Louise Allen

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Winner announced! ~ “Walks Through Regency London”

And the winner is…?

 Kelly! –   Congratulations Kelly! – you will have this for your anniversary celebration in London!  Happy touring through the early 19th century!

Please email me your address [info at this link ] and I will get this off to you right away.  If I do not hear from you by Monday March 7th, I will choose another name from the  mix.

Those of you who did not win? – You can still order the book directly from Louise Allen at her website.

Thanks one and all for participating, and hearty thanks to Louise for her great interview and responses to comments! 

Copyright @2011 by Deb Barnum at Jane Austen in Vermont.
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Book Review ~ ‘Walks Through Regency London’ by Louise Allen ~ Book Giveaway!

Book Giveaway! – see end of post for details

I love London – I had the fortune to spend a semester there in 1968 – the late 60s, a crazy invigorating time the likes the world has never seen again. When I started college, men and women were housed on opposite sides of the campus, by 1969, we were sharing dorms! I went to the London School of Economics to study political science, I, an English and sociology major – but there was one ‘political sociology’ course offered and more importantly the opportunity to finally visit the land where my parents were born.  So I ended up scouring The Times every day and learning politcal theory [ugh!] and British legal history [fascinating] and researching race relations in 1968 Britain to fulfill my sociology requirement [wonderful but exhausting and depressing], but I was in London! I had all sorts of plans to meet Prince Charles [we are of an age!], and we did have sort of an encounter [another tale!]; but alas! it was not to be, and surely I am none the worse! – but I did meet my future husband on this abroad program – and thus began my ongoing love affair with England. Today I collect books about London and try to visit when I can [never often enough] and I think I might have finally gotten a handle on the London map and the squares and the history only to discover another alley, nook, or cranny yet to be discovered and studied.

My London collection suffers the fate of most collectors: not enough shelves to house the ones I have and certainly not enough for the potential stacks of London-related books – I started to limit my collecting to children’s books about or set in London, then started to just find materials about the late Georgian – Regency periods – still too many books – I have notebooks filled with bibliographic data and now engage in mad forays into google-books, which substantially helps my shelf problem as well as my pocketbook but not the fact that I love BOOKS!

A friend and I are giving a talk on Jane Austen’s London next month, so I have been pulling a lot of research together, reading some of those books I have on the shelf [and the floor!] and finding the myriad of information online – it is quite daunting really! But in this search I discovered that the Regency Romance author Louise Allen was publishing a short guide titled Walks Through Regency London – certainly a book I had to have… so hot off the presses it arrived, and it is quite the delight!

This is a book of walks, it is not a history of Regency London – for that you can spend an inordinate amount of quality time reading all those resources I mention above. What Ms. Allen has given us is a guide to walking around the prime areas of Regency London. The major drawback for me in trying to write this review is that I am the ultimate armchair traveler here, chained to my sofa [no fainting allowed] in snowbound Vermont trying to imagine trekking around these streets – how I wish I had this guide last February when I last visited Town!  I took the Old Mayfair London Walks [1] tour, though I had been forewarned that it was not a literary-driven outing – What! I bellowed – no Jane Austen? No sneaking around the streets of Sense & Sensibility, looking for Willoughby or Edward, or Mrs. Jennings, or avoiding Fanny Dashwood if we should see her coming? No Jane Austen!? I cried! – “No Jane Austen” he said, clearly proud of eliminating her from the itinerary. It is great and instructive fun seeing the houses and imagining former inhabitants [thank that Blue Plaque program!], the architectural piece, but I wanted the “This is where Byron lived” (#8 St. James’s) and “This is where the Wedgwood had his showrooms”, and “This is where all the dancing took place at Almack’s.”

So how I wish I had this guide last year – it is the reason Louise wrote this book – her extensive Regency era research for her historical novels needed an outlet! And how hard the Regency is to pin down! – What was where when? When did that burn down? When was that demolished? Is that Victorian mansion camouflaging a Regency interior? Is this modern monstrosity on the plot of some famous building that Austen would have known and visited? One can get lost in their Horwood’s [2] trying to figure this all out – and even those maps changed so much over the several years of its editions, it could be a lifetime commitment to make sense of it all…

[Map image:  The West End, c.1800. From Christopher Hibbert, London: The Biography of a City, 1969.]

