My life has been pretty simple. I grew up in Alabama and graduated from the University of Alabama with a Bachelor's in Advertising. I have spent about the last ten years in web development. In 1998, a friend of mine and I started a web design company we ran for three or four years before deciding to close it due to the demands of school. Since then, I stayed in the web working with various companies in Alabama. I worked for a brief period with Southern Progress, namely with Southern Living magazine and Health magazine, in their web departments. While there, I also wrote for Southern Living magazine, Health.com., and the company's internal newsletter. I write as much as I can. For the last five years, I have been working on my first novel. I am on the third revision now and hope to be finished with this draft by the end of the year. I also write short fiction, though not as frequently as I used to due to the time I spend on the novel. My goal is to have my novel published in the next three years. Other interests include: History (particularly medieval and ancient civlizations), Reading, Foreign Language (I currently speak Spanish but plan to learn as many as I can), Landscape Photography, the outdoors, sports (especially college football), and Travel.
The Sawley Map is currently on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the medieval drawing exhibit, “Pen and Parchment: Drawing in the Middle Ages.” The museum has a post about it on its blog, along with an image of the map. According to the post, the map was… Read More »Medieval Maps – The Sawley Map
Fought between the armies of Henry II and rebellious factions in Normandy, Brittany and England, the Anglo-Norman rebellion takes only a brief page in the volumes of middle ages history. Lasting approximately two years, Henry II battled against his own sons to maintain control of his kingdom. His eldest three… Read More »The Anglo-Norman Rebellion
Castles of Europe: From Charlemagne to the Renaissance By William Anderson, Photographs by Wim Swaan Copyright 1970 – Paul Elek Productions, London; Random House, USA Castles of Europe: From Charlemagne to the Renaissance is an older book — at least the edition I own — and you’ll likely have to… Read More »Review of Castles of Europe: From Charlemagne to the Renaissance
I just finished taking this quiz to determine which fantasy writer I am similar to. I normally don’t take a lot of quizzes, but this one was entertaining and thought provoking and accurate. It’s a 36 question quiz that took me about thirty minutes and made me actually think about… Read More »Which Fantasy Writer Are You?
On this day, June 15th, in medieval history: 1330 – Birth of Edward (“The Black Prince”), Prince of Wales and eldest son of King Edward III of England 1381 – Death of Wat Tyler, leader of the English Peasants’ Revolt; Sir William Walworth, the mayor of London, killed Wat during… Read More »Timeline: Today in Medieval History
The Book Trailer Blog An interesting site showing how people use video as a viral marketing medium to promote their books.
The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco Paperback: 552 pages Publisher: Harvest Books; 1st edition (Sept. 28, 1994) ISBN-10: 0156001314 The Name of the Rose is a book I read several years back and one I wanted to revisit here on my blog. This historical fiction novel set in… Read More »Review of The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco
When writing historical fiction, how much should your dialogue reflect the actual historical period you are writing about? Is it a good idea to write — as say — a knight during the medieval period might actually speak, or write in more contemporary language for the reader? My personal thoughts are it’s… Read More »Discussion Topic: Dialogue and Historical Fiction
Melissa Snell has an in depth post on her blog regarding the heraldic symbols of the medieval period and what those symbols mean. The information is taken from W. Cecil Wade’s The Symbolisms of Heraldry or A Treatise on the Meanings and Derivations of Armorial Bearing, a document that is… Read More »What Do Different Heraldic Symbols Mean?