What is a historical novel? Why do we write them? What makes them special? These are questions I wrestle with often and Patricia Stoltey gave me a chance to explore some answers in Historical or ?. Check it out. I’ll be joining you in the comments over there later today.

Patricia is the author of The Prairie Grass Murders and The Desert Hedge Murders, two mysteries starring Sylvia Thorn, a retired FBI agent and judge who finds herself drawn into some surprising sleuthing.

– Margaret

Today I’m driving back from Kalamazoo, MI, where I’ve been attending the 46th International Congress on Medieval Studies at Western Michigan University, so my first “real” appearance will be tomorrow.

It’s release day! Once you’re done reading Winter Heart, stop on by my Facebook fan page and let me know what you think!

And if you’ve got a moment to spare, please help me spread the word about both Winter Heart and the Winter Heart Blog Tour. Let your friends know. And if you’re on Facebook, pop on over to my fan page and click the like button on the blog tour announcement.

– Margaret

Winter Heart, a novella starring Domina Frevisse, has been released for both the Kindle and the Nook! This is the first new story featuring Frevisse since The Apostate’s Tale in 2008 and to celebrate I’m going on a blog tour: Over the next two weeks, I’ll be making “appearances” on blogs all across the web with interviews, essays, and other fun stuff. My appearances will all be linked here from my home page, so if you subscribe to my feed, or follow me on Facebook, you’ll be able to keep track of me during the tour as it happens.

FOR THEY THAT WORK WICKEDNESS... One man has been kidnapped. Another has been murdered. In the bleakest depths of winter, Frevisse finds her soul chilled with the heavy burdens of duty and responsibility. Even the warmth of charity is in short supply as the villagers of Prior Byfield turn against each in bloody feuds of greed and rage, weaving knots of treachery which even the clever Frevisse may find hard to unwind. Award-winning author Margaret Frazer gathers shadows around the hearth to tell a tale of frigid winter and icy passion. Join Frevisse in her fervent prayers for a true peace of mind and body as she pits all her forceful will against the most cunning of evils. Fear for the lives which may be destroyed in unlocking the secrets of the winter heart... Kindle Edition / Nook Edition

THIS IS THE END…

My Winter Heart Blog Tour is coming to its end, and I can’t believe how much fun I’ve had.  As an author, I cheerfully spend most of my time alone, immersed in my work.  Over the years, signings and suchlike have drawn me out only occasionally.  So this venture into the cyber-world has been an adventure.  Thank you, one and all, for sharing it with me.

PREVIOUS APPEARANCES…

May 16th: Patricia Stoltey’s Blog – Historical Novel or ?
May 17th: The Alexandrian – Interview
May 18th: Blog Tour Special – Strange Gods, Strange Men
May 19th: Poe’s Deadly Daughters – Interview
May 20th: Let Them Read Books – Winter Heart Origins
May 22nd: The LadyKillers – Crafting the Historical Mystery (Interview)
May 23rd: Release Notes – Falling Into Medieval England
May 25th: Getting Medieval – The Joys of Research
May 28th: Historical Tapestry – Why I Love Life in a Medieval Nunnery
May 29th: Tiffany’s Bookshelf – A Full Review of Winter Heart
May 30th: A Fond Farewell

OTHER TALES OF DAME FREVISSE

If you’re new to the Dame Frevisse series, you can learn more about the series over here. In addition to Winter Heart and the novels, she has also appeared in three short stories: “The Witch’s Tale“, “The Midwife’s Tale“, and “The Stone-Worker’s Tale” (all of which are now available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, the iBookstore, and other fashionable online purveyors of the written word).

