Elisabeth Grace Foley

Historical Fiction Author

Announcement and Snippets: The American Pony

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As you already know if you’re subscribed to my newsletter, I have a new release coming out this year—the long-delayed return of Mrs. Meade! The American Pony has been hanging around in manuscript stage for several years now, and this spring I finally managed to get it revised to my satisfaction. I am so happy to be able to launch it out into the world at last!

While I don’t have a final release date yet, the target is sometime this summer—and in the meantime, you can add it on Goodreads. Here’s the story blurb:

It’s summer in Colorado, and Sir Edmund Marsland’s family are enjoying their visit to the West—though not everyone at the Wellman ranch is quite as happy with the company of the English family. The mood changes for the worse when an accident with a horse nearly claims the life of Sir Edmund’s young son. And with the discovery that someone deliberately caused the accident, suspicions and tensions divide the party. Was it meant for a practical joke—or was it for spite—or was there a motive for murder? Mrs. Meade may be the only guest at the ranch without title or fortune, but she may also be the only one who can get at the truth…

Now, for a little teaser, here’s some snippets for you:

“To hear you and Frederica talk, you wouldn’t think that ‘out here’ was less than an hour from a railroad and telephone and practically every civilized comfort,” said Lady Marsland with tolerant humor. “Sour Springs isn’t exactly a log-cabin trading post.”

“Oh no—oh, dear, no,” said Mrs. Meade, to whom this last remark seemed to be addressed out of courtesy. She added modestly, “We have a literary society, and three churches now the Congregational one is finished, and there is even talk of a second hotel.”

Miss Frederica Marsland lifted her eyebrows politely with a noncommittal “Ah,” which showed that these facts had failed to properly impress her. Mrs. Meade reflected that certain members of the Sour Springs literary society would probably have willingly slain her on the spot.

*

The boys were leading their horses out of the barn now, halfway down the slope. Mrs. Meade squinted a little. She had occasionally suspected lately, though she did not like to admit the possibility, that her eyes were not what they once were when it came to long distances. But the strong eastern light of morning flashed so on the bold white patches of the pinto pony that everything else looked a little shadowy by contrast.

*

“Not at all. But it’s a poor doctor who doesn’t get involved in a bit of mystery once in his life. I read the detective-story magazines too, you see, Mrs. Meade. And correct all the medical details in red pencil.”

*

It was a most unfortunate position to be in. Seated as she was between the two lighted windows, she could hardly rise and move either way along the veranda without being seen, and betraying that she had heard. It may have been the more honorable course, but Mrs. Meade was not sure it was the kindest one…

*

Mrs. Meade, who had very commonsense ideals, decided that a murderer would not behave that way. There must be another reason.

*

Mrs. Meade, mentally putting aside for later a good deal of new food for thought, turned eyes both inquiring and sympathetic to Sir Edmund’s face as he faced her wearily again. Sir Edmund gave her a small, tight smile. “My apologies, Mrs. Meade.”

“Oh, dear me, none at all are necessary. And Sir Edmund—” she stopped him as he was on the point of leaving, and his haggard eyes met hers—“I do believe he was entirely sincere in at least some of what he said.”

 

Add The American Pony to your Goodreads to-read shelf!

Ruritanian Snippets

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So the secret is out: I’m writing a Ruritanian novel. It’s an idea I’ve been gradually accumulating notes for and simmering in my head for two or three years, and finally decided “what the heck, let’s go for it.” It’s fun writing something a little different than my usual: cutting loose with a tad more flowery language and lavish setting (basically all the stored-up inspiration from years of reading classics and watching period films), and straight-up inventing stuff instead of researching every detail. It’s also a little different because I have an outline that’s shockingly more detailed and complete than any I’ve worked from before and which actually manages to incorporate some Crucial Elements of Story Structure that I usually blithely ignore. What do you know.

Anyway, I’ve reached a first milestone of sorts in the rough draft, though still not too far into the story (I have a hunch this thing is going to be a tome), and in spite of my typical wrestling with tendencies toward self-pressuring and self-criticism, I’m pretty satisfied with how it’s going so far. (In bad moments I just keep repeating to myself, “You can fix the mess in the next draft. You can fix the mess in the next draft.”) So here’s a few snippets:

Never allow yourself, Maximilian had taught her, to appear too eager, or heaven forbid, desperate, when negotiating with anyone who had the ability to grant or deny your request at their own will. And who but he stood in that exact position in nearly every aspect of Margareta’s life?

She wished she had someone to run to the way Lucie and Mathilde did to their mother—to tumble into someone’s arms and pour out her feelings and desires as simply as the little girls did their small wishes and grievances in their mother’s silken embrace, and to ask for decisions based entirely on love. But for Margareta no such person existed. Life was a chess-match in which she did not yet have a queen’s freedom to move.

*

He sat shaking his head a little in meditation for a moment, until Captain Marcusin’s rising to come around and stand at his elbow apparently roused him. “‘On the whole I’d rather not—!’ I don’t know. That boy has the makings of either a fine officer or a consummate rascal, and whichever it ends up being will be due solely to chance.”