In Walks Through Regency London, Louise tries to do just that, give substance to this very illusive nature of the Regency, as she says “fire, war and redevelopment have destroyed, changed and blurred the physical evidence of [the] past – yet it can still be found, sometimes intact, sometimes only as a ghost.” [Intro, p. i.] Walks is by no means a comprehensive guide – it is factual and anecdotal as you follow the directions on each tour: on this corner, such and such stood, this is where Wellington had his boots custom made; this is where Princess Caroline lived during her trial (# 17, now rebuilt), and Almack’s, now a new modern building at 26-8 King St, and this is where Frances Burney lived, etc … a mere 46 pages, but cram-packed!

I cannot verify all the data and comment on its reliability without doing the physical piece the guide is meant to accompany – one can read and follow along with a map [3], registering the endless details the guide provides, feeling the Regency come to life as you round each corner, filled with the buildings Jane Austen would have strolled by, made purchases in, as she likely took her own notes on where to place her characters in Sense & Sensibility so firmly (and proudly!) in Mayfair.

In her interview, Louise says she had enough material for twenty walks but chooses only ten (there are ten walks of about 2 miles each), and indeed, this is my only quibble [4] with the book!  In its very compact 46 pages of quite small print, it all ends far too soon – I could have kept walking for at least another ten such tours! [easy to say from the sofa] – It is nicely presented with color illustrations from the author’s own print collection of London streets and fashions that set the scene; quotes from a contemporary source, the 1807 Picture of London (by John Feltham I believe, though this is not cited); walking directions; visiting information for public places (and sometimes a website); literary landmarks; shops, shops and more shops (so Regency!) – and add to this and Louise’s offering of the most interesting literary and historical tidbits and delicious gossip of the time and interspersed with commentary on what we see today.

Here are the ten walks:

  1. St. James’s
  2. Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens
  3. Mayfair North
  4. Piccadilly and South Mayfair
  5. Soho North
  6. Soho South to Somerset house
  7. British Museum to Covent Garden
  8. Trafalgar Square to Westminster
  9. The City from Bridewell to Bank
  10. Southwark and the South Bank

And here one short example from Walk 4: Piccadilly and South Mayfair where we happen to find Austen’s publisher John Murray:

Turn into the Royal Arcade, so through into Albemarle Street and turn left and walk down towards Piccadilly. (On Sundays go past the Arcade, turn left into Stafford Street and then left into Albemarle Street).

Virtually every literary ‘name’ of the 19th century must have come to Albemarle Street to visit the publisher John Murray. The firm moved to no. 50 in 1812 and has been there ever since. Amongst the greats, Murray published Jane Austen and Lord Byron, and, at Byron’s wish, burned his diaries after his death.

The street had at least three hotels in the Regency period including the Lothian and the Clarendon. The most famous was Grillon’s opposite John Murray’s. Louis XVIII stayed there in 1812 during the somewhat premature celebrations of Napoleon’s defeat.

Guests could have borrowed books from “Earle’s original French, English, Spanish and Italian circulating library … now moved to No, 47, Albemarle-street, Piccadilly, where all new books in the instructive and entertaining classes of literature are constantly added…”

Retrace your steps, turn left into Stafford Street to Dover Street and turn left.

Footnotes:

1. Note that London Walks  does have a Jane Austen tour in their itinerary – when I was there, the guide was ill, so no Jane Austen for me that week! But I do not see it now on the schedule either – but I highly recommend these London Walks, where you can visit the haunts of Shakespeare and Dickens, Sherlock Holmes, the Inns of Court, Secret or Haunted London, and Greenwich, etc – it is all there for your to discover with their knowledgeable and entertaining guides.

2.  For the most accessible access to the Horwood Map if you don’t have the Regency London A-Z book on your shelves, see the fabulous Regency Encyclopedia – you will need a password:  JAScholar / Academia [case-sensitive] – click on Map Gallery and then Tour Regency London and then go exploring!

3.  Ms. Allen says that “the book has been designed to not require a map. However, a standard tourist pocket map is helpful in locating tube stations and bus routes and in linking up walks. I use The Handy London Map and Guide by Bensons MapGuides. Otherwise all you need are a comfortable pair of shoes and an active imagination!” [p. i.]

4.  quibble #2:  a few spelling snafus: Cruickshank [should have no ‘c’] and Gilray [should have 2 ‘l’ s, though I believe it can also be spelled with one!] are both misspelled, but as Jane herself would likely overlook this, so alas! shall I!

4 1/2 full inkwells out of 5  ~ Highly recommended! … whether you are sitting in a chair or fortunate enough to have this guide as you meander around Town, you will enjoy the journey!

