This is my Discovering Her Delight inspiration post. Warning! There are spoilers ahead for the book. If you don’t mind spoilers, read on. If you don’t like your romance spoiled, read Discovering Her Delight first!
An Initial Inspiration
I started the notes for Discovering Her Delight way back in 2014 (then known as Discovering Her Desire). I knew it was going to be a story centered on an archaeological expedition, I just wasn’t clear on the specifics. An archaeologist friend of mine had a bizarre idea: what if the hero had to write on the heroine’s back?
So I held on to that thought, and it continued to inspire the story. Why would he need to do this? Under what circumstances? And how would he do it in 1881?
When I finally wrote the first draft as my 2017 NaNoWriMo project, I had all the reasons why, and, thanks to the NaNoWriMo discussion forums, I had some idea of the how. You’ll have to read the book to find out.
Antiquities
As I worked on the book, the obvious plot device was a fake antiquities ring. Well, I have some personal experience with that, believe it or not. My father used to subscribe to the catalog for the Sadigh Gallery in New York. Most years at Christmas, he would give me and my siblings gifts of some antique object and not tell us where he got it. When we would visit him, we would notice some new object from antiquity prominently displayed, and he would be vague about how he acquired it. I recall one gift of an “Egyptian” necklace and feeling rather uncomfortable about it. If it was real, it was illegal under international law. Then came the year I received the “Ancient Greek” kylix for Christmas.
I knew immediately it was fake.
By that time, I had finished my masters in art history (my emphasis was late Roman art). I knew objects such as the kylix would not be: a) intact and unchipped; b) if they were intact and unchipped, would be otherwise pristine, e.g. would not have uncleanable dirt and encrustations because the antiquities dealer would have cleaned all of that off to get a better price. The kylix was, simply, too perfect and too dirty.
Then, as I was going through my father’s effects while he was dying, I came across all of the Sadigh Gallery receipts, which prompted me to look them up. It just happened to be at the same time the gallery had been accused of selling fakes.
The sad reality became fodder for the villain’s story in Discovering Her Delight.
Accents
It has been enough time to have had a few reviews on the book, and so far no one has mentioned the character in the book who has a unique skill with accents. While some might find this an unlikely skill, it is indeed based on my own experience.
When on a family tour of Italy, I could tell our British tour guide spoke Italian with a British accent. He told me the Italians found his accent as sexy as the Americans find British accents sexy. I laughed.
At a party at the apartment of a Turkish friend, I told him I could tell he spoke Turkish with a Los Angeles accent. He agreed in surprise.
I only offer these experiences as evidence in case someone wonders if ascertaining a speaker’s origin from the way they speak a foreign language is possible. It is.
Theme songs
So, our theme song for Discovering Her Delight is absolutely, positively “I Think We’re Alone Now”. But which version?
I am torn by all of the choices of versions of our theme song!
[Disclaimer: I have no control over whatever commercials/adverts Youtube chooses to show you when you watch these embedded videos. Whatever the ads are, I probably do not support the product or message.]
The original by Tommy James & The Shondells from 1967?
The remake by Tiffany from 1987 (twenty years later)?
The COVID lockdown version made by Billie Joe Armstrong with his sons?
(Okay, I think Billie Joe’s version is my favorite, although I do miss the vocal harmonies of the other versions.)
Misterotica, however, has a different take on what the theme song should be. Because William has an “unruly cock” that he has to keep bound under his trousers, my husband thought of a lesser-known song about young male virility: Jizz In My Pants by The Lonely Island. [Totally “Not Safe For Work” video!]
And in Discovering Her Delight, yes, William does, um, “jizz” in a few unusual places, one of which is not next to a kylix, but a larger vessel from antiquity.
Happy reading!