Guest Blog: Maggie Secara

This week, we’re welcoming historical fantasy author Maggie Secara, whose title THE DRAGON RING looks at history through time traveler Ben Harper's eyes. Join us Sunday, when Maggie will be here to talk about the novel and offer a copy to a lucky winner. Please leave a comment with your email address for a chance to win. Here's the blurb:

When the King of Faerie calls in a favor, what can you do? Follow your gift. Find the magic. Travel in time. Save the world... How hard can it be?

Reality TV host Ben Harper has a problem: he owes the king of Faerie a favor. So now he has to track down the three parts of a Viking arm-ring, and return them to their place in time. This takes him through the wolf-haunted forests of Viking Age Wessex, the rowdy back streets of Shakespeare's London, and a derelict Georgian country house. Partnered with caustic, shape-changing Raven and guided by a slightly wacky goblin diary, Ben must rediscover his own gifts while facing his doubts and the queen of Faerie's minions, who will do anything to stop him.

The Dragon Ring, the first in the Harper Errant series, is a time travelling mythic adventure that takes you to Old England, and leaves you enchanted. 

**Q&A with Maggie Secara**

What do you love best about your own writing or anyone else’s? What makes you fall in love with a book?

The music! That is, the words themselves. I started out as a poet, and I’ve been singing from an early age in choirs or small groups, and that’s all influenced how I use and respond to language. There’s music in a balanced sentence, in the way the words bounce off each other, that tells me I’ve chosen the right ones.

Everything else builds on that, whether the sensory details of a description or the flash and dazzle of a conversation; the hero’s awareness of the weight of the sword in his hand or the giddy realization that he’s in love. When I’m reading, those are the passages that make me stop and read them out loud just for the feel of the words in my mouth. When I’m not sure about a sentence or a paragraph of my own, I always read it aloud and listen for the stumbling places, and don’t move on until I’m content with the sound as well as the meaning. Oh yes, the meaning too. There’s a story going on here, and characters to meet. The words may sing and dance, but are they doing their job? If not, if I have to cut them away and put them in a box, I will. Tough love.

Speaking of characters, what do you do to make your characters both believable and interesting to the reader?

Story is why we pick up a book, but the characters are why we read it. A plot isn’t events, it’s people reacting to events. If you don’t believe in the characters, you probably won’t buy any of the rest. I think what makes a character come to life is the little, often secret things—skills or beliefs or events in their past-- that even their friends may not know.

In The Dragon Ring, for example, ex-pat Ben Harper is the star of a popular reality show on British television, who practically grew up at the Renaissance Faires in California. In King’s Raven (coming this Christmas),  Miss Susan Pickering, a perfectly sensible Victorian spinster struggling to manage on her own, keeps a sketch book in her handbag and a photographic memory in her head. I can’t plan those things. In general, I’m completely unaware of them until the character comes up and says Hey! Look at this! In some cases, those details turn out to be critical to the story—and what a happy surprise that is! Other times, they’re more or less incidental, though never irrelevant. Either way, those details are what sets one blue-eyed hero apart from another, and helps to make him real.

  

Without asking ‘where do you get your ideas”, can you tell us about the inspiration for your latest book, The Dragon Ring?

This is actually kind of a funny story, if you know my friend Ari. Ari is a college professor, a brilliant scholar and folklorist, a devoted husband and father, and a gifted writer with a devastating wit. Also, I’ve known him a very long time. Well, I’d wanted to tackle NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) for some time, and was racking my brain for a starting point. Then late one night in a hotel room in the middle of nowhere, a question popped into my head: “What if Ari had to solve a mystery?” That tickled me so much I knew it was the start of a great idea—but still only the start. For one thing, there had to be a puzzle worthy of his talents. And there had to be something precious at stake to be worthy of his time. And being Ari, myth and folklore would be central, and that led me straight down the road to fair Elfland. I stayed up all night filling up the last blank pages in an old spiral with the questions I always ask and sketching in possible answers until something like a plot started to come together. Of course, it all came out quite different as the story plan developed, but the idea of a clever, charming hero who was also a family man was where it all began.

  

What do you find most interesting about setting a story set in the past?

A lot of the historical writers I know would probably say it’s historical events, but the big events are too big to me, and I tend to shy away from them. When a story idea starts to form, it always has a historical setting, but it’s the place, times, and peoples themselves that I find fascinating. So I dig up letters, inventories, wills, landscape and costume pictures, as well as street maps and floor plans. The minutiae of everyday life shows me people who find their challenges on days when the world isn’t violently changing around them. When their world intersects with Faerie, the characters meet those challenges in unexpected ways. And there’s my story

There are exceptions, of course. The central historical point in The Dragon Ring is a meeting between King Alfred and a Viking war leader called Guthrum. The meeting actually took place, though the details are vague—perfect for fiction. One thing we do know, as I discovered while I was in the planning phase, is that they swore an oath on a “holy ring”. And that was the key to everything.

