I am not one of those type of people who tells complete strangers their life’s history. I have to get to know people before I start telling you about myself. So, you’ll be happy to know that I’m not going to tell you what I ate for breakfast, if my son won his baseball game, or whatever else might be going on in my life. Don’t get me wrong, I like meeting new people and getting to know them, but that’s not what this blog is going to be about.

What I want to blog about is the book I wrote, “The Search”, and eventually tell you about the second and third book I have already started on. Yet, I know you don’t want me to go on and on and on and on about that either. So, I think I’ve come up with a solution. I’m going to tell you interesting facts (at least I find them interesting) about the time period and location my book takes place in, 1831 London or England.

For example, during the time when Dukes, Earls, and other peers had titles that meant something, a title was sometimes used as a nickname. In my book the hero’s title is the Earl of Prestonshire. His father’s title is the Duke of Blackfield. These names could come from a nearby town, forest, lake, river, or the county they came from. The Earl of Prestonshire is called Lord Preston by close family and friends. His real name is Mark Hurst III. His father’s nickname is Lord Black, but his wife hates the color black, so, refuses to call him Lord Black. Instead she uses his given name which you can probable figure out.

At this time you may be wondering how a father and son could both have a title when generally a title is inherited. Well, it is not unusual for a monarch to bestow a title of hirer rank to someone already with a title. In this case, an ancestor had the title of Earl of Prestonshire when the reigning king decided to give them the title of Duke of Blackfield. The first son of a titled peer was often granted the use of the lesser title.

So, I hope you found this entertaining. I do not consider myself to know all there is about the Georgian or Victorian era. If I have my fact wrong I welcome your feedback. I’m hoping to find some of the link to websites where I found a lot of my information. I also purchased a book that helped me tremendously. It is called “What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew: From Fox Hunting to Whist – the Facts of Daily Life in 19th-Century England” by Daniel Pool.

Did I explain myself well enough? Is there anything else you would like to know?