by Roseanna White | Mar 17, 2011 | Thoughtful Thursdays, Uncategorized
It’s been an awesome week and a half. I can’t share everything that has made it so (yet), but really, it started last week when I got to tell Dina Sleiman that WhiteFire will be publishing her medieval novel, Dance of the Dandelion. We’ve had a blast diving into plans for that, including getting the cover design ready to roll. My awesome friend Karlene has volunteered to be our costume designer, and I just know this is going to be awesome.
And since WhiteFire will be in the 2012 edition of the Christian Writer’s Market Guide, I dedicated much of last week to preparing our information and catalog for that too. Of course, that required the covers of the above-mentioned Dandelion and Christine Lindsay’s Shadowed in Silk, neither of which are finalized yet. So I also had a blast playing with some unofficial cover designs. =)
(Special thanks to Michael of ArmStreet and Vitaliy Mirgorodskiy for giving me permission to use the photo of their model and costume for this temporary design of Dina’s book!)
We’re also pleased to welcome Dina onto the staff of WhiteFire as an acquisitions editor–which makes me the Senior Acquisitions Editor (how heady is THAT? LOL). Dina was one of the first to get excited about the vision of our company, so we’re really excited about the energy and insight she brings. And also excited to announce that she’ll be representing us at the Blue Ridge conference this May! Then I’ll be at the Oregon Christian Writers conference this August.
Tuesday night I also got the heads-up that official cover design of Shadowed in Silk is underway, and I know Tekeme Studios will be coming up with something astounding. Can’t wait to see it.
And I’m going to shut up now.
by Roseanna White | Mar 17, 2011 | Uncategorized
I’ve totally spaced drawing my winners lately. But without further ado . . .
The winner of Shellie Neumeier’s Driven is . . .
Rubynreba! (pbclark@ . . .)
And the winner of the Read and Share Bible is . . .
Wanda! (wandaelaine@ . . .)
I’m emailing you both now.
by Roseanna White | Mar 16, 2011 | Remember When Wednesdays, Uncategorized
For reasons I will be sharing soon, my 1784 story is back on my mind. And as I lay in bed last night unable to get back to sleep, I remembered a fun little factoid I’d yet to share with y’all. =)
Ever wonder how people kept up on fashion back in the day? I mean, in the 18th century fashion was EVERYTHING. Even here in the colonies–in fact, a London man described our balls and gowns as far more fashion-forward than anything to be seen in London. (Not his exact words, but that’s the gist, LOL.) But it wasn’t exactly the age of full-color magazines . . . nor of Fashion Weeks. They didn’t have Style or E! and certainly couldn’t browse Ideeli daily for awesome bargains on designers.
So they looked at dolls. Yep, that’s right. Marie Antoinette was more than a leader of France in the late 18th century, she was the unanimously agreed upon leader of fashion the world over. And whenever Marie Antoinette appeared in a new style, her peeps would make miniature versions of it for dolls and send those dolls to every major port.
It may have taken two months, but those “fashion babies” arrived on our doorsteps and brought detailed examples from the Queen of Fashion into our lives. And so, though it moved at a snail’s pace compared to our changes from season to season now, styles changed far more quickly than they had in centuries prior.
All thanks to prettily made up baby dolls. =)
Happy Wednesday, everybody! I know mine will be!
by Roseanna White | Mar 15, 2011 | Uncategorized
The Girl in the GatehouseBy Julie Klassen
Thanks to one poor decision, Mariah Aubrey has been sent into exile. She finds herself taking up residence in the abandoned gatehouse of a distant relative’s estate, where secrets abound as numerous as her own. But when her tight finances force her to resort to publishing the novels she writes in secret, Mariah cannot be certain who is friend and who is foe among her new acquaintances–who will judge her harshly, and who will accept her for who she is, stained by ink and shame though she may be?
Captain Matthew Bryant has made a fortune in the war, but can it buy his way into polite society? Determined to win the hand of the only woman he has ever loved, the woman who spurned him for his inferiority not so long ago, he leases Windrush Court with one goal in mind–prove to the world that he is worthy. But the longer he is master of the estate, the closer he gets to his goal, the more he finds himself drawn to the mysteries of his lovely tenant-neighbor. Is getting to know her worth risking the scandal that follows her? Worth his dreams?
The Girl in the Gatehouse is the newest Regency by Julie Klassen, full of intrigue and intricate plot details that had me guessing up to the very end. Her characters were immensely lovable–Matthew Bryant is at once a swashbuckling naval hero and a man grasping desperately at the chance to be, for once, accepted. What better combination to make a reader’s heart thud? Mariah is a young woman whose good heart contrasts so brilliantly with her shamed reputation that I was propelled through the story with the need to learn every one of her secrets, so that I might love her anyway.
Though The Girl in the Gatehouse didn’t start as quickly for me as Klassen’s The Silent Governess did, I loved how intricate were the mysteries woven through the plot. Each time I figured one aspect out, another twist was thrown in to keep the anticipation and intrigue strong. I found the suspenseful elements to be oh-so-interesting and compelling without venturing toward nail-biting; and the book as a whole was fabulous and satisfying. I could put it down–but I was eager to pick it back up.
Overall, The Girl in the Gatehouse is another amazing period novel from Klassen that leaves me thirsting for her next release. I adore the Regency as brought to life by this talented author and the way love burrows deep into the heart through her characters. A definite must-read for those historical romance readers out there! (And if we’re judging books by their covers, this ranks as one of my favorites!)
by Roseanna White | Mar 14, 2011 | Word of the Week
I don’t often pause to examine the etymology of words like “handsome,” which have meant what they mean for centuries, and so I can use freely in all my manuscripts.
But once in a while, it’s fun to see how it came to mean what we know all those hundreds of years ago. =) “Handsome” is a good example. When we break it down, it’s “hand” and “some.” Now how in the world did that come to mean “good looking”??
Well, first it meant “ready at hand or easy to handle” in the 1400s. Literally hand + some. By the mid/late 1500s the meaning had been extended to mean “considerable, of fair size.” And then within ten years, that became “of fine form,” which easily becomes “good-looking.” Then it extended further to mean “generous” (i.e. a handsome reward) a hundred years after that, in 1680.
Fun, eh? Who knew?
Roseanna M. White is a bestselling, Christy Award winning author who has long claimed that words are the air she breathes. Having successfully launched two homeschool grads, she now spends her time writing fiction, designing book covers, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna is the author of a slew of historical novels that span several continents and thousands of years, as well as a fantasy series and contemporary mysteries and romances. Spies and war and mayhem always seem to find their way into her books…to offset her real life, which is blessedly ordinary. 