I understand you do a lot of research for your books, but when I read a novel, I want a good story not a history lesson. How do you handle that?

As a reader, I hate authors who over-explain. The trick is to provide a sensory impression of place and time without burying the story in mere facts. I want you to feel like you’ve really been there with Ben and Raven, not like there’s going to be a quiz later. Mind you, I’m fussy about accuracy in the fine details as well as the broad generalities. I want to know how houses were furnished, the kitchen tools they used, and the way they spoke to their children and servants as well as to their lovers—and all these things change over time. The better handle I have on those details, the easier it is to decide what to use and what to leave aside. The more comfortable I feel in, say, Elizabethan London, the easier it is to just tell the story and let the details fall into place just as you would in a contemporary setting.  

Thank you, Maggie, and best of luck with THE DRAGON RING! 

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Feasts: Bronze Age Solstice Feast by J.S. Dunn

By J.S. Dunn

“Mead distilled sparkling, its praise is everywhere.”

From Welsh myth, Song to Mead

What did the ancient Irish eat at 4,000 years ago? And, what about the peoples in what is now Spain’s Costa Verde, and up the Bay of Biscay to the Morbihan and Brittany’s coasts? At first, researching prehistoric foods looks daunting.

The Dindshenchas, a medieval text of oral histories, has clues to the early diet: the sacred salmon of knowledge, the hazelnut which also imparts wisdom, cereal grains for porridge and brewing, and various berries. The ancients made milk and butter from their herd animals. To this day, well-formed oak casks holding Bronze Age butter turn up at digs in the Irish bogs, the contents still smelling of dairy---though no one samples!

Meats of early domesticated sheep and cattle, and cuts of wild deer and boar, show in the bone counts from archaeological digs. Fish were trapped in wattle river weirs long before the Bronze Age. The north Atlantic produces a diverse marine life that is richer than the Mediterranean, and the Atlantic peoples consumed shellfish in great numbers per the remains in ancient shell middens: mussels, whelks, periwinkles, oysters, lobster.

Despite an ancient prohibition on killing swans in Irish myths, there is evidence that swans were indeed eaten for food, and swans winter at the river Boyne and other areas in great numbers. The prohibition re: swans was perhaps politically motivated or may have been an early conservation measure.

The ancients’ knowledge of edible seeds, roots, and herbs, would far exceed our own based on paleobotany surveys at excavations. They collected and dried the wild apple, and berries, which were used for beverages in addition to mead from fermented honey.

In warmer latitudes like ancient Spain, the Bronze Age people began to cultivate the olive and other fruiting shrubs. There is evidence they knew which acorn varieties to collect, and ground those into flour. Spain’s meltingly tender acorn-fed ham of today may have begun in antiquity given their early use of the abundant acorns.

The richness of the environment held bounty for those who well knew how to utilize it. For these ancients, a feast was literally a sacrament of life. The reborn winter solstice sun showed the ancients that spring’s bounty would return.

Boyne solstice feast:

Smoked salmon, smoked haddock

Dried apples stewed with fresh or dried swan

Wild boar, venison, joint of beef ; boiled or roasted

Meal cakes of finely ground hazelnuts, seeds, and grains, sweetened with honey

Soft white cheese, sweet butter

Mead, herbal infusions, primitive beer and cider

Juniper reduction sauce for modern roast wild game:

Here is a simple (and relatively low-fat) reduction sauce if you happen to be serving wild boar or venison for winter solstice or a more modern holiday. Juniper berries impart a flavor like rosemary with a citrus hint. The berries should be dried and crushed before use. Note, buy in a shop—don’t try to harvest your own; some juniper varieties are toxic.

Roast or sauté the meat, keep warm. Deglaze the pan with around ½ cup of red wine (or Calvados, or Guinness, or whatever!), and simmer that mixture in a heavy saucepan until the essence reduces by half in volume. The sauce should coat a spoon. Add one chopped shallot ( or wild garlic shoots if you have those at hand ) and  8 fluid ounces of beef consommé ( not bouillon) and reduce again. If desired, butter (3 tbsp) can be added for a smoother, shiny sauce or to correct overcooking! Add the crushed juniper berries when almost ready to serve the sauce. 4-6 portions.  

