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Challenge 2010 / Cover Gallery / Giveaways Plaidy Ladies / Pseudonyms / Reading Group Home / Contact / Links  Plaidy's Royal Intrigue BLOG is everything Plaidy! Anything you find on this website is usually first posted on the blog, so please check it regularly! September 1, 1906 - January 18, 1993  Who was Jean Plaidy? Jean Plaidy is one of 7 pseudonyms belonging to Eleanor Hibbert (though one source says she had as many as 15): Eleanor Burford, Elbur Ford, Kathleen Kellow, Ellalice Tate, Victoria Holt, Philippa Carr and Jean Plaidy. At Royal Intrigue we focus on Jean Plaidy because this is the pen name in which she published most of her fiction on royalty (our favorite genre). Though many of the earlier novels, published under Hibbert, Burford, Ford and Kellow were re-issued under Plaidy, they are extremely hard to find in their original form. (If anyone has any information on Rochester, the Mad Earl by Kathleen Kellow, I would be most interested.) Philippa Carr is a historical romance genre and Victoria Holt is Gothic romance or romantic suspense, though some titles vary, like The Queen's Confession and My Enemy the Queen. Publishing under certain pen names and genres always depends upon the current market (hence the embarassingly scandalous covers of the older novels), as to what they believe will sell. No matter how they package them, Jean Plaidy novels are the best historical fiction there is (and we have no reason to be biased, other than a love for authentic, accurate historical fiction)! Mini-bio from a Pan paperback (1976 printing): "Due to illness, Jean Plaidy was unable to go to school regularly and so taught herself to read. Very early on, she developed a passion for the 'past'. After doing a shorthand and typing course, she spent a couple of years doing various things, including sorting gems in Hatton Garden and translating for foreigners in a City cafe. She began writing in earnest following marriage and now has a large number of historical novels to her name. Inspiration for her books is drawn from odd sources -- a picture gallery, a line from a book, Shakespeare's inconsistencies. She lives in London and loves music, secondhand book shops and ancient buildings. Jean Plaidy also writes under the pseudonym of Victoria Holt." Jean Plaidy: A Life written by Lucy, February 2009 In the creative spirit of the very prolific author, Jean Plaidy, Royal Intrigue proudly presents its own interpretation of the Queen of Historical Fiction’s life, in a glimpse. “What better way to live your life than by doing what you love most. That is what I’ve been doing for the past sixty or so years. Writing has always been my passion. I’ve enjoyed it ever since I was four. This infatuation evolved from my love of books; which I’ve inherited from my father. Lucky for me, I was able to indulge in my craft wholeheartedly after I married my husband, George Hibbert. My writing provided me with the freedom of expression while making a very good living; without having to support myself using the secretarial and language skills I had learned in Business College. My books were extremely popular, you see. I wrote over 200 historical, gothic and romance novels which were translated worldwide. My first novels were authored under my real name, Eleanor Hibbert. My subsequent novels reaping huge successes were penned mostly under the Jean Plaidy and Victoria Holt names. Other Pen names that I may be remembered by were: Elbur Ford, Kathleen Kellow, Ellace Tate, Anna Percival and Philippa Carr. Although this lucrative passion of mine led me to great wealth, I lived a rather simple life. So enraptured was I by my writing that I had very little time for other diversions or pastimes. After the death of my beloved George, I continued to write even more, filling my days with words woven from the past. I wrote every single day for five hours, starting at 7:30 in the morning. I spent my afternoons personally responding to fan letters. I loved my work and I honestly felt guilty for even taking some leisure time for myself. Although I hated distractions, I did, however, take cruises (often for extended periods of time). I loved visiting exotic places that I later set as locations in my novels; especially the Victoria Holt ones. But not to feel as though I were neglecting my work, I was diligent enough to always take my typewriter with me. I just can’t keep away from my writing. It’s such a part of me. I’m sailing right now on a beautiful cruise from Athens to Port Said. Today is January 18th, 1993. As I