[...] fortune of getting to spend a few days with fellow writer and History Hoyden Tracy Grant. I adore Tracy’s books (which everyone should read! right now!), so it was an incredible treat to get the advance scoop on [...]
[...] Waltz by Teresa Grant. Under the name Tracy Grant, she wrote Daughter of the Game (aka Secrets of a Lady) and Beneath a Silent Moon, two books with [...]
Suzanne’s back story in Vienna Waltz involving her family and Wellington’s gold does not agree with Melanie’s background and history in Secrets of a Lady (Daughter of the Game) which I re-read after reading Vienna Waltz. ?????
Thanks so much for reading Vienna Waltz, Beverly. And it’s wonderful that you then reread Secrets and compared the details!
In the 1812 flashback sequence in Spain, Mélanie tells Charles her parents were killed in an attack by a French patrol a month ago, and she and Blanca set out for Galicia and were attacked by bandits just before they met up with Charles in the Cantabrian Mountains.
In Vienna Waltz, Suzanne/Mel tells Malcolm/Charles that a bit more time elapsed between when her parents were killed and when he found her in the Cantabrian Mountains than she had originally allowed him to think (in the scenes in 1812 dramatized in Secrets). She says she and Blanca were making their way toward Galicia when they met Radley with an expeditionary force of British soldiers. Radley took them to Léon, and she had an affair with him along the way. Once they reached Léon it was clear Radley had another mistress and found Suzanne/Mel an inconvenience, so she and Blanca set out for Galicia again. They got lost in the mountains and were attacked by bandits and then encountered Malcolm/Charles.
So Charles/Malcolm would know about Radley in the 1819 parts of Secrets, but not in the 1812 flashback where Mel tells the story of her family’s death. They don’t explicitly refer to Radley in the 1819 scenes, but they don’t talk about that period of time much.
The story Suzanne/Mel tells Malcolm/Charles about her affair with Radley in Vienna Waltz is not the precise truth (which becomes clear in the next book in the series, the Waterloo book).
Hope that makes sense! Do let me know if you have more questions. And thanks for asking!!
I discovered your books in the library where I live and bought 3 of them from Amazon to go on with the preceding book….I am sorry to see the suggestive covers (paperbacks) b/c inside are treasures and not cheap novels. You take the reader (me) right into the story and I hate for them to end! Keep up your wonderful talent!
I found “Der Mantel des Schweigens”, “Daughters of the Game” in translation, in my mother’s bookshelf some time ago and really, really liked it so I looked for other books from you. I was really disappointed when I found out that there is no print version of “The Makl of Night” as I am old-fashioned and like the feel of a real book so I do hope it will be published as a paperback just like the others (but I still got it on my PC anyway). Thank you for your wonderful books and I hope there’ll be much more of them!
Wonderful to hear that you found the German translation of “Daughter of the Game”! I really hope “The Mask of Night” is published in print as well. If the e-book version does well, that makes it more likely a publisher will pick it up in print, so thank you for getting it!
By the way, as you can read about on the FAQ page (http://tracygrant.wordpress.com/faq/), Malcolm and Suzanne in Vienna Waltz and my forth coming Imperial Scandal are the same characters as Charles & Mélanie. These books are set before Beneath a Silent Moon.
Thanks for the tip! Yesterday I got started with “Vienna Waltz” and I’m really enjoying it, I couldn’t stop reading. I can’t wait to finish and see if my suspicions about the murderer prove true. Just now I’m through with chapter 26 and puzzled how Malcolm and Suzanne found out the name of the man plotting against somebody so I have to go backwards to see what I missed. Looking forward to your next book already!
So glad you’re enjoying Vienna Waltz, Tima! Do let me know if your suspicions about the murderer prove true. If you mean Count Otronsky the man plotting against somebody) Malcolm suspects it’s him from Margot’s description of the leader of the men meeting at the Empress Rose.
Finished it this morning at 3.30 am because I couldn’t stop reading. Loved the book, probably even more than “Mantel des Schweigens” but that might also be due to the translation. The feeling for the atmosphere at the congress was so real it brought long-forgotten history lessons back to life.
I did suspect Fitz from quite early on but it still was a shock that he really was the murderer, and his motive was a real surprise as well as the motive of Tatiana for her attempted blackmail. When I reread the last pages of chapter 26 I found the description of the conspirator.:-) I had a feeling that his name was mentioned before but I was probably wrong. Now I’m more than curious for your next book!
