Jacki has offered a free audiobook download of A Code of Love for readers; thank you to everyone who entered, the winner is Carol Cork!
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What's
Love Got to Do With It: Marriage with an Agenda
While some cultures still practice
arranged marriages, most contemporary societies believe the foundation for
marriage should be love. This is a fairly recent shift in perspective. For many
centuries, marriage was a strategic decision made for political alliances,
financial gain, expanding land holdings or advancing social status.
"What marriage had in common was
that it really was not about the relationship between the man and the
woman," said Stephanie Coontz, the author of Marriage, a History: How Love Conquered Marriage (Penguin Books,
2006) in the article History of Marriage: 13
Surprising Facts.
"It was a way of getting in-laws, of making alliances and expanding the
family labor force."
For historical authors who incorporate
suspense and intrigue into their plots, the "strategic marriage"
concept opens up the potential for all sorts of emotional conflict and plot twists.
My series, the Code Breakers, is set in Regency England, and I've had great fun
with this angle. During this time period, British and French aristocrats were
all connected by marriages and alliances, and the division of classes also
meant they socialized together. This makes a great area for creative license to
develop spies who are conflicted over family loyalties vs. country loyalties.
And it also makes for excellent double
agents which I did in A Code of Love,
Book 1 in the Code Breakers Series. In A
Christmas Code, the romance is derived from the familiarity within the
closed aristocratic society. Gwyneth is in love with her brother's best friend.
She has grown up with him and now is in constant contact in the small social
circle of the Ton. To prove her merit, maturity and strength to Ash, who is a
spy, Gwyneth becomes entangled in espionage, which pushes Ash’s internal
conflict as he struggles between duty and passion. In A Code of the Heart, Miss Amelia Bonnington assumes she will marry
her best friend’s older brother, the Earl of Kendal, the man she grew up with
and who brought solace after her mother died. That is until she accompanies
Gwyneth to a house Christmas Party and meets the Lord Derrick Brinsley, an
outcast in society. One of the conflicts standing between Amelia and Derrick is
the strict Ton standards for behavior and etiquette. Ultimately Derrick must
find a way to redeem himself in order to avoid having Amelia also shunned from
society.
What are your thoughts on how
historical authors use social norms as part of their story plots?
About the Author
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A Cantata of Love - Book 4 in The Code Breakers Series
Two
weeks earlier in Paris
Michael Harcourt, the Earl of Kendal,
attempted to stand with the arrival of his unexpected guests. He was quite
adroit at avoiding any pressure or pain from the gunshot wound in his arse by
this nimble maneuver. Using his arms to push himself off the settee, he planted
one leg at a time, twisting forward, preventing any backside contact.
Hurrying to greet the guests and to secure
his dressing gown from revealing any part of him, he twisted a bit too quickly
and fell backward on his wound. The sharp pain on impact was excruciating.
“Son
of a bitch.” He knocked over his brandy in the fall, spilling the liquid into
his boots. “Double son of a bitch.”
Denby, his valet, rushed to greet the two
nuns encased in black robes and white wimples, who stood at the entrance to the
drawing room. The older nun held a young boy’s hand; a round, jolly nun carried
a large portmanteau. Denby turned back at the commotion caused by the fall. He
signaled impatiently with his hand for Michael to get off the floor.
Without any help from his valet, he was
left to get off the floor. Hampered by his cumbersome, dressing gown, he
struggled on all fours to obtain an upright position.
The boy giggled behind his hand at
Michael’s gymnastics. The minx whispered to the older nun whose severe lines
softened when she leaned down to answer.
Her penetrating gaze at Michael left him feeling
fully exposed for every one of his transgressions.
Now upright, he pulled himself up and
walked forward with decorum of his rank, his hands holding his dressing gown
together. He glanced at Denby, whose face was red. Could a stalwart of the
cavalry be embarrassed by the censure of a nun?
“Sister Marie Therese and Sister Genevieve,
may I present Lord Michael Harcourt, the Earl of Kendal,” Denby said.
Michael bowed with the correct amount of
aristocratic poise for greeting the sisters, who had just witnessed his
disgraceful fall. He ignored the piercing pain that shot down his arse. “A
pleasure, I’m sure. May I ring for tea?”
The round Sister Genevieve smiled. It was
obvious that she had an amiable personality, unlike her tight-lipped and tight…superior.
“There
is no time. Only a snack for Pierre for the journey.” Sister Marie Therese commanded.
Avoiding further pain, Michael nodded
instead of bowing to the youth. “How do you do, Pierre?”
With his eyes focused down, the boy
whispered almost inaudibly, “Monsieur.” A hat covered his hair, little wisps of
blond hair framed his pale face.
