Miracle on the Hudson- The Hero In All of Us

You know him. He's our new hero. Captain C.B. "Sully" Sullenberger, who, with a damn-you gleam in his eyes, put together luck and the impossible and saved the lives of all 155 passengers and crew of U.S. Airways Flight 1549 out of La Guardia.

Okay, so I'm only guessing. I don't know what he was thinking. I can only imagine, based on the little information I have. What I do know, though, is, he's a hero we will long remember.

But while all of New York and the national media are all but dancing with joy, Sully is conspicuously absent. Where is Sully? Well, it appears he's working. Who, after all, would be more deeply involved in the aftermath of the most successful ditching in history than the man who is not only an extremely experienced pilot but an air safety consultant?

We don't know a lot about who he is as a person. His family says he's very controlled, very professional. I suspect he's not particularly enthusiastic about all the attention he's getting, and wishes we'd just leave him alone to do his job. Possibly a pleasant,friendly guy, probably not modest, but also not self-aggrandizing. He's the kind of guy, I'm guessing, who believes he simply did his job, and knows there's plenty more to do.

Sorry, Sully, if we're embarrassing you. Because you really are a hero. You did your job, yes. You had the skills, yes. You also had a huge amount of luck on your side, we'll all agree. And you had the amazing spirit of first responders, passengers, and people who just happened to be there to pull people to safety in the few minutes available before the frigid air and water took its deadly toll. But you're the one who pulled it together. You're the linchpin. Without you, none of the rest would have mattered. You did a job that's never been done before in quite that way. A perfect job.

And everyone who has ever flown in an airplane, or seen one fly overhead, thanks you. You are our hero. Plain, pure, simple, and we will not forget.

But let's remember the other heroes, too. They were the people who saw tragedy coming and threw themselves quickly and wholeheartedly into doing whatever it took to save lives. We don't know all their names, but we know a lot of what they did.

The flight attendants who stood in the rear of the plane in frigid water as the tail sank, calmly making sure the passengers went forward instead of making the mistake of opening the tail exits. Imagine being them.
The off-duty pilots on board who helped people in exit rows get the exit doors open.
The passengers who kept their cool and and stayed quiet, who paid attention to instructions. That was all of them.
The passengers who deliberately set women and children before themselves.
The passengers who pulled some of those who had slipped into the water back onto the wings.
The ones who shared their clothing, or just helped others be a little warmer.
The ones who turned the flipped raft upright.
The passengers with medical experience who aided those with injuries.
The ferry boats/water taxis and FDNY who went immediately to the downed plane.
The ones who had the good sense to toss flotation devices into the water.
The ones who got passengers out of the water, off the wings, got them any way they could on board their vessels, wrapped them in warm blankets and hurried them to shore.
The divers who jumped into the frigid water to save a woman who would have had only minutes left to live.
Then went inside the plane to be sure no one was left behind, not knowing the captain and his co-pilot had not left the plane until they were sure everyone was out.
The responders on shore who offered medical attention and rushed passengers to hospitals.
The medical personnel who treated passengers who arrived, on both sides of the river.
The police officers who helped those who couldn't find friends and family find each other.
People who parted with garments so a wet, nearly frozen person could survive or be a little more comfortable.
Buses that transported groups of the survivors more quickly.
People who were quick with a joke or words of comfort and reassurance to lighten the fear and suffering.

Did I forget anyone? Certainly. I haven't heard all the stories. But the number of heroes in just plain staggering. All of them, just doing their jobs, but doing jobs that had suddenly become extraordinary, dangerous, requiring immense courage. How amazing and wonderful they all are.

I can imagine them, and what they must have done to help save lives, to help bring comfort, to help make connections. Yes, the spirit of New York, the same spirit we saw on 9/11, and it is beautiful. But even more, the spirit of human beings. We hear awful things every day, and there's so often good that goes unnoticed. But all our heroes this day have reminded us we all have something of the hero in us. Looky-loos often get maligned when they slow down or stop at an accident, but (and I do know there are people who are just plain greedy for gore) most of us look because if we can do something to help, we will. We just don't know what. We're usually helpless. On this day, though, even those who thought quickly and got pictures and videos have done the world a great service, letting the rest of us share in this wonderful triumph of human spirit.