Wow! It’s a great compliment that Vienna Waltz kept you reading until 3:30! So glad you enjoyed. I loved researching and writing about the Congress. So rich in characters and intrigues and atmosphere. And glad there were some surprises even though you suspected Fitz.
I’m posting a teaser from the next book, Imperial Scandal, every month. You can find them if you follow the “teaser” tags on my Dear Reader blog.
Now I’m really looking forward to your next book! I have the feeling I can’t wait until next year for another story of Malcolm and Suzanne although I still haven’t finished “The Mask of Night”. It just takes forever reading it on a computer so I do hope it will be published in print soon. It’s just so much more fun to read a real book.
PS: Love the cover of your new book!
Finished “Mask” yesterday night and it’s another brilliant book about Charles and Mélanie! I specially love that you`re so honest about the problems between them and I still can see that somehow their relationship works. Are you planning to write a book about events after “Mask”? There are so many open questions in it that make me extremely curios about how it’s going on.
Please, please tell your publisher they have to bring it out in print, too. I’m already looking forward to reading it a second time! And even more to hopefully many more books about Mèlanie and Charles in the future!
Thanks for a great book!
Oh, I’m so glad ot hear you enjoyed Mask of Night, Tima! So far there are no plans to bring out a print version, but I am still hopeful (good feedback from readers helps). I definitely want to write books set after “Mask of Night.” I have lots of thoughts on what happens to the characters – not just Charles and Mel, but David and Simon, Bel and Oliver, Sandy and Bet. What I may end up doing is catching the Malcolm and Suzanne books up to the timeframe after Mask of Night. So there will be books set after Mask, but the characters may be called Malcolm and Suzanne.
I love your books; the complexity of the characters and the historical settings you have chosen make them “standouts” in the vast field of romantic suspense. I have to confess, though, that I am struggling with the new names. I fell in love with Charles and Melanie, and their names evoke certain images. I don’t like the new names and find it extremely disconcerting to read when my brain keeps trying to correct what I am seeing on the page. It takes me out of the story in a frustrating way – so much that I really don’t want to read the Malcolm/Suzanne books. I feel like the characters I loved have died.
I’ve never seen this done in a series before, and there’s a reason for that – it just doesn’t work well. I wish there was something you could do about this. I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels this way. (I usually don’t write about negative feelings, and I am uncomfortable with implied criticism, but I just feel like something important has been lost here. I hope you take my emotional involvement with your characters as a compliment.)
Thanks so much for posting, Carole! I’m so glad to know you enjoy my books are so invested in Charles and Mélanie. The change in names was hard for me too, but there was no alternative if I wanted to go on telling these stories about these characters, and I really wanted to go on writing about them. Not to do so would really mean they had died to me. Malcolm and Suzanne are Charles and Mel’s middle names, which helps me with the transition. I also like to think that Charles and Mel’s lives are so adventurous that it makes sense some of their adventures are chronicles under aliases. I confess I’ve got to the point where I think of the names interchangeably and sometimes type the wrong one (say in the Fraser Correspondence where they’re still Charles and Mel) without realizing it.
The interesting thing is that I’ve heard from readers who found my books through Vienna Waltz who can’t imagine Malcolm and Suzanne with other names and had to adjust to the names Charles and Mélanie when they read Secrets and Beneath and The Mask of Night.
I don’t know if that helps at all. I hope you find a way to enjoy the Malcolm and Suzanne books. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.
I just started Vienna Waltz ( my library had it on a recommended list) & am really enjoying it! I’m already looking forward to the next story about Suzanne & Malcolm.
I like it that you note the real historical characters; now I’ll have to read up on them.
Thanks so much for posting, Nina! It’s great to know you’re enjoying Vienna Waltz (and also cool your library had it on the recommended list). Do let me know what you think when you finish it. The real historical characters were a lot of fun to write about–their lives are fascinating and have some twists and turns I don’t think I’d ever have invented for fictional character (particularly the Courland princesses).
I’m posting a teaser from the next book, Imperial Scandal, every month in my Dear Reader blog. I’ll post the next one next weekend. You can find them by following the “teaser” tag.
Hi Tracy. Love your books, you are that rare combination of a good writer and a good storyteller, I really appreciate it! I don’t mind the name changes, but I’m wondering why? Is it something a publisher insisted on? Also, any chance Beneath a Silent Moon will be coming out in e-book?
Thanks so much, Selena – that makes my day! Yes, it was my new publisher who wanted new names to give the series a fresh start. And I hope Beneath will be released as an e-book. I’ll keep you posted!