J.S. Dunn lived in Ireland during the past decade, on 12 lovely acres fronting a salmon river. The author continues to research and travel the Atlantic coasts and recently  enjoyed wonderful seafood on the Cotes d’Armor, and in Cornwall, and at the famed Lobster Pot restaurant in County Wexford, Ireland.

Excerpt Thursday: THE DRAGON RING by Maggie Secara

This week, we’re welcoming historical fantasy author Maggie Secara, whose title THE DRAGON RING looks at history through time traveler Ben Harper's eyes. Join us Sunday, when Maggie will be here to talk about the novel and offer a copy to a lucky winner. Here's the blurb:

When the King of Faerie calls in a favor, what can you do? Follow your gift. Find the magic. Travel in time. Save the world... How hard can it be?

Reality TV host Ben Harper has a problem: he owes the king of Faerie a favor. So now he has to track down the three parts of a Viking arm-ring, and return them to their place in time. This takes him through the wolf-haunted forests of Viking Age Wessex, the rowdy back streets of Shakespeare's London, and a derelict Georgian country house. Partnered with caustic, shape-changing Raven and guided by a slightly wacky goblin diary, Ben must rediscover his own gifts while facing his doubts and the queen of Faerie's minions, who will do anything to stop him.

The Dragon Ring, the first in the Harper Errant series, is a time travelling mythic adventure that takes you to Old England, and leaves you enchanted. 

**An Excerpt from The Dragon Ring**

The circle at the top of the spiral path was complete even if the stones were mostly broken. At its far edge hulked the unlikely tumble of boulders known as the Raven’s Eye, which some said was the granite core of the hill with the top soil worn away by the constant wind (it was) and some said was a door into Faerie, and who could say? It was like a door. From two sides, slabs of granite had fallen or perhaps been laid by giants against and on top of each other, leaving a low squarish archway just big enough for a grown man and his son to sit under without banging their heads. Not so long ago, women had come up here to be passed through the arch when they wanted to get pregnant. On school holidays, teenagers came up here to get high.

Just now, Ben Harper sat on the ground in that archway and contemplated the view. He listened to the breeze hum through the sparse grasses and furze, imagining the men who had so long ago raised this spiral, singing to the sky.

A slight grumble of earth and stone made him shiver. Louder, the sound coming from directly beneath him. To a California boy that’s not especially alarming, except that earthquakes seldom happen in Britain. Dust and grit sifted down from the stones over his head, though, and that made him jump. The air shimmered around him as the rumble grew louder. And the earth shook more seriously now.

A California boy also knows when it’s time to get out of the building. So he was on the other side of the circle, breathing hard, when the rumble became a sound like pounding hooves, like moor ponies teased by elf riders to a gallop, like the planet rifting open. And as he watched it, the space under the stone arch fell away with a hideous crack, and as the dust settled a ramp could be clearly seen sloping down into the hill.

Out of somewhere impossible, a stocky grey Dartmoor pony hauled itself up into the clear air and shook its mane, looking fat and well fed. Behind him came a pair of spotted ponies, white and black, and a bay with black mane and tail, nudging a bright-eyed foal. Six or seven more, the last two bearing riders with limbs so long and slender and with faces so wild there could be no mistaking them for human.

Ben stared and shook himself, knuckled his eyes to be sure of what he saw. The ponies cantered past him and came to a rest just outside the stone circle, as if it were the most ordinary thing in the world. In moments they were all calmly grazing and frisking amongst themselves, snorting their pleasure at being again under the familiar sky.

The two almond-eyed riders leapt to the ground, graceful as Minoan bull dancers, and with a few melodic words and a friendly smack or two encouraged the ponies to wander towards home. That done, their pointed faces alight with humor, they each threw Ben a mocking salute and strolled fading into the long twilight over the brow of the hill. 

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Feasts: Christmas and Easter feasting and the medieval peasant

By Lindsay Townsend

Feasting for a noble or a king in the medieval period could be a splendid, lengthy, expensive affair, where dishes were produced and shown to display wealth and power. What about feasts for the bulk of the population who lived on the land?

In an age without freezers and only limited storage methods – smoking, salting, drying, preserving, keeping – all foodstuffs had to be produced in time to the rhythms of the farming year. In the Middle Ages, that meant the Christian calendar. Feasts were allied to the high points of harvests, saints’ days, Christ’s life, the change of the seasons and the winter and summer solstices.

Christmas especially, covering the darkest time of the year and preceded by the fast of Advent, was celebrated for almost two weeks by all classes. No work was done in that ‘quiet’ season of the farming year and people celebrated by dancing, singing, story-telling, drinking and eating.

