Elizabeth Kerri Mahon

Scandalous Women is pleased to welcome historical romance author Cara Elliott to the blog, talking about Lord Byron's daughter Ada, Countess of Lovelace. Cara is the author of the fabulous book To Sin with a Scoundrel from Grand Central Publishing which came out this month. There is something about women who dare to be different that has always appealed to me, even as a child. Maybe it’s because I tended to be a tomboy and was often scolded to “act more like a normal young lady!” when I wanted to do things like catch frogs and throw a football rather than play with dolls. (To her credit, my mother was not one of those voices. She always encouraged my enthusiasms—whether they involved cutting out cardboard swords and crowns, or making bow and arrows—for which I am profoundly grateful.) In any case, I never understood why being a girl should limit what I could do . . . so I guess it’s no surprise that I tend to write offbeat heroines in my historical romances—women who dare to def

The winner of Invitation to a Dance is Alyce and the winner of Creation of Eve is Terri Ladies, I will be emailing you for your addresses shortly.

Scandalous Women is pleased to welcome guest blogger Lynn Cullen, author of the new book Creation of Eve.  I recently asked Lynne:  After you discovered Sofi, what was the hardest aspect of her to bring to life and write about? And how limited were the resources regarding Sofi? Good questions! There is very little printed information about Sofonisba Anguissola. She has an entry in Giorgio Vasari’s THE LIVES OF THE ARTISTS dating from the 1500’s, and there are two good art books about her from the 20th century, but even those are out of print. I got my hands on those books and started reading about her life. Yet it was not words but Sofi’s own paintings that brought her to life for me. I read that her father encouraged her career and promoted her within the noble families in Cremona, and then when she caught on locally, he paved her way to paint in several ducal courts across Italy by writing letters and sending samples with the recommendations by Cremonese dignitaries. Only a fe

Happy Ides of March everyone! This month I'm giving away two books. The first one is Lynn Cullen's The Creation of Eve which I reviewed at the beginning of the month. The second book is An Invitation to Dance by Irish author Marion Urch, a novel about Lola Montez, who I have written about when I first started the blog. Here is a sneak peek at An Invitation to Dance from the inside cover: Set against the turbulent beginnings of the 19th century, An Invitation to Dance is an epic novel that sweeps from the margins of the Empire - Ireland and India - to its very heart, within the upper echelons of society in London and Europe, moving later to encompass America and Australia. In beautifully written, almost hypnotic prose she ushers us backstage and behind the headlines, to a cruel and sensual world of high stakes and shattered dreams. As she danced her way across Europe she left a string of admirers and scandals in her wake.  In Saxony, she became a source of inspiration f

Scandalous Women is pleased to welcome Guest Blogger Jo Manning. Jo Manning is the author of two Regency romances, The Reluctant Guardian and Seducing Mr. Heywood (a Booklist Ten Best Romances of the Year selection), and The Sicilian Amulet, a contemporary romance. She was also the founder and director of the Reader's Digest General Books Library for over twenty years. Manning divides her time between London and Miami Beach. My Lady Scandalous is her first work of nonfiction. On the 20th of May I will be at the Dr Johnson House Museum in London giving a talk on three prominent 18th-century artists and their favorite models. This presentation is an outgrowth of the research I undertook on the London art scene when I was writing My Lady Scandalous, the biography of Grace Dalrymple Elliott, a famous courtesan (Simon & Schuster, 2005). I focused on three portraitists: Thomas Gainsborough, Sir Joshua Reynolds, and George Romney. There were points of congruence amongst all of t

Recently I was putting together an appendix for Scandalous Women of all the films and fiction adaptations that have been done, when I discovered that at least 4 new historical fiction novels are coming out within the next five months featuring Eleanor of Aquitaine as a major character. One of the first new books is called The Queen's Pawn by Christy English. This is Christy's first book and it looks like an interesting one. Here's a sneak peek: At only nine, Princess Alais of France is sent to live in England until she is of age to wed Prince Richard, son of King Henry II and Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine. Alais is an innocent pawn on the chessboard of dynastic marriage, her betrothal intended to broker an uneasy truce between the nations. Estranged from her husband, Eleanor sees a kindred spirit in this determined young girl. She embraces Alais as a daughter, teaching the princess what it takes to be a woman of power in a world of men. But as Alais grows to maturity and d

Title:  The Creation of Eve Author:  Lynn Cullen Publisher: Putnam, March 2010 From the back cover: The Creation of Eve is a novel based on the true but little known story of Sofonisba Anguissola, the first renowned female artist of the Renaissance. After a scandal in Michaelangelo's workshop, Sofi flees Italy and joins the Spanish court of King Felipe II to be a lady-in-waiting to his young bride. There she becomes embroiled in a love triangle involving the Queen, the King and the King's illegitimate half brother Don Juan.  The Creation of Eve combines art, romance, and history from the Golden Age in Spain in a story that asks the question: Can you ever truly know another person's heart? My thoughts: When I first heard about this book from Trish and Lydia at Penguin, I couldn't wait to read it and review it. It sounded like a book that was after my own heart. Set in Spain in the years 1560-1568, Lynn Cullen provides a view of the Spanish Court through the eyes of