Conrad Lanfear - Synopsis of a Spirit

One of the characters of "The Visitor" is Conrad Lanfear who first appears to Mirisa during her first year at the Lanfear Plantation.

Conrad was born and lived on the family plantation in the mid-1700s.  In 1716, the French founded Natchez as Fort Rosalie; it became the dominant town and trading post of the area. In the early 18th century, the Roman Catholic Church created pioneer parishes at Old Biloxi/Ocean Springs and Natchez. The church also established seven pioneer parishes in Louisiana and two in Alabama, which was also part of New France.   Tribes include the Chickasaw and Choctaw. Other tribes who inhabited the territory of Mississippi include the Natchez.

During this period, there were numerous skirmishes between the settlers and the native Americans.  After the killing of the Chief during one of the skirmishes, a curse fell on the Lanfear family resulting in unexplained accidents besieging the family for generations.  

Conrad took to a life as a hired gun riding with Algonquin's brother, Sequasi.  Both were members of the Choctaw nation.  Despite Algonquin's attempts to lift the curse, they knew it would only be lifted when Mirisa crossed the threshold of the plantation and only if Conrad could bring her into his world voluntarily.   Through the story is his seduction of her and then the impregnable bond that is created in the ritual.

Conrad remains through the story though his presence is always elusive though important as Mirisa struggles with the ups and downs of her life.  Always present, he chooses when to intervene and when to appear but always giving her the ability to handle life even if it will be destructive. 

The tie of Conrad with the plantation is found strongest in Simone, the fat yellow cat who has lived in the plantation house for centuries and who is unable to leave the house.  The other connection is with Jasmine who like Conrad is there to guide and observe but never interfere.   Minnie and Mrs. Chauvin are both from long lines of seerees who dabble in the underbelly of the practices of physical world with superstition and folk lore.   The last connection between the two worlds is Dog, the coyote who travels through Mirisa's life protecting her and the children.

The story is around two of Conrad's descendants, Dominic who ignores the folklore of his ancestors and Dog Moon who is chief of the Choctaw nation in the latter half of the 19th century.  Both exhibit the same traits as their great-grandfather.  Conrad and Algonquin's first son is raised by his brother Jake on the plantation as Jake and Sara's child.  Dominic descends from the first son while Dog Moon descends from a son who was born after they travel with the tribe to Oklahoma.

Is this a ghost story?  It is infused with just a touch of the past pulling Mirisa into a life from which she becomes so entangled that she can't break away but the story is about her unusual life and unbreakable love to the men who would kill to keep her in their lives.  Conrad is with Mirisa until the end of the story but his existence remains just on the cusp of existence.

Merry Christmas

Book 1 - The Visitor - 1862

Is free to download on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

Book 6 -As yet unnamed will be top priority when I get home later this week.  Share the free download with family and friends and

Have

A

Great

Christmas....!


Barb

Thank You!!

Just a little ditty

sort of like a soft kitty

to thank you

for following the story

in a thunderstorms pomp and glory

as the adventure begins

and no one ever wins

another day

in the life of a changing way!

 

 

Thank you to all my followers for a great weekend of downloads taking

Book IV to #53 on the top historical romance genre.

 

I am working on Book V - and have no title but have no fear it will

work itself out as it usually does but I'm taking you back to New York for the

winter as we drop into the life of Washington politics

and the New York charities...and of course more assignments and death.

 

 

barb

Honeymoon In Hawaii

I do have the laptop with me so I can work on Book IV but it's not getting much attention since I am on my honeymoon in Hawaii - some 2 plus years after getting remarried.   I was one of those people who believed once I married it would definitely be 'till death do us part' but that didn't happen and after adjusting to the left turn in the story of life I met someone I knew in another life and it doesn't matter whether it is forever or not because I am enjoying every second of every day.  Book IV will be done soon and my honeymoon will be one worth remembering.

barb

Thank You!!

The free download on Kindle was a great success for both Book I and Book II.  Thank you to everyone who downloaded the books. 

I have now moved on to Book III and hopefully won't take 6 months like Book II.  So, enjoy!!

barb

City of Natchez and the Lanfear Family

Located on the Mississippi River, some 90 miles southwest of Jackson, the capital of Mississippi, and 85 miles north of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, the city of Natchez is named for the Natchez tribe of Native Americans who lived in the vicinity through the arrival of Europeans in the eighteenth century.

Established by French colonists in 1716, Natchez is one of the oldest and most important European settlements in the lower Mississippi River Valley, and served as the capital of the Mississippi Territory and then the state of Mississippi. It predates Jackson, which replaced Natchez as the capital in 1822, by more than a century. The strategic location of Natchez, on a bluff overlooking the Mississippi River, ensured that it would become a pivotal center of trade, commerce, and the interchange of Native American, European, and African-American cultures in the region for the first two centuries of its existence. In U. S. history, it is recognized particularly for its role in the development of the Old Southwest during the first half of the nineteenth century. It was the southern terminus of the historic Natchez Trace, which provided many pilots of flatboats and keelboats a road back to their homes in the Ohio River Valley after unloading their cargo in the city.

The Lanfear family immigrated to the territory of New Orleans from France as the French began to settle along the Mississippi river.  Dominic's ancestors moved up the river and settled in Natchez, Mississippi which was the home of several Indian Nations including the Natchez Indians and the Choctaw Nation.  Skirmishes and wars broke out as the French attempted to seize the land and build their plantations to grow indigo, cotton and tobacco.  It was a dangerous and hard time with the slaughter of many.

As the Civil War grips the nation, our story begins in the peaceful community of Natchez where life seems to be normal but a current of uneasiness is coming to the surface as the living and the dead clash in an attempt to lift a family curse.  Mirisa finds herself absorbed into the past as she deals with the isolation of living on the Lanfear plantation.

The Violin and Old English Roses

I am a sculpture glass artist...I am!  I work on a small torch designed for glass artists and I work with 6-8 mm glass rods in the greatest colors.  I began my adventure in glass in 2005 and though it was a hobby for many years, it is now a wonderful expansion of my love for music, for flowers and for romance.  I am the ultimate romantic who was plucked from the days of yesteryear and dropped into a fast moving, over achieving world where art has to work hard to rise to consciousness.

The above piece is a 1901 violin that I found at a 'barn sale'.  It is normal size, a little rough around the edges and will never again hear the sound of it's own strings.  I have created Old English Roses in several colors of pink glass rods from light pink to dark purple pink.  It talks secretly of romance, the Waltz on a summer night when the roses bloom and the jasmine dances in the moonlight.  It is these things that make our hearts soar and our belief in possibilities escape the world.

Writing is my inner spirit dancing with the memories of past lives.  Like with my glass, I don't plan a story I just write it down as it comes back in my memories.  Romance is love bursting quietly and softly through the veil of those memories.  Romance is about those dreams we hope for and those who fulfill the dreams.   Intertwined in my world are the words, the music and the flower gardens and inspire each day with possibilities. 

The Visitor was always written while I was wearing my Ipod with the inspiration of Chris Isaac who does love and pain so beautifully and the Eagles, Bob Seger and other musicians from my early days but mostly I love romantic music without words.  It's all a circle as I continue to create art and write the next chapter of The Visitor.