The Burning Candle: Final Cover Art

Here's the finalized version in the full cover spread. Just gave the final nod, otherwise known as eternal gratitude, to the wonderful Lance Ganey. I've loved all of his work, but Lance really made this one so striking. Just wait, I'll probably say that about the other covers to follow. Yeah, I'm fickle.

You may notice one change from previous books in that this one bears a logo for "Alhambra Press" on the spine. The Burning Candle will be distributed through Lightning Source (LS) AND CreateSpace (CS). LS requires a publisher imprint, hence the slightly pretentious name, but absolutely gorgeous logo. LS setup is a bitch different from CreateSpace and the fees are slightly higher, but not enough to dissuade. Still, pray for me. Seriously. Lest you think I'm some glutton for punishment who thrives on near-insurmountable tasks (the whole self-publishing process gave it away), there is method to my madness. LS offers great print distribution channels and better revenue on paperbacks, which account for eight percent of total sales. Having bought ISBNs, I can stay with CS and never enroll in its Expanded Distribution again. The revenue through Expanded Distribution is ABYSMAL. Like 18 cents on one book or 33 cents on another kind of  ABYSMAL. Hoping for better through LS.

Edits continue on the book and then it's off to the patient beta readers. Still looking at a summer release of this title.

The Burning Candle: Isabel de Vermandois

Isabel de Vermandois, the heroine of The Burning Candle, lived a controversial life. A descendant of French Kings, she became the wife of Robert de Beaumont, Comte de Meulan, who loyally served Henry I, King of England. Robert's contemporary, William de Warenne, Earl of Surrey would also play a role in Isabel's final fate. Through her numerous children, Isabel is a common ancestress of English and Scottish royalty and nobility to the present day.

Facts about Isabel's life
Born: circa 1081 - 1085
Father: Hugh Magnus, Comte de Vermandois 
Mother: Adelaide / Adele, Comtesse de Vermandois 
Siblings:  Ralph, Henry, Simon and William (brothers) Matilda, Beatrice, Constance and Agnes (sisters) 
Titles: Comtesse de Meulan

Isabel's ancestry and her descendants linked her with the most prestigious bloodlines throughout Europe. Her father Hugh was a younger son of King Henry I of France and his Queen, Anne of Kiev. Hugh married Adelaide / Adele, daughter of Herbert IV, Comte de Vermandois and Adele, Countess of Valois. Isabel's heritage included the Capetian dynasty (from Hugh Capet, first King of the Frankish domain), Carolignian dynasty (from Charles Martel, royal grandfather of Charlemagne) and Russian royalty (through Anne of Kiev, daughter of Yaroslav the Wise, Grand Prince of Rus). Isabel was the second or third daughter of her parents. Some historians refer to her as Isabel de Crepi and she may have been born at Crepy-en-Valois, which was founded in the tenth century by the counts of Valois, just northeast of Paris. The dates for Isabel's birth vary; as early as 1081 or as late as 1085, making her between 11 and 15 when she married Robert de Beaumont in 1096. As early as 1094, Isabel's mother arrived at the Norman abbey of Bec, perhaps as an emissary for the negotiation of her daughter's union. Robert was several decades older than his prospective bride.

The marriage of Isabel and Robert faced an impediment before the union could take place. Bishop Ivo of Chartres raised an objection on the basis that the couple shared kinship within prohibited degrees; the exact connection is uncertain. It might pertain to a common ancestor among the Counts of Valois. As a condition of the Pope's dispensation regarding Isabel's marriage, her father Hugh participated in the first Crusade. He reached the Holy Land, aided in the capture of Antioch and should have gone to Constantinople with a request for reinforcements. Instead, he returned to France. Facing Pope Paschal II's threat of  excommunication, Hugh joined another crusade against the Turks in September 1101 and died of his wounds a month later at Tarsus. His actions did not affect Isabel and Robert; they may have married in 1096 without awaiting the papal dispensation. Their first child, a daughter Emma arrived in 1102, making Isabel either 17 or 22 when she became a mother for the first time.  Other children followed; see the previous article on Robert de Beaumont as well as my Author's Note in the novel for more on the couple's children.

A privileged pedigree did not guarantee Isabel's happy existence as Robert's wife. William de Warenne changed her perceived future. Find out how in The Burning Candle.

How much of you is reflected in your characters?

Do you ever find your personal struggles mirroring those of your characters? This is a first for me as I prepare my next title, The Burning Candle, for a spring debut. I'm one chapter / long weekend away from finishing the story of Isabel de Vermandois, who was the wife of two powerful Anglo-Norman earls in the twelfth century, Robert de Beaumont and William de Warenne.  As I've written her, Isabel is a young woman struggling to find her voice and a sense of her true self against society’s expectations, against the backdrop of King Henry I's scandal-ridden court in England. She's also lucky enough in her journey of self-discovery to find love on her own terms. Writing this book has become cathartic for me in an unexpected way, where many of the frustrations the character experiences seemed very familiar. Still, Isabel and I couldn't be any more different, beyond the almost nine centuries that separate us. 

Adultery and bastards in
medieval times? Shocking!

First off, her lineage included generations of French kings. She married as her parents dictated to a hero of the Norman Conquest, a man several decades older that her. Robert de Beaumont might have been 16 or 18 when he fought at Hastings in 1066. He and Isabel married by 1096, when she was between the ages of 11 and 15. She later gave birth to least three sons and five daughters. At some point, she might have had her fill of all that dutifulness to her "old man", because she had an affair with a younger William de Warenne that might have produced a daughter named Ada or Gundred. A year after Robert died, Isabel sealed the deal for real with William and had more children. The sons of Robert and William became good friends, except for the Anarchy period when Henry's daughter Matilda and nephew Stephen fought for the crown. Isabel had died by then, but I'm sure she would have proud to know both sets of her kids put aside their fathers' individual resentment and jealousy, the affair and bastard children issues, and focused on what was really important - carving up as much of England for themselves as they could. 


Just as an aside, I wouldn't really mind the living in a castle bit. While I do adore kids, there is nothing on God's green earth that could make me push out THIRTEEN of them like Isabel did. So, all the other stuff in her life, I could do without.


Why does Isabel's perceived struggle appeal so much? In medieval times, there were great consequences for flouting conventions or disobedience, things like disinheritance and excommunication. Even if Isabel did as her parents and society dictated when she married Robert, she obviously chose a life beyond those expectations when she embarked on an affair with William. It's the only example I have of a moment in her life where she did as she pleased, without caring about the consequences. Where did she find the strength or was it always inside her? Read The Burning Candle for my take. 


I can understand some of the sentiment behind Isabel's choice, having known moments where I want to abandon concerns about family and my job and just do only what I want to do, whether that's writing or absolutely nothing at all. Interestingly, the more I've written about Isabel finding her voice, discovering love instead of duty and defining herself as a woman, the more I'm focused on my priorities. In writing about this one person's possible struggles, seems like I'm finding ways of dealing with my own.