Catherine Haustein

When I meet old friends they ask, “What are you writing”? “A novel.” I say. “What’s it about?” “A romance.” Their eyes narrow. You can see what they’re thinking That is not literature. But ah, of course it is.

The modern romance features a woman complete in her own skin, but open to love. In the words of Amy at The Geek Girl Project “Changes in the conventions of the romance genre have turned the typical romance novel into an extremely empowering story combined with the happily ever after ending.” Romance is the best selling genre and according to Romance Writers of America accounts for over a billion dollars of sales annually, 39% of E-books and 32% of mass-market paper backs. But, the disrespect starts with the trade paperbacks (bookstore books)—here romance captured just 18% of the market in 2013 and as for hardback books—9%. Audiobooks are even slower to catch the trend-1%, as if a romance is an unspoken secret. (RWA)

I’m not sure where this prejudice against romance comes from. I haven’t encountered it in my MFA studies so it’s not an academic prejudice. It must be something cultural. Romance is to literature what quilting is to art. It’s beautiful, but because women do it, it doesn’t command public respect. Tamara Lush has the right perspective on this, romance writing is a feminist act. (In fact, a study at Rutgers University found that feminists make good partners for romance.)

The art world has come to accept handcrafted items as art, thanks in part to Miriam Schapiro, who worked to get quilts and handcrafted items–the “invisible women’s work of civilization” recognized as legitimate art. Why not the same for romance writing?

used in writing Natural Attraction.

Disclaimer: Natural Attraction is fiction and not an historical document. However, I used numerous sources in its creation.

Books used to establish an historical framework for the story.

Pierce, Bessie Louise, A History of Chicago 1848-1871, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1940

A well-written history with focus on the everyday lives of citizens, this was an important resource for details of Chicago in 1871 including fashion, commerce, public transportation, reversing the Chicago river, and prevailing attitudes.

Swieringa, Robert P., Dutch Chicago A History of Hollanders in the Windy City, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, grand Rapids Michigan 2002

I used this for details of a church experience, Dutch names, and information on the lumber industry and pine boards.

Wade, Louise Carroll, Chicago’s Pride The Stockyards, Packingtown and Environs in the Nineteenth Century, University of Illinois Press, Urbana and Chicago, 1987

Provided details of unsavory smells and the growth of the packinghouses

Elderidge, Niles, Darwin Discovering the Tree of Life, W.W. Norton and Company, New York, 2005

I used this to establish some of Darwin’s basic ideas as well as ideas of reproduction and the distinction between soma and germ line cells. Also included in this book were details of his family life.

Desmond, Adrian and Moore, James, Darwin’s Sacred Cause, Houghton Mifflin Harcort, Boston New York, 2009

I used Darwins’ ideas on beauty and sex, his ideas about the intermingling of races, along with his family’s anti-slavery views. I used pages 139-146 and classification and racism in 19^th century society.

Amy Kaplan and Donald E Pease, Cultures of United States Imperialism, Duke University Press, Durham and London, 1993

From this book I used the chapter “Terms of Assimilation” by Priscilla Wald. In this chapter, efforts to assimilate Cherokee into the US were discussed along with the frontier mentality.

Lewis, Robert M., From Traveling Show to Vaudeville Theatrical Spectacle in America 1830-1910, Johns Hopkins Press, 2003.

The chapter on Melodrama (pp 155-236) was used extensively when writing the play “Clementine and the Creature” that was a part of the Prospectors’ show. I also used the chapter on The Wild West Show, mainly for the ideas that Buffalo Bill was “an undisciplined drunkard” who stole the idea of a wild west show and that his depictions of Native Americans were stereotypically false. Also used to establish that the trend following melodrama was vaudeville/burlesque and to find names and name suggestions for forms of entertainment in Post Civil War US.

Souder, William , Under a Wild Sky, North Point Press, 2004

This book gave me details of Audubon’s life, including his preservation and mounting of specimens and his relationship with his wife Lucy. It also discussed his career successes (he did not meet with success until age 54) and his falsehoods about vultures and rattlesnakes.

Smith Duane A., Mining America: The Industry and the Environment, 1800-1980, University Press of Colorado, 1993.

I used Chapter One Booming, Digging, and Dumping.

Whitaker Jr., John O., National Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Mammals, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1996.

Used for descriptions of mammals along with the on-line Animal Diversity Web. At times I encountered changes in Genus species designations and when this happened I selected the older reference. An exception to this was Bison bison which changed before 1871.

Clark ,Thomas Curtis and others, The American Railway Bramhall House, New York, 1972

Used to establish train lines and places trains went and the types of train cars.

Crawford, Anthony, The Butterfly Hunter The Life History of Henry Walter Bates University of Buckingham Press, Buckingham, UK, 2009

Used for basic information about the man who first described biological mimicry.

LIFE-HISTORY STUDIES OF THE WYOMING GROUND SQUIRREL

[Citellus elegans elegans] IN COLORADO An e-book with details about Genus Spermophlius which includes an account of keeping one for a pet.

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:0svSVnij4icJ:digitool.library.colostate.edu/webclient/DeliveryManager%3Fpid%3D18362+wyoming+ground+squirrel+fighting&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESi_tQGN6OfgyH-6uW41O2XlP8L1XG9d54IYU6mB3XnxcVSlSXixsOku1H8QcDfNWRQQJSGtyDKHif7GJCvjx-fKv8FJkikfnKDlLQoXGR7D9vOdGTwwXVfzXmzrIpTquyfch7cA&sig=AHIEtbTa8zcWTnbBCP8LfdxbgzjRnD0LvA

Family History: Henry and Grace Boersma Family Historical Items complied August 2009.

Articles referenced to add details.

Christopher Halin, “Forensic cultures in historical perspective: Technologies of witness, testimony, judgment (and justice?)” Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 44(2013)4-15.

This article was most helpful in setting the tone of the trial scene and the use of expert witnesses and the use of forensic science. It outlined the role that perception of moral character played in judgment. I was shocked to read that the first forensic medical text, the 1788 Elements of Medical Jurisprudence, by Samuel Farr contained the entrenched idea that a woman could not get pregnant from a rape because “lust and pleasure were required for conception.” It was noted that this idea prevailed even into the 20^th Century.

H.W.Rhodehamel and E.H. Stuart “Atropine sulfate from Dataura Stamonium” The Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry Vol 13, No 3, 1921 218-220.

This publication established the connection between atropine and jimson weed. It underwent some “time travel” back to 1871 but since distillation and extraction were done by the alchemists I took the liberty. The research was first presented at an American Chemical Society meeting in Chicago in Sept. 6-10, 1920.

Conway Zirkle,”Animals Impregnated by the Wind,” Isis, Vol.25, No.1 (May, 1936) pp.95-130.

An historical look at the notion of wind related pregnancy.

Buffalo Bill Cody “When Buffaloes Roamed in Herds”, originally published in 1898 and reprinted in The Saturday Evening Post, Vol 248(5 pp 89 1976.

After killing off most of the buffalo, Bill Cody gets nostalgic about all of his bloodshed, including the time he stampeded a herd of buffalo into a wagon train.

Nancy M. Peterson, “Monsters of the Plains” Wild West Feb, 2009, Vol 21 (5) p36-42.

Discusses the killing of the buffalo, for sport, for food, and to teach the Native Americans who was boss.

Symposia

Symposium A of the 125th Proceedings of the Iowa Academy of Science (April 19, 2013) was titled Overlapping Magisteria. I am thankful to the participants Loyal Rue and Jerry Soneson for the enlightening discussion on magisteria.