So thank you, all those who went to the rescue, however small your role may have been. And thank you for reminding us of our humanity, and that it can make a difference.

And thank you, Sully. The calm and capable master of the impossible.

I Love a Swashbuckler

Captain Jack in my bedroom! Oh my! Oh, my fainting heart!

I know, get off it. This is an excellent example of the difference between reality and fantasy that so many scoffers of romance think women confuse. I know perfectly well this is Johnny Depp in Captain Jack costume. No, to be really real, this is a cardboard image of Johnny Depp in costume, and this is not even my bedroom. It's my office/guest room, which is ridiculously over-crowded with insignificant things such as six-foot tall cardboard renditions of my favorite Swashbuckler. And no, I didn't steal him from the theater. Jack was given to me by a friend who stole him from a theater, although she will not admit that to this day. Unfortunately for Jack, she grew tired of a six-foot tall piece of cardboard taking up space in her office, and discovered her imaginary heroes did more for her than a real, physical chunk of cardboard. (Bow your head in shame, Diana.) This is also why Jack is propped against the closet door of the least-used room in my house. (Most of my work is actually done in my bedroom, but Jack is not actually welcome there, since another somewhat more live male also inhabits that room.)

I've always had this thing for the Swashbucklers. Errol Flynn in all his movies. Harrison Ford in Star Wars. Robin Hood, who was a bit of a crossover, but still fully SB. Maybe it's the swords and arrows. They are pretty phallic, you know. Sure, you can have a modern Swashbuckler, because it's all really a matter of mentality, but I gravitate toward those of the previous centuries. The Earl of Uxbridge (Marquess of Anglesey after Waterloo) was clearly a Swashbuckler. He was also much handsomer than this, but he shows his SB nature more clearly here. Uxbridge had other strong SB characteristics, which became evident when he eloped with Wellington's sister-in-law, which got him banned from his favorite SB sport, the Peninsular War. But it was his sweetheart who was ruined. He eventually got back in the game, and was a major hero at Waterloo. He led a famous charge, but later while simply sitting astride his horse next to Wellington, had his leg blown off. In typical SB style, he said, "By God, I believe I've lost my leg." Wellington, equally the adventurer, responded, "By God, sir, I believe you have."

The Earl of Uxbridge by Hamilton Smith

The pure SB, as Tami Cowden, Caro LaFever and Sue Viders tell us in their book, The Complete Guide to Heroes & Heroines: Sixteen Master Archetypes, lives for adventure. He's fearless, exciting and capable. But he's also unreliable- too busy swashbuckling to remember to pick up the kids at day care, fool-hardy and selfish. The very idea that his heroine might want him to bring home a paycheck from a desk job is offensive. He'll promise all the emeralds from the next booty, but when you inform him emeralds don't usually come with booty these days, he'll just tell you it's all the emeralds or nothing. You'll just have to wait until the emeralds come along. And you can be pretty sure he means it. What our pure SB needs to be a really worthy hero is a very large dose of reality and empathy. But then he'd be a different kind of hero.

The straight SB can get boring in a hurry. No problem for him, of course, because he's almost always ready to move on before his heroine is. In real life, I get tired of these guys very quickly. They're as cardboard as Captain in the corner of the least-used room. Psychiatric diagnosis is probably Severe Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Add an addiction to danger and excitement and inability to form healthy relationships. Sorry, not my hero. Cardboard is flat and collapses in the middle.