[Image from Nassau Library.org]

Your turn! – if anyone has any questions of Louise, please ask away! – see details for the book giveaway below… You can visit Louise’s website here and find her on Twitter @LouiseRegency

If you would like to order the Regency Walks book, you can do so directly from her website – I can attest to the book being mailed right away, arriving safe and sound and very quickly!

Book Giveaway: Please enter the drawing for a copy of Walks Through Regency London, compliments of ‘Jane Austen in Vermont’, by asking Louise a question or commenting on any of the three posts about this book. Drawing will take place next Wednesday 2 March 2011; comments accepted through 11 p.m. EST March 1st. [Delivery worldwide.]

Copyright @2011, Deb Barnum, at Jane Austen in Vermont.

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Interview with Louise Allen, Part II ~ Regency Romance, Heroes, and Thoughts on Writing

Book Giveaway! ~ See details at the end of this post.

I welcome again Louise Allen for the second part of my interview about her new book Walks Through Regency London ~ [click here for Part I]

JAIV:  Hello again Louise! – now let’s talk about your fiction: I have to make the embarrassing confession that I have not read any of your Regency romances! Your website says you write “Scandalously witty Regency romance” – how are you different from the other writers in this genre?

LA: I write romance, so obviously there is emotional intensity, but I have a well-developed sense of humour and I don’t enjoy writing about people who can’t laugh at themselves and the situation they find themselves in. A hero who isn’t witty isn’t quite a hero for me and my heroines, who all have a bit of me in them somewhere, are more likely to find the light side of any disaster, pick themselves up and carry on. And scandalous? Well, I’m told I write “hot” historicals – which means that I tend to have slightly older, more experienced and/or less conventional heroines who might have convincingly amorous encounters.

JAIV: What book would you suggest a “newbie” start with? [I promise to order a copy right away!]

LA:  Well, I’ve just won a CataRomance Reviewer’s Choice Award for The Lord & the Wayward Lady which is the first of a series of eight books I wrote with five other authors. I also wrote the seventh in the series, The Officer and the Proper Lady which I have to confess is a favourite of mine. Or you might like to start with a trilogy which comes out in the States later this year (August, September, November) – “The Transformation of the Shelley Sisters.” The first one is Practical Widow to Passionate Mistress.

JAIV:  You have several stand-alone titles and several titles in series – which do you prefer to write? Is it hard to let a character go when there is no sequel in the wings?

LA:  I do enjoy being able to stretch myself over a series and I love revisiting characters from earlier books. And yes, I hate letting my characters go! But it does make scheduling problems and there is more flexibility and variety with stand-alone books. My next one will be a singleton and I’m just starting it. Mills & Boon is producing a series set in historical houses owned by the National Trust, linking a fictional romance with real events and people, and I’m lucky enough to have been asked to do one. I’ve chosen Wimpole Hall in Cambridgeshire. When I’ve completed that I’ll be writing one set entirely in India in the 1790s.

JAIV:  This National Trust series sounds intriguing! Are any of your other characters based on historical figures?

LA:  I will occasionally have real characters “walking on” – the Prince Regent or Wellington for example – but all my heroes and heroines are entirely fictitious. I try very hard to make sure historical events take place as the records show and I’m not making people act out of character.

JAIV:  What is your writing process? – do you plan ahead or as you have said yourself do “the Hero and Heroine take over and sabotage all your efforts at discipline”?

LA:  I’m what is known in the business as a “pantser” – I fly by the seat of my pants into the fog – rather than being a planner. But I need to know my characters very well before I start, then I put them in a situation and I hope I can keep control of them!

JAIV:  Do you have a favorite character? – the Hero? The Heroine?

LA:  I need to be able to identify with the heroine – and hope my readers will too. And I have to be a little bit in love with the hero (luckily my husband is secure about this!). Some heroes though, stay with me – Hal Carlow in The Officer and the Proper Lady and Jack Ryder in The Dangerous Mr Ryder for example.

JAIV:  What makes a great Hero? A great Heroine?

LA:  My heroes have to be men of honour, even if sometimes that is buried rather deeply. They must have courage – physical and moral – and they need an edge of darkness, of danger. And a sense of humour, of course! Great heroines have the reader living the book with them – and I wish there was a recipe for achieving that. I know I’ve succeeded when my editor says (in a good way) “ was in tears over x or y”.

JAIV:  Do you believe in the transformation of the Rake, his redemption? –

LA:  That depends on the rake. There were some genuinely unpleasant and vicious Regency rakes. I believe that a man who has, for good reason, become cynical and cold and destructive can be redeemed by love, but there are things I wouldn’t countenance in one of my heroes.

