Celia

Celia Lake spends her days as a librarian in the Boston (MA) metro area, and her nights and weekends at home happily writing, reading, and researching for her books about magical Albion. Born and raised in Massachusetts to British parents, she naturally embraced British spelling, classic mysteries, and the Oxford comma before she learned there were any other options.

Idea to book: Pastiche

/ Charms of Albion, Ideas to books

Pastiche is my first Edwardian book, mostly set in 1906. That year turns out to be interesting for medical history reasons, but it’s also in the middle of a period rich in artistic and creative activity. Living well with chronic illness Alysoun, the heroine of this book, lives with what we’d call fibromyalgia today. At the time of the book, they don’t quite have a name for it: fibrositis (the earlier name) shows up in the medical literature for the first time late in 1906. What she knows is that her body aches – often and also unpredictably. She struggles with fatigue and brain fog, wanting to have an engaged and active life, and yet also not wanting to spend her limited time and energy on social events she doesn’t enjoy. The trick is that she is Lady Alysoun, married to Lord Richard, who not only has those obligations to the land magic, but who is also a member of the Guard (Albion’s equivalent to the police, more on that in the next section), and who is asked to become a magistrate in the course of the book. Being a magistrate comes with a number of additional social obligations for both of them, as well. My chronic health stuff is not exactly the same as Alysoun’s – though at points in my life, I have had a lot more of all of her main symptoms than I do at the moment (if sometimes in slightly different modes.) Writing that experience, […]

Idea to Book: Seven Sisters

/ Ideas to books

Seven Sisters is simultaneously an outgrowth of some of the larger worldbuilding and my (somewhat odd) Classical education. It’s also about the density of history, the role of time, and the question of how much of other people we can begin to understand, anyway. Also a touch of sign language and magic. The Fatae First and foremost, this was a chance to explore the Cousins, those who descended from the more human of the Fatae, in this case the seven Grandmothers. (There may be others out in the world, for the record, even in Britain.) The Grandmothers have a sizeable number of opinionated and very busy descendants, who refer to each other as Cousins. Some look entirely like other humans, others have features that are a little less so – particularly odd eye colours, sometimes hair. They work closely with a number of the non-human shaped Cousins, everything from the custos dragons (see Fool’s Gold for one) to the Belin (see Goblin Fruit), to the trees we see in this book. (There’s more about Robin in Fool’s Gold, as well, and his particular Aunts. And a bit of Vivian.) One of the things I wanted, as I wrote about the Cousins, was the sense that they are a large sprawling clan. They know of each other, but they may not know individuals very well. They have interconnections, they end up at the same rites and festivals every so often. But they also have their own individual preferences and priorities, and

Idea to Book: On The Bias

/ Ideas to books, Mysterious Charm

On The Bias came to pass from a couple of distinct ideas. I’d been deeply curious about Thomas Benton, valet to Lord Geoffrey Carillon, since my first books. But I also wanted to spend some time dwelling on the glorious fashions of the period. And then there are my three dangerous birds. Thomas Benton Of course, there’s a syllogism here: as Geoffrey Carillon is to Lord Peter Wimsey, so is Benton to Bunter. Only, of course, Benton and Carillon are very much their own people, whatever the starting inspiration. Thomas Benton is highly competent, but in a fairly specific way. As I mentioned back in a discussion of neurodiverse characters in my books, Benton is definitely somewhere on the autistic spectrum. For him, the structured expectations of service in a great country house were often reassuring, rather than restrictive. The great houses ran like clockwork, with clear delineations about who was doing which task (and in a well-run house, with clear instruction in what those tasks involved.) The social interactions were the same way: there were clearly identified things you might do on your afternoon off, who you spent your time with, and so on. (Obviously, there are a lot of people for whom these things were limiting, too restrictive or even abusive. But it’s also clear if you read historical sources that there were plenty of people for whom that structure was comfortable in varying ways, or at least a good fit at a particular point in their lives.)

