Absence

I hope the old adage, "Absence makes the heart grow fonder" is true. I have been ill, but I am hopefully on the road to recovery and while my gluten-free blondies are baking, I thought I'd share a post.

I believe I have mentioned before that I love most period dramas. And I love how so many of my favorite British actors and actresses are recycled, for lack of a better term, throughout these films.

While Keira Knightley is not my first choice of Elizabeths, I absolutely adore her in almost every one of her films. The Duchess is one of my favorite films- a go to movie for when I want to escape. I know just about every word by heart. My favorite scene has some of the snappiest dialog I've come across. Georgiana, the Duchess of Devonshire, stands in the foyer with her two good friends, Richard Sheridan, the playwright, and Charles Fox, then Leader of the Opposition. The Duchess is heavily pregnant and Mr. Fox says, "A huge belly was never more becoming on anyone." Sheridan replies, "And Fox here offers an expert opinion as he does a giant belly every time he passes a mirror. If your belly were on a woman," he says to Fox, "well, we'd all know what to think." Fox, never to be outdone replies, "My dear Sheridan, an hour ago my belly was on a woman. Now what do you think?"

Simon McBurney, who plays Fox, is such a great actor, with such piercing eyes. It usually happens that when I start researching an actor, I find he or she has been in many other films that I have seen and loved, and perhaps I didn't recognize them or wasn't yet a fan at the time. In this case, I found that Simon McBurney did the voice of Kreacher, the house elf at Number Four Grimmauld Place, in Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows, Part I. Kreacher first appeared in Order of the Phoenix, but a different actor did the voice in that film. McBurney also played the evil Mr. Brocklehurst in the most recent Jane Eyre.

Back to Ms. Knightley. Has anyone seen A Dangerous Method? She gives an amazing performance alongside Michael Fassbinder and Viggo Mortensen, who was almost unrecognizable as Sigmund Freud. It's worth a watch if you haven't seen it already. Don't watch it in front of the kids. It wouldn't be a movie about the birth of psychoanalysis without a bunch of sexual innuendo.

Time to go have a gluten-free blondie.

Jane Austen Festival

Oh my dear ladies (and gentleman) how I long to attend the Jane Austen Festival in England. And, today, they posted pictures of last year's summer ball as well as last year's festival. You simply must go like "Jane Austen Festival" on Facebook and then peruse these pictures. They are high quality images chock full of divine gowns and handsome gentlemen! Definitely lifted my spirits on this cold, grey morning.

Jane Austen Social Media Game Announced

The BBC is apparently making a game for Facebook.

"The game takes Pride and Prejudice as its starting point, following the newly married Elizabeth and Mr Darcy on a hidden object adventure. The pair have escaped from the pages of Pride and Prejudice and it's the player's job to find them and convince them back into the book. Along the way you meet all of Austen's favourite characters while solving hidden object scenes, decorating your manor house, dressing up in Regency era garb and courting..."

I already decorate my virtual manor house and dress in virtual Regency garb:

However, I am sure I will soon be harassing my friends with JA Game requests on Facebook just like the most dedicated Farmvillian. Read more about the BBC game here. I just found out that Kimberly Denny-Ryder of Reflections of a Book Addict and The Austen Games is a writer on the project! Way to go Kimberly! How exciting!

What do Regency Gowns and Forearm Tattoos Have in Common?

Danielle Sherwood of Swenson Book Development interviewed me recently about Pinterest and how authors can use it to drive traffic to their blogs and and to drive sale of their books.

You can find the interview here. Be sure to go and check it out!

I was pleased to be asked because Swenson Book Development is such a great group here in the Fingerlakes Region of Upstate NY. If you're looking for help developing your non-fiction book, give them a shout. I took an historical fiction writing workshop led by Dr. Jill Swenson back in September, and it was really top notch. I wouldn't be here writing to you today if I hadn't taken that workshop, nor would I be tweeting. Here is a link to follow Swenbooks on Twitter where you will find timely, interesting and often funny tweets about writing and publishing.

I love looking for Austen-related images on Pinterest, but I also really love being able to pin something from outside Pinterest, so I don't lose it. I don't always have the time to read an article, say, on the evolution of the chemise, but I certainly would want to go back to it later, so I can pin the chemise picture to my Jane Austen Regency board, and go back to it when I have time. The picture links back to the original blog.

Another reason I like it so much, is that while I might do targeted internet searching for "regency morning gowns" or ...ahem... "Colin Firth," Pinterest allows me to browse boards of my interests that I have chosen to follow- other people's boards- and I find things I may not have been originally looking for, or that I didn't know existed. Such as this forearm tattoo of Pemberley:

You can find the pin for this image here.

I'd love to see you over on Pinterest. If you need an invitation, give me a shout in the comments.

Austenland Movie

Hello lovelies! A quick post this am as I run out to get a massage (I know- poor me right?) Stephenie Meyer has posted on her blog about the making of the movie verison of Shannon Hale's novel, Austenland. Go here to read about it and to see an image of some of the cast, and of the house cast as Pembroke Park.

*STILL* Revising and Editing

Great post this morning by Abigail Reynolds on Austenauthors.net about how our impressions of characters can change over time. Go check it out!

Joy of Books

I'm still editing and formatting my story for http://www.theaustengames.com so here's a little diversion in the meantime.