Lauren Willig on making history fun, helped by 'Blackadder' and 'Outlander'

Lauren Willig shares how she figured out her brand of historical fiction. The final book in her Pink Carnation series, The Lure of the Moonflower, is out this week.

Lauren: "Congratulations!" said my new publisher. "You've invented a new genre!"

This was back in 2003 and I was pretty sure I hadn't invented anything, but I nodded and smiled all the same. It's like that Ghostbusters line, when someone tells you you've invented a genre, you say yes.

"No, really," I was told. "You made history fun."

They said it as though it was strange.

Admittedly, I could see where they were coming from. When I was growing up, historical fiction was a serious business. There was Scarlett O'Hara in the radish patch declaring she would never be hungry again; there were Colleen McCullough's doomed lovers in The Thorn Birds; there were John Jakes' Hazards and Mains on their inevitable collision course. Historical fiction was on a grand scale; there was the destruction of civilizations, the loss of illusions, the tearing of hair and gnashing of teeth. The same held true for historical romance. Iris Johansen's lovers weathered the sack of city states and the vagaries of the French Revolution; Judith McNaught's heroines endured amnesia, social ostracism and misunderstandings so big they deserved their own ZIP code.

My own early writing reflected this. We all have those manuscripts tucked away in a drawer that make us wince. Mine include The Chateau Secret, a multigenerational saga ranging from Revolutionary France to India to America and back to France again, in which at least one character died of cholera and I'm pretty sure someone wound up in a harem (or as a junior associate in a law firm). There were many deep and impassioned speeches and much reflection upon the vagaries of Fate with a capital F.

And then came Blackadder.

Thank you, PBS. Thank you, BBC. Thank you, Rowan Atkinson. I felt as though I'd voyaged far and landed on an island where everyone spoke my language — with a laugh track. Other people who found sheep inherently funny! And who weren't afraid to joke about Caroline of Brunswick's undergarments. Bliss.

After that, the humor came thick and fast: I discovered the mystery novels of Elizabeth Peters, with her wisecracking heroines Vicky Bliss and Amelia Peabody. Then there was Judith Merkle Riley, who dared to make the Black Death funny, who mocked Catherine de Medici and poked fun at Cardinal Wolsey. And, of course, Outlander. Outlander appeared in my local Barnes & Noble when I was in 10th grade. I fell in love — with Jamie, of course. Everyone fell in love with Jamie. But even more with the humor of it, the joy in the absurd.

You'd think I'd have realized that this was what I was meant to write. But I was still set on writing my vast historical epic. I toddled off to grad school at Harvard for a degree in Tudor/Stuart history with the intention of writing a sweeping, deadly serious, doorstop of a novel, the sort of novel that gets reviews that start with "A vividly woven tapestry of …" (Have you ever noticed that it's always a tapestry? Why not a tea towel? Or a pillowcase?)

And then came the footnotes. Oh, the footnotes. I couldn't make myself write serious; I was surrounded by serious, in monographs, in articles, in my own dissertation prospectus, in the very earnest e-mails of students telling me just why that paper couldn't be in on time, cross their hearts and hope to get an A-minus.

So I wrote a swashbuckler. With sheep jokes. With spies in black masks and fops in knee breeches and poets in puffy shirts and just about everything except a dachshund named Colin (the dachshund made it into a later book). From Judith Merkle Riley, I borrowed the idea of putting in real historical characters and using them for comic relief, from Elizabeth Peters I purloined a sharp-tongued chaperone with a parasol, and, last but not least, from Diana Gabaldon I took a wry, first-person modern narrator who I used as my entry point into the story: Eloise, a Harvard grad student, researching Napoleonic spies — and finding so much more.

That was 12 years ago. This month, the 12th and last Pink Carnation adventure, The Lure of the Moonflower, appears in stores, as that master spy, the Pink Carnation, finally meets her match (and, of course, thwarts Napoleon one more time).

Did I invent anything? I don't think so, not really. But if I've helped make history fun … then my work here is done.

At least for this series …

About The Lure of the Moonflower (courtesy of NAL):

Portugal, December 1807. Jack Reid, the British agent known as the Moonflower (formerly the French agent known as the Moonflower), has been stationed in Portugal and is awaiting his new contact. He does not expect to be paired with a woman—especially not the legendary Pink Carnation.

All of Portugal believes that the royal family departed for Brazil just before the French troops marched into Lisbon. Only the English government knows that mad seventy-three-year-old Queen Maria was spirited away by a group of loyalists determined to rally a resistance. But as the French garrison scours the countryside, it's only a matter of time before she's found and taken.

It's up to Jane to find her first and ensure her safety. But she has no knowledge of Portugal or the language. Though she is loath to admit it, she needs the Moonflower. Operating alone has taught her to respect her own limitations. But she knows better than to show weakness around the Moonflower—an agent with a reputation for brilliance, a tendency toward insubordination, and a history of going rogue.

Find out more about Lauren and her books at www.laurenwillig.com.