Help! I loved Vienna Waltz and just started Imperial Scandal and then found your website. I’m a little lost with these other books (Mask, Beneath, Secrets) and the order in which they go chronologically. Could you let me know the series in order? I would love to go back and start from the beginning. Thanks!
So great you found my book, Leslie! There’s more info about the series order in FAQ (http://tracygrant.wordpress.com/faq/), but basically the chronological order is:
Vienna Waltz (November 1814)
Imperial Scandal (June 1815)
Beneath a Silent Moon (June/July 1817)
Secrets of a Lady (originally Daughter of the Game) (November 1819)
Mask of Night (January 1820)
My book that will be out next year follows Imperial Scandal i August 1815. After that the Malcolm & Suzanne books will take a “parallel universe” track for one or two books to catch Malcolm & Suzanne up to where Charles & Mélanie are emotionally and situationally at the end of The Mask of Night – the same revelations will play out in a different way so that I can write later books in the series (which I already have planned) set post Mask of Night.
Hope that all makes sense – please post if you have further questions – I know it’s a bit confusing!
Thank you so much– I am loving the series and glad to know you have more planned. I think you’ve done a terrific job at combining a complicated period in history with and equally intriguing personal story. Hope your writing goes well and know it’s appreciated!
So great to hear you’re loving the series, Leslie! I work really hard to weave together the real historical events and people with my fictional characters and plots, so it’s wonderful that you think that works so well. Keep me posted!
May 26, 2008 at 5:58 am
[...] Books [...]
November 23, 2009 at 1:33 am
[...] fortune of getting to spend a few days with fellow writer and History Hoyden Tracy Grant. I adore Tracy’s books (which everyone should read! right now!), so it was an incredible treat to get the advance scoop on [...]
January 5, 2011 at 6:22 am
[...] Waltz by Teresa Grant. Under the name Tracy Grant, she wrote Daughter of the Game (aka Secrets of a Lady) and Beneath a Silent Moon, two books with [...]
April 10, 2011 at 7:16 pm
Suzanne’s back story in Vienna Waltz involving her family and Wellington’s gold does not agree with Melanie’s background and history in Secrets of a Lady (Daughter of the Game) which I re-read after reading Vienna Waltz. ?????
April 11, 2011 at 7:29 am
Thanks so much for reading Vienna Waltz, Beverly. And it’s wonderful that you then reread Secrets and compared the details!
In the 1812 flashback sequence in Spain, Mélanie tells Charles her parents were killed in an attack by a French patrol a month ago, and she and Blanca set out for Galicia and were attacked by bandits just before they met up with Charles in the Cantabrian Mountains.
In Vienna Waltz, Suzanne/Mel tells Malcolm/Charles that a bit more time elapsed between when her parents were killed and when he found her in the Cantabrian Mountains than she had originally allowed him to think (in the scenes in 1812 dramatized in Secrets). She says she and Blanca were making their way toward Galicia when they met Radley with an expeditionary force of British soldiers. Radley took them to Léon, and she had an affair with him along the way. Once they reached Léon it was clear Radley had another mistress and found Suzanne/Mel an inconvenience, so she and Blanca set out for Galicia again. They got lost in the mountains and were attacked by bandits and then encountered Malcolm/Charles.
So Charles/Malcolm would know about Radley in the 1819 parts of Secrets, but not in the 1812 flashback where Mel tells the story of her family’s death. They don’t explicitly refer to Radley in the 1819 scenes, but they don’t talk about that period of time much.
The story Suzanne/Mel tells Malcolm/Charles about her affair with Radley in Vienna Waltz is not the precise truth (which becomes clear in the next book in the series, the Waterloo book).
Hope that makes sense! Do let me know if you have more questions. And thanks for asking!!
May 15, 2011 at 10:10 pm
I discovered your books in the library where I live and bought 3 of them from Amazon to go on with the preceding book….I am sorry to see the suggestive covers (paperbacks) b/c inside are treasures and not cheap novels. You take the reader (me) right into the story and I hate for them to end! Keep up your wonderful talent!
May 16, 2011 at 6:14 am
Thanks so much, Bessie! I’m thrilled you discovered my books and enjoyed them so much! It’s my birthday today, and your comment made my day
.
July 11, 2011 at 9:09 pm
I found “Der Mantel des Schweigens”, “Daughters of the Game” in translation, in my mother’s bookshelf some time ago and really, really liked it so I looked for other books from you. I was really disappointed when I found out that there is no print version of “The Makl of Night” as I am old-fashioned and like the feel of a real book so I do hope it will be published as a paperback just like the others (but I still got it on my PC anyway). Thank you for your wonderful books and I hope there’ll be much more of them!
