antoinette – encrypted letters to Swedish diplomat Axel Von Fersen Christine: Oh my goodness. So my husband and I have been over to the UK- I think we’ve had 8 trips over. There are certain places that I visit routinely, just because they’re so wonderful and magnificent. I would actually say what’s been most helpful, in addition to walking through magnificent cathedrals and the stately homes and everything else where I can walk the path where Violet walks; to me, what’s actually been really helpful is getting to know actual Britons – what their personalities are like, how they react to different things. They are absolutely delightful people, I just love them to pieces. I’ve been treated so very kindly. Not to put the conversation too far off to one side, but my husband and I were actually in the UK on September 11 2001. The reaction to the attack – of course we were startled – we’re from the DC area, it was all very startling. We didn’t know what was going on back home. The way that people in Great Britain opened up their hearts, their homes, everything to us – I could never express in words (and typically I have many words) what the people in the UK were like for us. Helping us make phone calls, giving us free access to things. I feel like I’m able to bring out those personalities into the books I write. I’m so appreciative to be able to write them into my books. That’s in addition to of course being able to see all the wonderful things in the country. Jenny: That brings us nicely to your second series; the Florence Nightingale series, because she is a remarkable, iconic woman of British history. You’ve published two books in that series so far, and Florence hasn’t got to the Crimean War yet. You’re still early on in her career; are you planning to take that series right through to the Crimean War? Florence Nightingale Book #2 Christine: That is my plan, but we’ll see what the publisher’s plan is for what she does! Book Two goes right up to the Crimean War, and the third book goes into the Crimean War which of course lasted for a couple of years. Obviously that’s where Florence had so much impact into nursing and hospitalization and medicine overall – not just for the UK, but for the entire world. So yes, she will visit the Crimean War. I can’t wait to show readers what the conditions of the Crimea were really like, because they were worse than anything you could absolutely imagine in your life. Jenny: You like to dig into these dark places don’t you? That must have been harrowing research in itself. Christine: To see what the average British soldier went through to be in war – as if the war part wasn’t bad enough, the lack of care they themselves got was distressing. Yes, it is very dark and generally speaking – without doing a whole recap of the War – most of them were sent over there without enough supplies, food, blankets, horses, equipment. There were thousands of injured soldiers who were dragged to hospitals, where there might be two doctors for a thousand soldiers. So there was just no care. They just died of all this disease. In the United States, the wars had not been very bad in that respect. It was nothing compared to what they went through in the Crimean War twenty years earlier. Jenny: I think you’ve taken this to a new level – I saw on your website you do a presentation called Meet The Lady of The Lamp – tell us a little about that. You actually get dressed up as Florence, do you? Florence Nightingale attending to patients National Library of Medicine #b029443 Christine: I do. I actually took a picture of her – of course it’s a black and white photo – and took it to a seamstress to have a dress made that was as close a replica as I could have done, including her head piece and sleeves. I got a replica lamp from the Florence Nightingale Museum in London, and I do a first person interpretation of a fairly questionable British accent- although I do try – and I talk about her as though I am her, and recount the important details of her life for audiences. I love it. Jenny: That’s fantastic! So it really is a one woman show, isn’t it? Christine: Exactly, and I really enjoy doing it. Jenny: How many times have you done it? Christine: I’ve done it several times – I’ve got another coming up in June for the Historical Novel Society’s North American Conference. That’s my next one, but I’m always booking those events. Christine as Florence Jenny: That’s fantastic! I do wish you could do it in New Zealand. Christine: Me too! Arrange it for me Jenny! Turning to your wider career  . . .  Jenny:    You’ve declared that – like Thomas Jefferson – you “can’t live without books,” and you and your husband share a passion for books that’s led to you build a library extension on your home – Is this where you also do your writing? Christine: It is, and it’s very kind of you to refer to my book collection and something we share and collect – I think it might be a little of an obsession! But yes, I do write from the library. We put this addition on our home about 10 years ago and as my husband was building book shelves and doing things to set it up, we found this little nook inside of it. We thought, it’s a tiny little space and I would say it’s probably 4 feet by 6 feet. He built in little desk, and shelves where I can store some books and get my laptop in there. I sit in this tiny, little enclosed space and it’s where I do my writing. I have pictures on it on my website. I really like it, because it keeps me from getting too distracted other than by my cats, which are a welcome distraction! But it keeps me from looking around too much and wandering off from my writing during the day. Jenny:    Is there one thing in your writing career, that you’ve done perhaps more than any other, that is the secret of your success? Christine: To think about that, I would say the thing I have done that’s been most difficult, thus the thing I think has contributed to success is that I have tried very hard to take criticism and correct from people I respect. I’ve tried to not be too “precious” about my writing and to take direction from editors and from my agent and from other writers whom I really respect. They’ve been able to guide and form my writing to be better than it might have been had I decided that every word I wrote was golden. That has helped me a lot to be able to do that- to be able to roll with those sort of criticisms and things when I’ve gotten them. So no matter how bitter the pill is, I try to smile and learn. Turning to Christine as reader Jenny:    The series is called “The Joys of Binge Reading” because I see it as providing inspiration for people who like to read series.  