In the countryside, some lucky peasants might be fed within their lords’ manor houses over Christmas as part of the Christian tradition of charity and share in rich dishes and strong beers. Other peasants would feast at home. Meat, as a luxury, would certainly be enjoyed, usually in the form of bacon, salted beef or mutton. Such cuts would be made into stews or slow roasted. Pepper was used as a spice by all classes and at Christmas carefully hoarded spices such as ginger, some dried herbs from the kitchen garden and perhaps even exotic fruits such as dried raisins might be added to the stews to add different flavours. We know that peasants had access to exotic spices and dried fruits because the Sumptuary Laws forbade indulgence in both rich clothes and expensive foods by the ‘lower’ classes.

Fine wheat bread, if peasants could produce it (by grinding the flour in secret away from their lords’ mill) would be a treat. River fish or eels would make a change from the usual salted dried cod of winter-time. Waterfowl, chickens, and – once they had escaped and bred from their specially constructed warrens – rabbits, could be caught, roasted or turned into stews and pies.

Hard cheese, which would keep through the winter, might have been part of a peasant’s Christmas feasting and certainly there would have been pottages, vegetable one pot stews made from the cut and come again greens and root vegetables (not potatoes yet) from the kitchen garden.

As well as food treats, peasant households would decorate their homes for their Christmas feasts. Holly, ivy and mistletoe were cut and brought indoors to make the Christmas Bush that hung from the rafters. And after Christmas there was the festival of wassailing in cider apple districts. People would gather in the orchards and light fires under the trees, dance round them and drink to them.

The lengthening days of early spring were often times of sparse commons for everyone as winter stores were eaten and the new crops and growth were still not ready. The hard fasting of Lent, and before that the feast of Shrovetide when all the dairy food ‘luxuries’ not allowed during the fasting time were used up, gave way at last to Easter.

Richer peasants might feast on lamb or suckling pig, served with the first spring greens. Eggs featured heavily since they symbolised the stone rolled away from the tomb of Christ. Pace or paschal eggs, coloured with onion skins and wine, were part of the Easter feast, which, like Christmas, could last over several days.

(Pictures from Wikimedia Commons.)

Lindsay
http://www.lindsaytownsend.net
http://www.twitter.com/lindsayromantic

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Guest Blog: Celia Hayes

This week, we’re welcoming historical fiction author Celia Hayes, who writes novels of the Old West. Her novel, Daughter of Texas, is the first of her series on the drama of a woman's life in Texas. Celia is be here to talk about the novel and offer a copy to a lucky winner. Leave a comment with your email address for a chance to win. Here's the blurb:

Before the cattle drives … Before the Alamo …Before the legends were born. She was there, and she saw it all. On the day that she was twelve years old, Margaret Becker came to Texas with her parents and her younger brothers. The witch-woman looked at her hands, and foretold her future; two husbands, a large house, many friends, joy, sorrow and love.

The witch woman would not say what she saw for Margaret's younger brothers, Rudi and Carl – for Texas was a Mexican colony. Before the Becker children were full-grown, the war for Texas independence would come upon them all and show no mercy.

During her life, she would observe and participate in great events. She would meet and pass her own judgment on great men and lesser men as well; a loyal friend, able political hostess . . .  and at the end, a survivor and witness. But in all of her life, there would be only one man who would ever hold – and break – her heart!

**Q&A with Celia Hayes**

You have had something of an interesting background, before becoming a scribbler of historical fiction: Tell us about that.

I served in the US Air Force from 1977 to 1997, as a radio/television broadcast specialist – mostly overseas, in places like Japan, Korea, Greece, Spain and Greenland. That’s where there generally was no English-language television and radio programming, until cable stations like the Star Channel began international service. So, I wound up doing all sorts of interesting and amazing things – I was the midnight rock and roll DJ at our station in Greece, for example, and the TV newscaster for the 6 PM news broadcast in Japan. I got lost in every major city between Portugal and the then-Iron curtain, and I knew how to say ‘excuse me’ and ‘I’ll have a pound of that’ in about eight languages. I drove across Europe alone with a small child; we took six weeks at it, and my poor daughter got dragged through every museum and historical site we came across. We went camping all over Spain, and when I was in Korea I had an outside job copy-editing and voicing English-language educational videos. The experience of military service came in handy in several ways - first, in meeting and working alongside of a great variety of people, from very different backgrounds than mine. Secondly – in letting me travel all over the world, and to see and experience a larger world, and finally for honing my ability to tell stories, in practically any format, from a thirty-second radio spot to a 500 page novel.

Can you explain why you are attracted to the American frontier, and the 19^th century in particular?

