About Kate

Kate Quinn is a native of southern California. She attended Boston University, where she earned a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Classical Voice. A lifelong history buff, she has written three novels set in ancient Rome: “Mistress of Rome,” “Daughters of Rome,” and “Empress of the Seven Hills,” all of which have been translated into multiple languages.

Kate made the jump from ancient Rome to Renaissance Italy for her fourth and fifth novels, “The Serpent and the Pearl” and “The Lion and the Rose,” detailing the early years of the Borgia clan.  She also has succumbed to the blogging bug, and keeps a blog filled with trivia, pet peeves, and interesting facts about historical fiction. She and her husband now live in Maryland with a small black dog named Caesar, and her interests include opera, action movies, cooking, and the Boston Red Sox.

The official blurb for THE SERPENT AND THE PEARL:

Rome, 1492. The Holy City is drenched with blood and riddled with secrets. A pope lies dying and the throne of God is left vacant, a prize awarded only to the most virtuous – or the most ruthless. The Borgia family begins its legendary rise, chronicled by an innocent girl who finds herself drawn into their dangerous web . . .

Now Kate, give us your quick-drop on THE SERPENT AND THE PEARL…

Take a vivacious blonde with floor-length hair, add a cynical dwarf on the hunt for a serial killer, toss in one fiery cook with a dangerous past, then stir to a boil, light on fire, and serve for a hell of a read!

Why the switch from ancient Rome to Rome under Borgia rule? 

Because I was starting to have daydreams about writing a book where I never, not once, had to type the word t-o-g-a.  I love ancient Rome, but I needed a vacation!  And the Borgias grabbed me as soon as I started reading about them.  That whole era is just saturated with artistic and scientific advancements side by side with bloody mayhem, and the Borgias are the poster children for all that gorgeous Renaissance chaos.

You say your culinary husband inspired dishes in the Serpent and the Pearl, and that his traits appeared in the hero of Mistress of Rome. Can I borrow him? In what other ways does he influence your work?

My Navy sailor husband probably shows up the most clearly in my last book, “Empress of the Seven Hills,” which features another tall freckled left-handed military man who doesn’t suffer fools even when they’re superior officers! As for “The Serpent and the Pearl,” one of my two heroines is inspired directly by my husband’s fiery Sicilian grandmother, the one who taught him to cook so well.  To this day he can’t break pasta into a pot of water without a wince and a “Sorry, Grandma” because just like my Renaissance cook heroine, his grandmother would whack you over the head with a wooden spoon for daring to break pasta instead of folding it.  She turned my husband into a fabulous cook; now that “Serpent and the Pearl” is out, he’s having fun cooking his way through all the recipes in it.  Who knows, maybe there will be a companion cookbook?

I’m really into the use of cosmetics throughout history. Did you uncover any interesting beauty regimens during your research of the Borgia family?

My second heroine Giulia Farnese was one of the most famous beauties of the Renaissance, especially known for her floor-length hair, so you can bet her beauty routines are meticulous.  Some of the Renaissance cosmetics recipes I found are absolutely vile, like a face mask that calls for dove entrails.  Others, like a rinse for blondifying hair which was made out of saffron, cinnabar, and sulphur, sound a bit nicer.  Renaissance ladies were all mad for fair hair, so a favorite girls-day-out back then was to head up to the rooftop and put on big-brimmed crownless sun hats so you could spread your hair out under the sun to bleach it, but still keep your skin white!

Finally, a discussion on craft. Your sentences are so precise and well paced! Is this a natural gift or do you have to edit a work to death before it’s in such great shape?

Edit, edit, edit.  Re-read, curse a little, edit some more.  One of my worst habits is that I start unconsciously relying on favorite words or phrases.  Almost the last thing I do is to run a Search in my manuscript for the words and phrases I like to overuse: shrug, smile, grin, glare; arms folded across chests; people tilting their heads; etc.  But it’s like a Whack-A-Mole game: no sooner do I push down one set of over-used words than another set pops up in its place!

Thank you, Kate! It is always a pleasure! Do I finally have the secrets to your own lovely golden tresses? Is that saffron or cinnabar I smell? I’m headed for the spice aisle right now!

The Serpent and the Pearl by Kate Quinn

~Praise for THE SERPENT AND THE PEARL

“Three compelling characters weave a tangled trajectory through the life and politics of 15th-century Rome.  Carmelina’s sharp tongue, Leonello’s caustic wit, and Giulia’s unconditional good humor in the face of danger play off each other beautifully to create another riveting novel from Kate Quinn.”

