The Rose Red Bride, book two of my Jewels of Kinfairlie series of medieval romances, is now available in German! I’ve enrolled this book in Kindle Unlimited so it will be available exclusively at Amazon at least until April 19.
Die rosenrote Braut
Höhergeschätzt als Gold sind die Juwelen von Kinfairlie und nur die Würdigsten dürfen um ihre Liebe kämpfen … Der Laird von Kinfairlie hat unverheiratete Schwestern – jede für sich ein Kleinod. Und er hat keine andere Wahl, als sie in aller Eile zu verheiraten.
Wie eine Heldin in einer alten Erzählung wartet Vivienne im höchsten Turmzimmer von Kinfairlie auf den Liebhaber, den ihr das Los bestimmt hat. Er kommt in der Dunkelheit zu ihr, mit Umhang und Kapuze, sodass sie sein Gesicht nicht sehen kann. Er liebt sie süß und hingebungsvoll … und Vivienne weiß, sie ist ihrem Schicksal begegnet.
Doch im Morgenlicht zerbricht ihr Traum. Erik Sinclair von Blackleith ist kein romantischer Held, sondern ein enterbter Krieger, der ihre Entführung geplant hat, um sein Erbe zurückzugewinnen. Empört über Eriks Behauptung, sie nur für die Zeugung eines Sohnes zu benötigen, und doch verführt von der Leidenschaft, die er in ihr erweckt, wird Vivienne klar, dass ihr schweigsamer Ehegatte mehr Vorzüge hat, als er selbst zugeben würde. Erik betrachtet ihr wachsendes Vertrauen in seine Ehre und ihren Wunsch, sein gestohlenes Geburtsrecht zurückzuerlangen, mit Skepsis …
Er ahnt nicht, dass seine Braut, dieses seltene Juwel, beabsichtigt, auch sein verschlossenes Herz zu gewinnen.
One of the things going on behind the scenes here is the translation of many of my books into other languages. This is a really interesting exercise: I love seeing the covers translated and also the discussions with my translation teams. One team in particular sends me questions to make sure they get the details right. This can require a bit of detective work on my end, since we’re starting translations with the Jewels of Kinfairlie series, which I wrote in 2005. Sometimes I just don’t remember! I thought I would share one of my recent investigations with you, when I went looking for a 15th century dress.
The translators are working on The Rose Red Bride, and wanted more explanation about Vivienne’s dress. Here’s what it says in the book:
“Her finest chemise of sheer linen was an obvious choice, as she wished to impress her fairy lover with her finery. It was cut full and gathered at the neck on a drawstring, as was typical, but was distinguished by sleeves fitted from elbow to wrist and secured with dozens of tiny buttons made of shell.
It was no small feat to don the chemise without the aid of one of her sisters or their maid, but Vivienne managed the deed.
She then donned her favorite kirtle, also a gift from Rosamunde, which was wrought of silk woven in two shades of emerald. The sleeves were slit from the shoulders to reveal the chemise and trailed to the ground, while the hem pooled upon the floor. The hem and neckline and sleeve edges were all graced with intricate golden embroidery. The men in her family had called it a most impractical garment, while her sisters openly coveted it.”
It sounded to me as if I’d been inspired by a specific dress, so I went looking in my library for the source. I found it in The Chronicle of Western Fashion, by John Peacock, a book of illustrations I’ve had for a long time.
It’s labelled as being the outfit of an Italian lady from 1410. If you look closely, you can see the buttons along the sleeve of the ochre chemise, from elbow to wrist.
I did wonder whether I could find more detail, though, and kept looking.
In Medieval Costume in England and France by Mary G. Houston, I found the image below. It looks like the same dress but the woman is illustrated with three other people.
One of the interesting things about medieval costume is that there aren’t that many sources, and the sources are a bit different than you might expect. Queens and kings carved onto cathedrals, for example, or depicted in marginalia of manuscripts or woven into tapestries will usually be dressed in the style of the times of the artist and not of their actual era. An illustration of Noah at the flood could show 13th century court dress very well.
This line drawing was inspired by an image in the Très Riches Heures of the Duc de Berry, a 15th century book of hours filled with miniature paintings. Books of prayer are also a great source of social history details, including clothing styles.
