~~After a week of very few words, imagine my surprise when 150 stray words popped into my head this morning. I have no clue why. They don't fit with anything I'm writing. I don't plan to write historical fiction, though that's the genre I think they would fit. The only thing that makes sense is that I did focus on European medieval history in college and my master's thesis is a biography of Blanche of Castile. But I never wanted to be Eleanor of Aquitaine.
~~Here are the mystery words:
When I was a girl, I wanted to be Eleanor of Aquitaine. Dashing troubadours would sing love songs to me. I'd be Queen of both France and England and own the richest province in Europe. Then I learned her whole story--about the civil wars between her sons and husband and that she spent sixteen years imprisoned by her husband, Henry.
But reading about Eleanor's life led me to her family and the little talked about daughters who married into the ruling families of the Holy Roman Empire, Toulouse, and Castile-Leon. It was among Eleanor's grandchildren that I found my true lodestone--Blanche of Castile, who married Louis Capet, destined to be Louis VIII of France. While it's true she would lose children before they were grown and her husband would die young, her life typified a woman of learning, justice, power, and grace. In Blanche, I found a guide for living life based on belief.
~~What do you think happened? And do you ever have mystery words showing up uninvited? Do they ever lead you into a new WIP?
~~There is one other bit you should know that my long-delayed SF trilogy (The Dawn and the lion)originated as a fictionalization (that's an understatement! ; ) of Blanche's life. It's moved a long way from it's origins now.
