Dorothy Dunnett - why has it taken me so long?

The same thing happened to me reading Game of Kings! There's one single scene at Warkworth Castle when Margaret Lennox first appears - I had literally visited Warkworth Castle that day by total coincidence.

@JaninaDuszejko I actually read King Hereafter before I got to Lymond. When I started it I thought it was one of the most complicated things I had ever read. All those people! But I got drawn in and it is the most extraordinary portrayal of early medieval Europe.

I'm over halfway through King Hereafter thanks to this thread. And I had an amazing reading moment quite by chance. I read about a sea battle in the Pentland Firth while on a boat in the Pentland Firth. Now racing to the end and looking forward to it about as much as I looked forward to the end of The Mirror & the Light.

I'd just like to wade in very late to this thread and say hi... I discovered Lymond in May/June this year, and am on my third back to back re-read. I just freaking love them.

Completely agree with the 'total confusion followed by unputdownable excitement' arc. Game of Kings took a while to get start but I basically haven't stopped since then. I'm desperate for anyone I know to read them but they're really not an easy sell!

Thank you! I’ve just got home and flicked through it. I think Francis inherits the house and with it the money, so it comes back to Philippa. Her reference is to money Francis knows about/has left instructions for. It was a very quick flick through though so I might have missed something (I should be unpacking, I got distracted). A re-read is due!

I know! I am really going to have to go back and reread the series as I don't remember someone of these things!

Why have I only just found this thread?!

It's when Philippa is at Sevigny getting ready to leave, and she writes to someone, presumably the bankers, to deal with sending her property home. I think. I'm only on QP at the moment, just before the fireworks and elephants, so I'm not going to break off yet.

And now I have reread Checkmate, and blow me, bits of it had quite vanished. But I now know what happened to the money, half a sentence.

What did happen to the money? I've never registered that and I'm not home to go through Checkmate to find out! I have obviously skimmed past it.

It was quite usual to go to university in your mid teens. And boys could be serving at sea in the Royal Navy in their early teens. Nelson was only twelve when he first went to sea.

And it's not that long ago that the majority of people left school at 14 or 15 and entered the workplace.

Having read the "Enigma of Francis Crawford" - academic pricing, but it was a gift, I am now rereading again, and bits have vanished again. I have found a real error though! He flicks a silver coin on the fire and it melts. I've checked. Wood fire up to 1000F, silver melting point 1900 something, so unless it was silver plated pewter not possible. Probably a metaphor. I think there is something similar elsewhere, possibly in the alchemy in Game of Kings
But my goodness, if she put her husband into Lymond, what she did to him! Whipped on the galleys, shot in the chest by a hackbut, near death, Burned in the incident with the elephants at the bridge. Broken leg and collarbone in Blois, near death, and I haven't finished Queens Play yet! I know there is worse coming with Mallet. He's nothing but scar tissue. Not to mention the psychological scars.
As for his age, we sent people to war before they were 20. Patrick Leigh Fermor was not much older and had already been around Europe by the time he was on Crete kidnapping generals. But my friend's dad was piloting bombers at 19, as were his fellows, and he was a lucky one. And I was thinking last week about the lads who swam to the beaches at night to defuse the mines on the timber obstacles, and whose bodies were seen as the main body of the forces fought their way up the beaches. My dad would have been with them, but he was on a course when the volunteering form went round, or I wouldn't have been here. He wasn't that young, but I think we forget how nations slaughter their boys, and what they can be capable of. Lymond isn't quite as exceptional as he seems from now.

Poor Tom Erskine.

I love Lymond but would rather be with Adam Blacklock or Jerrott. Or Danny Hislop for the laughs.

How about Tom Erskine?

Bother, can't edit. Primitive peoples may have done a crawl, but Wikipedia doesn't show the cited images. Contact with America may have introduced it, but it wasn't gentlemanly - splashed too much. There are books on swimming from the 16th century, but pictures not available.

Trudgen, a famous gentleman, 19th century.

And now I have reread Checkmate, and blow me, bits of it had quite vanished. But I now know what happened to the money, half a sentence. And as to whether Philippa knew what LB was going to do, in their earlier interview she had stressed that only money was on offer, but there must have been lurking a suspicion, from his behaviour at that time.
And I knew there was another anachronism, but had forgotten what it was, a quite important event, wnich is a pity. DD liked describing Lymond swimming, and indeed a man doing the crawl is quite entrancing, elegant, shows him off well. (Not if he's racing, but at leisure.) But he couldn't have displayed his arms like that, if the history of swimming is to be believed. My father, a competitive swimmer, started off doing the trudgeon, in which the recovery, like breaststroke, is in the water. Then he was introduced to what was initially called the Australian crawl, it must have been in the late 20s.
Unless someone can enlighten me about the style being around earlier. I have over the years tried to ascertain what people did in the past. I can't believe the Romans taught the legions dog paddle.
I shall persist in envisioning Francis doing the crawl.

I've now read the lot and am puzzled by how little I remember. For instance, that awful chess game, and the beatings. Nothing. Most things I read, I have a memory of, can recall by holding the book, don't need to reread. I think I may have to see if the same thing has happened to Asimov and Foundation. My brain is now riffling through Persuasion and P&P, What Katy did Next. Stop it!...
Now rereading Checkmate with all the background fresh.

Yes! He's hardly a relaxing funny guy is he!

Mytholmroyd, I love Lymond but would rather be with Adam Blacklock or Jerrott. Or Danny Hislop for the laughs.

Yes he's definitely a clever clogs @mimbleandlittlemy ! There are people with remarkable and inexplicable abilities to pick up languages/play musical instruments/do maths but I always think of Lymond as some unearthly higher level being which is why I find him so fascinating!

I am now recognising in bit parts the ancestors of, on one side my nephews, on the other my nieces, by very fringe descendants of real people. One of whom is now being beastly in a political way. Fascinating.

I don't know why they decided to plant the London ones in the streets - they definitely still have the orientalis in the parks. I don't know whether it's to do with the London ones coping better with the pollution or something.

My pet hate is the fact Lymond quotes poetry that's not actually even been written at the time he quotes it. Some of it's early C17th yet Lymond manages to quote it like a good 'un. She gets far more scrupulous in the Niccolo books but she wanted the poetry for the romance of it, I suppose (and so he can be a clever clogs).

I'm glad about that. I wondered about orientalis, which seemed more likely. I wonder why they decided to plant the London variety. I'm relieved.

Treaclewell - I'm afraid Dunnett's right and your guide was wrong - in a way. A lot of the plane trees in Istanbul now are London planes but the Balkans were famous for Platanus orientalis which is different and what Dunnet means. The oldest oriental plane in Istanbul is thought to be 1300 years old.

Same, and also the “one sea voyage with a person is enough to learn their language to the point where you can pass as a native speaker” - but I find it’s best to let that pass as a “slightly magical acceptability”

eta meant to quote @crumpet here!

One thing I'm finding interesting and which as author she could not include is the light the Ringed Castle shines on the present Tsar's interests. The Crimea, for example, has a long history as well as being an opening to the Black Sea. The Baltic states are right to be worried.