JAIV:  How do you come up with names? Ravenhurst, Carlow, etc…

LA:  What a good question – I wish I knew the answer! I tell my subconscious to get on with it and end up with lists and jotted notes on every scrap of paper. Then I have to try them out and see what works. Sometimes a character insists on a different name and I have to give in.

JAIV:  If you were giving advice to budding writers, what would it be?

LA:  Write, write, write – you have to learn technique and you have to build your writing “muscles”. Listen to constructive advice from agents, publishers, published writers and think about what they are saying. But never over-polish your work so that you lose you unique “voice”.

JAIV:  Your covers – do you have input or is this out of your hands?

LA:  Out of my hands!

 
 
 

UK cover

 

US cover

 

  

                                                                   JAIV:  You mention that your last work is part of a “continuity series” of eight books written by six different authors. How ever did you all come together in such a task? And how different was the writing process for your two books in this series? – what are the other titles and authors, and should the series be read in order?

LA:  The editors at HMB in Richmond, London, put us together – we didn’t know each other so it was a sharp learning curve. Fortunately we got on very well together, which was a good thing as we had to come up with the over-arching mystery that links the books, all the characters and eight plots ourselves, subject to editorial approval. For me it meant I had to plan far more than I usually do and the process was slower as we were all writing at the same time and constantly checking back and forth to ensure continuity of plot and characterization, especially as we were all using each other’s characters. But it was a wonderful experience and we are still firm friends. The books can be read alone, but if read in order you also get to follow the mystery through to its conclusion. In order they are:

The Lord & the Wayward Lady (Louise Allen)

Paying the Virgin’s Price (Christine Merrill)

The Smuggler & the Society Bride (Julia Justiss)

Claiming the Forbidden Bride (Gayle Wilson)

The Viscount & the Virgin (Annie Burrows)

Unlacing the Innocent Miss (Margaret McPhee)

The Officer & the Proper Lady (Louise Allen)

Taken By the Wicked Rake (Christine Merrill)


JAIV: I am interested in your current “work in progress” – to be set in India – you have recently visited to inspire you and help in your research – I had the good fortune to visit India a few years ago and was so moved by the beauty of the people and the culture – what were your impressions? And what works are your reading for your historical research?

LA:  As I said above, this is now the book after next. I went to India last year and used some of that experience in my “Danger & Desire” trilogy (out in the States next year) but I wanted to do one set there entirely, and rather earlier than I usually write – the late 1700s. I love India, even at its most chaotic, and Rajasthan where we were in January had the most incredible palaces and forts, many of which we stayed in. I’m reading through a pile of quite academic material on the East India Company but I found William Dalrymple’s The White Moghuls very inspiring and for light relief there is always William Hickey – Memoirs of a Georgian Rake.

JAIV:  What is the most essential tool in marketing your work?

LA:  Constant contact with readers is paramount. I keep my website up to date, I tweet and I’ll do talks wherever and whenever I can. Next week I’m speaking at a US base in Norfolk!

JAIV:  And finally a question about the publishing aspect of books vs. Kindle [etc.] – I see that many of your works are available in the ebooks format – have you seen an increase in sales because of this?

LA:  I love books, but I love my Kindle too and I’m really pleased that many of my out of print books are becoming available in e-formats. It is too early to say what impact it is having on sales, but I don’t think there is any option other than to go along that route. Having said that, I can’t see the paper book dying any time soon, thank goodness.

JAIV:  And finally, what do you like to do when not writing??!

LA:  I read voraciously, travel, go antiquing, garden and talk endlessly to other writers.

JAIV:  Anything else you would like to say?

LA:  Thank you very much for having me! And do get in touch if you are coming to London – I’d love to meet members of your Society.

JAIV:  Thank you Louise for sharing your thoughts with us – You have been most generous with your time!  To All: Please look for my review of  Walks Through Regency London in Friday’s post.

Your turn! – if anyone has any questions of Louise, please ask away! – see details for the book giveaway below… You can visit Louise’s website here  and find her on Twitter @LouiseRegency

If you would like to order the Regency Walks book, you can do so directly from her website – I can attest to the book being mailed right away, arriving safe and sound and very quickly!

Book Giveaway:  Please enter the drawing for a copy of Walks Through Regency London, compliments of ‘Jane Austen in Vermont’, by asking Louise a question or commenting on any of the three posts about this book.  Drawing will take place next Wednesday 2 March 2011; comments accepted through 11 p.m. EST March 1st.  [Delivery worldwide.]

