The week before the release of debut novel “Emmie and the Tudor King
1. Can you give readers a quick snapshot of your novel Emmie and the Tudor King?
Sure! EMMIE AND THE TUDOR KING is part one in a new YA romance in which a high school girl gets sucked back in time and falls in love with a dreamy Tudor king who is destined to become an infamous tyrant. Able to travel back to her own time, but intensely drawn to the troubled king and the mysterious death of his sister, Emmie finds herself solving the murder of a young princess and unraveling court secrets while trying to keep her head on her shoulders, literally. With everything to lose, Emmie must face her biggest battle of all: How to cheat the path of history and keep her irresistible king or lose him—and her heart—forever.
2. Time travel and teen angst… on their own, these two are already compelling themes. Still, you chose to add the mystery of an extinct royal line. What was your inspiration to write this? Or better yet, who was your muse?
I wanted to write a novel with the feel of a contemporary romance but set in the land of Henry VIII. While I spent years researching the Tudor era, I didn’t want to write another book about its established events, or about Henry VIII’s wives or daughters. Therefore, I decided to create a reimagined history in which Elizabeth I married her rumored lover Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, and they had a son who became the most notorious Tudor tyrant of all: Nicholas the Ironheart. My muse for this fictional king was probably the real Henry VIII in his younger years, who was not only ridiculously smart and talented, but a total hottie. There’s a misconception that Henry VIII was always obese, but actually, he was more than six feet tall, slim and athletic, and known to be extremely handsome. Henry injured himself badly during a jousting accident when he was in his forties and after that he couldn’t exercise, which is when the famous weight gain set in. My King Nick is all Tudor, however: charismatic, clever, and fiery to the end.
3. Your description of Tudor fashion is fascinating. Let us do a gender flip. Let Emmie be a teen Tudor Queen and King Nick as a 21st century Gen Z. How will you dress them?
I love this.
Queen Emmie would be wearing a silk dress the color of pink ballet slippers and weaved with champagne lace, but it would be fraying at the edges because she’s just that kind of girl. Her on-Tudor-trend slashed sleeves dotted with pearls would match the crescent-shaped hood hiding her tangle of blonde and brown tresses.
Our next-gen Nick would be decked out in a worn pair of tapered-fit denim jeans, and a classic long-sleeve t-shirt in cloudy gray. He’d be wearing a pair of low-topped white trainers, be carrying a sleek new laptop and a beaten-up guitar, and his hair would be windswept and ruffled.
4. Quick – can you dreamcast Emmie, the King and four other characters whom you believe are important to the storyline.
Ooh, fun!
Cailee Spaeny as Emmie Grace
Nicholas Hoult as The Tudor King
Emma Watson as Alice Grey
Frank Dillane as Francis Beaumont
Lana Condor as Mia Fairbanks
Raffiella Chapman as Catherine Tudor
Now, pass the popcorn.
Dreamcasting Emmie and the Tudor King (Photos courtesy of Wikipedia and IMDB)
Natalie Murray
Natalie Murray is the author of EMMIE AND THE TUDOR KING (June 11, 2019; Literary Crush Publishing). A fast-paced YA time-slip romance, Emmie and the Tudor King follows an American high school girl to a reimagined Tudor England, where she meets a doomed, but utterly dreamy, Tudor king. Books 2 and 3 in the series will be published in 2020 and 2021, and Emmie and the Tudor King has already received acclaim from Foreword Reviews, YA Books Central, and popular YA authors Brigid Kemmerer (A Curse So Dark and Lonely) and CJ Flood (Infinite Sky), among others. You can visit Natalie at nataliemurrayauthor.com.