July 11, 2011 at 11:11 pm
Wonderful to hear that you found the German translation of “Daughter of the Game”! I really hope “The Mask of Night” is published in print as well. If the e-book version does well, that makes it more likely a publisher will pick it up in print, so thank you for getting it!
By the way, as you can read about on the FAQ page (http://tracygrant.wordpress.com/faq/), Malcolm and Suzanne in Vienna Waltz and my forth coming Imperial Scandal are the same characters as Charles & Mélanie. These books are set before Beneath a Silent Moon.
July 19, 2011 at 9:05 pm
Thanks for the tip!
Yesterday I got started with “Vienna Waltz” and I’m really enjoying it, I couldn’t stop reading. I can’t wait to finish and see if my suspicions about the murderer prove true. Just now I’m through with chapter 26 and puzzled how Malcolm and Suzanne found out the name of the man plotting against somebody so I have to go backwards to see what I missed. Looking forward to your next book already!
July 20, 2011 at 1:09 am
So glad you’re enjoying Vienna Waltz, Tima! Do let me know if your suspicions about the murderer prove true. If you mean Count Otronsky the man plotting against somebody) Malcolm suspects it’s him from Margot’s description of the leader of the men meeting at the Empress Rose.
July 20, 2011 at 9:34 pm
Finished it this morning at 3.30 am because I couldn’t stop reading. Loved the book, probably even more than “Mantel des Schweigens” but that might also be due to the translation. The feeling for the atmosphere at the congress was so real it brought long-forgotten history lessons back to life.
I did suspect Fitz from quite early on but it still was a shock that he really was the murderer, and his motive was a real surprise as well as the motive of Tatiana for her attempted blackmail. When I reread the last pages of chapter 26 I found the description of the conspirator.:-) I had a feeling that his name was mentioned before but I was probably wrong. Now I’m more than curious for your next book!
July 21, 2011 at 2:32 am
Wow! It’s a great compliment that Vienna Waltz kept you reading until 3:30! So glad you enjoyed. I loved researching and writing about the Congress. So rich in characters and intrigues and atmosphere. And glad there were some surprises even though you suspected Fitz.
I’m posting a teaser from the next book, Imperial Scandal, every month. You can find them if you follow the “teaser” tags on my Dear Reader blog.
Do stay in touch!
August 24, 2011 at 3:33 pm
Now I’m really looking forward to your next book! I have the feeling I can’t wait until next year for another story of Malcolm and Suzanne although I still haven’t finished “The Mask of Night”. It just takes forever reading it on a computer so I do hope it will be published in print soon. It’s just so much more fun to read a real book.
PS: Love the cover of your new book!
August 24, 2011 at 3:57 pm
Sorry reading Mask is so slow, Tima, but glad you’re able to read it! I hope it’s published in print soon too.
And so glad you like the cover and are looking forward to Imperial Scandal! I’ll be posting another teaser from it this weekend.
September 14, 2011 at 3:12 pm
Finished “Mask” yesterday night and it’s another brilliant book about Charles and Mélanie! I specially love that you`re so honest about the problems between them and I still can see that somehow their relationship works. Are you planning to write a book about events after “Mask”? There are so many open questions in it that make me extremely curios about how it’s going on.
Please, please tell your publisher they have to bring it out in print, too. I’m already looking forward to reading it a second time! And even more to hopefully many more books about Mèlanie and Charles in the future!
Thanks for a great book!
September 14, 2011 at 5:23 pm
Oh, I’m so glad ot hear you enjoyed Mask of Night, Tima! So far there are no plans to bring out a print version, but I am still hopeful (good feedback from readers helps). I definitely want to write books set after “Mask of Night.” I have lots of thoughts on what happens to the characters – not just Charles and Mel, but David and Simon, Bel and Oliver, Sandy and Bet. What I may end up doing is catching the Malcolm and Suzanne books up to the timeframe after Mask of Night. So there will be books set after Mask, but the characters may be called Malcolm and Suzanne.
September 17, 2011 at 4:51 am
I love your books; the complexity of the characters and the historical settings you have chosen make them “standouts” in the vast field of romantic suspense. I have to confess, though, that I am struggling with the new names. I fell in love with Charles and Melanie, and their names evoke certain images. I don’t like the new names and find it extremely disconcerting to read when my brain keeps trying to correct what I am seeing on the page. It takes me out of the story in a frustrating way – so much that I really don’t want to read the Malcolm/Suzanne books. I feel like the characters I loved have died.
