Author: tessb

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tessb

art-of-swords:

European Small Sword

  • Dated: 1750 – 1820
  • Creator: Rundell Bridge & Rundell (jeweller)
  • Medium: steel, gold, diamonds
  • Provenance: purchased by George IV c.1820 “..placed in the Windsor Armoury by command of His Majesty King Edward VII in August, 1901”. According to Laking it had formerly been kept among the Coronation Regalia of George IV, having been worn by him.”

The hilt of the sword is of cast and chased gold. The pommel is in the form of a barred helmet surmounted by a recumbent lion. The grip and guards are studded with numerous diamonds set in the form of bands of foliage. These elements are probably by a German goldsmith, circa 1750.

After the sword had been acquired by George IV around 1820 it was embellished with additional diamonds by the royal goldsmiths Rundell, Bridge and Rundell. The scabbard with two large brilliant stones was also supplied by Rundells.

Source: Copyright 2014 © Royal Collection Trust/Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II

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tessb

Trying to describe the current scene I’m working on for She Whom I Love, to someone who hasn’t read the rest of the manuscript.

“Remember that scene in Sense and Sensibility where Edward comes to visit Elinor Dashwood, but Lucy Steele’s already there?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Like that, but Lucy’s not an idiot, and the girls are gay for each other.”

She Whom I Love – writing F/F/M fiction

tessb

I’m slowly puttering my way through a first draft for what will hopefully be book 2 in Treading the Boards (look at me, not jinxing things!), and I ended up wandering around some sites on the romance blogosphere reading bits and pieces about queer romances and what works. The general understanding seems to be that F/F doesn’t sell, because the primary readers of romance are women (91% was the stat I saw), the bulk of whom are by nature straight, and they prefer to have men in their smut as lust objects.

I’ve heard the other argument side as well, that women’s rejection of F/F fiction is because of internalized misogyny – that we’ve been programmed to think that a story or a romance isn’t real unless it centers on a man, that women’s genitals are somehow lesser, or that we still hang on to the Victorian conception that women aren’t sexual beings until and unless they’ve been awakened into their urges by the power of cock.

I love navigating the sticky waters of expectations when it comes to romances and menages, so She Whom I Love was always going to be a poly bi triad, but I’m curious about what you think.  Do you read F/F, in fic or in original fiction? If you’re a straight woman, what intrigues you about it? Can you empathize with the characters enough to enjoy their eroticism, even if a scene doesn’t include your preferred objects of desire?

 

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tessb

medievalpoc:

babaloo55555:

infinitemachine:

thebrayton:

medievalpoc:

via Saladin Ahmed

So tokenism is fine?

If that’s as high as your imagination will allow you to set the bar, I suppose it’ll have to do.

It’s fantasy, folks. The genre practically begs you to think bigger.

thebrayton why not just say “I’m not capable of creating/can’t imagine a complex and realistic character of color.” Because that’s the only line of thought I can think of that would result in your response to these tweets.

“So tokenism is fine” like, are you for real?

Even if you take the “fantasy” out of it and just go with biopics and historical fiction…

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These stories are worth telling.

So why should our historical and/or medieval-inspired fantasy worlds be more limited and less diverse than history?

She Whom I Love: Progress Report

tessb

It goes and it goes. 

Word Count: 20,323 / ~98,000? I’m getting verbose and some of that will have to get cut down or moved around. 

Listening to: snoring cats and falling rain

Reading: The Theatre of Shelley, by Jacqueline Mulhallen

Reason for Stopping: Chapter break, moving to some fic writing for a brain break. 

Things Researched: Annual salaries for Georgian staymakers, seating arrangements in small theaters, popular perfume scents in 1811.

Mean Things: Nothing major… yet 

Favorite Bit:

“Let us say,” James began, “that a friend of mine-“ Sheridan snorted with laughter, and James stopped talking. Sheridan waved him off with a swing of his hand.

“No, no, pray, continue.”

“A friend of mine is caught in a bind,” James said pointedly, but the men shared a grin. “Between a fine, lovely woman fit to be a good helpmeet and wife, and a glorious angel who haunts his dreams.”

Sheridan dropped his chin and chortled, shaking his head with the easy way of a man who has seen too much. “First things first, that friend of yours better hope that even one of ‘em will want him in the first place,” he advised. “Assuming he’s no fool.”

“Oh, he’s a fool, alright,” James said ruefully.

“So let him be foolish,” Sheridan said unexpectedly. “Marry the one and keep the other, in whatever manner he can afford.”