It’s December! Deck the halls with boughs of holly. Tra la la la la, la la la la. Curling up with a book in the winter holidays, perhaps in front of a logfire and the glinting Christmas tree, and/or in your Christmas jumper and socks, or with a glass of port – whatever appeals to…
Medieval Murder in Toulouse
I launched my novel, Love’s Knife, in France last weekend and promised to post the slideshow. Here it is. Images are numbered to coincide with the images in the text of my talk. Tracey Warr, Writing Medieval Murder at Library Lit, Parisot Library, 82160 France Saturday 16 November 2024 [1 title slide] Love’s Knife [2 slide] has been…
Writing: From 0 to 90,000 words
I am launching my new novel at Parisot Library in France this Saturday, 16 November 10.30am (in case you are in the vicinity). I will be talking about my various strategies for getting from 0 to 90,000 words, which, in the case of this novel involved salt lakes in the Camargue, chapels in the Pyrenees,…
Competition for Book Reviewers
Many of us don’t get around to posting reviews of the books we’ve enjoyed. It takes a bit of time to craft a well-worded review, but we writers are very grateful for the ones we do receive and even those with critiques can be very helpful for us. As a book reviewer myself (mostly for Historical…
Starting to write: Old and new beginnings
My new novel, Love’s Knife, a medieval murder mystery, was published last month. I started writing it 10 years ago during a month-long writing residency in the Pyrenees. It’s been a long time brewing. I just came across a series of blogposts from those weeks of having the initial idea for the novel and am…
Time-Sensitive Historical Fiction
Today is the last day that you can buy my new novel, Love’s Knife, as an ebook on amazon.co.uk for a mere £0.99. The price goes back to its normal £4.99 in 17 hours or so. It’s also available as a paperback. Love’s Knife is a medieval murder mystery set in Toulouse at the turn…
On a Viking trouser-snake
I’ve a crick in my neck, And tend to fall on my head, My trouser-snake is soft, And my hearing’s gone away. The extract above is from Judith Jesch’s translation of a lament on old age by the 10th century Viking skald (or poet) Egil Skallagrimsson. The image is a 19th century French painting by…
Parisot Literary Festival 2024
When I moved to a village in southwest France some sixteen years ago, I thought I would find myself in splendid isolation, with no distractions from writing, but I quickly acquired a writers’ group, then a reading group, and discovered that I was living in proximity to a big literary festival in a small French…
October Newsletter
My quarterly newsletter, Just Meandering, is out now on https://justmeandering.substack.com It has articles on my new novel, on recent author events, on starting on a new writing project and on a free book offer. Sign up for free to read it. My latest novel, Love’s Knife is available as an ebook for a mere £0.99…
Rock, Paper, Swords! interview
I’m still emerging from the mammoth and thrilling task of organising the HNS UK 2024 conference. It could take a while! Matthew Harffy and Steven A. McKay interviewed me for their roving podcast from the conference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gh2b63b-efM Check out their podcast for interviews with the conference speakers including Bernard Cornwell, Diana Gabaldon, Kate Quinn +…
Tracey Warr Writing 