Author Interview & Giveaway: Emmie and the Tudor Queen by Natalie Murray

Hands up if you love books set during the Tudor era! I do, especially plays on history. Emmie and the Tudor Queen is the second book in a fun play on an era we are all familiar with – and we caught up with author Natalie Murray right as its coming out. Check out a little about Emmie and Nick, Natalie’s research process, and more!

Emmie and the Tudor Queen (Hearts and Crowns, #2)

by Natalie Murray
Published by: English Editor Limited
on August 25, 2020
Audible
Goodreads

True love has never been more deadly in this lush sequel to the best-selling Emmie and the Tudor King.
For an extraordinary love, Emmie Grace has given up her life in the modern world to move to the sixteenth century and marry the Tudor king she bravely saved from a dreadful fate. However, not everyone is pleased to see the glorious King Nick betrothed to the unknown and uncultured Emmie—especially the noblemen commanded to protect her.
As Emmie is drawn deeper into Nick’s sumptuous and savage world—where beheadings are way more popular than time travelers—the Tudor court heads on progress across the country, and a growing rebellion against the promised queen looms.
With life and love at stake, Emmie must face the cost of changing the path of history and realize that her greatest sacrifice is yet to come.

Interview with Natalie Murray

Check in about Emmie and Nick. What do readers need to know going into Emmie and the Tudor Queen?

I’m excited to share that Emmie and the Tudor Queen picks up right where Emmie and the Tudor King left off. If you’ve read Emmie and the Tudor King, you’ll remember that Emmie and Nick are in a pretty loved-up place at this point. He’s won her back, and they’ve committed to making a go as a couple in the 16^th century. Perhaps if he were a regular, common guy back then, there wouldn’t be much to worry about beyond Emmie’s occasional homesickness. Except, far from an ordinary Tudor chap, Nick is a Renaissance king of a country on the brink of war, where he has absolute power and responsibility for the welfare of his subjects. There is also the natural expectation that he’ll do his duty and marry a royal princess or an accomplished member an influential family for a suitable alliance and dowry. Emmie couldn’t be further from those things, so readers can expect some trouble in Tudor-paradise in Emmie and the Tudor Queen. Will her relationship with Nick survive it? 

What was it like revisiting the characters from book 1?

There were opportunities and obstacles to this. I loved being able to explore Emmie and Nick more; to see them grow and change, both individually and together. While Emmie and the Tudor King is more about the two of them meeting and Emmie preventing Nick’s sister’s murder that would change him for the worse, Emmie and the Tudor Queen is more about their relationship and the reality of trying to make it work in his complicated world. I was also able to revive a character originally from Emmie and the Tudor King who I’d cut out because she wasn’t adding anything to the story there (Bridget Nightingale), and I loved being able to dive deeper into Alice and Francis’s thorny relationship. Having said all that, it was trickier than I thought it would be to write a second novel featuring the same characters because of consistency. I had to keep going back to check that I hadn’t mistakenly changed someone’s personality or hair color!

Talk about the decision to reimagine the time period. What elements did you want to keep? What felt fun to play with?

I wanted to recreate Tudor England as accurately as possible, with the exception of introducing two new members to the dynasty – King Nicholas and his sister Princess Catherine. I did this because I wanted to write about a capricious Tudor king (a boy with some Henry VIII in his blood), but I didn’t want to write a book about Henry VIII – there are plenty of those already! Apart from the Tudor family tree, however, everything else is accurate to the time period and researched: from the clothing to the palaces, the food, the music, the political landscape at the time – everything. In terms of what felt fun to play with, I would say the entire setting because I’m a Tudorphile, but I also enjoyed introducing marriage and children to the real-life relationship between Elizabeth I and the Earl of Leicester, Robert Dudley. I’m a believer that Elizabeth and Leicester genuinely loved each other but couldn’t marry for complicated reasons, and I relished giving them a young family in this story, even if it’s a figment of my imagination and doesn’t end well for Elizabeth! Playing with the rather complicated Tudor family tree is endless fun ☺.

Thank you very much for having me! 

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