Monday 29 November 2021

“This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England.” – Richard III, Shakespeare

I've been getting a lot of questions lately about my writing process. Do I know my story when I begin to write? (Somewhat)  Are the characters based on real people? (Sometimes) How do you know all that "stuff?" (Research)

Those are the easy answers. Of course, writing, like life, is far more complex and so much more interesting and fun than those one-word answers. So, I thought I'd share a few insights to my approach to historical romance over the next little while.

LOVE DENIED is set in rural England during the Regency era—1812 to be more precise. I love looking at old houses near and far, so it was no hardship to root around in books and the internet looking for inspiration for my setting. When I came across Willey Park in an old book, I knew instantly that I had found the perfect place to land my story.

It has the majestic structural opulence of the new architecture of the times married with the sweeping grandeur of old-world bucolic land holdings. The story is founded on old-world values clashing with new-world ideals, so this combination was exactly what I needed.

Now, I write fiction, so of course I could not use Willey Park, but its inspiration breathed life into my own world. My characters roam Woodfield Park, an imposing manse and property that was built long before Willey Park, which only began construction in 1813. However, Woodfield Park does include an addition that happens to be designed and built by the same master architect who built Willey Park, the talented Lewis Wyatt. In my far-too-fertile imagination, I like to think that Wyatt practiced the Neo-classical style on Woodfield Park before moving on to Shropshire to build Willey Park.





Check out Modern-Day Willey Park


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