The Wolf Mirror
Caroline Healy
Publication date: February 14th 2017
Genres: Historical, Romance, Young Adult
Changing places doesn’t always help you see things differently.
Cassie throws the first punch in a brawl at Winchester Abbey Girl’s School. Her subsequent suspension is a glitch in Cassie’s master plan; Finish School/Get Job/Leave Home (and never come back). As punishment her mother banishes her to Ludlow Park, their creepy ancestral home. In the dark of a stormy night Cassie finds herself transported to 1714, the beginning of the Georgian period.
With the help of a lady’s maid and an obnoxious gentleman, Mr Charles Stafford, Cassie must unravel the mysterious illness afflicting Lord Miller. If Lord Miller kicks the bucket the house goes to Reginald Huxley, the brainless cousin from London.
Cassie’s task is to figure out who is poisoning the Lord of Ludlow without exposing herself to the ridicule of her peers, getting herself committed to the asylum or worse, married off to the first man who will have her.
Cassie must learn to hold her tongue, keep her pride in check and reign in her rebellious nature – because the fate of her entire family, for generations, rests on her shoulders.
Meanwhile, Lady Cassandra Miller frantically searches for her smelling salts or her trusted governess Miss. Blythe, whose soothing advice she would dearly love. Instead Cassandra finds some woman and a boy squatting in the Ludlow mansion; her father, her lady’s maid and all the servants have magically disappeared.
Tell-a-vision, the In-her-net, horseless carriages and women wearing pantaloons; Cassandra is afraid that she might have inhaled fowl air causing her to temporarily lose her senses.
Only when both girls can get over their pride, societal prejudices and self-importance will they be able to return to their rightful century. Until then, they are free to wreak maximum damage on their respective centuries.
Interview
with Caroline Healy
What inspired you to write The Wolf Mirror?
I remember a substitute English
teacher took our class for a semester when I was about thirteen years old. She
introduced us to the Classics. Wuthering Heights and Pride and Prejudice were
two of the books she chose for us to read. I had never even heard of these
authors before, and I was a bit
reluctant. It took me a while to get into the language but once I did, I was
hooked.
I have read and watched a number
of adaptations of Classics, the BBC Pride and Prejudice version with Colin
Firth springs to mind.
I always wanted to write
historical fiction but didn’t want to go with the era of Austen, so I went back another hundred years. I
studied history and English in University so for me, the merging of the two,
writing and history, was relatively easy.
I chose 1700’s because it seemed a
grittier than any of the later centuries, more unpredictable and I felt like it
would be a greater challenge for the main character to readjust to this time
period. I wanted a messier century than the 19th, so I chose the
1700’s.
Can you tell us a
little bit about the next books in The Wolf Mirror or what you have planned for
the future?
I
am writing a children’s book called ‘Leonard Moonfinger and the Giant’s Ring’
and it is a historical fiction book about a boy who lives in the Iron Age in a
ring fort. I am really enjoying the challenge of writing this and getting the
historical details right is a challenge.
Can you tell us a
little bit about the characters in The Wolf Mirror?
There
are two main characters in The Wolf Mirror. Cassie is a spoilt London teenager
at loggerheads with her mother and Lady Cassandra Miller is an overindulged
heiress to a large stately manor in the year 1714. The two characters swop
places. I wanted to write about fitting in, about acceptance and a kind of a
commentary about society and equality. If people read my book and think about
their situation in terms of how they are treated and how they are equal then I
will be happy to challenge their mind to think about their place in society.
You know I
think we all have a favorite author. Who is your favorite author and why?
I
love anything by Austen. I re-read Pride and Prejudice almost every year and
also Brönte’s Jane Eyre. I think this is the ultimate female heroine novel. The
language in these books never gets old and is at times really humorous and
beautiful (I know I totally cheated here and picked two authors but I couldn’t
decide on my favourite).
If you could time-travel
would you travel to the future or the past? Where would you like to go and why
would you like to visit this particular time period?
I would definitely like to travel to the past and I think I
would go back to the exact year of the book, 1714 and see how true to life I
managed to make the writing. I would especially like to try out their clothes
and attend a ball, see if my idea of what it might be like is true to reality.
Do you have any
little fuzzy friends? Like a dog or a cat? Or any pets?
I have been adopted by a stray cat. He is totally white with
one dark spot on his coat. He is called ‘Katmando’ and he is SO loud. I mean,
he sounds like a crying baby when he meows. There is no getting away from him
when he is hungry and sitting outside on the window sill…it is feed him or be deafened!
But he does like rubs behind the ears and I think is edging for an invite
inside but I am not sure yet if I’m able for that sort of decibel.
Thanks for taking
time out of your busy schedule to visit with us today.
Author Bio:
Caroline Healy is a writer and community arts facilitator. She recently completed her M.A. in Creative Writing at the Seamus Heaney Centre, Queen’s University. She alternates her time between procrastination and making art.
In 2012 her award winning short story collection A Stitch in Time was published by Doire Press. Fiction and commentary has been featured in publications across Ireland, the U.K. and more recently in the U.S. Caroline’s work can be found in journals such as Wordlegs,The Bohemyth, Short Story Ireland, Short Stop U.K., Five Stop Story, Prole, Literary Orphans and the Irish Writers’ Centre Lonely Voice
Her debut Y.A. novel, Blood Entwines was published by Bloomsbury Spark in August 2014 and she is in the process of writing the second book in the series, Blood Betrayal, as well as a short story collection, The House of Water.
She has a fondness for dark chocolate, cups of tea and winter woollies.
(More details can be found on her website www.carolinehealy.com)
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