I’ve never seen this done in a series before, and there’s a reason for that – it just doesn’t work well. I wish there was something you could do about this. I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels this way. (I usually don’t write about negative feelings, and I am uncomfortable with implied criticism, but I just feel like something important has been lost here. I hope you take my emotional involvement with your characters as a compliment.)
September 17, 2011 at 5:21 am
Thanks so much for posting, Carole! I’m so glad to know you enjoy my books are so invested in Charles and Mélanie. The change in names was hard for me too, but there was no alternative if I wanted to go on telling these stories about these characters, and I really wanted to go on writing about them. Not to do so would really mean they had died to me. Malcolm and Suzanne are Charles and Mel’s middle names, which helps me with the transition. I also like to think that Charles and Mel’s lives are so adventurous that it makes sense some of their adventures are chronicles under aliases. I confess I’ve got to the point where I think of the names interchangeably and sometimes type the wrong one (say in the Fraser Correspondence where they’re still Charles and Mel) without realizing it.
The interesting thing is that I’ve heard from readers who found my books through Vienna Waltz who can’t imagine Malcolm and Suzanne with other names and had to adjust to the names Charles and Mélanie when they read Secrets and Beneath and The Mask of Night.
I don’t know if that helps at all. I hope you find a way to enjoy the Malcolm and Suzanne books. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.
September 20, 2011 at 3:50 am
I just started Vienna Waltz ( my library had it on a recommended list) & am really enjoying it! I’m already looking forward to the next story about Suzanne & Malcolm.
I like it that you note the real historical characters; now I’ll have to read up on them.
September 20, 2011 at 3:56 am
Thanks so much for posting, Nina! It’s great to know you’re enjoying Vienna Waltz (and also cool your library had it on the recommended list). Do let me know what you think when you finish it. The real historical characters were a lot of fun to write about–their lives are fascinating and have some twists and turns I don’t think I’d ever have invented for fictional character (particularly the Courland princesses).
I’m posting a teaser from the next book, Imperial Scandal, every month in my Dear Reader blog. I’ll post the next one next weekend. You can find them by following the “teaser” tag.
February 1, 2012 at 6:19 pm
Hi Tracy. Love your books, you are that rare combination of a good writer and a good storyteller, I really appreciate it! I don’t mind the name changes, but I’m wondering why? Is it something a publisher insisted on? Also, any chance Beneath a Silent Moon will be coming out in e-book?
February 1, 2012 at 11:03 pm
Thanks so much, Selena – that makes my day! Yes, it was my new publisher who wanted new names to give the series a fresh start. And I hope Beneath will be released as an e-book. I’ll keep you posted!
Thanks again and do stay in touch!
April 2, 2012 at 7:51 pm
My Kindle is officially updated!!
April 18, 2012 at 7:42 pm
Help! I loved Vienna Waltz and just started Imperial Scandal and then found your website. I’m a little lost with these other books (Mask, Beneath, Secrets) and the order in which they go chronologically. Could you let me know the series in order? I would love to go back and start from the beginning. Thanks!
April 18, 2012 at 8:14 pm
So great you found my book, Leslie! There’s more info about the series order in FAQ (http://tracygrant.wordpress.com/faq/), but basically the chronological order is:
Vienna Waltz (November 1814)
Imperial Scandal (June 1815)
Beneath a Silent Moon (June/July 1817)
Secrets of a Lady (originally Daughter of the Game) (November 1819)
Mask of Night (January 1820)
My book that will be out next year follows Imperial Scandal i August 1815. After that the Malcolm & Suzanne books will take a “parallel universe” track for one or two books to catch Malcolm & Suzanne up to where Charles & Mélanie are emotionally and situationally at the end of The Mask of Night – the same revelations will play out in a different way so that I can write later books in the series (which I already have planned) set post Mask of Night.
Hope that all makes sense – please post if you have further questions – I know it’s a bit confusing!
April 18, 2012 at 8:16 pm
p.s.
Leslie, you might want to check out this thread – http://tracygrant.wordpress.com/2012/04/05/imperial-scandal-discussion/ – for more info about the future direciton of the series.
April 18, 2012 at 8:51 pm
Thank you so much– I am loving the series and glad to know you have more planned. I think you’ve done a terrific job at combining a complicated period in history with and equally intriguing personal story. Hope your writing goes well and know it’s appreciated!
April 19, 2012 at 5:59 pm
So great to hear you’re loving the series, Leslie! I work really hard to weave together the real historical events and people with my fictional characters and plots, so it’s wonderful that you think that works so well. Keep me posted!