Lacis Museum of Lace and Textiles

On Friday, August 1st, a group of attendees at the RWA went on a very special roadtrip. We were escorted by the charming and knowledgeable writer and Beau Monde program coordinator Kalen Hughes to visit a tiny lace and textile museum/retail shop in Berkeley, the Lacis Museum. Kalen directed us through the BART (Bay Area [...]

Words

Find out how Joanna responded to these:
p 239. & elsewhere “front room.” It’s in OED, but in early reference simply indicates the more attractive rooms in the front of a structure, probably for public use. I don’t think it refers to the large gathering place in a contemporary house. “Sitting Room” or even “parlor” would [...]

Francophile

While I was growing up, I was very interested in my mother’s German forebears, and much less so in my father’s French Canadian family. I did have the foresight to study French in high school, and, unlike every math or science class I ever took, I’ve retained most of the French I studied, except [...]

Final Notes

(These were initially posted on Romancenovel.tv in Summer 2007.  I’m reposting them here, as they are no longer available there.)
Well, it’s been a marvelous week. I’ve enjoyed all the questions and comments from everyone. I’ll check back over the next couple days to see if there are any more questions, comments or solutions to the [...]

Next research project

(These were initially posted on Romancenovel.tv in Summer 2007.  I’m reposting them here, as they are no longer available there.)
Quote:
Franzeca -you put it very succiently (succinctly–ed.) (spelling?) – when researching it really is in how you ‘frame the question’. You’ve worked in a public library for 20 years? Wow! That’s one of my favorite places. [...]

PhysicalSocialPsychological

(These were initially posted on Romancenovel.tv in Summer 2007.  I’m reposting them here, as they are no longer available there.)
We’ve all got the drill down for physical accuracy in our romance novel depictions—the Regency hero with the Brutus hair cut, champagne-polished Hessians, matched grays pulling the high-perch phaeton. Our heroine is fashionably immaculate in a [...]

Questions I get asked to research

(These were initially posted on Romancenovel.tv in Summer 2007.  I’m reposting them here, as they are no longer available there.)
Hello again!
The questions most asked fall into the two varieties you mentioned.
There’s overall thematic questions–for Eloisa James’s Essex series, I did a lot of research about horse racing and horse breeding in Regency England. For Desperate [...]