[All images from Louise Allen’s website, except the letter-writing sketch which seems to be everywhere…]

Copyright @2011, Deb Barnum, at Jane Austen in Vermont.

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Interview: Part I ~ Walking around Regency London with Louise Allen

NOTE:  Book giveaway! ~ see the end of this post for details!

 Please welcome author Louise Allen today as she answers questions about her new book on Regency London.  Louise is a very successful writer of historical Regency romances, over thirty-five titles to date!  Her interest in all things Regency is fed by constant research into the period, as well as the development of a fine collection of prints and ephemera from the era – all this to help in her writing. In December 2010 she released her first non-fiction work titled Walks Through Regency London [available direct from her at louiseallen [dot] regency [at] tiscali [dot] co [dot] uk

 

JAIV:  Thank you Louise for joining us here in Vermont today! I was so pleased to get your new book on Regency London hot off the press! – I ordered two copies and gave one to another London-obsessed friend and she is most enjoying your book!…we only wish we could both be in London together and exploring Town with your book in hand, rather than this armchair traveler thing! – hopefully, sometime soon…we’re working on it!

JAIV:  So first, tell us something about yourself.

LA:  Thank you very much for inviting me to join you – it is great to be in Vermont, even if only in cyberspace! I live in the East of England with my husband and we are about to move even further east, to a cottage on the North Norfolk coast. I was first published back in 1985 and for years I wrote alongside my full-time job as a property manager, but for the last three years I’ve been writing full-time and I love it.

JAIV:  When did you first discover your love of the Regency period? Why this time and place?

LA:  I think I first became aware of it when reading Georgette Heyer as a teenager. I’ve always been an historian – I studied landscape history, historical geography and archaeology at university – but it took me a while to settle on the “long” Regency as a period to write in. My first book was set during the English Civil War of the 17thc but my editor encouraged me to look at the Regency and I fell in love with it. I think it is because it occupies a transitional place between the agricultural and aristocratic world of the 18thc and the rapid technological change and urbanization of the Victorian era. Boundaries are always interesting and complex and it is also sufficiently different and yet recognizable, which makes it fascinating to write about. And I’m English, so English history felt right.

JAIV:  Did you read Jane Austen as well as Georgette Heyer? – do you re-read them? Which are your favorite titles, if it is possible to choose?

LA:  Yes, to both authors and yes to re-reading. Austen – I love Pride & Prejudice, but I find Sense & Sensibility more interesting. I was at Jane Austen’s house at Chawton last year and it was very moving to walk in her garden and to see her tiny writing table. Heyer favourites? The Grand Sophy and also The Toll Gate, which isn’t everyone’s choice, but I’m tall, so I identify with the heroine!

JAIV: You obviously use London and the London social scene in your fiction, and the need to be accurate has led you to amass a great deal of research through the years – hence your “Walks” book – what first prompted you to pull all this together and publish it?

LA:  My husband and I love walking, and we love London, so it was no hardship to start exploring when I wanted to check details. Then we got hooked and started exploring specific areas – when I looked at my notes and our photos I realized that I had the makings of a book.

JAIV:  You cite the 1807 The Picture of London guidebook as your main source. What other books did you use? – there are so many works on London – which are your favorite and why?

LA:  I use the 1807 guide because it is fun to take it for a walk where it must once have gone with its Regency owner – it is the real thing, much used and slightly battered. We also take the invaluable A-Z of Regency London published by the London Topographical Society. Their historical A-Zs are a brilliant resource. When I checked my shelves just now I found I have 55 reference books on London, so it is a problem to pick out just a few, but I would say The London Encyclopedia (published by Macmillan) is an essential. Peter Ackroyd’s London: The Biography is full of fascinating, unusual and often downright weird information and Dan Cruickshank’s book on the sensual life of London The Secret History of Georgian London is about so much more than sex.

JAIV:  What are your favorite haunts in London, for both Regency times and the present?

LA:  The St James’s area is the best preserved Georgian/Regency quarter. Soho is endlessly fascinating – so many layers of history. The City, although it has been leveled by the great fire and then again by the Blitz still preserves its medieval street patterns and modern office blocks must contort themselves to fit the shape of some ancient workhouse or monastery cloister. You can even see the curved walls of Newgate Prison fossilized in the shape of an ultra modern building. But it is hard to find a part of London that isn’t interesting if you are prepared to be very nosy!

