Blog Tour of “Fair Stands The Wind” by Catherine Lodge, character interview + giveaway

Dear all,

I do apologise for abandoning you but I have finally settle in my new country but the new job has just started and I barely have time for much.

Today I am very happy to introduce a new writer: Catherine Lodge, an English lady who is presenting her first published book: Fair Stands The Wind. It is a Pride and Prejudice what if that shows Darcy in a very different light. Check the blurb below:

We all know that in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, Mr Darcy is proud and prejudiced because he is a wealthy landowner who believes himself above his company; and that Elizabeth Bennet can afford to be proud and prejudiced because she believes she has the freedom to make choices for herself.

But what if Mr Darcy is the second son, sent to sea at a young age? What if Elizabeth is trapped by circumstances, with an ill father on one side and an understandably desperate mother on the other?

Meet Captain Darcy of the Royal Navy, a successful frigate captain, with ample prize-money and a sister he needs to provide for while he is at sea. Meet Elizabeth Bennet, who needs a husband and is trying to resign herself to Mr Collins, the worst “least worst alternative” in the history of literature.

What do you think? Will Darcy’s personality change much? Why does he need to provide for a sister if he is the second son? Is Mrs Bennet even more desperate than in Jane Austen’s book? Is Captain Darcy more gorgeous than Captain Wentworth? 😛 Well… I will stop the teasing now with that last question.

Catherine Lodge

Catherine Lodge is a semi-retired lawyer and lecturer, living in Yorkshire–a part of the UK even more beautiful than Derbyshire. One of five daughters, although by birth order regrettably the Jane, she found 19th Century literature early in her teens and never looked back–even if that meant her school essays kept coming back with “archaic!” written in the margin next to some of her favourite words. She still thinks that “bruited” is a much nicer word than “rumoured.”

After years of drafting leases and pleadings, she finally started to write for fun in her forties and has never stopped since. Much of this will never see the light of day, having been fed to the digital equivalent of a roaring bonfire, but Fair Stands the Wind is the first book she thinks worthy of public attention.

She spends her day fixing computer problems for friends and family, singing in her local choir, and avoiding the ironing.

Follow her on: Facebook or send her an Email

Apart from introducing her book, Catherine is kindly sharing a character interview that I believe you will enjoy much. Some of the characters on her book are in The Jeremy Kyle Show. It is a very amusing and a great idea to present this character of the 19th century. Enjoy!

Announcer: And now on the Stuck at Home in the Afternoon Network: The Jeremy Kyle Show

The audience variously cheers, applauds and boos. They have been sat in the studio for three hours and have already sat through one happy episode where they got to abuse a spendthrift Baronet and his snooty oldest daughter.

Kyle oozes onto the stage.

“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, today we have with us Mrs Thomas Bennet of Longbourn in the Country of Herefordshire. Fanny, (may I call you Fanny?) welcome to the Jeremy Kyle Show.”

(Audience boos enthusiastically.)

“Now, now, no need for that. Fanny has come here to ask for our help with one of her daughters, isn’t that right, Fanny?”

Mrs Bennet, fanning herself vigorously. “Yes, Mr Kyle, For if you do not help us, I am sure I do not know what we shall do. With my poor Mr Bennet gone and that wicked girl entirely refusing to do as I tell her, we shall all be in the hedgerows in a wink of an eye. Not that I get many winks, the nights I’ve lain away, Mr Kyle, you can have no idea of, no one knows my sufferings but me.”

Audience, warily, they’re still not sure about her. “Aaaah.”

“So tell us all about it, Fanny.”

“Mr Kyle, that child will be the death of me, I am sure. Mr Collins, my husband’s heir you know, has already been sniffing around the house counting the teaspoons and deciding what to do with us all. I just do not know what has got into the girl. It is a perfect match for her, and it’s not as though the gentleman is hideous or anything, he’s perfectly amiable and £5,000 a year! And she swears she will not see him again, and I know he was so close to proposing too. She swears it is all my fault as though I know nothing at all. I married a gentleman, I’ll have you know, with an estate and £2,000 a year and everything handsome about him. But oh no, I do not know how to conduct myself, if you please.”

“We’d better have the young lady out, then. Ladies and gentlemen, Miss Jane Bennet”

Audience starts to boo, gets a good look at Jane and trails into silence.