– Historical Novels Review, August 2013

 Buy Kate’s Books

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Marci Jefferson’s Lavender Sachets: three tablespoons of dried lavender buds and five drops of lavender essential oil

But I’m not the only one entranced by lavender’s heady charms. Ancient Roman soldiers supposedly used it to perfume their bathwater. They are the ones likely responsible for importing it in 200 BC to England, where tourists still love to buy bars of lavender soap. Around 40 AD the Greek physician Pedanius Discordes wrote De Materia Medica, and proclaimed lavender to be “like Hyssop, good for griefs in the thorax. It is also mingled profitably with Antidotes.” His botanical wisdom was quoted up through the seventeenth century, when the English followed the example set by the Stuart Royals and used lavender in perfumes. Look for more about that in posts to come!

Personally, one of my favorite uses for lavender is in linen drawer sachets. I belong to a group of lady writers who have become very dear friends over the last year; they comfort through disappointments, cheer through victories. One of them is handy at the pottery wheel, and sent me a delightful tea mug. The only payment she requested was that I pay the shipping cost forward. So I distributed the sachets above to everyone in the group. It was an appropriate gift, I think, to give soothing lavender to my comforting friends.

Becoming Josephine

Heather Webb’s debut is a novel about Napoleon’s empress, a woman in search of eternal love and stability, and ultimately her search for self. It releases December 31, 2013 from Plume/Penguin. Stop by Heather’s blog Between the Sheets and leave a comment for a chance to win a $20 gift card to Barnes & Noble or a $20 gift card to Amazon. Pre-order her novel (present a receipt) and win a Josephine hand mirror with a velvet bag.

I think I’ll have to invite Heather Webb for an interview at release!

MORE ABOUT THE BOOK

Rose Tascher sails from her Martinique plantation to Paris to trade her Creole black magic culture for love and adventure. She arrives exultant to follow her dreams of attending Court with Alexandre, her elegant aristocrat and soldier husband. But Alexandre dashes her hopes and abandons her amid the tumult of the French Revolution.

Through her savoir faire, Rose secures her footing in high society, reveling in handsome men and glitzy balls—until the heads of her friends begin to roll.

After narrowly escaping death in the blood-drenched cells of Les Carmes prison, she reinvents herself as Josephine, a socialite of status and power. Yet her youth is fading, and Josephine must choose between a precarious independence and the love of an awkward suitor. Little does she know, he would become the most powerful man of his century- Napoleon Bonaparte.

BECOMING JOSEPHINE is a novel of one woman’s journey to find eternal love and stability, and ultimately to find herself.

ADVANCE PRAISE

Becoming Josephine has already been featured in a Wall Street Journal  piece on the popularity of historical fiction featuring the wives of famous men.

“Heather Webb’s epic novel captivates from its opening in a turbulent plantation society in the Caribbean, to the dramatic rise of one of France’s most fascinating women: Josephine Bonaparte. Perfectly balancing history and story, character and setting, detail and pathos, Becoming Josephine marks a debut as bewitching as its protagonist.” –Erika Robuck, author of Hemingway’s Girl

“With vivid characters and rich historical detail, Heather Webb has portrayed in Josephine a true heroine of great heart, admirable strength, and inspiring courage whose quest is that of women everywhere: to find, and claim, oneself.”  –Sherry Jones, bestselling author of The Jewel of the Medina

“Josephine’s warmth and complexity comes to vibrant life in this fascinating novel rich with vivid historical detail.”—Teresa Grant, Author of THE PARIS AFFAIR

“Vivid and passionate, Becoming Josephine captures the fiery spirit of the woman who stole Napoleon’s heart and enchanted an empire. –Susan Spann, author of The Shinobi Mysteries

“A fast-paced, riveting journey, Becoming Josephine captures the volatile mood of one of the most intense periods of history—libertine France, Caribbean slave revolts, the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars—from the point of a view of one of its key witnesses, Josephine Bonaparte.” –Dana Gynther, author of Crossing on the Paris

“Spellbinding . . . Heather Webb’s novel takes us behind the mask of the Josephine we thought we knew.” –Christy English, author of How to Tame a Willful Wife and To Be Queen

“Enchanting prose takes the reader on an unforgettable journey . . . Captivating young Rose springs from the lush beauty of her family’s sugar plantation in Martinique to shine in the eighteenth century elegance of Parisian salon society. When France is torn by revolution, not even the blood-bathed terror of imprisonment can break her spirit.” –Marci Jefferson, author of Girl on the Gold Coin, Thomas Dunne Books, 2014

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Yep, this historical fiction author has been known to torture her children with Colonial Williamsburg, Civil War re-enactments, and loooong leisurely walks around Revolutionary War battlegrounds at Yorktown. Hey, cool it, we do fun kid stuff, too (which is why I can advise you to never ever attempt a weekend in Colonial Williamsburg immediately after a week in Orlando for reasons that should’ve been obvious to me).

Last spring break we hit a few museums in Chicago. This year we chose to see a very special exhibit in Cincinnati; the Dead Sea Scrolls. Perhaps the world’s greatest archeological treasure, they were first discovered by a Bedouin goat herder near Qumran in 1947. With six hundred artifacts on display, this was the largest collection from the Holy Land ever to go on tour outside Israel. It included a copy of the ten commandments from about thirty BC, the oldest known, which took my breath away.