Hedwig and Ivo by Dopler

But in fiction as well as real life, most of our best SB heroes are crossovers with other types. They may be off to the New World to tackle pirates or sink the French like Lord Nelson, but their relationships mean something to them. They'll make it back to Kiddieland before closing time, maybe even trade their beloved chronograph for groceries if the ship sank and starvation of their family is imminent. These are the men who very literally give their lives for others, especially those they love. He doesn't have to be a pirate or lead the charge at Waterloo. He can find his great adventure in exploring Africa or beneath the lens of a microscope. He is a seeker. But the ones we love most also seek love and relationships. Their hearts call for humanity.

And then-- what happens when the time comes and our great Swashbuckling Hero must reach for his sword? And what if he knows doing so will cost him the True Love he's always desired and needed? What if he loses his life, and leaves her alone? That's the essence of his conflict. And because he is who he is, we know his decision could go either way. Or because he is so daring, his solution could be something beyond our wildest imagination.

Maybe that's why I love a Swashbuckler so much. Anything could happen.

I Need a Hero- Why?

The Vigil, ca. 1884, by Scottish artist John Pettie

I discovered hero worship very early in life. I can't say exactly when, but I do know I was actually walking by the time I realized I had a hero. He was tall, blond, with big, round brown eyes. He was strong. He could pull me in his wagon, or when I got stuck trying to get down from the couch and my little legs dangled precipitously far from the floor, he could lift me down to safety. He was smart. He taught me things. He could count, and he knew all the letters, and he even taught me the first letters of my own name. And nobody could color like he could.

The parts I don't remember, my mom told me, so I know this is the truth. One day, my older brother took crayons and coloring books and we got down on the floor to color. With great swooping strokes across the page, he made magnificent pictures from those bland black lines on white paper, and in awe, I tried to emulate him. Crayon in my pudgy little right hand, I swooped green stripes over the page. But they were so clumsy-- so-- wrong.

Carefully, I studied my hero to try to discern his secret. Somehow, I could see, his streaks were going in a different direction. Where his crossed the page at one angle, mine were the other way. How did he do that?

Then I saw it. Of course. How dumb of me. In my naive child's logic, I realized my hero was using his left hand, and I was using the wrong hand. Then, very deliberately, my mom said, I moved the crayon from right hand to left, and continued coloring, with my green streaks crossing the page just like my hero's. And mom always said that was why both my older brother and I are left-handed, to this day.

My first hero is still my hero, and my younger brother John eventually also received hero status (although he had to first grow up before his fine qualities could be recognized since he was, after all, YOUNGER. More about him and his amazing abilities another time.) But I learned heroes can come in many forms.

Eventually heroes often became romantic heroes, but the basis for all my heroes is the same. They have to be someone I can admire. In some way. Someone who has some way of making life better. More exciting. That's the tricky thing when it comes to romance, because like most readers/writers, I love a dark hero maybe even more than the shining knight.

It was a sad point in my life when I began to realize heroes all have flaws. But that was something I also quickly learned to accept as I realized this is the one tie they have to all humanity. The Lone Ranger was an early fantasy hero for me. Then I began to realize I didn't exactly like the way he treated Tonto. But he was who he was in his time, and like many a man before him (and he really was a man behind that mask, even I knew that) he hadn't reached the point of realization about prejudice yet. You can't realize what you don't know. Sad to say, the great Bringer of Justice For All missed his own point. But his point was still valid. The quest for justice and fairness is sometimes elusive, but something worth seeking even if the hero didn't quite get there.

You might have noticed, the photo of my brother and me is taken aboard a 19th century ship. It's the Surprise, from "Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World." Surprise is a replica, not a restored ship, purpose-built for the movies, and it now sits in San Diego Harbor as a museum piece. My brother, despite his desperate need to finish some unexpected work the weekend I visited, knew how badly I wanted to see the ship. Hard though it was, we managed to squeeze in an extra hour right before my plane departed. Wow, three heroes in one! Make that four, even more! In addition to Dave, there was Russell Crowe, all the heroes of the Aubrey-Maturin heroes of Patrick O'Brian's novels, and then Admiral Nelson and his great battle against Napoleon's fleet at Trafalgar. If there had been no Nelson, no Trafalgar, there would have been no basis for O'Brian's novels, for that battle was a huge turning point in world history. The testosterone was overflowing the decks.

