The Stewart Kings as Tolkien's Stewards of Gondor? And A Flintlock Fantasy Review

Fun Fact: James I of Scotland, was captured by pirates in 1406 (James was 11 years old). The pirates turned him over to Henry IV (played by Jeremy Irons in The Hollow Crown Series). (He was the first Plantagenet to speak English as his first language). James' father, Robert III, died and the uncrowned king of Scotland remained in captivity for 18 years. He fought with Henry V (played by Tom Hiddleston in The Hollow Crown Series) in France (see last week's post), and married Joan Beaufort just before his release in 1424. His re-entry into Scottish affairs was anything but smooth. He began by attacking his closest rival kinsmen to secure his position. He was eventually assassinated in February 1437. Joan was wounded but escaped to their son, James II, at Edinburgh Castle. James II was six years old. As for the assassination details, James and Joan were at Blackfriars monastery at Perth, and were at least temporarily separated from their servants. When the conspirators (about 30) entered the building, James learned of the conspirators' presence and attempted to escape through the sewer drain, but the drain, which passed beneath the tennis court, had been blocked off to prevent the loss of tennis balls (apparently on James' own orders a few days earlier). Double fault for James--Advantage murderers; I believe this was the first tennis related fatality, and it raised quite a stink.

James II was actually the younger of twin brothers. The older twin, Alexander, had died before his first birthday. James II was crowned in 1437. In 1449 the nineteen year-old married Mary of Guelders, the daughter of the Duke of Gelderland (Check this out for a dance of Gelderland). James II was nicknamed Fiery Face because of a vermilion birthmark upon his face. This is the same James that, as I mentioned I don't know how long ago, stabbed William Douglas 26 times and threw him out of a window. James II was a proponent of artillery and was killed in 1460 while besieging Roxburgh Castle when a cannon near which he was standing exploded. His son, James III was killed in 1488 either during or after the battle of Sauchieburn. James IV, son of James III was --- actually, he deserves his own fun fact post.

The above led me to consider whether the Stewart kings might be good candidates as real-life models for Tolkien's Stewards of Gondor in The Lord of the Rings. Previously I had speculated about the Kings of Numenor as the Plantagenets. Not only did I suggest that there was probably no merit to that idea at the time. I've since been reminded that Tolkien was not a big fan of the French and eschewed French terms in his writing. The true kings to represent Aragorn and his predecessors could not be the Plantagenets. As to the Stewarts for Stewards, probably the only similarity is in the similar spelling of Steward, and the Stewart spelling of Stuart.

If there's no similarity, why do I even bring it up? Well, there might be more good reasons that I haven't taken the time to consider. This all started with a fun fact about another royal person being captured by pirates and I arrived to this point by chance. I should have thought more about it before I posed the question. So I may come back to this another time. In the meantime, the lesson is that history is certainly as interesting as fiction, and fiction with some basis in history may make for the most interesting reading.

Such a statement naturally leads me to an update on the progress of my alternate history flintlock fantasy Clamorous Harbingers, book 3 in the Tomahawks and Dragon Fire Series. Here's another piece of the cover.

I have passed the 85,500 word mark. It looks like about 100K words at the finish. I had thought about writing the ending and working to it, but did not do that. I'm glad I didn't choose that option because some new ideas have emerged about exactly how the book (and the series) will end. I like the new ideas. The end will be an ever bigger spectacle than I had originally planned--and it will set up the successor series, tentatively called Wings of Rebellion.

Last time I offered some constructive criticism for authors doing readings of their books. Here's me reading the first chapter of Threading the Rude Eye -- and it's obvious to me that I learned almost nothing from my own instructions.

And here's the last third of the chapter, as I didn't realize that I wasn't pausing the video, but actually terminating it. I had to create second video to finish.

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Finally, last time I did a short review of a book so distasteful to me that I didn't name either the book or the author. I continued my search for more flintlock fantasy, and I am pleased to praise a book today. Old Nathan by David Drake.

The book is a series of sequential short stories about Old Nathan, the cunning man. (I had to wonder if it was a source of inspiration for DJ Butler's and Aaron Michael Ritchey's The Cunning Man). The dialog is written to reflect the Tennessee back woods manner of speech at the time (I guess). It was a little off-putting, but not difficult to follow, and I got used to it fairly quickly. Old Nathan has some interesting abilities which include speaking with animals and creating various spells for given situations. Each story reveals more about Nathan and his history, as well as his neighbors and their problems. Nathan and his bull Spanish King have similar story arcs, which helps prepare the reader for the rather foreseeable conclusion, but the desire to see how it happens presses one to finish the tales.

