Dear Reader,
Chateau of Echoes is one of my favorite books. It’s the sort of book I would choose to read myself. I hope the following is conveyed through the words you have just read: my love of France, my love of French food and wine, my love of legends. My love of people who aren’t perfect but who are trying; my love for a God who understands each of us, who doesn’t assume any of us is beyond reach, and who moves through time and history to reveal himself to us.
The writing of this book began with Alix. As much as we’d like to think we’d be the same enlightened people in a different century, our modern assumptions about the world make us unfit for the eras that have passed before us. When Alix started speaking to me, I began to wonder what it would have been like to be married at such a young age. And then I began to picture what being a child bride would have involved, and I decided I just couldn’t do that to her. She was too innocent. So I had to give her a husband who would let her grow up. A husband with a reason to let her grow up.
Freddie came second. The first scene I imagined her in was one in which she was talking to someone named Cranwell. There was something courageous and sad and grumpy about her. She was the sort of person you’d like to hug, if only you were certain she wouldn’t brush you off. She made sacrifices for marriage her first time around in terms of her faith and her dreams. She’s determined not to make those same mistakes again. How many of us are like that? How many of us have regrets about our past? And feel guilty about having regrets.
And King Arthur? The idea of writing a story about a story is irresistible to a writer. Especially a story that has survived centuries.
When I think of this book, I think of a world where mists swirl around a timeworn castle; where the scent of coffee mingles with the scent of musty, dusty old books; and where the sound of clanging pots mixes with the shuffle of footsteps on stone stairs.
After I finished this book, I often wished I could retreat to the little world I had created. A fantasy that existed only in my dreams. I’m so glad that my own little world can now be part of your world too. And I hope this story lingers in your memory as it has lingered in mine.
Sincerely,
P.S. Please visit my website at http://sirimitchell.com to find out more about the legends of King Arthur and life in medieval times.
Brittany
Only the smallest child would not feel the weight of history in Brittany.
At twilight, it is easy to imagine that you can hear the echo of sounds that are not a part of the modern world. Or see shadows flitting through the trees that are not birds, or smell the memory of fires from ages passed, as if some long-ago quest was being perpetually launched.
The land is ancient.
It is Brocéliande, home of the Breton people. And home before them of the Franks, and before them, the Gauls, and before them, the Celts-and with them the druids-and before them, some nameless race who vanished into the mists of time, leaving only massive standing stones to mark their passing. The legends say that some of them still walk the forests as if shipwrecked… out of sync with the tides of time.
The legends also say that King Arthur and his knights scavenged through these forests, looking for the Holy Grail. And it is here that some seek it still.
If you look far enough back through the legends, the search for the grail is not a search for a chalice. And those who concentrate on the chalice tend to lose their way, just as those who pursue happiness seem never to quite find it. The search for the grail is a search for a mystical union with God, a search for wholeness. It is the relentless pursuit for a second chance to commune with Christ. And after all, isn’t that what Christianity is all about?