Imagine me leaning over the glass of this battle replica, seeing in my mind the battle at exactly this point, explaining to my brother Nelson's great audacity in sailing directly at the French lines to break them, knowing the placement of the French guns is both their greatest strength and greatest weakness, and at exactly this point (my finger dares to actually touch the protecting glass) his flagship is in great danger...

He was impressed. He wasn't all that familiar with the history of this moment and how it changed the world, or that ropes aren't ropes but lines, that they would have been tarred to protect them from weathering, or that sailors were called tars because tar was what covered everything, and sailing ships aren't actually romantic at all, despite the obvious fact that they are. But I saw something different.

I was realizing exactly at this moment why I need heroes. At this very moment, all my heroes had converged into one. They were a grand abstract, a being above and beyond all of them, all one and indivisible, yet all unique and separately outstanding.

For all their flaws and humanness, heroes lead us forward. They reach into the darkness for a light they cannot see. For me, even the darkest hero must rise above the crowd in some way that makes me see more, want more, reach higher. In this way, they all are Alpha, no matter what else they might be. They change the world, or they change one person. They make something, somewhere, better.

So I need heroes. I might prefer mine wearing a Coldstream Guards uniform and fighting with desperate fury at Hougoumont at Waterloo, and you might want yours in a wetsuit, but they're all the same in one special way. Fictional or real, they give off sparks as they reach toward the unknown. They make life shine.

Great Expectations or, But What About My Marriage?

Maggie Jaimeson, a.k.a Maggie McVay-Lynch, President of Rose City Romance Writers and published author of non-fiction while daringly also throwing her hat into the romance fiction ring, got into this mess, uh, was forced to blog- well, let's just say she asked a question, so I asked her to answer it for us. She kindly assented after really minimal arm-twisting, and here's the result.

You can check Maggie and her books out at her website here:
http://www.maggiejaimeson.com/

and her blog here:
http://maggies-meanderings.blogspot.com/

As a reward to herself for finishing a book, Maggie makes herself a "faux" cover for it. You can see her covers below. As a reward for Maggie for being my first daring blogger, I made her a "faux" cover for this blog. You can reward Maggie by dropping by and reading what she has to say, and arguing or agreeing with her thoughts. It's a really interesting question, and a thoughtful answer. (Unlike my punny faux cover).(And no, Maggie doesn't write Georgians.)


Great Expectations: What About My Marriage?

I have been a romance reader since about the age of eleven or twelve. I began with the gothics by Victoria Holt and Phyllis Whitney in my youth. Thank goodness in those days there wasn't a lot of sex to worry or confused the rather sheltered adolescent I was. In High School I joined a couple of the Harlequin book clubs and had my eight books a month to devour. In college, I would occasionally pick up a romance at the bookstore but they were no longer the category ones. They tended to be what is now called Women's Fiction. But more often I would pick up a Science Fiction book because I was taken with the exchange of ideas. Then there was a long period of time, about 15 years when I didn't read a romance at all. I returned in my fifties to find, to my great delight, that the romance genre had changed drastically and I could now combine my desire for a mystery or SF story with a romance.

As I have watched the divorce rates rise, and have been divorced and remarried myself, I've wondered how my early upbringing with romance novels may have impacted my expectations of marriage. When I see many women today, young and old alike, choosing not to marry (either choosing to live with a partner or to retain independent households even when they are in committed relationships) I've often wondered if the romance genre or any media portrayal of romance has had a negative impact on our ability to be satisfied in a romantic relationship. Have we set the expectations too high? Are novels and media so powerful as to make us dysfunctional? Or is it the dysfunctional who seek out the salve of unrealistic love?