This is the painting for April from the Très Riches Heures, which shows fruit trees in bloom in a walled garden, maidens picking flowers, men fishing and a couple pledging their troth. It’s just what you might expect to happen in April in the northern hemisphere. You’ll recognize the woman in blue as the inspiration for the drawings, and for Vivienne’s dress.
This image is from a website called Digital Medievalist. You can see it in more detail, here.
Here’s the Wikion the Très Riches Heures, too, which is a comparatively large book of hours. It measures about 8″ by 12″ but many books of hours are tiny, only four inches or so in each dimension. The detail in them is incredible! If you’re ever at the Cloisters in New York, they have a collection of books of hours and there are always a few on display. You can also see selected pages from the books of hours in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum (which owns the Cloisters) on this page of search results.
So, I found Vivienne’s 15th century dress, and now the translators know what the sleeves look like.
The German edition of The Rose Red Bride – which will be called die rosenrote Braut – should be available in January.
I have another translation making its way to retail stores – it’s the Portuguese edition of The Beauty Bride. I’ve also created a Portuguese newsletter – like my Italian newsletter, subscribers will get a newsletter whenever a new translation is available for sale.
As Joias de Kinfairlie são mais apreciadas do que ouro, e apenas os mais dignos podem disputar seu amor… O laird de Kinfairlie tem irmãs solteiras, cada uma delas uma joia por mérito próprio. E ele não tem escolha a não ser tratar de casá-las urgentemente.
O coração de lady Madeline não está à venda… muito menos para um notório proscrito como Rhys FitzHenry. No entanto, a mão de Madeline foi vendida a ninguém menos que este guerreiro cansado de lutar e com um preço por sua cabeça. Uma donzela mais obediente poderia ceder às determinações do laird e aceitar passivamente o seu destino, mas Madeline nunca foi obediente. Ela decide fugir, embora não lhe passe pela cabeça que Rhys a perseguirá.
Ela não espera que esse homem taciturno a corteje com histórias fascinantes, muito menos que cada um de seus cativantes contos revele uma cicatriz em sua alma impenetrável. Ela nunca imaginaria que um homem como Rhys pudesse colocar em perigo o seu próprio coração, mesmo revelando tão pouco sobre seus sentimentos. Quando o passado de Rhys ameaça o futuro dele, Madeline lhe dá um voto de confiança. Ela ousa acreditar que ele é inocente — e arrisca a própria vida para ir ao encalço de uma paixão mais inestimável do que a joia mais rara.
“Um lírico romance da era medieval!”—Publishers Weekly
Se você se inscrever em meu boletim informativo em português, receberá uma mensagem sempre que uma nova tradução for publicada ou quando houver uma oferta especial.
Inscreva-se no meu boletim informativo em português, “Cavaleiros e Rebeldes”, clicando aqui.
I’ve embarked on a new adventure these past couple of weeks – I’ll be having translations done of some of my books. This will be a huge job, since each translation will take several months, and we’ll be working in several languages.
I’m starting with the Jewels of Kinfairlie series, and have contracted for an Italian edition of The Beauty Bride. There was a Mondadori edition before, but it was available only in print. This will be a new translation and it will be available in ebook as well as print. I hope it will be available by the fall. If all goes well, that translator and I will continue on to The Rose Red Bride.
I’m very excited about this!
There’s a new menu on my website called Translations. Under it, you’ll find a page dedicated to Italian translations. I’ll add pages as I contract for other languages, and will keep each page updated with titles available in that language as well as buy links.
If you sign up for my Italian newsletter, you’ll get a message whenever a new translation is published or when there’s a special offer. My translator is helping me with this, so the newsletter is in Italian.
Sign up for the Italian newsletter, Canaglie & Cavalieri, right here.
As Joias de Kinfairlie são mais apreciadas do que ouro, e apenas os mais dignos podem disputar seu amor… O laird de Kinfairlie tem irmãs solteiras, cada uma delas uma joia por mérito próprio. E ele não tem escolha a não ser tratar de casá-las urgentemente.
Claire Delacroix 