“Dame Frevisse, the pious and perspective nun gives focus to this sober series… [Frazer] shows a meticulous detail that speaks of trustworthy scholarship and a sympathetic imagination.” – New York Times Book Review

“Once you begin to read this series, you will want to follow your new friends to the end of their personal story.” – Cross Point Book Reviews

“Exquisitely written… A superbly researched medieval mystery series!” – Publisher’s Weekly

“Everything about it bespeaks quality and care… Frazer draws us into a medieval village in England with a story of lust, greed, and murder.” – St. Paul Pioneer Press

“Sister Frevisse is a stalwart, appealing sleuth.” – Mostly Murder

“Truly shocking scenes and psychological twists.” – Mystery Loves Company

“Frazer uses her extensive knowledge of the period to create an unusual plot … appealing characters and crisp writing.” – Los Angeles Times

Twice nominated for the Minnesota Book Award.
Twice nominated for the Edgar Award.
A Romantic Times Top Pick.

Those of you with iPads might be interested to know that The Outlaw’s Tale and The Boy’s Tale are now available through Apple’s iBookstore. The Bishop’s Tale will be following them shortly, as soon as it clears Apple’s digital publishing process.

Unfortunately, I haven’t figured out how to actually link to specific titles on the iBookstore. But if you do a search, they should pop right up.

In addition, all of my Kindle e-books (short stories and novels alike) are now available at Amazon.de (the German site for Amazon). This doesn’t mean they’ve been translated; they’re just available for sale. (Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like any of the actual German translations are available as e-books. Although they are still available in print.)

– Margaret

“The Stone-Worker’s Tale” has been released for the Kindle and Nook. It can also be read on any iPad, Android, Windows PC, Mac, or Blackberry device using the free Kindle Reading Apps for those platforms.

A LOVE TO DIE FOR…

When Frevisse is given bishop-pardoned leave to visit her cousin Alice at Ewelme, she is enchanted by the work of the sculptor Simon Maye. Charged with carving the angels upon Alice’s tomb, Simon has been truly touched by God’s gift – there was an otherworldiness to their stone features, an aliveness to the very feathers of their wings. He saw beauty that others could not, and brought it to life through his craft.

But Simon also saw the beauty of Elyn, one of Alice’s ladies in waiting. Clandestine meetings have given way to sinful lust, and now the two lovers have disappeared. The servants whisper that the lovers have eloped, and secretly pine for the passion to do the same. Lady Alice believes her sculptor has been stolen away by jealous rivals and rages at the injustice. But Frevisse alone suspects there may be some darker truth behind the midnight vanishing…

Kindle Edition – Nook Edition

As a special feature, this e-book also contains a Lost Tale of Dame Frevise… sort of.

By the late 1990’s several of my Dame Frevisse novels had been translated into German. As a result, I was asked to write a short mystery story for a German-language Swiss magazine. And when I say “short”, I mean short: It could only be 800 words long. The magazine, sold mainly in railway stations, was publishing stories of this length with the idea they would be short enough for readers to complete during a commuter train ride.

To help me understand what they were looking for, my agent kindly sent me a sample story provided by the magazine. Being in German, this was not as helpful as it might have been: I don’t read German. A teacher of German at my son’s school kindly looked it over and gave me the gist of it, which did help insofar as it confirmed that, yes, it was a short murder mystery. I gave him a copy of one of my books in a German edition in return for his help and buckled down to the unusual challenge.

Fortunately, I didn’t have to actually write it in German. (It would be translated by the magazine publishers.) The tricky part (besides the fact that I tend to be verbose) was less the story itself (although that had to be tricksy, too) but the fact that in a history mystery a sense of a different time and place have to be established along with everything else. Creating time and place take up a lot of words, and then there has to be some presentation of characters and a mystery and a solution, altogether making for a rather intricate challenge.

But when it was done and shipped off to Switzerland, the story continued dancing in my mind. It felt too short in some ways. The first rush of notes I had made for it had far more in the way of characters and relationships than were possible to use in the given word-count, and even after the necessary ruthless cutting the itch to further explore those characters and relationships stayed with me. A few years later, when Mike Ashley asked me for a story for one of his anthologies, I took the chance to expand the tale to its full and proper length. Hence “The Stone-Worker’s Tale”.

“The Sculptor’s Tale”, on the other hand, has remained unpublished in its original form since it first appeared in that Swiss magazine. And the English version has never been publicly available until today!

– Margaret