Squidge

Many thanks Jane and Thea! If anyone who has read it could consider leaving a review on Amazon and/or Goodreads, that would be wonderful. Thanks for your review Squidge, delighted you liked it

Congratulations, Jules your book looks fab – I’m looking forward to starting the series! Also, really enjoyed reading about your research, especially re the horses. It made me wonder whether you’d written a short story for the winter challenge that featured a talking horse, but maybe my imagination is running away with me…

Well done, Denizens, what a great concept, am looking forward to reading all the stories.

Thanks, Jim. And I’m so glad you enjoyed the Oath and Crown duology 😊

Congratulations on the book deal and for the new book coming out! I read A Black Matter for the King on the ferry back from Caen last week and enjoyed it very much!

And the armour would have gone rusty.

Most probably true, Richard. There’s a great youtube video showing people wearing full plate armour doing somersaults. Squires were required to master all the courtly and manly arts – combat, riding, tumbling, swimming, dancing etc – and often practised all of them in full armour. (Well probably not swimming because then there would have been far…[Read more]

I believe I once read that Henry VIII, in his youth, could reputedly vault into the saddle over the horse’s hindquarters while wearing full armour…

I think you’re probably right there, Daed. I doubted my own findings so I consulted a few horsey people (breeders, riders etc) A horse can comfortably carry a third of it’s own weight. You’re average destrier of 15 hands weighed 1200 lbs. So they could comfortably carry 360lbs.
Assuming the average height and weight of a knight was 5’7″ and 150lbs…[Read more]

I wonder if there was a bit of modern extrapolation going on with the notion of destriers being really huge, based on the misconception of the weight of armour? I admit I thought they were vast until I looked into it. If it was thought that armoured knights needed to be winched onto their horses, it would need to be a seriously hefty horse

Thanks, Sandra 🙂 re destriers – apparently the modern shire/ cart/ draught horses are descended from them. Basically they bred some warhorses too big to have enough speed for battle and that’s where the latter great horses come from. I too was surprised to learn that a Medieval warhorse was usually only 15 – 16 hands high. (Apparently I also…[Read more]

Well done, Jules and thanks for the horse breed check list, correcting my belief that a destrier was a sort of fast carthorse. I’m a big fan of Dorothy Dunnett so this will be added to my list.

Horses becoming fully fledged (ha) characters is only right and proper. They make more interesting friends/sidekicks/warriors/vindictive bastards than most actual people. 🙂

Wonderful news, Jules!! Congratulations. The book sounds fab!

Thanks, everyone 🙂

I am just about halfway through writing the second book now so the encouragement is much appreciated.

@JaneShuff – that has to be one of the best TBRs 😀

@Bella – I thought I was being flippant when I spoke about lads marrying their mother-in-laws, but having checked, there were cases where families got split up and the…[Read more]

WOnderful, JB! THis sounds fab and you’ve been dead sneaky with the deals etc! Well done there, lovely. I do now think every book needs a What Horse list.

Congratulations, Jules! sounds like a brilliant read. 3-book contract that slipped your mind, eh? 🙂 congratulations for that, too.

Out of interest, who was that with and did you negotiate it yourself?

x

Excellent.

I do wonder how anyone can marry their mother-in-law accidentally or otherwise – rather puts the lie to all those joke, though.