I’d always been drawn to the history of the frontier and the western pioneers; I read Little House on the Prairie at an impressionable age, and I also loved the stories of the wagon-train pioneers as I was growing up. I had mapped out a novel about the Stephens-Townsend party decades before I ever sat down to write it. And I had so much fun, that I thought I would go ahead and write another!  I decided that it had to be set on the frontier, since I already had so many of the necessary reference books and I was comfortable writing that time frame … but it would have to be an unknown story, something that not many people knew about. Where’s the fun in writing yet another story about the Tudors, or the Donner Party? Better to write about a terrifically interesting but relatively unknown story.  I realized that I lived just down the road from the scene of a fantastic unknown story; the thousands of German settlers who were brought to Texas in the late 1840s and essentially dumped on the far frontier to fend for themselves. It was going to be just one book, but grew to three, since I found out so much stuff about them, in doing research.

Then I got interested in that part of early Texas history that didn’t have much to do with the Alamo, which lead to the most recent work; a closer look at the life of a minor character in the Trilogy – a woman who was there in Texas from the start, experienced the Texian revolt against the Mexican dictator Lopez de Santa Anna, and the very complicated years of the independent Republic of Texas … all much more complicated and dramatic than most people know. Texas is kind of a concentrate of the frontier; there was enough drama there to go on for most of the century. The historian TH Fehrenbach wrote that Texas was at war for fifty years: war with the Comanche, with Mexico, the Comanche again, with the Union, and finally the Comanche one last time … and in between that, Texans feuded with each other. If they had kilts and broadswords instead of chaps and Colt revolvers, it would be Scotland! Texas was an independent country for ten years, and recognized by the great European powers; the last battle of the Civil War was in Texas, the Butterfield stage line ran through it, the great cattle drives began there, and humongous hurricanes wiped out a major port city – three times! The possibilities for a ripping good yarn are practically limitless!

As to why I am particularly attracted to the 19^th century? That period was absolutely key in developing what we think of as our national character, for better or worse, and because so much changed for us during the course of it. Consider that in 1801, the United States was a relatively poor, struggling little nation, just barely filling up the area between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachians. The way that everyone lived looked back more to the previous century, people lived by candle-light, they never went farther from where they lived – and they mostly lived on small farms – than the nearest town. Goods and people traveled on horse-drawn wagons, or on ships powered by wind. And by 1899 – good heavens! The United States went from sea to sea! There were electric lights, and factories making everything that once had been made by hand; you could travel by the railway or steamship, send a telegraph or use a telephone. And it was possible for someone to seen all of this during their lifetime! The 19^th century and the western frontier made us; and I find it irresistible to write about.

How much of your own background and experiences are expressed in your books?

One of the experiences that I put into my books, especially the Trilogy, came from a moment when my daughter and I returned from Europe, after I had been stationed there without a break for nearly twelve years. We were driving up the I-15 through the Great Basin, and we came over a low pass and looked out at a long, long valley … and there was nothing man-made in sight, but for the highway itself, and the electrical towers running along side. No ancient ruins and walls, no watchtowers or castles on the tallest height, no ruined village or stone sheepfolds … nothing. We had just past a little town with a sign warning us – that was the last gas station for fifty miles. I had driven all over Europe, and I don’t think we were ever more than five miles from a gas station, and I remember thinking that some of my British and European friends would just completely freak about that. And that the European settlers who came to the US, and found themselves in the Great Basin, or the Platte River Valley, or the Llano Estacado must have been very discombobulated by the emptiness of it all.

Now and again, I have been kind of amused by the irony that I have written very movingly about happy and loving marriages, but was never married, myself. Kind of like Jane Austin, I guess – never married and apparently never seriously courted, but wrote so charmingly and endearingly about it all. I also have had a very strong relationship with my father, and with my brothers, so some of that comes through in my books; father-son, father-daughter, and brother-sister relationships are a very strong element. And I write about strong women, who still have to deal with having responsibility thrown onto them, who sometimes don’t feel quite up to the challenge of it, who do have doubts about themselves, feel their own limitations, or feel a little resentful because they are not conventionally pretty, or perhaps don’t conform to the expectations that they think others have of them.

Are there any authors who inspire you in your writing?

I always loved Rosemary Sutcliffe for Rider on a White Horse and Sword at Sunset – she wrote so beautifully about two very different historical periods, the English Civil War and Arthurian Britan. Then Mary Stewart for The Moonspinners and My Brother Michael.  She wrote so beautifully about Greece! I wound up taking an assignment there, just because I loved the way she described the places and people.  As for American historicals;  A.B. Guthrie for The Way West; Robert Lewis Taylor for The Travels of Jamie McPheeters and Two Roads to Guadalupe – for rollicking adventure on the frontier. Without realizing it at the time, I used his method of using a couple of narrators or creating contemporary letters and diaries to further the story. Finally, George Macdonald Fraser – for the Flashman series.  Ripping good yarns, good fun and accurate down to the sub-atomic level

What type of writer are you? Do you plan ahead/plot or do you simply fly by the seat of your pants?

