Book Title: Times of Turmoil
Author: Anna Belfrage
Publication Date: September 29th, 2023
Publisher: Timelight Press
Page Length: 382 pages
Genre: Historical Fiction / Time Travel Romance
Twitter Handle: @abelfrageauthor @cathiedunn
Instagram Handle: @annabelfrageauthor @thecoffeepotbookclub
Hashtags: #AmericanColonialHistory #timetravel #historicalfiction #historicalromance
Tour Schedule Page: https://thecoffeepotbookclub.blogspot.com/2023/09/blog-tour-times-of-turmoil-by-anna-belfrage.html
Book Title and Author Name:
Times of Turmoil
by Anna Belfrage
Blurb:
It is 1718 and Duncan Melville and his time traveller wife, Erin, are concentrating on building a peaceful existence for themselves and their twin daughters. Difficult to do, when they are beleaguered by enemies.
Erin Melville is not about to stand to the side and watch as a child is abused—which is how she makes deadly enemies of Hyland Nelson and his family.
Then there’s that ghost from their past, Armand Joseph Chardon, a person they were certain was dead. Apparently not. Monsieur Chardon wants revenge and his sons are tasked with making Duncan—and his wife—pay.
Things aren’t helped by the arrival of Duncan’s cousin, fleeing her abusive husband. Or the reappearance of Nicholas Farrell in their lives, as much of a warped bully now as he was when he almost beat Duncan to death years ago. Plus, their safety is constantly threatened as Erin is a woman of colour in a time and place where that could mean ostracism, enslavement or even death.
Will Duncan and Erin ever achieve their simple wish – to live and love free from fear of those who wish to destroy them?
Why Time Travel?
Many years ago, I attended a writer’s conference. I has several one-on-ones booked with agents and one of them gave me a bored look and sat back in his chair. The wood creaked, his shirt strained over his padded torso.
“Why the time travel?” he asked. “What’s the point?”
Huh. One can ask that about a lot of genres, IMO. Why Sci-Fi? Why Fantasy? Why all those werewolf and vampire novels? I guess those who write any of the previously mentioned would reply that they write what they love, what intrigues them.
The same goes for me and time travel. The concept is mindboggling, and even if by now I’ve given up on it being possible—Stephen Hawkins sort of nailed the lid down on my hope by pointing out that if time travel were at all to become possible, by now we’d have people from the future visiting us. The sheer circularity in that makes my head ache. After all, the future hasn’t happened yet, so there are no people there to travel back in time, and. . .
In The Whirlpools of Time, Duncan Melville falls three centuries forward in time, crashlanding in 2016. He quickly realises it’s wise not to tell anyone he is from another time—well, no one but Erin, because he has to tell someone, and he trusts her. She reacts with a major “WHAAAT?” I suppose we would all react with a certain wariness were we to come face to face with a time traveller, right? And our first reaction would be incredulity. “Poor sod: he needs help, ASAP.”
Back to my fascination with time travel. As a child, I conducted various experiments in the hope of somehow transporting myself backwards in time. I had my heart set on the twelfth century—more specifically on Richard Lionheart’s reign. Even more specifically, it was at Richard’s feet I wanted to land, riding with him as he set out on his adventures.
My experiments involved midnights, lit candles set in various formations, the consumption of pilfered whiskey (Ugh! To this day, I can’t bear the stuff) and a lot of chanting in—wait for it—German. Not that I knew any German, but I had hold of my mother’s old German grammar and read aloud from the pages and pages of verb declinations. To this day, I think things would have gone better had I instead used her Latin grammar.
My various attempts to travel through the veils of time came to an abrupt halt when, one night, my father yanked open the door to my wardrobe (I had to conduct my ceremonies in secret) and was so shocked his voice rose into a squeak as he realised that his idiot of a daughter had been lighting candles among all her clothes. Yes, yes: he had the right of it, of course, but an idiot I was not—not then, not now. I was simply gifted with an extraordinarily vivid imagination. To my father’s credit, he apologised for the idiot, but told me that he would give me the spanking of my life if he ever caught me doing something that foolish again.
He never did spank me. Instead, he spent hours making me beautiful wooden swords, shields, helmets—everything I could need to indulge in my fascination with medieval times without attempting to distort the flow of time. It is one of the few times I recall truly bonding with my father. He was a very talented artist but spent his days running a large business. I think all those hours carefully shaping my sword did him good, and when he decorated my shield with heraldic lions he hummed under his breath while I sat beside him and shared everything I knew about dear Richard.
