The Gramophone Society

I'm about to go and write the next chapter of my new book, The Gramophone Society. I've stepped out of my comfort zone for this one, and that has given me the opportunity to do some really fun research.


The book is set in a system of tunnels under a castle during World War II. Evacuees are kept there by the unscrupulous Lady of the castle; while she feeds them and educates them, all underground, she uses them as well.


Plus there's a whole side plot about her heir, Victor, and a really nasty doctor with disturbing saying scrawled all over the walls of his office.


Enter my modern anti-heroine, Julia, who finds that the stairs to the attic now lead down into those tunnels during 1939. She has problems of her own: bulimia, for one, as well as a broken home.


In order to write the book I set up a HUGE story map. 

It was a lot of fun to create and it keeps my concepts from running out the door as I nail them down.

I also had to create my castle:

and my system of tunnels:

I was stuck on my story for a bit until I found a great image for Victor. I wanted him to be beautiful but damaged. Here he is:

I had to add the facial tat and the shirt.

To further research, I went to the Edison Museum and looked at all the lovely gizmos there. It's pure analog heaven, and better than sex (sort of) for a steampunk / dieselpunk fiend like me.

Lovely old equipment from the Edison think tank

I also got my hands on two of my father-in-laws books. He was a engineer during WWII, and I got images from his Handbooks and his "Audell's New Automobile Guide." (This is a beautiful volume with a hand-tooled cover; I'm so lucky to have it!

I'm off to create the rest of this adventure. Time to get lost in the Tunnels again.

Whassup???? And, Hugo Too

Hello, Blogosphere!


I've been away for, well, most of the month of November. Here's why: I was a participant in NaNoWriMo,  which stands for National Novel Writing Month. I and a gafrillion other people write 50,000 words each during November.


I'm back, and I missed you. Here's a present that I brought back from my mental travels:

What's inside? Cute kittens, sparkly baubles, a nose trimmer? You decide!

Moving on, I see that my own genre, Steampunk, took a hugestep in becoming main stream with the release of Hugo, the newest movie from Martin Scorsese. It's based on a novel by Brian Selznick, called "The Invention of Hugo Cabret." 


Part graphic novel, part flipbook, and a story of Coincidences, puzzles, lost keys, and a mystery, it's the kind of story that appeals to, well, me. I love adventure, I love inventions and mysteries; always have, since I picked up "Spiderweb for Two" in first grade.

The movie itself is moving into pure steampunk. There are huge gears, clockworks, and a very important automaton. There are children and a toymaker and a race through Paris. There's a hidden message. What's not to like?

All of this is pure joy for a steampunker like me. Now, back to NaNoWriMo; while I worked on my new book, called The Gramophone Society, I abandoned steampunk for something new: Dieselpunk. 

My new world is powered by diesel energy, since it is set during World War II during the London evacuations. I became fascinated by the tunnels built to hold people during air raids. They seemed like the perfect place for more adventure and mystery.

I wondered about the possibility of time travel. I didn't want to open a portal, so instead I imagined a set of stairs that usually went upstairs, and that suddenly led down instead: down to a set of mysterious tunnels and into the past.


As Hugo hangs off his huge clock hands like Harold Lloyd, my heroine, Julia, hung between the problems of her modern day world (eating disorders, divorce) and those of the past (displaced children and rationed food.) It was a manuscript that was a LOT of fun to write.

Enjoy Hugo now, and I do hope that you'll enjoy The Gramophone Society in the future...