I am a very organized one: I have a rough chapter outline and a fairly good idea of what is supposed to happen within the chapter. In that framework of course, all sorts of wondrously strange and creative things do happen. Whole conversations and characters do appear out of the blue, and some of the more strong-minded personalities try and take over. I do lots of reading and research first, almost always with contemporary accounts of what I am writing about. I make notes of incidents and accidents that I keep circling back to and try and incorporate a story that will take them in. Since last five books and the current work in progress are turning into a generational saga covering about 70 years, I have assembled this huge spread-sheet, tracking several interlinked families and their romances, marriages and other adventures, four wars, half a dozen cities and small towns and well as national and international events. 

What book projects are you working on now?

The most immediate is a German translation of the first volume of the Trilogy: It should come out around the end of the year, in e-book and print editions. The whole Wild West thing is very popular in Germany, and I would so love to clean up from all those Karl May fans out there. The second book project is a kind of follow-on to the Trilogy, again featuring some minor characters that appeared in it. It’s about an English lady who marries a Texas cattleman in 1876. She is desperate to escape an unhappy situation, and he feels sorry for her; it’s a kind of Mrs. Gaskell meets Zane Grey – I hope! I’ve only just started researching and outlining the book after that; a picaresque adventure in Gold Rush-era California. I’ve always wanted to write a Gold Rush adventure; like Texas at about that same time, there was a lot going on!

Thank you, Celia, and best of luck with Daughter of Texas!

Daughter of Texas is available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Visit Celia's blog, Facebook and Goodreads page.

Excerpt Thursday: DAUGHTER OF TEXAS by Celia Hayes

This week, we’re welcoming historical fiction author Celia Hayes, who writes novels of the Old West. Her novel, Daughter of Texas, is the first of her series on the drama of a woman's life in Texas. Join us Sunday, when Celia will be here to talk about the novel and offer a copy to a lucky winner. Here's the blurb:

Before the cattle drives … Before the Alamo …Before the legends were born. She was there, and she saw it all. On the day that she was twelve years old, Margaret Becker came to Texas with her parents and her younger brothers. The witch-woman looked at her hands, and foretold her future; two husbands, a large house, many friends, joy, sorrow and love.

The witch woman would not say what she saw for Margaret's younger brothers, Rudi and Carl – for Texas was a Mexican colony. Before the Becker children were full-grown, the war for Texas independence would come upon them all and show no mercy.

During her life, she would observe and participate in great events. She would meet and pass her own judgment on great men and lesser men as well; a loyal friend, able political hostess . . .  and at the end, a survivor and witness. But in all of her life, there would be only one man who would ever hold – and break – her heart! 

**An Excerpt from Daughter of Texas**

Chapter 15 – A Muddy Field Near Harrisburg

“Ma! Miz Vining!” Davy called. “It’s the Army! They’re coming, just along the road there. General Sam and all! The Army is coming!”

“Oh, my God – a prayer answered,” Margaret breathed, but Maggie’s expression remained bleak. Others of the families encamped in that muddy meadow began to gather as they heard the sounds of marching feet and men’s voices raised in the notes of a ribald song, borne on the morning air.

There was a party of mounted men, first – with General Houston among them, on a brave white horse. His face was set with determination, and he looked neither right nor left. The men following were at first hidden by trees around the turn in the road, but the sound of their voices and brisk but uneven marching filled the morning. The song – which truly was rather rude – died abruptly away as the first marchers saw the women and children watching by the roadside. A slight rustle of consternation rippled through the ranks. Margaret searched for her husband among the horsemen, looked for the elegant black shape of Bucephalus, but did not see either of them.

“There are so many more!” Maggie exclaimed, standing beside her. Roused by the noise of the marching men, and by Davy’s calls, other refugees were joining them at the side of the road, women looking frantically at each face among the marching ranks, searching for a dear face, familiar garments among the motley throng, or holding up their smaller children. There wasn’t a uniform among them that Margaret could see, other than a small cluster of men in grey and others in blue coats – coats with darker patches upon them where shapes picked out in gold braid had been torn off. Most wore plain coats, or round jackets; the men whom she recognized mostly had fringed hunting coats. Every man bore a rifle or a musket, on a sling over their shoulders, though – and all at very nearly the same angle. The general’s drillmasters must have been at it night and day, for weeks.

