writing into your deepest fantasy

The coronation of Chelsea's Barbie

This year I wrote two books.  STAIRWAY OF LOVE and THE EMPRESS CHRONICLES. What they have in common is that they both were fueled by an interest in actual, historical people, scandal, and big, dysfunctional families.  As a writer, if I have a niche, I suppose it's the "what if" in the "what about"--taking history and revisioning it. But this year, I discovered a micro-niche as well--and it was propelled by a blossoming self-indulgent urge to imagine what it would be like to be-er, well-a princess!

The coronation of Lidia's chimp

Although SOL has a sort of blue-blood wealth kind of royalty theme, TEC goes right for the traditional fairy tale version of kings and queens--specifically, 19th century Bavarian-Austrian royalty.  And I know I'm not alone. After all, don't we all have a latent fascination with kings, queens and all things courtly? I mean, don't we just pore over the daily developments of the royal romance of William and Kate?

"Hayshrope" gets a crown too!

I must say, the process of flinging myself into "what iffing" the character of Sisi (or the Empress Elisabeth of Austria), led me down a most fantastical rabbit hole, and, indeed, she's become quite the alter-ego in my fantasy life. I've appropriated her likeness on Twitter. She has her own pretty little blog, and when I was recently down in Old Pasadena, I came across this fascinating Steam Punkish store, Gold Bug, where I swooped up the featured crowns you see sitting atop doll heads belonging to my workshop mates. What fun!

So, dear readers and writers, I leave it to you.  What interesting rabbit holes did you stumble into this year?