Ideas to book: In The Cards

/ Ideas to books, Mysterious Charm

In The Cards takes place largely over the course of a week on a remote island off the coast of Cornwall. It has references to a number of aspects of the 1920s, everything from the after-effects of the War (both in terms of injury and in terms of love and consequences) to Tarot, chronic illness to the way we build networks in our lives. Locked room murder mysteries I love a locked-room murder mystery, and they’re certainly a staple of the mystery genre (and of Golden Age mysteries, in particular.) Unsurprisingly, they’re also rather tricky to write! My editor and I went back and forth on how to make the plot of In The Cards come out right, and how to layer in the available clues in a useful way.  The other trick for this book is having three point of view characters, all of whom knew they didn’t do it. (And who can confirm that to each other fairly early on after the murder.) This is rather different than many mystery novels, where you’re only dealing with a single point of view, and often that of a detective, amateur or otherwise. Tarot As you may or may not know, Tarot has a long and complicated history, some of which we’re not entirely sure of. What we do know is that by the 16th century, various decks were circulating around Europe. Some were used for playing card games (notably tarrochi, which is played in the book, and was still reasonably

Being Seen (a memorial post)

/ Writing and publishing

(Note: this post talks about death and grief and the complicated ways we know other people.)  Last week, I found out that Catherine Heloise had died suddenly, while on vacation. As I said in the memorial post on Smart Bitches, Trashy Books (where she’d been a reviewer for years), in my religious tradition, we talk about “What is remembered, lives.”  I’ll be remembering her for the rest of my life.  I never met her.  To the best of my knowledge, I never even had a direct one-on-one conversation with her.  And yet, there’s this tremendous gap in my life now that feels impossible to find words for.  Once upon a time, a while ago I’ve been a reader at Smart Bitches, Trashy Books for ages. I started sometime in my Minnesota years, which puts it between 2005 (when the site began) and mid-2011. Maybe 2007 or so. I’ve long appreciated their wide-ranging reviews in the romance genre, but also delighted in a lot of other posts – baking, knitting, commentary on the state of Romancelandia, and of course the Cover Snark posts.  Some online communities I’m extremely active in, others I read and enjoy, but don’t say much. SBTB was one of the “don’t say much”. I often felt a little uncertain of my footing among people who read more widely in the genre than I could manage. (The problem of loving a bunch of genres is that you are never as immersed in any one of them as someone

The Hare and the Oak is out now!

/ Announcements, Mysterious Powers

The Hare and the Oak is full of: Two colleagues thrown together A lost heir Land magics The intimacy of ritual Making peace with your past Oaths kept and broken Finding magic in unexpected places Learn more (and get a copy if this strikes your fancy) Cyrus appears in Sailor’s Jewel (1901, as a secondary character), and very briefly in Carry On in 1915 as well as in Eclipse (1924). Mabyn appears briefly at the end of Eclipse.

Idea to book: Wards of the Roses

/ Ideas to books, Mysterious Charm

Wards of the Roses remains my favourite title so far, given that I get to pun on the era, and on the walls of impenetrable roses around the manor house that’s central to the book.  I wanted to do several things with this book: write about the experience of blindness in the 1920s, talk about the creation of the Pact, and gesture at some of the forms of ritual magic in play both historically and during the time of the books. Blindness in the 1920s I have plans to do a post entirely about this, so I’m going to save the details for that. However, the 1920s were a particularly interesting time in the history of blindness. Part of this is directly because of World War I. Damage from the new gas attacks, as well as injuries from bullets, shrapnel, and explosion, as well as better medical care that meant people did not die from initial injuries led to improvements in blindness rehabilitation.  People had previously been using four or five different methods of reading (embossed text, braille, Moon Type, among others). By 1919, the United States had standardised on a single form of braille (as the UK had a few years before that.)  Two things we associate with modern blindness – the long cane and guide dogs – both come directly out of the the 1920s and 1930s, thanks to various rehabilitation efforts. Both a lot more independent travel – the cane by giving a lot more information about what’s