Even my kids were impressed. Seriously. My daughter even drew highly accurate pictures of the scrolls in art class when we returned. See…

When I asked her for an exact translation, I received a blank stare. However, for readers who may be interested in what I learned about ancient cosmetics during this museum adventure, I have a treat!

These are Iron Age (seventh-ninth century BC) limestone cosmetic bowls from Hazor, Megiddo, and Arad. Ancient Israelites combined kohl or antimony with fat or resin in these, dipped a metal or ivory wand into the mixture, then used it to line their eyes. Sounds like a lot of work to me.

Decorative palmettes are carved into the underside of this bowl of steatite from the same period.

Keep in mind these are Iron Age tools from the middle east. Stay tuned for more about eye cosmetics from other eras.

The lipsticks we know, in retractable tubes, were invented in 1915. Lipstick itself, however, has been around for thousands of years. Archeologists discovered a five thousand year old sample of lip rouge in an Egyptian tomb, and Etruscan women still rouged their lips in the sixth century B.C. In the fourth century, early Christians began their unceasing complaints against cosmetics, including lip paints. Even when Europe was thrust into the Dark Ages, men and women in the thriving Indus Valley enhanced their lips with betel.

Ladies in the Middle Ages went for a pale look, and if lips were rouged it was lightly. They used plant matter and minerals. The colorful Queen Elizabeth I’s lips were painted “rubie red.” And by the time James I united Scotland and England as the first Stuart Monarch, cosmetics were more widespread.

The primary lip colorant in use from then into the Restoration Period, and used in my upcoming novel, was known as Spanish Red. The Spanish created this with cochineal insects imported from the Americas. It came on paper and was applied moistened with water or dry with a cloth.

This is an image of just how those prized cochineal bugs were collected.

Indian Collecting Cochineal with a Deer tail

In 1740 an alternate became available when a recipe for Red Pomatum for the Lips was published. It called for melted white wax, ox marrow, white pomatum, and a dram of alkanet stirred in until the concoction acquired a red color. I don’t know about you, but I’ll stick to my handy tube of lip gloss!

When I started researching for THE DUCHESS OF RICHMOND, it was difficult to find information on the web about makeup during Restoration Period England. I quickly discovered the reason for this – there isn’t a ton of information out there in the first place.

The 1600’s were rather eventful. England split into Royalist and Parliamentarian factions and proceeded to bludgeon each other during the Civil Wars. These ended in 1649 when Parliament executed the head of the Royalists, King Charles the First. Royalists fled into exile, and the Puritan head of the Parliamentarians, Oliver Cromwell, took it upon himself to rule England as a Commonwealth for the next eleven years. Apparently Puritan rulers are pretty drab, because England got sick of the situation and invited the heir to the throne, Charles the Second, home. They called this the Restoration of the Monarchy, and legendary partying ensued.

Throughout this upheaval, there were necessary changes in access and attitudes toward cosmetics. Wars shorten supply. Puritans denounce artifice. Restored Monarchs revel in it. Despite the confusion, time was kind enough to preserve family letters, paintings, records left by herbalists, plays, poetry, woodcut illustrations, and extant cosmetic containers to help us keep track.

So as you read future posts on this blog about gross ingredients (puppy dog fat!), odd elements (mooches and plumpers!), and strange practices (forehead shaving!), keep context in mind! We’re going to jump around through the decades mentioned above to get an understanding of beauty trends in the seventeenth century. In closing, a work by a Dutch painter from the same period.

Gerrit Dou: A young woman at her toilet, 1667,

A studious historical fiction author and blogger herself, she laughed and laughed.

But I was quite serious. You see, five years ago, when I started the long process of researching and writing THE DUCHESS OF RICHMOND, I found a gaping lack of information on the web about make-up throughout history. Particularly during the Restoration Period in England. There was a blog post or two. A few museum photographs. But few meaty facts. The main character of my novel was known as one of the greatest beauties at a court where both men and women wore cosmetics. Like most ladies, I myself simply love to have fun with makeup, so I considered it important to get beauty elements right in the novel.

I hit the books. Thankfully, historians before me produced a number of informative guides to the topic. If you decide to follow my posts, you’ll learn lots of nitty-gritty details about cosmetics during the Restoration and through the centuries.

But you’ll also find posts like today’s, where I succumb to one of my personal obsessions and talk about…you got it…lip gloss.

Bobbi Brown High Shimmer Lip Gloss in Naked Plum

This February I’m wearing a Bobbi Brown favorite. Naked Plum High Shimmer Lip Gloss glides on with a rich and opaque soft mauve-purple that suits green-hazel eyes. With just the right touch of shimmer instead of lacquered shine, and a hint of peppermint, it’s perfectly kissable for the month of St. Valentine’s.

What are you kissing with this month?