Felicia Davin

food words

A costly dish

in which I’m perilously out of my depth re: food words (but perfectly at home re: romance novels)

historical romance

Absolute skulduggery

sneaking around and romance novels

fashion

Kamarband

a little fashion history and some romance novels

historical romance

*slaps roof of brougham*

some love for Sherry Thomas novels

US history

Corcas

etymological mysteries and romance novels

expressions

Behind closed doors

shacks, cabins, toilets, cahoots, and a real “one of these things is not like the others” set of book reviews

writing process

Calques and loanwords

calques, loanwords, and romance novels

expressions

White elephants and quiet Americans

fellas,

fashion

On cravats

Croatia, must-have historical romance accessories, and romance novels

contemporary romance

Fish, cheese, war

various mongers, and, of course, romance novels

expressions

I do cock a snook, but not at thee

rude gestures, death, and romance novels

French history

And yet they were surprisingly moderate

The Black Jacobins, revolution, romance, and horror

animal words

Big-eared rabbit-eared

a small Australian marsupial, language names, and romance novels

contemporary romance

Shedding some light

TORCH, n., FLASHLIGHT, n. I recently had to look up, for novel research, when handheld battery-powered lights were invented (1899). Wikipedia revealed why US and Canadian English speakers call these things “flashlights” while the rest of the English-speaking world calls them “(electric) torches”: Early flashlights ran on zinc–carbon batteries,

sapphic romance

and sucks in his turn

VAMPIRE, n. These fanged undead creatures show up in romance novels a lot, often as protagonists, so it’s sort of surprising that I haven’t looked up the word until now. People love to argue about vampire lore—what powers they have, what weaknesses—and I’m not sure

thriller

Snucked up

SNEAK, v. I have read so, so much Mick Herron in the past four months. I didn’t intend to dedicate a whole newsletter to his spy thrillers until I ran into this passage in Slough House, the seventh novel of a series that is also, somewhat confusingly, titled Slough

contemporary romance

Ground down

CONTRITION, n. Did you know that this word used to mean “[t]he action of rubbing things together, or against each other; grinding, pounding or bruising (so as to comminute or pulverize)” (OED)? I did not. I was only familiar with the figurative meaning: “being bruised in heart; sorrow or

contemporary romance

Fending for yourself

on the word "fend" and two excellent romance novels

sapphic romance

Weaved and wove

WEAVE, v., and also WEAVE, v., but differently. Yeah, it’s confusing. Do you ever open the dictionary and find out you’ve been wrong about something your whole life? This rocked my world. I mean that positively, though I did have to stare slack-jawed at my screen for a

fantasy romance

Ask nicely

PLEASE, adv., int. I’ve been trying to teach the toddler to say “please” when he shouts “MORE BLUEBERRIES” at me, or his dad, or anyone in the general vicinity who might have access to blueberries. For a while he found it easier to say in American Sign Language, usually

contemporary romance

Downfalls and inheritances

DEMISE, n. This word showed up in one of the romance novels below (A Caribbean Heiress in Paris) in the sentence “If the duke only knew that his sons had been plotting his demise for weeks […]” In context, the duke’s sons are not plotting his death, but his downfall;

Shakespeare

Comely truth

come (yes, like that) and, of course, romance novels

fantasy romance

Shall we sing a song?

SHALL, v. This word has been on my mind because my kid adopted it. A couple days ago, he asked for more strawberries and when I told him the box was empty, he said, “Shall we go to the store?” like the world’s most prescriptively correct almost-two-year-old. He says

English literature

Every beating heart a secret

SONDER, n. This is a new word (we could say “neologism,” sure), coined by the writer John Koenig in 2012 for his project The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows. He invented it based on French “sonder” (to probe, to measure the depths of), and German “sonder-,” a prefix that indicates something

Jorge Luis Borges

God's secret dictionary

JACTITATION, n., also jactation. I’ve been reading the work of Argentine genius Jorge Luis Borges again. In one translation (Douglas Crockford’s), I ran across this word, “jactitation,” for Spanish “jactancia,” which I think is more usually translated as “boasting.” “Jactitation” has the same meaning in English, but it’