I came of age in the late 1960's and early 1970's with the rise of feminism. In that era there was a great deal of discussion about the portrayal of women in fairy tales as magical figures who are often defined by beauty, danger, innocence, malice, and greed. Researchers called fairy and folk tales the primary source of information about a culture, and argued that humans cannot help acting out roles taught to them by these tales, which specify gendered romantic roles. Because women are depicted as either evil or saintly, the real terror of fairy tales lies in the romantic message--that is, a woman who is not passive, innocent, and helpless must then be evil. And I still find that these fairy tale type roles continue to be the primary images of women in movies and TV. I believe those early romance novels I read also reflected those fairy tale gender roles. Women were usually innocent and men were experienced. Women were passive and men were the leaders.

Though our novels have now changed to reflect more equal gender roles, romance novels still serve as a powerful source of expectations about love relationships. For the most part, romance novels still depict "alpha" heroes. That is take charge men who are larger than life and, of course, physically perfect. Though many novels have "wounded" heroes, they are still able to overcome their pasts and be amazingly whole, particularly in their relationships with their romantic partner. Yes, it is true that now the female protagonists are also take charge women who are larger than life and, at least in the heroe's eyes, physically perfect. I must admit, for myself, though I can be just as interested as younger women in the spectacularly masculine phallic power, for me what really truns me on is the hero's capacity for tenderness, self-reflection, and attentive concern.

When I look at my own marriage, particularly if we've had a bad day together or a bad week, I know I often wonder why my DH isn't more like the romance heroes I read. Why can't he rise above the banality of every day life? Why can't he put aside whatever perceived perturbance ruined his day and still worship the ground I walk on? Or for that matter, does he ever worship the ground I walk on? Uh, I don't think so. On the other hand, often when reading a book with a strong alpha hero I also know there is absolutely NO WAY I could have a long term relationship with that type of man. In fact, it is when my DH acts like those typical alpha heroes -- the I-can't-see-past-my-immediate-needs behavior that I want to walk out the door. So both in the novel and in real life I find that my expectations and the clash of reality and fantasy certainly set up a strong cognitive dissonance for me.

In 1991, Shapiro (a researcher and marriage counselor) did a large survey on the impact of media images around romance and, as expected, she found that respondents with more unrealistic beliefs about romantic love reported significantly less satisfaction with their current relationship than those who endorsed more realistic views. There was a statistically significant trend for married women who reported more exposure to popular media to rate themselves as less satisfied with their current intimate relationships. No significant differences were found based on age. Granted her study included all media, not just romance novels. But still...it makes me wonder.

I've found a way to embrace that dissonance in my life. Perhaps it is a matter of age and perhaps it is a matter of having been married before and so entering the next relationship with different expectations. However, I do still want more. I do still want and expect some of what I read in romance novels. A part of that expectation is that things are bigger, better, get resolved faster and that makeup sex is amazing. Sometimes I get it. Often I don't. I think that's the way life is and if it was perfect all the time I would probably not recognize it or take it for granted. Maybe having high expectations is a good thing. Maybe it makes both of us strive for more. Who knows?

Do you feel that romance novels set up unrealistic expectations for your relationships? If so, how do you bring yourself down to earth? How do you manage to be satisfied in the long term? If you believe that the romance depicted in the novels is, in fact, not only possible but probable then please share how you've seen that reinforced in your own relationships. Happy reading!

The Gentleman Wore Lace

When I think of a contemporary man wearing lace, the immediate image that comes to mind is of my very Alpha step-son. Strong-jawed, tanned, six-foot-four, muscle-rippling and lean as a fence post, you'd get a fist in the face if you tried to force him into a dandy's cravat, not to even consider the thick ruffs of lace so prized by gentlemen in the 16th and 17th Centuries. He's no wimp.

But masculinity was not always expressed by T shirts and billed caps with Mariners emblems prominently displayed. And although we understand suits of armor, chain mail (really should be called just mail) and 19th Century military uniforms decorated with miles of gold braid (called lace), some male clothing of the past really makes us wonder. Were the European aristocratic men of the early modern age "wusses", as my step-son would call them?
When you look at their portraits, you can clearly see the arrogance and great pride in their silk hose, velvet doublets. And lace. Just how many yards of lace did they manage to cram into those incredible ruffs, anyway?