“Dragon’s teeth,” Margaret said, teased by a faint memory of a tale that Opa Heinrich had told her once, long ago. Maggie looked at her in surprise. “Dragon’s teeth. When the dragon’s teeth were sown, as we sow corn – the teeth become fully armed fighters, springing up from the furrows. Such were sown, all across our lands, and now here they are!”

The children were cheering, crying excitedly when they saw a familiar face, the face of brothers, uncles and fathers; Mrs. Burnett, with her gray hair straggling down her shoulders, came running from her wagon, hastily rolling it into a bun as she ran.

“William!” she called, “William Burnett – where are you!”

“I’m here, Liddy!” an older man called to her from middle of the ranks of marching men, men who were so much younger it wrung Margaret’s heart. “Stay with the girls, Liddy!”  Mrs. Barnett darted into the crush and threw her arms around him, snatching a kiss and a brief embrace, before his company marched on.  Many faces were familiar to Margaret – neighbors and friends of her husbands’, faces which she recognized from last fall when the militia volunteers had come to Gonzales in defense of their little cannon – men from Mina, from Bexar, from Beeson’s Crossing, the two soldier-volunteers who had brought them meat and firewood on that first day of this long march east, the flaming red hair and pale freckled face of Harry Karnes, but they were a mere scattering among the larger number of strangers. One by one, with their limbers following, came the two cannon that Margaret had seen in the camp at Groce’s Crossing, drawn each by several teams of horses straining at their harnesses to draw the heavy gun-carriages through the mud and ruts of the Harrisburg Road.

“Where have they all come from?” Pru marveled, holding up Sarah’s baby, “Darlin’ little girl, now you can say you saw the Army of Texas on the march!”

“Where are you going?” Margaret called to them, hardly expecting an answer, but several passing close by answered in chorus, amid jovial laughter.

“To fight Santy-Anna, ma-am! Word is that he has gone up the river looking for us!” “We ain’t but a days march away from him, ma’am!” “Oh, but we aim to surprise him, for sure!” “Aim is right, ma’am, aim is right!”

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Davy Darst shrugging into his jacket, running at a purposeful jog, his musket and haversack and a rolled blanket slung over his shoulders.

Maggie saw him too, and cried, “David Darst – where do you think you’re going?”

“With the Army, Ma!” he answered, hastily embracing her. “’Bye, Ma!”

“You come right back here, David Darst!” Maggie shouted after him, but he had already run into the mass of men and boys, falling into a place in the march. He waved at them once, cheerfully. Then he was gone, lost in the ranks and leaving Maggie distraught and furious, and Margaret feeling as if she had seen this many times and would see it again. “Come with me,” Maggie commanded. “We must fetch him back, at once!”

“I think not,” Margaret answered slowly. “I believe he will be in a better and safer place with his fellows than he will be with us. If the Mexican Army comes upon us, with our tents and wagons, and Mama and Sarah’s babe – then all they will find will be women and little children. He is a boy of near to fighting age. With that musket – they will assuredly execute him as a rebel.”

“But you heard what they said – they are going to turn and fight now!” Maggie was still distraught. Margaret looked after the last of the Army, a handful of horsemen ranging this way and that. None of them were Race, and she sighed a little in disappointment.

“So they are,” she answered, with an assurance that she did not in truth feel. “But I have a better feeling in trusting General Houston with the lives of our own. He will not fail us, Maggie – or our men. I am confident of it.”

Daughter of Texas is available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

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Feasts: Medieval Feasting in the 21st Century

By Sandy Frykholm

With most of the people I talk with about things medieval, any glimmer of interest they have is satisfied by a sentence or two of describing research I’ve done, books I’ve enjoyed, or places and people I find intriguing. If I go on, more often than not their eyes begin to glaze, they feel a sudden need for something from the kitchen, or spot another person they meant to talk with. Papal politics of the late 13^th century seems to leave them cold.

I shared my excitement with some friends after attending the International Congress on Medieval Studies in Kalamazoo, Michigan as a treat for my fiftieth birthday. One friend stared, incredulous, as I described the delights of the world’s largest gathering of medieval historians. “When I turned fifty,” she said, “I went to Disneyland.”

Same thing, really. To me.

Count Thomas the Heartless Bastard and
Lady Winnifred the Longsuffering,
with Brother Vern and the hostess,
Lady Alessandra of Frykhaven

However, one effort to share my medieval mania was a smashing success: a Michaelmas feast. Using a fancy font like Old English Text, I sent this invitation: “Lord Vern and Lady Alessandra of Frykhaven request your company for a celebration to mark Michaelmas, the feast day of St. Michael the Archangel.” Following the details of date, time, and location, I included this note: “Medieval garb is encouraged, but not required.”

