|
Book of Forbidden Words has three main characters. Milly Bennett is the fictional English housewife of an American pilot who served in the second world war. She is a GI bride who travels back to America with him in the early 1950s, together with their two small children. Milly struggles to fit in with the mothers she encounters in the Long Island town where they live, but Milly carries with her a secretive past, and there is much more to her than first meets the eye. When someone from her past brings with him a strange, encrypted manuscript, Milly embarks on a journey of discovery that will change her life forever. In the 1500’s, Lysbette Angiers, also a fictional character, is originally from Bruges. I take time to choose names carefully, as I like to find something that is appropriate for their character. Lysbette is an unusual name, but it is fitting because she is an unusual woman, particularly for her time. She was fortunate to be raised by a wealthy, powerful man (Sir Thomas More, the man who, amongst other things, wrote the famous book, Utopia.) He gave her the same rigorous education she would have received had she been a boy, which was certainly not the case for most women at that time. Whilst she is fictional, Sir Thomas More did adopt or take as wards, both boys and girls whom he educated the same way, unusually for his time, believing girls and boys to be equally clever. My third main character is Charlotte Guillard, who was in fact a real person. She was a Parisian printer of great repute and some of the works she printed may still be seen today. She was a formidable business woman who carved her way, not only in a man’s world, but she must have walked a tightrope so as not to come under the scrutiny of the voracious heretic hunters in Paris at that dangerous time, who were busy banning and burning books. Charlotte was married twice, was childless, and outlived both her husbands. After the death of her second husband in 1537, she continued to successfully run the famous Parisian printing workshop, Soleil d’Or, for twenty more years until her own death in 1557. I found her to be a fascinating character, working as a lone woman at this volatile time of the Protestant revolution. She printed many ecclesiastical texts, but also many scientific and philosophical works, including those of Desiderius Erasmus, a man declared a heretic by both the Protestant and the Catholic Church. Charlotte’s printing shop was just a short distance away from the Sorbonne, then a hotbed of heretic hunters, who were keen to put to death anyone they declared to be a danger to the Catholic Church and who did not recant. To find out what happened to these three courageous women who fought so hard to have their voices heard, and how they are linked, you will need to order a copy of the book! Book of Forbidden Words is part mystery, part suspense, part celebration of the written word and the freedom of speech. You can pre-order in the US here and in the UK here The book will also be translated in Germany, France, Italy and Russia to date. Below is a copy of one example of Charlotte Guillard’s printing mark. It holds some key clues in the manuscript!
|