The book came up in my flintlock fantasy search, but the flintlock rifle doesn't play much of a role. Nevertheless, I wasn't disappointed. I noticed several 1, 2, and 3 star reviews on Amazon. Interestingly enough, one of the 1 star reviews called it "very good" and gave it other compliments. Perhaps that reader doesn't understand the rating system. Most of the complaints were about the dialect, so it may bother some more than others. I rate it four out of five powder horns. It's still available for FREE on Amazon.

Plantagenets as Kings of Numenor?

Fun Facts: Henry V, King of England (and claimant to the throne of France via Edward III) and Charles VI (actual King of France) agreed by the Treaty of Troyes (May 1420) that upon the death of Charles VI, Henry V and his heirs would receive the French crown. Unfortunately, both of these kings died in 1422, and Charles VI (who was given to bouts of madness) survived Henry V by two months. Henry's infant son, Henry VI (son of Henry V and Catherine of Valois--Charles VI's daughter) then became King of England and King of France, and everyone lived happily ever after--not quite. Charles VII was still in France and he had supporters who did not recognize the Treaty of Troyes. Of course, the English were still in France, as were the Burgundians who were allied with the English. These enemy forces occupied much of northern France - including Paris, and Rhiems which was the traditional place for the crowing of the French kings. Enter Joan of Arc. Under her spiritual leadership, the French lifted the siege of Orleans, and took back several other places, crushing the English in the Battle of Patay--the French equivalent to the Battle of Agincourt. The French marched to Rheims and crowned Charles VII king. The Burgundians later captured Joan of Arc at Compiegne (one of my favorite places), and turned her over to the English who invited her to the to be the barbecue in May 1431. The Burgundians eventually left the alliance with the British and no French princes recognized Henry VI's claim as King of France. Over another decade or two, the French drove the English completely from France, with the lone exception of Calais.

Why the overlong and tedious history lesson? The actual reason is because over the last few weeks I re-watched The Hollow Crown series which comprises Shakespeare's Richard II, Henry IV parts 1 and 2; and Henry V. Naturally, that got me to thinking about the actual history, and one fact leads to another, and for every sentence I included in that little synopsis, there were hundreds that I did not. I was tempted to go all Dan Carlin's Hardcore History on it and go back to Edward III and creep forward from there. I'm disappointed that I don't have the time for that, and you probably don't have the attention span to read it anyway, but there are a lot of really cool and interesting things I left out. Maybe I'll come back to some of them sometime. Anyway, I hit upon a what if. What if Tolkien in The Lord of the Rings loosely modeled his Kings of Numenor upon the Plantagenets, and the Tudor Kings and their successors were the mere Stewards of Gondor until the real kings returned? Suppose Calais is represented Minis Ithil, making the Anduin a stand-in for the channel.

I just did a search and couldn't find anyone else making that connection. I'm sure there's a reason for that. The reason being that there's no merit to the idea. It is, however, interesting to consider. Learning about Tolkien's service in WWI and the conditions in the trenches and shell holes etc., certainly makes me think he incorporated some of that in his description of Frodo and Sam's journey through Mordor. So is it unreasonable to speculate upon him borrowing a bit of the history of English succession for his mythology?

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As for my own battle against the blank page and the growing mythology of my alternative history flintlock fantasy, I've broken 83,500 words--make that broken, bent, mangled, wrecked, strangled, beaten, brutalized, and misused that number of words. Of course, the word count is slightly less than that number because I keep my notes reminding me of things to include in upcoming parts of the story and notes on things to go back and edit all at the end of my current place in the book, so those notes are always easy to find. I was aiming for 90K words. I think I will exceed that, but I'm still hoping to remain under 100K words for completion of the book.

Here's a partial cover reveal for Clamorous Harbingers:

It's a departure from the flame motif that I used on the first two books in the series, and a little darker than the tone of the book actually merits, but I made a command decision and now I'll ride that decision into the ground.

I have to finish the book soon, because I've got another novel working in my head that I need to move on before the ideas grow weary of waiting and catch the bus to that land populated entirely by the great ideas that I never acted upon. I did write a couple thousand words on it during the week, but that was just to get it started. When I woke up one morning the ideas were banging on my brainpan for attention, demanding the respect of being converted into writing, so I wrote the opening scene which included four important characters. It's a cross country swashbuckling adventure.

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Speaking of riding things into the ground (I know that was an entire paragraph ago, but I added the intervening paragraph after I wrote this), the Corsican Brothers graced us with their presence and forced us to ride the 4 wheeler all over the west 40 again this week. They even wore jeans instead of shorts, so I could tell they were serious about wanting to ride. It was the first thing they requested when they came through the door. Unlike last week, the machine fired up right away. I still had to jump-start it, but the process went quickly and smoothly this time. I was also helped by the fact that I put gas in it before I tried to start it this time.

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As for the skirmish game, I think I've hit upon the proper modification to the grappling rules, but I didn't get to play test them. I also came up with an idea for handling a minefield, and another for calling in artillery and air strikes.