Actually that was exactly their point. How much lace could they wear at any given time?

The man you see in this engraving is Sir Christopher Hatton, a distant relative of mine, who was Lord Chancellor of England and a favorite of Queen Elizabeth I. Although he does bear a strong resemblance to my youngest brother, I'm not bragging about him, though- he was utterly villainous. So he's not hero material.
But he was a very powerful person in his day, and there is no question that the Queen owed much of her success in staying on the throne through her long reign to him. Villain he might be, but he's no wuss. either.

It all goes back to the instinct for survival, one of the most basic of all drives. For all the written history of Europe, masculinity has been about power. Survival has been about power, which was largely about the accumulation of wealth and the conspicuous display of it. To survive a famine, one needed a great stockpile of food. To survive winter, a warm shelter was needed. To survive in the face of danger, the shelter needed to be secure. Such strength also meant survival for his family, clan, or country as well, and so the stronger male attracted more attention from females than a weaker one. Display of wealth became an aid to securing female interest just as surely as brightly colored males in many species of birds. So status symbols have been important to males for a very long time. We love luxury because it automatically triggers thoughts of safety, filled stomachs and solid roofs over our heads.

Take a look at today's economy, and you can see just how much the bottom line of survival means to people, even now. And never in history did money so strongly represent survival. Today most of us can't go live in the woods and shoot deer to stay alive. Money is the currency of survival. Money is power.

Although the precursors of lace go far back into the Middle Ages and perhaps even longer, true lace as we know it did not come into fashion until the 16th Century, when it suddenly exploded into popularity. Being full of holes, lace doesn't keep one warm, so only someone who has no worries about the supply of firewood can afford to dress in it. And it was very expensive, for the intricate designs require hundreds of hours of labor. Some forms of lace can take a full month of long hours of labor to produce a single inch, in length, and only a few inches wide. Going back to my ancestor's portrait, I made a guess on the amount of lace in his ruff, which I figure has about 50 folds of lace, times 2, close to 3.5 inches deep. That's 350 inches of lace, over 9 yards or 28 feet. And we said a month to make each inch of it? What would some manufactured piece in today's market cost us if it took a hundred thousand hours to make?

As the European world emerged from Medieval times, England in particular experienced an enormous surge in personal wealth. A building boom, along with the building of ships to sail to the New World and defend the English shores helped denude the country of its trees. And everywhere, men sought to display to the world their success. What better way than on their own bodies?

If the wearing of lace tells the world a man is wealthy, then the more lace a man could wear, the more powerful and wealthier he would be in the eyes of beholders. Flat lace collars gave way to ruffles of lace, which in turn became more deeply and densely ruffled to the point where no more lace could physically be packed into the ruff. Cuffs were the same. Stealing and smuggling lace makers, then lace patterns and secrets of production into England became a thriving business. But as costs lowered, its great popularity also led to its eventual fall from favor. By the early 19th Century, gentlemen had found other ways to display their wealth, such as watches dangling on gold chains and decorated with not one but several fobs. And the lace ruff became merely the descendant of the dandy's elaborate linen cravat.

Today, you're lucky to get a hero to wear a tie. The open shirt look that is common even in the business office today would cause fainting by being viewed by more fragile women of an earlier day. But in the 16th through 19th Century a bared neck was not just scandalous, it was the symbol of a man who was so poor he couldn't afford to keep his own throat warm. And did women care? You bet they did. Those were the days when very few women had any way to make a viable income of their own, no matter how hard they worked. Nor could they hope future generations would prosper if they did not actually produce a future generation, and one with enough financial security that it could hope to do well.

No, the gentleman who wore lace was not effeminate. He was in fact the Alpha male of his day, as strongly masculine as any man in history.

Got 'Em!

Need I say anything? Okay,you twisted my arm. My first Samhain author copies,for APHRODITE'S BREW! And there I am in my sweats, and you even get to see how I look without a spot of makeup. But at least I'm not wearing my dorky computer glasses, and the books outshine me so that's just fine! Already got two promised out, too.

