Today, I did a quick tally in my head of people I know–and by “know” I mean, have met in person and talked with–who have debut historical novels coming out from major New York houses in the upcoming year-or-something.  By my count, that number stands at eleven.

Here are the debut authors in that once-dead genre (note that release dates are tentative the farther you get out):

• Kris Kennedy, to Kensington: Debut Novel, THE CONQUEROR, out May 2009
• Lavinia Kent, to Avon: Debut Novel, A TALENT FOR SIN, May 26, 2009
• Jennifer Haymore, to Grand Central: Debut Novel, A HINT OF WICKED, out May 19, 2009
• Jackie Barbosa, to Kensington Aphrodesia: Debut Single-Author Anthology, BEHIND THE RED DOOR, out June 2009
• Tessa Dare, to Ballentine: Debut Novel, GODDESS OF THE HUNT, out July 28, 2009
• Lori Brighton (website coming soon), to Kensington: Debut Novel, title unknown, out Fall 2009
• Courtney Milan (that’s me!), to HQN: Debut Novella in HQN’s Regency Christmas anthology, ~Oct 2009; Debut Novel, PROOF BY SEDUCTION, ~March 2010
• Susan Gee Heino (2008 Golden Heart Winner for Regency Romance), to Berkeley: Debut Novel, MISTAKEN BY MOONLIGHT, out December 2009
• Beverley Kendall, to Kensington: Debut Novel, A LADY’S COMPROMISE, out January 2010
• Sara Lindsey, to Signet/NAL: Debut Novel, PROMISE ME ALWAYS, out March 2010
• Erica Ridley, to Kensington: Debut Novel, TOUCHED, out late 2010/early 2011

All that doom and gloom two years ago?  It turned out kinda like this:

It’s entitled Women, Property, and Personhood (not the title that’s showing up on the Conference List), and it’s a short look at the legal development of property rights in England (and only England, sorry, Scotland has its own courts of equity and I’ve never researched anything from them), with a particular look at how they pertain to women’s property rights and personhood. As this is a writer’s conference, the focus is on plots rather than particulars of the law.

You are probably thinking something like this: “Oh great. I would rather be bludgeoned to death with a baby seal then attend, at 9:45 in the morning no less, a workshop that delves into legal details from three centuries ago. Well, look at it this way: This workshop is 55 minutes long. The subject matter could fill a small room chock full of microfiche. If I tried to convey a great amount of legal detail, (a) I would run out of time before I hit 1400 A.D., (b) you would all fall asleep, and (c) there would be no guarantees I would get to material that would be useful to you.

So what I’m doing, instead of conveying vast amounts of factual detail, is giving a very broad overview of how people thought about property throughout history. I’ll explain how these give rise to a number of rules, and I’ll hand out a common checklist of “ways to figure out if you may be making a legal error.” The last half of the workshop will be hands on–we will examine wills and devises from actual romance novels, and I’ll show you how to use my checklist to figure out whether they can (or can’t) hold up, and if they can’t hold up, I’ll explain ways that the author could have achieved the exact same plot points.

In short, it’s designed to be useful for writers, to facilitate your plots (rather than to pull them to pieces), and to be more fun than you ever imagined law could be. Which, believe it or not, is pretty darned fun!

So come, and win various and sundry prizes, such as CDs containing scans of complete legal treatises (some of which are not available on Google Books), and never-seen-before-dare-you-to-wear-them buttons promoting the coolest, legally-accuratest Regency-set trilogy that 2009 will see!