Author: Cora Lee

Cora Lee is a National Bestselling author of Regency romance. She went on a twelve year expedition through the blackboard jungle as a high school math teacher before publishing Save the Last Dance for Me, the first book in the Maitland Maidens series. She then followed it up with six other novels and novellas ranging from sweet and traditional to spicy and suspenseful. When she’s not walking Rotten Row at the fashionable hour or attending the entertainments of the Season, you might find her participating in Regency Fiction Writers events, wading through her towering TBR pile, or eagerly awaiting the next Marvel movie release. If you’d like to find out more about Cora or her books you can sign up for her newsletter, or connect with her on Facebook, BlueSky, Bookbub, or Goodreads.
Friday Favorites

Friday Favorite: Shakespeare Uncovered

Cora Lee

Shakespeare’s plays and sonnets were a hot topic during the Regency. Love them or hate them, most educated people had read them (or pretended to). But in this day and age, Shakespeare is something crammed down our throats in school, something we endure like a bad dentist appointment. Wouldn’t it be nice instead to parse out a play, have it make sense, and enjoy the process?

Now you can!

PBS produced a six-part series called Shakespeare Uncovered earlier this year. Each episode follows a renowned actor as s/he researches one of The Bard’s plays (or pair of connected plays), consulting historians, Shakespearean scholars, and other actors in an effort to find the meaning and the heart inside the story.

Shakespeare Uncovered

As much as I can appreciate the talent Shakespeare clearly possessed, I’ve never been a fan. But watching this series helped me to look at his works from a historical and a literary point of view, helped me to get past the fudging of facts and mind-numbing word games. I really enjoyed the whole series, and I learned a lot too!

You can catch the whole series on Netflix or on PBS’s website.

Buildings & Architecture

Great English Country Houses

Cora Lee

 

Are you fascinated by the enormous country houses of the old aristocracy? Check out Carol Cork‘s article about Longleat House in Warminster. Then check out her whole series!

Longleat House

Longleat House is set in 9,000 acres of rolling countryside, just a few miles from the Wiltshire market town of Warminster.

The estate consists of 4,000 acres of farmland, 4,000 acres of woodland, which includes a Center Parcs holiday park, and a further 1,000 acres of ‘Capability Brown’ landscaped gardens. It is regarded as one of the finest examples of Elizabethan architecture in Britain.

Read the rest of this article here: GREAT ENGLISH COUNTRY HOUSES.

Fashion, Friday Favorites

Friday Favorite: Regency Era Fashion Plates

Cora Lee

Every author has her favorite resources, and this week I’m sharing one of mine.

1800-1819 Cover

As the title suggests, it’s a book of fashion plates from the years 1800-1819. Descriptions are only occasionally provided, but the source of each plate is always identified (magazines such as Ladies’ Monthly Museum, Costume Parisien, La Belle Assemblee, and Ackermann’s Repository) along with the year of publication.

Since I’m a huge visual learner, the plates themselves are more important to me than the descriptions. With this book I can see what dinner dresses and pelisses and poke bonnets looked like, what colors they might have been, and how a lady might have worn them. 🙂

Available from Amazon, Amazon UK, and Abe Books.