Delle

Haddon Hall: The Hall That Made a Man Into a Hero

I confess. I stole Haddon Hall. I whisked it away, stone by stone and beam by rafter, and moved it to a setting of my own, nestled in the crook of a river that looks suspiciously like the River Wye. Yes, I hoped to hide my crime by moving a few walls and making them taller. I moved the kitchen and added odd staircases and privies, and a portcullis. I even gave it a new name, Steynes Hall, and a new owner, Thomas Steynes, Viscount Savoury, whose ancestors I also invented. But I could not disguise it enough, as I discovered when I went to England.


If it weren't for Haddon Hall, I probably wouldn't have made the trip. True, there were hundreds of places in England I have always wanted to see, but that was the real problem. Too many places, and no way to decide which ones I was willing to pass up. But when I began to write LADY WICKED, a Golden Heart winning story, I discovered Haddon Hall as a possible model setting. And the more I learned, the more I was fascinated. It became the one place I had to see. It became the place that would change my hero from an aimless rake to a man with purpose, destiny and love.

Before we left, my friend Margo, who went with me, read my manuscript to see Steynes Hall first in her imagination, and then go to Haddon Hall to see for herself if I got it right. My son Andy, our companion and driver, had also read parts of the book and probably wanted to know why his mom could get so excited about old buildings. I wanted to know both if I "got it right" and if the old buildings were as wonderful as I believed, but also if my alterations were really possible.

I'm not going to take you into the history of the hall, nor show most of its most famous sites. For that you can go to the official Web site, http://www.haddonhall.co.uk/. And on my website, www.dellejacobs.com, I have posted some more pictures and an account of the story behind the pages of LADY WICKED.

Now, come and cross with me the busy road from the car park (taking your life in your hands) to the entrance gate. Once past the gate, we enter a different world, a pastoral world with sheep grazing alongside a tiny, shallow river. Beside the river on the left, I had hoped to see a small stone cottage that once stood there, the one that would have been Davina's home that she rented from my hero. But it is gone now. Or it may be that the artist who did the engraving placed the still-standing cottage below the stables in a slightly different location. Back then, artists often re-arranged scenes for artistic purposes. Standing on the ancient stone bridge, we look up on the hill ahead to the gray stone of the walled manor that is Haddon Hall. It seems to me my hero had a steeper climb when he left his sweetheart's cottage to return to his hall.

I gave his hall an ancient, rusting portcullis that he had to tie up to keep it from falling on people. Haddon Hall has no such gate, but instead has two wooden gates, the outer one with a small door within one of the bigger doors, that would admit only one person at a time. I like my portcullis and try to imagine where it would have been.

Once past the gate passage, we come to a row of uneven, worn, stone steps set at right angles to the building, and leading to the sloping, paved courtyard. There's the lantern tower where Savoury would go to look out over his land, but I see immediately that the artist who gave it that name was wrong. It's a bell tower for the chapel. We sit inside the tiny chapel, surrounded by quiet serenity, and try to picture the color that must have enlivened the tracery and paintings on the walls. The bell chimes the noon hour. It is a warm, mellow, welcoming sound, like open arms set to music.

Now, here's a surprise that's not in the story. See Margo standing in the stone doorway? She's all of five foot nothing tall. It's commonly thought men of Medieval times were pretty small compared to today, so does that explain the really low lintel? Well, first, they weren't all that small after all, at least not the upper class of Norman descent. And second, most of the passageways and doors are at least as high as modern doorways, or considerably higher (especially where horses or wagons might have to pass). Why this one so low, then? I didn't know until I got home and looked through my research. This outer range of rooms lying on the downhill slope was there before the courtyard was paved. At first it was just a wall, and then chambers built along it. The very steep slope had to be filled in before the stone paving could be laid, but it couldn't be completely leveled or the windows and doors would be buried, and there is no access outside tha walls. So they compromised, ending up with very low entrances and more gently sloping courtyard. It's very weird walking on sloping pavers, but it's a marvelous example of Medieval practical engineering. And although I didn't write this little doorway into my story, I did try hard to capture the essence of the four hundred years of building and evolving architecture.