Ideas to book: Magician’s Hoard

/ Ideas to books, Mysterious Charm

Welcome to the next in this series of posts about ideas behind my books. Today, we’re talking about Magician’s Hoard, which takes place in 1926, featuring Pross and Ibis. Egyptology offers so many opportunities. And the 1920s are a tremendously rich period in the history of the field. (I’m pretty sure we’ll be revisiting sometime later in my writing). In 1926, when William Matthew Flinders Petrie was actively excavating and sending materials back to what would become the Petrie Collection at University College London.  In 2015, I visited London, and was able to go to a lecture at the Petrie Collection (on the Egyptology behind the Doctor Who episode, Pyramids of Mars, which had its 40th anniversary that week.) It’s an amazing collection, with all sorts of little treasures and unusual items. Exactly the sort of thing Ibis could usefully apply himself to.  Who would do this? I knew I wanted to do a book centering on Pross Gates, who appears in Outcrossing as a secondary character. She’s intelligent, resourceful, and independent – not looking for love, but rather stuck in a rut. The more I wrote about Ibis, and his goals and priorities, the more fascinated I was about how they fit together.  Ibis and his religion. Here’s another bit of worldbuilding. One of my goals for the series is to write a cultural sense of religion that was not purely Christian (or religions of the Book, for that matter…)  Many of the characters in my books have family practices

Welcome to 2022! More books ahead!

/ Announcements, Writing and publishing

Hello, and welcome to 2022! I have aspirations and intentions of doing more regular blogging about my books and writing this year, so I thought it’d be great to start out with what I’m hoping to write and publish this year.  (As always, my newsletter gets all the news first, including some additional details that won’t be on the blog. Also some extra scenes or short stories from time to time as I’m inspired to write them.)  (2021 was an amazing year! The Fossil Door, Eclipse, Fool’s Gold, Sailor’s Jewel, Complementary, and Winter’s Charms all came out thanks to my being home a lot more. I’m expecting my writing speed to drop a bit in 2022, but I also have a lot of things I want to write, so I’ve got some ambitious goals.) (Likely) coming out in 2022:  I’m hoping to release 4 books and 2 novellas in 2022. Because of the way I draft and edit, three of the four novels already exist in draft (or will within a week or so, I’m finishing one of them right now.) My goal is to hit the months indicated, but it’s a changeable world out there, so dates may shift somewhat in the process.  The Hare and the Oak: A later-in-life romance featuring Cyrus Smythe-Clive (seen in Sailor’s Jewel as Rhoe’s older brother, and briefly in Carry On and Eclipse). When Lord Baddock shows up at the Council Keep looking for help, Cyrus and Mabyn Teague (seen briefly at the end of

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Winter’s Charms

/ Announcements, Novellas

Hello to winter! (At least in New England, where I am.) Time to curl up on the couch with a good book? Winter’s Charms is a collection of three seasonal novellas that centre around the winter holidays. I’d known since I wrote Eclipse that I wanted to spend more time both with Seth and Golshan and Dilly, and exploring some of the further mysteries of Schola. Several readers had also said they were very interested in these things. Add in a bit of Kate and Giles and their glorious banter, and you have a collection! Casting Nasturtiums is about how Seth finds his best friend Golshan after the Great War. (MMF polyamorous romance, mentioned briefly in Eclipse). This is the novella that came bursting out of my head from the opening scene, and the three of them continue to delight me. Seth’s fierceness, Golshan’s bafflement, and Dilly’s resolute good humour just make me smile (and sometimes cry) every time. Country Manners finds Kate and Giles (from Wards of the Roses) visiting his grandmother and his family for the winter holidays in 1921. It’s a bit of a challenge. Fortunately, they also discover a small mystery. I love Kate and Giles, and their comfort with each other here. (They have a great line in banter, sometimes.) This also answers the question of “How did Kate get that Pleasing Token she’s wearing in Outcrossing, and what is a Pleasing Token, anyway?” Chasing Legends explores some of the deeper magics of Schola, when a mysterious knock on the

Welcome to Fool’s Gold!

/ Announcements, Mysterious Powers

Fool’s Gold came about partly because my editor said, “You haven’t done a villain redeemed yet. Robin would be a great candidate.” Robin appears in Seven Sisters (and Fool’s Gold does contain references to, and thus some spoilers for the events of that book, though only in fairly broad strokes.) He also appears briefly in Wards of the Roses. Since then, he’s been struggling. Closely monitored by his Aunts for more than two years, he’s finally freed to begin to rebuilding his life and work. He’s eager to get back to paints and inks, art and antiques, even if he’s still frustrated and unmoored by other parts of his life. When he overhears a chance conversation about art forgery, he notices Beatrice. Beatrice has lived with an inherited curse since she was a baby. Visible to her family but invisible to everyone else (or so she thought), she is startled when Robin addresses her. She wants to know more, and besides, Robin has some thoughts about the man who’s courting her cousin. Come enjoy Fool’s Gold for a story about finding your way in the world, family expectations (both good and bad), a perky dragon, art and artists, and much more.

