Welcome to weekend writing warriors. Many fine authors, and me, contribute short snippets for your delectation.
Since it seems that our Regency spy romance is much more popular than our science fiction, this post introduces the sequel to The Art of Deception.
Amanda looked up from her stitchery at the noise; her parents were arguing; they always were arguing. This time it seemed to be about the assembly tonight; her father did not want to attend it. She thought, “Perhaps they love to argue,” and with them distracted, put down her stitchery. She rose and slipped away to an upstairs room; a room away from the noise, but more important, it was where she hid her books. The ones that were too exciting for a mere female.
Ignoring the distant cries of battle from her parents, she sat in the window. She opened her book, a tattered copy of Hutton’s ‘Course in Mathematics’ and re-read the inscription, “To my darling sister, better you than me, Freddy.” She paged through the book to find the section, on symmetric polynomials; it was hard going, but interesting.
A gentle knock, on the door frame, disturbed her. Mary, her maid, said, “Miss, your mother is asking for you; remember, there is an assembly tonight.”
My sincere apologies for abusing semi-colons.
As a bit of a hint, symmetric polynomials were the basis for Galois’ investigations into polynomial groups. Groups form the basis for much of modern cryptography – including the https you don’t see at this website. Amanda won’t go there, but … well you’ll see. Any road, Dr Hutton’s book was state of the art for 1809, and her brother has done her a great favour by sending it to her. Mind you, he wants to be a poet – a much more suitable occupation for a gentleman.
The assembly takes place in Chipping Sodbury, a small town near Coalpit Heath, which is near the villages of Frampton and Cotterell. Not to mention the thriving iron works at Iron Acton. It doesn’t look it today, but the area was a hotbed of coal mining and iron working in the early 19th century. Mind you, Frampton was an industrial centre for making hats. Today they’re all suburban communities on the outskirts of Bristol. The featured image shows how some of the area looks today – the buildings in the foreground would have been there, but those on the hill were built mostly after the second world war.
The Art of Deception, first in a series of late Georgian/early Regency spy novels is now up.. You can get the first part here.
Illegal aliens is up for order on Amazon. In the end, the way to fix my mistakes was to issue a new edition. I still used kindle create but in a more native way to produce a “reflowable” book.
You can get a copy of the first four chapters on instafreebie.
You can find my, well our, works here.
Symmetric polynomials are NOT what I expected of a book too exciting for a mere female!
Up until the end of the Victorian period (nearly 100 years later) they really did not approve of educated women. It was supposed to be bad for their health. Even the founder of Girton (a woman’s college in Cambridge) was worried for her students – and pleasantly surprised that they were healthy.
Interesting excerpt and I enjoyed the historical details as well!
Thanks for the historical details. Great snippet!
Thank you
Ha, I love that inscription. That’s great. 😀
Thank you
Here I thought she’d bring out ‘The Mystery of Udolpho’ – HA!
I also have a Regency spy story threading through my WIP and am enjoying it immensely.
Thank you.
I love that she has to sneak around to read mathematics. And is using it for breaking codes! Smart girl.
Thank you. She’s not too sure about men (yet).
Yay, my parents are so busy they’ll never notice I’m secretly reading about those racy symmetric polynomials…
I had to sneak that in. I teach a little Galois theory. Thank you.
Yes, I always found math too exciting for a mere female, too! Very fun clip. Love her attitude toward the parents.
Thank you. It’s hard to capture the regency ideal for females. I’ve left off some of the dietary restrictions – but many young middle and high class women were systematically malnourished – to keep them from being overcome by passions.