Guest Post by Lynn Cullen + Giveaway of Reign of Madness

Passages to the Past is pleased to welcome Lynn Cullen, author of Reign of Madness, to the blog today with a guest post and giveaway!

HISTORY AS A JIGSAW PUZZLE: Why I’m Hooked on History

Guest Post by Lynn Cullen 

Have you ever been hooked by a jigsaw puzzle? You start with fitting one piece to another. Then you put together a few more. Now you’re finding it hard to walk away. Each additional piece sucks you in deeper. Faster and faster you go, building one piece upon another, until soon you have to sit down and finish the whole thing, just for the satisfaction of completing the entire puzzle. 

Writing novels based on historical figures can be like this. 

When I thought I might write about the reportedly insane Spanish queen, Juana of Castile, I started with a biography, JUANA THE MAD: SOVEREIGNTY & DYNASTY IN RENAISSANCE EUROPE by Bethany Aram. Learning about a potential character for a novel from a reputable, penetrating biography is like finding all the edge pieces of a puzzle. When you put them together, they form the framework. 

Juana of Castile—Was she really mad?

Only after the framework is in place, can you start to fill in the rest. I began by reading biographies about many of the other persons in Juana’s life. In this case, I read extensively about her parents, Isabel and Fernando, the Spanish monarchs who sent Christopher Columbus on his voyages of discovery. That, in turn, led me to Columbus. Reading about him, I found out that he had a son near Juana’s age, Diego. Diego served as a page to Juana’s brother and then to her mother. Juana would have known who he was. Another puzzle piece! In fact, Diego became an important part of the book. 

Diego Columbus (Colón in Spanish) was a young man who had a lot to prove. He worshipped his father, even though his father left him for years at a time at a monastery when he was growing up. His father was driven by an insatiable desire for fame, gold, and power, not necessarily in that order. And prospects were looking up for Columbus when he received a warm welcome from Isabel after returning from his first voyage. By his second voyage, Columbus’s stock had fallen sharply. He became a laughingstock in Spain. The only “riches” he found in what he called the Indies were slaves, which infuriated Isabel, who from the start considered the New World inhabitants as subjects worthy of her love and protection. Christopher Columbus was soon called “The Lord of the Mosquitoes.” Diego spent the rest of his life trying to prove his father’s honor and to win back his father’s claims in the New World. 

How did this puzzle piece fit with Juana? She, too, was always trying to prove herself. She was the daughter of the most powerful woman in the world. Trying to find her own identity under such a strong and charismatic mother was a constant challenge. I imagined that Juana could identify with Diego. She knew what it was like to have to make sense of one’s life while living in a parent’s shadow. 

It follows that a lot of pieces would center around Isabel. I found that even though she was arguably the most powerful person in the world, her life was not as rosy as it seemed. Her marriage to Fernando was the talk of Europe—they were the Brangelina of their time. They plastered their symbols over every church, palace, and public building in Spain, as well as their motto that proclaimed, “We are Equal!” Which was hogwash. Their marriage was terribly unbalanced, with Isabel holding the bulk of the power. I wondered how such a proud man as Fernando would handle being Mr. Isabel. Not well, it turns out. He acted out by fathering at least 4 children out of wedlock, an act, I think, designed to get Isabel’s attention. It did. She was furious but there was nothing she could do about it. Fernando attacked her in one arena she could not control. 

Wedding portrait of Isabel and Fernando—“We are equal”

The final hole to be filled in the puzzle of my story of Juana had to do with her husband, Philip the Handsome, the Archduke of Austria. If you think a man with “handsome” as part of his name might be trouble, you’d be right. A more spoiled boy-man could not be imaginable. He treated Juana with disdain from the start, going so far as to be late—by six days—to their wedding. The original party animal, he spent more time with his hawks and mistresses than with his wife. Cavalier to all, especially to the Spanish, no wonder people immediately believed that someone had poisoned him when he died. 

Philip the Handsome—poisoned?

My job as a novelist was to fit all these pieces together. As in a jigsaw, the connections have to dovetail perfectly—a novelist can’t force them or the story will not be believable. Fortunately, in the case of REIGN OF MADNESS, I had a wealth of fascinating people from history to work with. And several trips to Spain and Belgium filled in the missing links. Once I put the pieces together, the puzzle of whether or not Juana was actually insane was neatly solved. And then the writing began. 

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About Reign of Madness 

Paperback Publication Date:  May 1, 2012

Berkley Trade

464p

{SYNOPSIS}

From the author of The Creation of Eve comes a tale of love and madness, royal intrigue and marital betrayal, set during the Golden Age of Spain.

Juana of Castile, third child of the Spanish monarchs Isabel and Fernando, grows up with no hope of inheriting her parents' crowns, but as a princess knows her duty: to further her family's ambitions through marriage. Yet stories of courtly love, and of her parents' own legendary romance, surround her. When she weds the Duke of Burgundy, a young man so beautiful that he is known as Philippe the Handsome, she dares to hope that she might have both love and crowns. He is caring, charming, and attracted to her-seemingly a perfect husband.

But what begins like a fairy tale ends quite differently.

When Queen Isabel dies, the crowns of Spain unexpectedly pass down to Juana, leaving her husband and her father hungering for the throne. Rumors fly that the young Queen has gone mad, driven insane by possessiveness. Who is to be believed? The King, beloved by his subjects? Or the Queen, unseen and unknown by her people?

One of the greatest cautionary tales in Spanish history comes to life as Lynn Cullen explores the controversial reign of Juana of Castile-also known as Juana the Mad. Sweeping, page-turning, and wholly entertaining, Reign of Madness is historical fiction at its richly satisfying best.

About Lynn Cullen

Lynn Cullen is the author of Reign of Madness which was added to the Best in the South selection by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and nominated for the Townsend Prize for fiction. Her previous novel The Creation of Eve, was named  among the best fiction books of 2010 by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and an April 2010 Indie Next Pick. She is also the author of numerous award-winning books for children, including the young adult novel I Am Rembrandt’s Daughter, which was a 2007 Barnes & Noble “Discover Great New Writers” selection, and an ALA Best Book of 2008. An avid traveler and historian, Cullen lives in Atlanta.

For more information on Lynn Cullen and her novels, please visit her website.

Giveaway Information

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