These days, I’ve reassessed Richard. Yes, he was flamboyant and capable and brave, but he wasn’t much of a king—at least not to the English, whom he mainly seems to have seen as a source of the money he needed for his ventures abroad. But whenever I’m in London, I detour by the statue of him outside Parliament, just to say hi.
When I started to write, I knew that at some point I would write about someone who fell through time. That’s the benefit of being a writer—I can indulge myself. In my first novel, A Rip in the Veil, the time traveller was Alex Lind, who ended up landing at the feet of Matthew Graham, a very devout Presbyterian who feared this strange woman was a witch of sort.
In Times of Turmoil, my time traveller is Erin, who sort of was dragged back through time with Duncan when he was returned to his original time. Not something she is entirely thrilled about. I am though, because other than wanting to treat myself to some time travelling by proxy, there was another reason why I wanted my female protagonist to be a time traveller. As I told that agent, having a modern protagonist in a historical setting allows for much more commentary. A woman born in the 1690s will not react to the food she eats, the clothes she wears—of course not, as they’re familiar. But having my readers experience the 18th century through a fellow modern woman gives me the opportunity to really submerge them in the past.
A modern protagonist also offers me the opportunity to comment on how restricted women were back then—at least legally. It is my personal opinion that women have often overcome these restrictions by being a powerful mover and shaker behind the scenes—like in their homes. But still: officially, a woman in the 18th century woman was chattel, accorded no rights beyond those extended to her by her husband.
Writing a time travel story does not preclude hours and hours of research. To some extent, the research becomes even more important, as it is in the small details—like how the tallow candles leave streaks of soot, or how the rope frame of the bead creaks and groans—that I truly transport my readers to my protagonist’s new reality.
I hope I’ve managed to do that in Times of Turmoil.
“Oh, you have,” Erin mutters. “But how about you do something anachronistic and have someone invent a shower, hey?”
Nope. Not happening. But I can offer her a pitcher of hot water.
“I hate you,” she mumbles.
“No you don’t. Without me, you’d never have met Duncan.”
“Maybe I’d have been happy anyway,” she retorts.
“You think?” I shake my head. Content, maybe. Happy, no.
She sighs and rolls her eyes before muttering that maybe I’m right.
Of course, I am. I share a wink with Duncan as he enters the room and enfolds Erin in his arms. She may be far from home, both in time and place, but if we’re going to be quite honest, she’s found a new home. With him.
Buy Links:
This title is available on #KindleUnlimited.
Universal link: https://myBook.to/ToTABG
Amazon US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CJ7FYQVL
Amazon UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CJ7FYQVL
Amazon CA: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0CJ7FYQVL
Amazon AU: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0CJ7FYQVL
Author Bio:
Had Anna been allowed to choose, she’d have become a time-traveller. As this was impossible, she became a financial professional with two absorbing interests: history and writing. Anna has authored the acclaimed time travelling series The Graham Saga, set in 17th century Scotland and Maryland, as well as the equally acclaimed medieval series The King’s Greatest Enemy which is set in 14th century England.
Anna has also published The Wanderer, a fast-paced contemporary romantic suspense trilogy with paranormal and time-slip ingredients.
More recently, Anna has been hard at work with her Castilian series. The first book, His Castilian Hawk, published in 2020, is set against the complications of Edward I’s invasion of Wales, His Castilian Hawk is a story of loyalty, integrity—and love. In the second instalment, The Castilian Pomegranate, we travel with the protagonists to the complex political world of medieval Spain, while the third, Her Castilian Heart, finds our protagonists back in England—not necessarily any safer than the wilds of Spain! The fourth book, Their Castilian Orphan, is scheduled for early 2024.
All of Anna’s books have been awarded the IndieBRAG Medallion, she has several Historical Novel Society Editor’s Choices, and one of her books won the HNS Indie Award in 2015. She is also the proud recipient of various Reader’s Favorite medals as well as having won various Gold, Silver and Bronze Coffee Pot Book Club awards.
Find out more about Anna, her books and enjoy her eclectic historical blog on her website, www.annabelfrage.com
Author Links:
Website: www.annabelfrage.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/abelfrageauthor
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/annabelfrageauthor
Instagram: https://instagram.com/annabelfrageauthor
Book Bub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/anna-belfrage
Amazon Author Page: http://Author.to/ABG or http://amazon.com/author/anna_belfrage
When Angels Fly 
Thanks so much for featuring Anna Belfrage today, Mary.
Take care,
Cathie xo
The Coffee Pot Book Club
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