I've seen a number of authors on fb reading their books. I've found them really awful for the most part. My advice is as follows: Raise your laptop or webcam up so that it's level with your face. I don't want to look up your nose or have you looking down at me the whole time. Second, practice reading before you go live--better yet, don't go live. Record it and post it after you've watched it, and maybe deleted that first effort and made a second or third recording.  I mention this because I thought about reading some samples from my books and posting them online. I watched myself on the webcam and determined that as bad as those other authors look--I look worse, even withe the webcam raised to be level with my face. I decided to use a cover of the book I'm reading instead of my own made-for-radio face. The learning didn't stop there. I learned that I need practice reading the female parts. The female voice I did during the practice recording sounded like a chain-smoking old lady with a bad cold. My wife will verify that I'm being too generous to myself with that description--but she's not here to stop me, so I'll describe it as I will. Anyway, I'm hoping to read and post a chapter or two this week. We'll see. Maybe one of my friends will send me a sample of them reading from one of my books.

Fun fact: Julius Caesar was captured by pirates at the age of 25. To clarify, Caesar was 25. I don't know how old the pirates were. The story goes that when the pirates told Caesar the ransom to be paid for his release, he told them that they didn't know who they had captured, and he voluntary doubled the ransom. Apparently he promised the pirates, whom he treated rather disrespectfully, that he would see them all crucified after he was released. His friends returned with the ransom and the pirates released him. He was not a general at this time, but he raised a fleet and sailed back to the island where the pirates had remained. He captured the pirates and charged them two dollars each for their freedom--in other words, a buck an ear. No. He didn't release them. He imprisoned them and asked the local governor to execute them. When the governor proved reluctant, Caesar had them crucified on his own. Some sources indicate that being merciful, he had their throats cut before their crucifixion. That story begs for a funny punchline, but I'm not seeing it. Maybe you can tell me the punchline.

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Writing Progress: Did I mention that Book 3 of the Tomahawks and Dragon Fire series has a title? If I didn't, it does. Even if I did, it does. The title by which it shall be known, now and forever, or until I change my mind, is: Clamorous Harbingers. Yes, in keeping with the theme of the titles in the series, it is from Shakespeare. In this case it's from a line in Macbeth. I may post the line later. I will. I'm sure I will.

I know. Clamorous Harbingers sounds like the name of a really bad band. If you glance at the title without reading it too carefully, you could misread it as Glamorous Hamburgers. The misreading might make for an entertaining and eye-watering treat. (DYSWIDT?)

As for the actual progress, I don't know precisely how many words I've got into it so far because I've used a copy of Book 2 as a template, deleting an old chapter every time I'm ready to start a new chapter. (The answer if 72,337 words, precisely. I wasn't happy with that inadequate response, so I did a text selection to the end of the new material to get an exact count). I am currently finishing chapter 17. I think I have 5 to 8 chapters left, with my chapters coming in between 3,000 and 10,000 words, but most average around 5,000 words. The end is in sight--and it's even better than a sharp stick in the eye the breakfast I had in Bayeux, which was fabulous; it was huge, I tell ya.

The romances are but minor subplots (mostly) in the exciting adventure, and they're developing very slowly, what with all the fighting dragons, fighting the British, fighting the natives, capturing, rescuing, magic wielding, and trying to stay alive, and all--except for Antonio's romances; there's nothing slow about Antonio and romance.

And don't forget the new beasties. The new creatures in this book are rife with dark possibilities, but they may surprise you. Speaking of "rife," it is a fun word. Merriam-Webster.com states that the word has been around for over 900 years and that it's from:

 Middle English ryfe, from Old English rȳfe; akin to Old Norse rīfr abundant

It does sound like some old Viking word to me.

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Last week I found time to game with my skirmish rules an encounter (between British troops, Native warriors, and young dragons) which was loosely based on an event from Book 3 of the Tomahawks and Dragon Fire series. I won't bore you with the details, but in the game the dragons won. Pictures follow. The partially and poorly painted British soldiers represent who you think they might. The partially painted woodland Indians and primer-brown natives represent who you think they would. The plastic dinosaurs represent the two young dragons. The dragons entered upon the happening of the triggering event and they displayed neither partisanship nor mercy. They were equal opportunity hazards.

This pic is from near the end of the game. I think the soldier in peril may have escaped.

This was first contact. Unfortunately for the natives, they were able to move more quickly through the forest. This ability gave them an advantage against the soldiers, but also put them directly into the path of the young dragons at the time of the triggering event.

One of the warriors at the lower left could have escaped, but he suffered from an excess of untimely valor and became a woodland happy meal while his leader fled the scene.

Choices, choices. The dragonling, having already finished the appetizer, decides upon an entree.