“Not chance,” said Captain Marcusin, who never wasted words. “Providence.”

“Ay, well,” said Colonel Sproesser, “Providence had best take a hand soon, for I am about to give up.”

*

The Baron called his tenants by each other’s names, confused last year’s harvest with this year’s planting, and was surprised by the absence of fences long since moved and flocks long gone to market, and the farmers corrected him or did not bother to correct him, both with the greatest good-humor. Often Julian met a twinkling eye over his father’s shoulder as he stood by and listened. The Baron was conscious of nothing from them but respect, but Julian saw that he moved in a sheltered atmosphere of their tolerant kindliness—an almost paternal attitude, as if they were the ones taking care of him rather than the theoretical opposite. It was a good thing they were fond of him, Julian reflected, or they might have cheated him far more than they actually did.

*

“I own I was surprised,” she said, “but if indeed there was any change in my manner you must put it down to curiosity, not incivility.”

Charclau bowed slightly. “I would not do you the dishonor of thinking otherwise. But you know, Your Grace, even curiosity need not lead to restraint. In my experience a lady is often more than usually free and secure in speaking to one used to burying confessions in oblivion.”

Valencia was smiling a little. “You do not look to me like someone who knows much of the confessional.”

“You are right. I am more of the scholar than the priest. But discretion—” he gave an infinitesimal pause as if to lay some stress on the word “—is one of the subjects I have always studied.”

*

Two other officers of another regiment joined them and Guilbault left; a hand at cards was proposed, and they cut for a dealer. Rapscal dealt, and small wagers in gold and silver appeared on the table among the wineglasses. There was a certain unpredictable excitement in playing cards with Rapscal; they never knew when he would bet casually and play lazily, or when he would be merciless. One time he might glance at his cards and toss them face downward on the table with a half-smile as if it were not worth the effort, and another time he would sweep away an ensign’s livelihood for a month with a cool, “Better luck next time, lad.” The uncertainty was as heady as the gambling itself.

*

“If I wanted to reprimand you, I could do much better than that. But I am not in the mood. Today I am letting you talk nonsense because it amuses me.”

 

There will probably be radio silence on this project again for a while, at least till I have another good chunk of the first draft under my belt, because I just do not do well at concentrating on something while sharing progress continuously. But you’ll be hearing more of it eventually.

well, whatcha think?

 

Snippets: September – November

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As writers everywhere are plunging into the race of NaNoWriMo, I am sitting back and taking a short breather after having just wound up a race of my own. I wanted to finish typing the second draft of Land of Hills and Valleys by the end of October—and I finished on November 1st, which is close enough for me. It’s a bit more ragged in places than I had expected, so it’ll require some more work before I’m ready to hand it over to beta-readers; but I want to let it sit for at least a few weeks before I look at it again.

I have another project in line that I’m looking forward to starting soon—a novella—of which more in a future post. But this week I’ve taken to just rest, breathe, and catch up on a few little household tasks I kept putting off until I met my self-imposed deadline.

Meanwhile, snippets! Here’s a few short excerpts from the second half of the book:

“How do you know so well what they thought?” I said, feeling again that unhappy prickling of resentment at the differences in how much we knew. Why her and not me? When I’d thought they all liked me and meant well towards me?

“Oh, things get around. In a place like this they always do. Tony Gleason’s not the most discreet person alive, you know, even though he was always on Ray’s side.”

*

By the time we got back to the courthouse it was dusk. The sky above the buildings in the cul-de-sac was pale, and there was a burnt-orange glow along the horizon in the west. The street lamps had come on, shedding small circles of glare over the dusty hoods of automobiles parked bumper to bumper along the curb.

*

“Oh, let him do what he wants!” I said sharply. “It’s certainly better than anything you people achieved by looking the other way and keeping your mouths shut because you were afraid of whose toes you might step on.”

In the utter silence that followed—Carol being flabbergasted, I imagine—I realized that Carleton Kent’s eyes had fastened on my left hand. I wanted to move it, to drop it out of sight in my lap, but I couldn’t bring myself to such an obvious action…even though I knew, once a few seconds had passed, that Carol must have seen what he was looking at too.

“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” said Kent quietly. He got up from his stool, reached in his coat pocket for a dollar and put it on the counter, and walked out of the dining-room.

*

The first rider wore no slicker, and his clothes were soaked and dark. Tim’s face was set like a flint, as he drove the other ahead of him—had he had a gun with him all that time, since we left the house? The other man’s shoulders were slumped; he was leaning over sideways in the saddle with what might have been drunkenness or exhaustion, or abject terror.

“Get down,” said Ray in a hard voice I had seldom heard before, and he laid his hand on the man’s shoulder and almost dragged him out of the saddle. The man staggered as his feet touched the ground, as if Ray’s hold on his collar was the only thing keeping him up.

*

“A much simpler way of putting it,” said Mrs. Crawley with some acerbity, “is that a guilty conscience spoils one’s aim.”