And thus was born Mrs. Merlin’s Academy for Select Young Ladies, a secret school for Hellion Heroes. I chose to set it in Regency England because the era is so richly romantic. It was a world aswirl in silks, seduction and the intrigue of the Napoleonic Wars. A time when old ideas were constantly clashing with radical new ones. What better place for an unconventional female to test her mettle? Siena’s story made its debut in June '07, Shannon's story hit the shelves in March '08 and Sofia’s adventure is scheduled for October’08.

As for blogs, some of the sites I enjoy are www.riskyregencies.blogspot.com and www.wordwenches.com

A few more random facts about me, in no particular order of importance:

I took up fencing in college but soon decided that I didn't like getting poked with a sharp object and turned to squash, a sport that allows you to whack a little rubber ball against wooden walls. (It rarely hits back.)

I studied children's book illustration with Maurice Sendak.

I spent a summer touring around Europe on the back of a BMW 750 cc motorcycle, which was not as romantic as it might sound. (Imagine going over a Swiss mountain pass at night in a July snowstorm and you will begin to have an inkling of why.)

My "pet" is a 2,000 lb vintage Vandercook 211 printing press. I love setting type by hand and printing limited edition art books.

And speaking of facts . . .

I always compile a notebook full of offbeat information in the course of writing a book. For me, part of the fun of being a writer of historical romance is getting into the spirit of the time. I love the research that goes into creating the mood and setting of a certain era. In working on Seduced by A Spy, I was lucky enough to travel to Scotland and Ireland, where I uncovered lots of fascinating facts. Strangely enough, a good many of them seem to revolve around . . . spirits. Very strong spirits. Here are just a few examples:

There are close to 200 single malt scotches made in small distilleries throughout Scotland. (If you have ever experienced the weather in the Highlands, where my fictional McAllister castle is located, you will understand why.)

In both Scottish and Irish Gaelic, the words uisge beatha and usquebaugh mean "water of life." This somehow translated into"whisky" in English. (No doubt after someone consumed more than a few wee drams of the stuff.) Another interesting aside is that the Scots spell it "whisky" and the Irish spell it "whiskey."

The local brew of the seaside town of Dornoch, where Orlov and Shannon first land to begin their trip into the hills, is Glenmorangie, which means "glen of tranquillity" in Gaelic. It was founded in 1848, but illicit distilling in the area dates back to the 1700s.

Saltpeter, an essential ingredient in gunpowder, is found in nitrates, so during the Napoleonic Wars, the British government considered requiring tavernkeepers to save the urine of their patrons in wooden vats. (Brandy was said to create an especially desirable end product.)

Kenmare, the charming town on the Ring of Kerry where Shannon helps the wonded Orlov to safety aboard a British naval cutter, has been renowned for its healing waters since the 1600s. Today it is also known as the home of Sheen Falls Lodge, a luxious country manor hotel with the largest wine cellar in Ireland.

Be sure to check back often for more arcane trivia. I'm working on a fun list of modern terms and their historical inspiration . . . Do you know where the term "slush fund" came from?

If you are like me, you may you may often stop and wonder where a word or a phrase came from . . .

In the course of researching various arcane historical subjects, I occasionally come across some unexpected—and fascinating—facts. Being a writer, the ones pertaining to language are especially interesting to me. So, as promised, here are a few modern terms, and the historical explanation for their meaning.

Slush fund
During the early 1800s, the meat served aboard ship in the British Navy was pretty disgusting and consisted mostly of fat and gristle. For the most part, it was simply boiled in large vats, leaving a thick scum on the top of the water which was called “slush.” This was skimmed off, and half of it was used to waterproof the ship’s rigging. The other half belonged to the ship’s cook as an official perk of the job, and he sold it to tallow merchants to supplement his Navy wages. Thus the term “slush fund”.

Head
This modern nautical term for toilet also derives from the British Navy. The beakhead was a term for an area in bow of the ship. The figurehead and the catheads were also located in the bow, as were the primitive wooden latrine seats that hung over the sides of the ship. When sailors needed to relive themselves, it became customary to say they were going to the “head.”

Out of sorts
When type for books and newspapers was set by hand, printers would choose the letters from wooden job cases, which were arranged not according to the alphabet, but rather to standard layout based on the frequency of a letter’s use. Other compartments held lead “sorts” for spacing the words. When a printer ran “out of sorts” he usually turned snappish, yelling at his apprentices to for more lead so he could finish the job. Thus, to be “out of sorts” is to be in a bad mood.

Blackballed
At Muirfield, one of the oldest and most exclusive golf clubs in Scotland, when someone applied for membership it was a tradition that the all the current members voted on whether to admit the applicant by putting a golf ball in a wooden ballot box—white signified approval, black signified a rejection. It took only one black ball to sink a person’s chances of being admitted to the club.

The acid test
Nitric acid was used to test the purity of gold before countries had a standardized system of coinage.

Bedlam
A word synonymous with chaos, it derives from the ancient London religious house founded in 1247, which was turned into Bethlehem Hospital for lunatics by Henry VIII. Later it was called Bethlem, and then Bedlam.

Bite the bullet
In the days before anesthesia, soldiers wounded on the battlefield would be given a bullet to bite down on while a doctor operated on a wound in order to keep from screaming in pain.

Bobby (or Peeler)
The modern day London bobby, or policeman, owes his nickname to Sir Robert Peel, who established the first official police force in London, circa 1830. Early law enforcement officers were also called “peelers”.

Cut to the chase
This saying comes from the arcane game of court tennis, which was the sport played by Henry VIII (very different from lawn tennis, which didn’t come into being until the 1870s.) It has a very complex, complicated set of scoring rules—don’t ask—but one of them involves a ball landing in a certain place. When it does, a “chase” is called. However, the set is played out before the players engage in a game within a game, which ultimately determines the winner. So “cut to the chase” means skipping over parts of an endeavor to get to the most important, or dramatic, point.

A square meal
For easy storage, the wooden plates used in the British Navy were usually square instead of round.

Limey
A slang term still used for the British, it came about because during the 1700s, the British government discovered that scurvy, a disease caused by a lack of Vitamin C, could be prevented by giving sailors citrus fruit. So in 1795, it became standard orders that all sailors in the British Navy received a daily ration of lemon or lime juice.

Lock, stock and barrel
This term dates from the 1600’s and comes from a British government Ordnance order demanding that the gun barrels being ordered for the army be equipped with wooden stocks and double spring French locks—in other words, the weapons had to be in full working order. Toda, it still means “complete, and ready to go.”

Going off half cocked
An improvement was made to flintlock weapons in the early1600s, whereby a mechanical safety mechanism was designed to keep the gun from firing in the half cock position. Thus, “going off half cocked” means “exploding” prematurely. It also has connotations of something not working properly.

Pleased as punch
This saying has its origins in the traditional street puppet show of “Punch and Judy”, where the character Punch is always very proud of himself when he murders off everyone else in the play. Popular in 19th century England, the show had its origins in medieval Italian street theater.

Pipe dream
This term, which refers to an unrealistic goal or notion, came into being in England , where during the 18th and 19th century smoking opium had become prevalent. (Samuel Taylor Coleridge is said to have written many of his famous poems, including Kubla Khan, under the influence of the drug.)

Do you know any terms with an interesting historical background? If so, e-mail them to pickensbooks@aol.com with the heading “words from history”. Not only will I post the best ones here, with your name given prominent credit, but you will also receive an autographed ARC of one of my “Spy” books.

References: Nelson’s Trafalgar by Roy Adkins; Sniper—A History of U.S. Marksmanship by Martin Pegler; www.businessballs.com/clichesorigins