JAIV:  The book is fact-filled and anecdotal, and culled from so much available information – how did you decide what to include and what not to include?

LA:  It was a nightmare! I had enough material for twenty walks, but I tried to chose ones that gave a variety of experiences, which were all about 2 miles long and which could be split up if walkers wanted to have a shorter route or spend more time in a museum.

JAIV:  Did you discover anything surprising in your research and exploration? Something you did not already know?

LA:  It wasn’t so much new facts that I found but places which gave me a real frisson of excitement: the 1820s operating theatre where you can see the marks of the surgeons’ saws on the table; the last galleried coaching inn left in London; the great scales in Berry Bros & Rudd where Byron used to weigh himself; having a drink in Tom Cribb’s own pub and exploring the back alleys behind Almack’s which were once filed with high-class brothels and gambling dens. Perhaps the most unexpected discovery was in a Chinese supermarket in Soho – walk past stacks of dried herbs and fish, bags of rice and look up and realize you are in a very old house indeed – and in the back is still the sweeping 18thc staircase. This is the Turk’s Head coffee-house and Dr Johnson and Joshua Reynolds were just two of the great men who  socialized here.

[Image of Samuel Johnson: Johnsonese.com]

JAIV:  The illustrations in your book are from your own collection. What other ephemera from the era do you look for? When did you start becoming a serious collector? – and did your writing come first or vice versa?

LA:  The writing came first then the more I wanted to know about the period, the more I would look for items from it. I collect fashion prints 1790-1820, prints of London from Ackermann’s Repository, coaching and sporting prints, bills and invoices, playbills and anything else that I can get my hands on. I started buying fashion prints when I stubbed my toe on a box of over thirty, all framed, under the table at an auction. I got them for a song and as the porter staggered out to the car with them he said, ‘Bloody hell, madam, you don’t half buy in bulk!’ He didn’t know how true it was, I’m afraid – I’ve got about 1,000 prints now.

[Charles Street]

JAIV:  Where are your favorite haunts to find items? How do you categorize and store them?

LA:  On-line and live auctions, antique fairs and antique shops are all good places to search, but auctions are the most productive. I store them in archival-quality binders on acid free paper, or have them framed by a specialist framer using acid-free mounts. I arrange the fashion prints by date, the London prints by street and everything else by subject.

JAIV:  You bring the Regency so to life! – better to have this guide while actually walking around London – but even so this journey of readinghas been delightful… Which of your walks is your favorite? – what is your favorite part of London?

LA:  Thank you! I enjoy them all – it depends on my mood. If I am feeling like high society and shopping, Mayfair and St James’s are best. Hyde Park is great for a good walk, Soho is vibrant and slightly edgy and the City surprisingly dark and sinister.

JAIV:  The process of writing fiction and non-fiction is quite different – explain the process for writing this Walks book.

LA:  I was very conscious the whole time that I had to make this crystal-clear for people to follow. It would have more than doubled the cost if I’d included maps, so users needed to be able to do without, or use it in conjunction with an ordinary pocket map. Then, once I had plotted each walk out on a modern map it was a question of picking out the relevant points of interest or short snippets of interesting information and weaving them in with the directions – and then re-walking to check every turning and fact.

JAIV:  Do you have another non-fiction Regency-era book in the works?

LA:  We are tracing the original route of the Great North Road, the main coaching route between Edinburgh and London – but not on foot! This is great fun and needs a lot of detective work and old maps. I see this one as possibly being a Kindle book rather than a print one.

JAIV:  Thank you Louise for joining us today for Part I of this interview! – Louise is happy to answer any of your questions, so please ask away!

Stay tuned: Part II  tomorrow where I continue this interview with Louise on her Regency Romances and her thoughts on writing; followed by Part III, a book review of Walks Through Regency London. 

You can visit Louise’s website here and find her on Twitter @LouiseRegency

If you would like to order the Regency Walks book, you can do so directly from her website – I can attest to the book being mailed right away, arriving safe and sound and very quickly!

Thank you again Louise for joining us today – looking forward to continuing our discussion  tomorrow!

Book Giveaway:  Please enter the drawing for a copy of Walks Through Regency London, compliments of ‘Jane Austen in Vermont’, by asking Louise a question or commenting on any of the three posts about this book.  Drawing will take place next Wednesday 2 March 2011; comments accepted through 11 p.m. EST March 1st.  [Delivery worldwide.]

[All images excepting Dr. J from Louise Allen’s website]

Copyright @2011, Deb Barnum, at Jane Austen in Vermont.