The local inhabitants so appreciated the stature she brought to their town that they built an enormous new hotel for her. The Regina Excelsior. it stands on a hill, overlooking the town and the bay. The queen came here for four years in a row, bringing a retinue of 100, including Highland pipers, her bedroom furniture and a pony and trap and took over an entire wing of this hotel, including her own kitchen staff to cook for her.
It seemed too good not to write a story around this. I'm not going to tell you what the story is but I do want to share how I filled in the pieces for this story:
First I visited the area with the hotel, now luxury flats:
Then I browsed local used bookstores for books and photographs of the era. I found several brilliant books: one on the history of Cimiez (where she stayed), another on the British on the Riviera, one on the villas of Nice and their history. I found plenty of old postcards showing me the city in 1890 as well as the Carnival procession, the parade of flowers, which are destined to play a part in my story. The queen loved to throw flowers at handsome young men! I have so many good tidbits for my book already!
In the central library I found a really helpful librarian who hunted diligently and finally struck gold: The brochure published when the Regina Excelsior was opened. It had images of all the public rooms, the floor plans, the list of servants that the queen brought with her.. in fact everything I needed. Hooray for librarians (but it is lucky that I have a degree in French).
I rode a bus up to the waterfall which she loved to visit. So now I know the layout of the place where I want to set the story. All I have to do is to write it... but that has to wait until next year.
So dear Reds and Readers, how do you set about researching a setting for your books? Do you feel it's necessary that you have to visit the place in person?
And the winner of Dianne Freeman's book is RAMONA. Ramona, please email me at authorrhysbowen@gmail.com and I'll put you in touch with her.