Perhaps you should know that I don’t take readily to playing dress up myself. My husband is the actor—in fact he is on stage tonight in the leading role of a play about Vince Lombardi, the legendary football coach. But I was determined to be as medieval as I reasonably could, and began sewing a bodice as the basis of a costume I planned to wear. Then I found some maroon Naugahyde and made a hat, and ordered a costume Vern chose: a Franciscan monk’s robe.

The menu was developed mainly from sources on the internet, and was provided to the guests.

* First Remove  *

Bread, butter, blackberry jam

Cheese selection

Figs and dates

*  Second Remove  *

Roast Chicken with Cameline Sauce

Wortes in Marrow Boats

Gingerbread and walnuts

*  Third Remove  *

Pork loin with Blackberry Sauce

Frumenty

Brie Tarts

Pickled onions

Sotelte

*  Fourth Remove  *

Blackberry-Apple Crumble

Blackberry Pie

Apple Rice Pudding

St. Michael slaying the dragon;
Source - Wiki Commons

The emphasis on blackberries in the menu allowed me to explain the legend—the medieval truth—that when Michael the Archangel cast Satan from heaven, he landed on earth in a blackberry bramble, and cursed the berries. It became the rule of thumb that blackberries must be picked prior to Michaelmas, September 29.

The menu called for some additional explanations of medieval food. What is frumenty, anyway? It’s a cracked wheat dish, something like bulgur, though I omitted the porpoise one recipe called for. Cameline sauce? A spicy wine sauce thickened with bread crumbs. Wortes are green leafy vegetables, and I served them in giant zucchini (marrow) boats.

The costumed revelers enjoyed the feast
perhaps a bit more than the others!

I had the most fun making the sotelty, or “subtlety”, a sculpture made from edible ingredients, not necessarily intended to be eaten, but meant to delight the guests with a visual treat. I made a castle of sugar cubes, topping the towers with bright striped candles.

Perhaps you are wishing—I certainly am!—that I had taken photos of the food, but sadly I did not. I was distracted by the demands of serving a four course meal to 35 guests. But neither the guest list nor the menu need to be so elaborate, to create a fun evening when your medieval enthusiasms can have free reign. And there are plenty of feast days throughout the year to play with.

I also prepared a quiz of ten questions about Michaelmas.

1.       Michaelmas has been celebrated since:

a.      Daniel prophesied about Michael (Daniel Chapter 10).

b.      he appeared to an Italian bishop in 492 on Mount Gargano.

c.       the French chivalric “Order of St. Michael” was founded in 1469.

d.      Michaelmas daisies were discovered in Africa.

2.      The traditional meat for Michaelmas is:

a.  rabbit stew             b.  wild boar    c. goose     d.  venison

3.      Michaelmas was one of the medieval “quarter days” of the year when:

a.      rents were collected

b.      debts were paid

c.       fairs were held

d.      all of the above

4.      The angel Michael is known for:

a.      leading the worship of God in heaven.

b.      announcing Mary’s pregnancy to her.

c.       wrestling with Jacob.

d.      casting Satan out of Heaven.

5.      Michaelmas marked:

a.      the end of fishing season.

b.      the completion of the annual harvest.

c.       the beginning of winter curfew.

d.      the time to hire new servants and laborers.

6.      True or False?  Michael is recognized in Christian, Jewish, Islamic, and New Age religions.

7.      True or False?  The name Michael means “Who is like God?”

8.     True or False?   Michael is commonly depicted is artwork with a raised sword, holding Satan to the ground with his foot on Satan’s neck.

9.   True or False?   “Harvest Moon” is the full moon nearest to Michaelmas.

10.  True or False?   Michael is the patron saint of England, grocers, paratroopers, the German people, soldiers, the city of Brussels, Papua New Guinea, and the Archdiocese of Seattle, Washington.

The kitchen staff, Vassal Braden von Dungeness
and Sir Soren of Queen Anne,
provided vital help with serving the meal.

As our guests arrived, we were delighted to see how many had made some concession to costume, and for those who hadn’t, we provided hats for a medieval photo op anyway. I loved having the opportunity to immerse my friends in the medieval history I enjoy so much, and to have the extra reward of their enjoyment too!

(Answers to the quiz: 1-b, 2-c, 3-d, 4-d, 5-b, 6-T, 7-T, 8-T, 9-T (but keyed to equinox, not the feast), 10-F (but yes to grocers, paratroopers, Brussels, and Papua New Guinea)

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