Blog
More Than A Sex Scandal
You don’t have to be an Anglophile to know King Henry VIII had six wives. Even in American schools, many of us memorized the little ditty: "divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived.” The rhyme helps keep the fate of Henry’s wives straight, but it does...
Who is Thomas Abell?
Visitors to London’s most popular historical site, the Tower of London, have heard stories of the fortress's sordid past. On any given day, the black square-hatted Yeomen Wardens, the “Beefeaters,” roam the castle complex, ready to entertain curious tourists with...
A Midsummer Day for Katherine of Aragon
Midsummer was a big deal in the pre-modern world. In Scandinavia, it still is. I lived in Sweden for three summers and saw the traditions firsthand with the flower wreaths, strawberries, green maypoles, silly dances, smoked fish, and snaps. Nothing is quite as sweet...
A Pet Dog for Queen Katherine of Aragon
I was writing today, and there he was, all sad eyes and soft fur, sitting faithfully at the end of Katherine's bed. He refused to leave her side, and when he noticed me, he laid his head on his paws, and I knew he absolutely existed. But then the historian in my head...
St. Frideswide and Katherine of Aragon in Oxford
In April 1518, pregnant with her sixth child, Katherine of Aragon visited St. Frideswide’s Shrine in Oxford with a desperate prayer for God to give her a healthy male child. Had God chosen to answer that prayer with a live prince, history would have been different....
Finishing the Rough Draft… Beginning the Rewrite
I finished my first rough draft of the Thomas Project last week. I cried as I wrote the final scene, not because I was finishing the first draft, but because I saw, for the first time, the redemption in Thomas’s tragic imprisonment and death. As I wrote, I had an...