Neurodiversity and recent history

/ Mysterious Charm, Mysterious Powers, Novellas, Questions and answers

If you’ve read more than a couple of my books, chances are that you’ve noticed a number of them have characters who are what we’d now describe as neurodiverse. Neurodiversity is a term that encompasses a lot of conditions or experiences of how people think and interact with the world. They can include a wide range of things we have some names for, and plenty of things we don’t. Some you’ve probably heard of include autism, ADHD or ADD, dyslexia, dyscalculia, or dyspraxia  Tourette’s Syndrome and some mental health conditions. Some estimates suggest that 30-40% of people fall into at least one of these categories (there can be overlaps, which make statistics harder…)  There’s also a huge range of experiences and ways this shows up for people. Each and every person has a unique brain and set of life experiences. All sorts of factors like family support or expectations, educational support, professional support and guidance (if testing and/or medication is part of the picture) make a difference in what it means for an individual. We also know that while the term ‘neurodiversity’ is quite modern (it was coined in the late 1990s by Australian sociologist Judy Singer), that neurodiverse folks have been part of the world since, well, there were people. For example, John Donvan and Caren Zucker wrote In a Different Key: The Story of Autism, a history of autism. As part of their research they discovered records from the mid-1800s that pretty clearly describe what we’d call autism today,

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Sailor’s Jewel is out!

/ Announcements, Charms of Albion

Sailor’s Jewel is set in 1901, during a November crossing of the Atlantic on The Moonstone, a luxury magical ocean liner. Rhoe is about to take up a new and challenging position at the Temple of Healing. Her parents have persuaded Cyrus, her brother, to take her on one last pleasant voyage in hopes of changing her mind about a few of those commitments. Cyrus, a member of Albion’s Council, has his own worries, but he’s looking forward to a trip with the sister he rarely gets much time with. Hugh Pelagius has been working his way up in the family business, learning all the pieces that go into every voyage. This trip, for the first time, his duties are to socialise with the first-class passengers and make sure everything goes smoothly. When a magical jewel Cyrus is conveying to Boston causes problems, Rhoe and Hugh must work together with Cyrus and others to keep the ship safe and take care of everyone on board. Get your copy now for pelagic mermaids, magical gems, and shipboard life: Amazon Kindle Apple Books  Barnes and Noble Nook Google Play Kobo Additional options Where this book fits into my other stories: As always, you can read my books in any order. Rhoe appears later in her life as a secondary character in Carry On, and Rhoe, Hugh, and Cyrus have all made an appearance in Eclipse. Anything else you want to know? You can check out my content notes page for some additional

Joy! People loving my books

/ Mysterious Powers, Writing and publishing

I spent last night staring at my computer screen in utter delight (and a fair bit of ‘wait, is this real?’), due to the lovely comments on the latest Whatcha Reading? (May 2021, part 2) post from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. Thank you so much to Catherine and all the other commenters who’ve said such kind and glowing things about my books. I’m ecstatic that people have enjoyed them for all the reasons I hoped people would. I’ve been a reader at SBTB for many years (sometime before 2010), and it’s one of my go-to sites for discovering new books, with thoughtful commentary about a wide range of books. The comments there did make it clear I really ought to add some information to my website, though. If you’d like to try out my books, you can get my first book, Outcrossing, for free by signing up for my newsletter. (It’s my first book, and I’ve learned a lot about writing since then. I recommend Pastiche as a starting point to see what I think my books do best.) New today: I have a page of questions and answers, talking about: Reading order (see below) Where you can get my books Getting my books from your library What helps me most as an author Finding out about what’s coming next Why I’m (mostly) writing in the 1920s Why disability representation is a thing I care about. Where to learn more about historical tidbits What’s in my newsletter and why you

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