The Chalice

Cynethrith, the heroine of Courting Trouble, is visiting the abbey her mother founded. As Christianity was taking root in Anglo Saxon England, rich patrons demonstrated their piety by establishing abbeys and furnishing them with treasures and relics. Cynethrith describes what she sees. 

The altar, covered with a gold-embroidered frontal, held a silver and gold chalice [my mother] had commissioned in East Anglia: around its rim fantastic birds interlaced so cleverly that you could hardly tell where one began and the other ended. Her father had bought the imposing altar cross of gold and precious stones from a Byzantine trader. In its center a tiny vial contained a drop of St. Etheldreda’s blood. My eye came back to the chancel arch—its grappling angels and demons carved by a sculptor my mother had brought in from Kent—then was pulled to the center of the choir where, in darkness beneath the floor, lay my mother.

The Abbey Chapel

A nunnery plays an important part in Courting Trouble. Buildings in early Anglo Saxon times were almost all made of wood, and windows were scarce. In this drawing from my sketchbook we see what the heroine sees as she waits for her friend in the chapel's dark interior.

Anticipation of the king’s visit and the activity it generated in Easton blocked out all other concerns for a while. . . . Then one night, too excited to sleep, the knowledge that the court was coming formed the backbone of a solution so simple that it seemed inevitable. I knew there were members of the old guard among the councilors and thanes, even during the current regime. I began to think, or rather, to be convinced, that if I could find a way to get into the palace I might, somehow, make a powerful friend or two who could help me hang on to my inheritance. There must be someone who remembered my mother. I would do this despite the current king, a despicable man if ever there was one.

These were my thoughts as I came to the Itchen road and turned off into the abbey. Within its gates, in contrast to my unsettled state, all was quiet. Figuring the sisters must be at Nones, I stabled my horse and went to the church, entering as inconspicuously as possible. I stood at the back of the tall timber building, dark as a tomb, my eye drawn to the distant altar candles sparkling on gold treasure.

From the Sketchbook: Scene 1

These sketches illustrate the first scene of Courting Trouble. After a tour of her abbey with a very tiresome bishop, the elderly Abbess Cynethrith reminisces about her youth. She tells us about the day she pumped a monk for information, got a glimpse of a naked monarch, and ran into a very angry queen.

The (Almost) Lost Manucript

A friend asked me how long it took to write Courting Trouble. I told him that I started it in England in 1990 or there about. I worked on it a couple of years, doing all sorts of research--to the point of taking archeology courses at Southampton University, drawing the local flora to learn it, and embroidering in the style of the times. I wrote during the couple of hours a day that my youngest child attended preschool. I remember sitting at my desk, chortling. Then we returned to America and I let it go. I might have dragged the book out once or twice in Raleigh, but the rewrites I remember were not in the text that Rob found on the old computer.

I had written off the whole project long ago, even though my husband nudged me yearly to finish it. I had no interest. Then he wanted to get rid of the antique (at this point) computer the book lived in, but he wouldn't do it until he found a way to free the imprisoned text. It was a very big job. It had been written in a version of WordPerfect that is so outdated that even later editions of the same software cannot read it.

After he had gone to so much trouble to rescue the book from oblivion I thought I should at least read the damn thing. After all this time I read it as a reader rather than the writer, and at times I had no idea what would happen next. I remember from time to time saying to myself, "I wonder where I am going with this?" I was entertained. It made me laugh, and I thought it would take a month or two to whip it into shape. It took another 10 or 11 months. So, to answer my friend's question, it took probably 3 years of actual work and 30 years of gestation.

A Visit to the Abbey

The novel's heroine, Cynethrith (pronounced KIN uh trith) visits an abbey to see her best friend, Athelflad (Ath el flad), a nun. An excerpt from the novel Courting Trouble.

I closed my eyes and inhaled the incense. One of the nuns was playing a lyre. She led the sisters in singing psalms. I opened my eyes and watched them. In the choir two groups of nuns faced each other, novices in front, the others on a step behind them. There were about thirty members of the order then, and all but one were at Nones that day. Their white faces gleamed in the candlelight. They seemed transported. They radiated a purity I found both admirable and totally alien.

I spotted Athelflad. She was second in from the altar. I found her voice reedy, but she loved to sing and was completely enthralled by the music. I shut my eyes again and prayed that an atheling would fall in love with me, preferably one who wouldn’t have any connection to King Beorhtric. When the service was over I waited for Athelflad outside the church. Her dark hazel eyes sparkled when she saw me.