The hall to the left of the entrance is so dramatic, we can't help but go there. That's Margo on the left. And here's an old engraving showing how it would have looked to Savoury when he walked with Davina in the courtyard in the moonlight.

My next surprise is inside the Great Hall. I had pictured a huge, cavernous place like a cathedral. But it isn't that big. And the ringing footsteps I imagined are muted instead, the sound absorbed by wood-paneled walls and a grasscloth-like carpet to protect the floor. In the hall's dim light, I can't tell if the floor is stone or wood, but I anxiously hurry on, to see as much as I can in the short time we have here. So I don't really get much of a picture of Savoury and his Davina when they almost kissed in the dark shadows of the hall.

In the far corner, steps worn by the passage of thousands of footfalls over time take us up to the Great Chamber, and on to the breathtaking Long Gallery. But before we go there, take a look at the gates at the base of the stairs. Dog gates, to keep the dogs downstairs. Fewer fleas in the beds that way. There is no dog in my story until the last chapter. But see the missing slats in the lattice? I can see Daisy as just the kind of dog who would have seen to their demise in order to get to her people.

Up the stairs, now, and to the left to the Long Gallery. You can see this bright, beautiful, long room on the Haddon Hall Web site. I'm choosing instead to show you one of the lovely small bays. Savoury's Elizabethan ancestors would have spent many a dreary winter day walking here, with ambient light pouring through the many windows on each side. Here he hung the paintings he and Davina treasured. Some of the glass in this lovely square bay is only 4 mm thick. Several windows in the house have some stained glass, especially in the chapel, and many rooms have glass set in intricate patterns. The hall is also known for its wonderful collection of tapestries, but these are difficult to photograph because they must be kept in low light environments to help preserve them.

Now, a quick dash back through the hall, back to the kitchen on its far side. This is where you roast an ox whole! But for Savoury, it was the bane of his existence, for nothing he could do could make the kitchen chimneys draw. He built a new kitchen, much as the real owners of Haddon Hall turned the stable into their modern kitchen and arranged a tram-like device to carry the food up the hill to their dining chamber.

In his efforts to make his hall livable, Savoury found an ancient, very narrow passage (near these stone stairs) hidden between two stone walls, and in cleaning it out, he found a single small shoe, and he began to think of the generations who had lived in this house before him. They had never mattered before. Now they began to walk with him in the mists of night, and he began to feel for the first time that he belonged to them and this hall, the place he wanted to share with his love.

Now we go out to the gardens where Savoury and his love walked and made love in the moonlight. Savoury had the advantage of the more modern gardens you see here, for Davina had a knack for growing things. The fountain is 20th century, but it seems so much a part of the hall, it's hard to believe it hasn't been there for a few hundred years.

Last, look over the garden wall with me, down the valley at Dorothy Vernon's Bridge, where that famous ancestor of the Manners family is said to have passed when she eloped with her love, John Manners. Maybe, maybe not. But she seems sort of like the shades of Savoury's ancestors who walked with him in the moonlight, who taught him about heritage and belonging, as did his marvelous, frustrating hall that demanded so much of him but gave him everything he really needed in return, including his love.

So now I've seen where Savoury and Davina walked, lived and loved. And along with his home, purloined though it was, I have a newer, deeper appreciation of my hero. Someday I'll go back to England in search of more heroes and their places. But I doubt if there will ever be any in my mind to equal the sense of being I found at Haddon Hall.

Yes, that's the heroine on my imaginary cover, standing before Dorothy Vernon's Bridge, and yes, the title refers to a woman. But like so many romances, the story is really the hero's story because Lord Savoury is the one who finds himself, his home, his place in the world, and his love. Though their story is still unpublished, I believe someday it will find its home where everyone can read it.