So – turning to your taste in fiction – who do you “binge read?” Any recommendations for listeners? Margaret George latest – Emperor Nero  Christine: I suppose when I was younger, I was a Nancy Drew fan, of course! I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of Freddy the Pig, but I loved Freddy the Pig. My mother hated Freddy the Pig. He lived in a barnyard with all his other barnyard friends and they had adventures. I absolutely loved that as a child. I also loved the usual Dr Seuss type things, and Charlie Brown and Snoopy. I did begin to turn to historical fiction as a late teenager I would say. People that I read now I really like Margaret George, she writes really large novels but they’re fantastic. She just came out with a book, the second in her Nero series which is really not to be missed. I like Tasha Alexander and her Lady Emily series. Elizabeth Chadwick writes really accurate, absorbing historical fiction. I’m going to be in an anthology soon with some other authors. I’m in with them because I like them so much, but that will be Susanna Kearsley- she writes really neat books where it’s not time travel, but part of the action takes place present time and then it switches back in time to get the history behind what’s going on in the present day. They’re really good books. I really like Anna Lee Huber (Link to Joys of Binge Reading podcast with Anna) and her Lady Darby books – just a really lovely fast reading series. C. S Harris writes the Sebastian St. Cyr series which is regency historical mystery. Those are fast paced and really great reads as well. I’m sure I could go on all day about other authors, but I’d say those are some of my top ones. C S Harris – Sebastian St Cyr series Jenny: Yes, I’d have to agree with those names. We’ve had Anna Lee Huber on and C. S Harris, I’ve been reading her for years. I’m still on tenterhooks to see how she’ll round off that series, because there’s a mystery there that’s got to be solved somehow and I’m just really interested to see how she’s going to do it! Circling back to the beginning at the end  Jenny:    At this stage in your career, if you were doing it all again, what would you change – if anything? Christine: I would say that generally speaking, I’ve probably been quite blessed actually in that I did sell my first book. My first book I ever wrote was the Queen’s Doll Maker, and I did manage to sell it inside of about two years- which any aspiring writer will tell you is really quite a quick sale. So I could not be more blessed or happy about that. I think something I might have changed is I might have put more of an emphasis on shall we say writing faster. I tend to be a little bit slow, because of the historical nature of my book and trying to put historical detail on every page of every paragraph. I wish over the last ten years or so that I had written faster so that my backlist would be bigger. I do have readers clambering all the time- where’s the next Violet, where’s the next this, where’s the next that? I wish that I had done something to learn to adjust myself to getting more output out there. Jenny: Yes, there’s a big emphasis out there today. This thing about “binge reading”- when they discover an author, they do just want to keep reading their books. Christine: Exactly. We binge television, we binge everything now don’t we? And especially mystery readers I think. Historical fiction readers tend to be a little more patient I think, whereas historical mystery readers are veracious in how they like to read. I had readers come to me and say “I read all your books in a week.” I can’t produce them that quickly, I just can’t! Jenny:    What is next for Christine the writer?  What are you working on, and new projects?  Christine: Actually there is, and they say bad luck for talking about something before it’s actually real… in addition to working on Florence and Violet, believe it or not I’m changing gears and working on a piece of contemporary womens’ fiction, just to change it up a little and shift my brain a little bit to ding something different. I’ve given a proposal to my agent, and we shall see where it goes. Jenny: Fantastic. So in terms of your existing series, what’s on the publishing schedule? Christine: On the publishing schedule I am starting to write believe it or not, a Violet prequel. I have for 2019 two anthologies coming out, where I’m providing Violet stories for the anthologies. One of them being the anthology with Anna Lee Huber, Susanna Kearsley and C.S Harris and the other is an anthology being put out by the Domestic Group. On May 7th, the next Florence Nightingale will be out, right smack in the middle of Nurses week. Jenny: Great- so you’re doing Florence as an indie are you? Christine:No, Florence is with a publisher Crooked Lane Books. Jenny:    Do you enjoy interacting with readers and where can they find you online? Christine: I love interacting with readers. I especially love doing it in person, although I won’t be in New Zealand anytime soon. I love going to conferences and signing and meeting people. Honestly, historical readers are just the best, they really are. I encourage people to reach out to me through my website. There’s a contact on christinetrent.com, or my Facebook. My handle there is @ChristineTrentBooks. I promise, I respond to every email and every message on Facebook, I always do it. I love getting emails from my readers. Jenny: It’s been such a pleasure talking with you. I’m still thinking how I can get to see you as Florence sometime, but that’s something for the future! It’s been such a pleasure, thank you so much for being on the show. Christine: Thank you so much Jenny, I really enjoyed it. If you enjoyed hearing about or reading Christine’s Florence Nightingale mysteries you may be interested to know the mysterious (true life) murder of Florence Nightingale’s god daughter, Florence Nightingale Shore, features in Jessica Fellowes’ Mitford Murders. And if you liked Christine’s dark Gothic mysteries you may like to consider Anna Lee Huber’s equally dark Victorian Lady Darby mysteries, featuring the wife of an anatomist forced to cooperate in his work. Thanks To Our Technical Support: The Joys of Binge Reading podcast is put together with wonderful technical help from Dan Cotton at DC Audio Services. Dan is an experienced sound and video engineer who’s ready and available to help you with your next project… Seek him out at [email protected] or Phone + 64 – 21979539. He’s fast, takes pride in getting it right, and lovely to work with. Our voice overs are done by Abe Raffills, and Abe’s another gem. He got 20 years of experience on both sides of the camera/microphone as a cameraman/director and also voice artist and television presenter. Abe’s vocal delivery is both light hearted and warm and he is super easy to work with no matter the job. You’ll find him at [email protected]