Or
Book Club Friday guest to day is author Nancy Bilyeau, a magazine editor who
has worked on the staffs of Rolling Stone, Good Housekeeping and InStyle. Her first
novel, The Crown, was shortlisted for the Ellis Peters
Historical Dagger Award in 2012. Oprah Magazine said, "Bilyeau deftly
weaves extensive historical detail throughout, but the real draw of this
suspenseful novel is its juicy blend of lust, murder, conspiracy, and betrayal.”
The Chalice, a sequel, will be released in March. Learn more about Nancy at her website.
Nancy
is offering two copies of The
Crown to readers who post
a comment. As always, please leave your email address or check back on Sunday
to see if you’ve won. -- AP
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The Cloisters |
When crafting my novel, a
historical mystery thriller, I not only ignored “Write
what you know,” I went about as far into an unknown world as a person can go
and not be authoring science fiction. The
Crown is set in England; I’m American, living in New York City. The book
takes place in 1537-1538, during the reign of Henry VIII; not being a time
traveler (unfortunately), I’m of the modern era. My protagonist, Joanna
Stafford, is a novice in a Dominican Order; I was not raised in any religion,
unless you count a few Sunday-school classes at the Unitarian-Universalist
Church in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
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The Cloisters passageway |
I love research and I dove
into studies of Tudor personalities and daily life in Catholic monasteries. The
novelist leading the fiction workshop where I developed The Crown, Rosemarie Santini, urged me to “get in the mood” to
write, through listening to music or going to places that would inspire me.
Music helped, no question. But finding inspiration in New York City was a bit
of a challenge…until I re-visited The Cloisters, a branch of the Metropolitan
Museum of Art.
The Cloisters’ collection is
made up of 3,000 works of art from medieval Europe, and many of its rooms are
re-assembled French monasteries from the 9th to 16th
centuries. To get there requires an hour and a half trip, taking two subways,
but I haunted the Cloisters for quite some time (and still do). It definitely
helped me get into the head of a devout young Catholic novice. But spending
time in the Cloisters gave me actual ideas for important passages in my book,
too--even clues. I made use of the
stone chapter house, where nuns received correction from their superior; the
herb-filled cloister gardens; the famous Unicorn tapestries; the tombs
containing stone effigies; and the arched doorway with statues of kings on
either side.
Author Nancy Bilyeau in The Cloisters tomb |
Most thrilling of all, I was
making my way through a lower-floor room of precious medieval objects: cups,
plates, crosses, playing cards, devotional beads, silver, reliquaries, busts of
saints, stained glass,
candlesticks, framed miniatures, when I saw….my murder weapon.
Now that was a good day at The Cloisters!
Thanks so much for joining us today, Nancy. I love
The Cloisters! Readers, if you’d like a chance to win a copy of Nancy’s book,
leave a comment. -- AP