“We should make the switch quickly. The men
watching your home will be suspicious of your entertainment of the Sisters of
the Visitation.” Sister Marie Therese’s speech was clipped, her manner fixed. “Lord
Kendal, remove your dressing gown.”
Michael stiffened in shock. He had been
imbibing generous amounts of brandy for the pain, but he had consumed nowhere
near-enough to have imagined that a nun had just instructed him to get naked.
He
turned to Denby for help, but the seasoned soldier’s gaze was on the ground,
his face as bright a crimson as a chaste debutante.
Michael replied through gritted teeth,
“Over my dead body.”
“Lord Kendal, it will be your dead body if
we don’t make haste.”
Sister Marie Therese stepped closer. Her
eyes flashed with authority, the same look he assumed she gave to Pierre and other
wayward children. “You and Mr. Denby will escape Paris and deliver Pierre to
the safety of England. You will leave France disguised as Sisters of
Visitation.”
In the seaside town of Berck, France
Mademoiselle Gabrielle De Valmont pushed
back Lord Harcourt’s blond curls and applied the wet cloth to his burning brow.
His long golden eyelashes brushed against his bright red cheekbones. In their
days of hard travel from Paris, the Earl’s gunshot wound had festered into a
nasty infection.
At this moment, he rested, but, in the past
days when the fever peaked, he thrashed, calling out about a book to woman
named Henrietta. Desperate to soothe him, Gabrielle discovered he’d calm with
the French songs of her childhood.
They couldn’t stay in the little village
much longer without Napoleon’s or Fouche’s henchmen discovering them. Gabrielle
had brought them to her former nanny’s tiny village of Berck, south of Calais,
when it became obvious the Earl couldn’t travel. They waited until the middle
of the night to make their entrance into the village to avoid alerting the
citizens.
For seven long days and nights, she had
cared for the ill Earl. Their presence in the tiny town couldn’t be kept secret
much longer. They had to leave Berck and France.
But how would they cross the channel with
the French soldiers on alert, watching all the boats crossing the English
Channel?
Monsieur Denby, Lord Harcourt’s valet, had
assured her that he had a plan to divert their attention away.
Helpless and despondent from the
exhaustion, she beseeched the Blessed Virgin for their safe escape and the Earl’s
recovery.
She also prayed that Lord Harcourt would forgive
her and Mother Therese for their deception. When he understood what Fouche and
Napoleon had planned for her, she knew the amiable gentleman wouldn’t abandon
her to her terrible fate.
Look for more heart-pounding adventure,
international intrigue, and sizzling romance with the release of Book Four in
The Code Breaker Series, A Cantata of Love
in the Fall of 2015.
Copyright © Jacki Delecki, 2015.
9 comments:
Sounds an intriguing series!
The Code Breaker series sounds interesting. I have two of the volumes.
Marriage of convenience stories are usually popular. Unfortunately, they are not often presented with historical accuracy.The author of the non-fiction Gentleman's Daughter wrote the book to counter ideas about the business like basis of marriage .However, even she agreed that the subject was complex and often subjected to class differences.
The excerpt give is certainly intriguing.
I think it makes it more realistic in historical romances to use social norms because it was considered a family duty to marry to further your family. Even today while it might not be seen as strictly family obligation to marry for the family, it seems like most very well to do families still marry within the same social circles. It could be due to the fact of that being who they grow up around or due to expectations.
That is certainly one of most intriguing excerpts I've read!
From a reader's point of view, I enjoy the concept of marriages of convenience because I love to seeing how the relationship gradually develops; how the hero and heroine overcome any obstacles in their way and finally seeing them fall in love.
Hi Sarah,
The Series is a lot of fun! And I hope you get a chance to enjoy. All my best.
Jacki
Hi Crystal,
Thanks for commenting. I think you're right on about social norms guiding us whether we want to accept or not.
Hi Carol,
I'm totally with you. I want to see the barriers between the two fall and love blossom. Yeah for HEA! All my best.
My message disappeared..trying again.
I want me free book , shakes fist.
Marriage was always part of the political economy game and was later used by the church to enslave the commoners.
In recent times , with the economy failing and commoners disinterested in The Church , the commoners have set them selves free and no longer marry . ( UK )
My wife and I , as commoners , only married so that my wife could not be deported from the UK. Thus our marriage , although founded in love , was a political act against the government .
It was 1972 , the anti America hatred was running at a force unbeatable and although a tenured teacher at a Polytechnic ; threats were being made.
Thus we have commoners using marriage the way the ruling classes use marriage ; for political reasons.
My son emigrated to the US because the UK government turned down his American wife's married woman's visa. The grounds? he'd lost one payslip and she was paid in cash. Tax returns were not evidence. They would have lived together after a handfasting had not they thought marriage would mean she would get her visa.heir political act didn't work. So marriage a la mode is not always as safe a political game as it looks....
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