“Oh Mama, how could you?” Jane is mortified and inclined to hide her face in her hands.

“Don’t you ‘Oh Mama’ me, you ….you…you…serpent’s tooth. What do you mean by it? There’s Mr Bingley, mooning around after you with his great cow-eyes and you refuse to receive him. It is beyond everything!”

“But mama, how can I look him in the face after what you did?”

“What I did? All I did was look out for the family’s credit. It is all very well my brother Gardiner telling me I need to economise, but he hasn’t got half the country watching to see if we start acting like paupers. I have other daughters I need to dispose of , you know, and then I can die happy knowing my duty is done.”

Jane, getting uncharacteristically annoyed. “I fail to see what spending all that money on a new upstairs carpet has to do with disposing of your daughters. You were just bored and wanted to buy something!”

Audience, warming up, this is more like it. “Oooooh.”

“You see how I am treated, Mr Kyle. It was quite bad enough with her sister, Lizzy. Turning her nose up at Mr Collins indeed. We could have stayed at Longbourn forever and ever but oh no….. It’s all of a piece. No one knows how I am tried. Five daughters, would you believe, Mr Kyle, five daughters and I’ve devoted my life to those girls, to making sure they are all respectably established and what are my thanks for a mother’s devotion?”

Kyle springs the trap. “So, you’ve been a good mother then, Fanny?”

“None better, sir.”

“And you’ve brought your daughters up well?”

“As well as I could on my own, for my poor dear Bennet took no interest in any of them but Lizzy and that only served to make her saucy!”

“We’ll see about that.” Kyle turns to look back stage. “Come out Miss Lydia Bennet.”

Lydia bounces on stage followed by an unwillingly amused Mr Gardiner. “Oh Ma, you’ve got to let me come home, Uncle Gardiner is being perfectly horrid.” Fanny and Lydia embrace.

“So, what do you say to that, Mr Gardiner?”

“Perfectly horrid in this case consists of stopping her sneaking out of the house to meet a young man,”

Audience, getting into the swing of things variously shout out. “Shame!” “Spoilsport!” and several other things not suitable to the delicate ears of my readers.

“What do you say to that, eh Fanny?”

“Well to be sure it was very wrong of her. Lydia, was he particularly good-looking?”

“Even better than Captain Darcy!”

Audience, having read the book, storm the stage and the show develops into a fist fight, security swarm the crowd and at the back, Jeremy Kyle can be seen smiling in satisfaction. Until Mr Gardiner, channelling the hopes of a large proportion of the British population, punches him firmly on the nose.

Well, Lydia has to be always controversial!!

If you have liked this introduction of the book with such a great interview, do not forget to visit the other stops of the blog. By the way, the book will be very soon available to be bought on Amazon US and UK, so check it!

Blog Tour Schedule

08/30 Babblings of a Bookworm; Guest Post or Vignette, GA

08/31 My Vices and Weaknesses; Character Interview, GA

09/01 Austenesque Reviews; Vignette, Excerpt, GA

09/02 Interests of a Jane Austen Girl; Review, Excerpt, Giveaway

09/03 Darcyholic Diversions; Author Interview, GA

09/04 Half Agony, Half Hope; Review, Vignette

09/05 Of Pens and Pages; Review, Excerpt, GA

09/06 Diary of an Eccentric; Guest Post, Vignette, Giveaway

09/07 From Pemberley to Milton; Guest Post or Vignette, Excerpt, GA

09/08 So little time…; Guest Post, Excerpt, Giveaway

09/09 My Love for Jane Austen; Vignette, GA

09/10 Margie’s Must Reads; Review, Excerpt, GA

09/11 My Jane Austen Book Club; Guest Post, Excerpt, GA

09/12 Just Jane 1813; Review, GA

Time To Give Away

Catherine Lodge is giving away ebooks of Fair Stands The Wind and it is very easy for you to participate. Read the terms and conditions below and click here to enter.

Terms and Conditions:

Readers may enter the drawing by tweeting once a day and daily commenting on a blog post or review that has a giveaway attached for the tour. Entrants must provide the name of the blog where they commented. Remember: Tweet and comment once daily to earn extra entries.

A winner may win ONLY 1 (ONE) eBook of Fair Stands the Wind by Catherine Lodge. Each winner will be randomly selected by Rafflecopter and the giveaway is international.