type away, here in my cabin, with a view of the sea, I contemplate my next line; words I shall write, expressions, plots…or thoughts. But now, as never before, the words come slower, my fingers hesitate as the light gets dimmer…slowly, I lay my head on those reliable keys that have typed endless stories of intrigue. I must rest. Little by little, my mind shuts to the world. My heart beats no more…My spirit though, lives on through the pages I have orchestrated. It has decided my fate: Jean Plaidy will continue to spin the stories…” For an in-depth summary of Jean Plaidy’s life please visit this website (reference and source). "I think people want a good story and this I give them. They like something which is readable and you can't really beat the traditional for this. I write with great feeling and excitement and I think this comes over to the reader." On Daphne du Maurier: "I have heard her name mentioned in connection with mine and I think it is because we have both lived in Cornwall and have written about this place. Rebecca is the atmospheric suspense type of book which mine are, but I don't think there is much similarity between her others and mine." On writing influences: "Dickens, Zola, Brontes (particularly), and nearly all the Victorians." "I write regularly every day. I think this is important. As in everything else, practice helps to make perfect. Research is just a matter of reading old records, letters, etc., in fact everything connected with the period one is researching. I can only say that I love writing more than anything else. I find it stimulating and I never cease to be excited about it." "Hibbert was one of the most prolific and popular romance writers of the 20th century." Kay Mussell, Twentieth-Century Romance and Historical Writers "Jean Plaidy never fails to provide what may be termed 'a good read'." and "...a compulsive good read." Jean Stubbs, Books and Bookmen on The Captive of Kensington Palace "...richly peopled with lifelike and colorful characters, the story rolls on and on from one dilemma to the next, not quite to the point of reader exhaustion." Kirkus on Beyond the Blue Mountains "Plaidy has brought this remarkably sinister woman into full focus in this historical thriller. Seldom has a character been brought to life with such clarity." Richard Blakesley, Chicago Sunday Tribune on Madame Serpent "This gaslit, gothic novel with its labyrinthine mansion, its intimations of ghosts, its whispers of scandal and treachery, is a legitimate descendant of Jane Eyre." Kirkus on Mistress of Mellyn "...an unusally readable and likable book. Holt's touch is so assured, her presentation of late nineteenth-century Cornwall so loving, her heroine so (almost anachronistically) spirited that even a jaded curmudgeon like this reviewer has no objection to reading the old story once more." Anthony Boucher, New York Times Book Review "Murder, intrigue, threats of insanity, family skeletons rattling in closets and ghosts who walk in the moonlight keep the reader credulous and turning pages fast in this absorbing story." Genevieve Casey, Chicago Sunday Tribune on Kirkland Revels "Among the clamour of novels by angry young men, among the probings and circumlocution of psychological novels, the works of Victoria Holt stand out, unpretentious, sunny, astringent, diverting." Casey, Best Sellers on The Legend of the Seventh Virgin "It's hard to say objectively, just why . . . [this] is so intensely readable and enjoyable. . . . It is Holt's weakest and slightest plot to date, and equally certainly nothing much happens in the way of either action or character development for long stretches. But somehow the magic . . . is still there." Anthony Boucher, New York Times Book Review on Menfreya in the Morning "...a very competent escape artist." Susan Dooley, Washington Post Book World on Landower Legacy "Hibbert was prolific, probably too much so for her own good. Her last few years witnessed a significant decrease in the complexity and believability of her plots. . . . Her best work was probably her first five or six Victoria Holt novels, when she was setting the standards for the host of authors who imitated her formula, although few could match her in the evocation of terror. . . . Mistress of Mellyn . . . deserves a place among the most important gothic romances of the century, placing Hibbert . . . near the top of her field as heiress to Daphne du Maurier, whose Rebecca remains the premier gothic romance of the 20th century." Kay Mussell, Twentieth-Century Romance and Historical Writers © 2009 royal-intrigue.net  |