The second most exciting thing in life for me has always been learning something new. The first? Getting to share what I’ve learned with others. My life has given me so many opportunities to do both—as a professor (retired), as a historical novelist, and as a cruise lecturer.
My goal as a historical novelist is to provide you, the reader, with high-quality fiction about women and the forgotten and undervalued roles they played in their societies. Whether it’s the real-life physicist Emilie du Chatelet, the literary heroine Penelope, or women who have sprung entirely from my imagination, I offer you stories true to the facts of a time and place, to bring history alive for you and make you feel as much a part of other cultures as you do your own.
As a world-wide lecturer for several cruise lines, I use my career as a college professor of humanities to find the stories that make travel more exciting and memorable.
If you have either met me recently or been in my life since I was a teenager (or younger), you may know me by my birth name, Laurel Weeks. I have been using this name in my private life for several years.
Please check back from time to time for updates on my new projects and schedule, and drop me a line at lacauthor@gmail.com to let me know you’re out there reading and traveling!
From my diary
- Body LoveI have been traveling the world as a cruise lecturer for over a decade now, and I always came home actually looking forward to going on a diet. I’ve done quite well managing my weight throughout my adult life, learning from childhood obesity that I never wanted to feel that uncomfortable in my body again. I’ve been told that fat cells don’t disappear once they are established. They are greedy little buggers that lurk in a shrunken state eager to fill up again. Maybe that isn’t all that scientific, but ask anyone who has ever been overweight how easy it is to…
- This Without ThatI arrived back in Victoria yesterday evening after a month in the Canary Islands, the south coast of Spain and France, and a week in Paris. After the fitful sleep and predawn awakening typical of jet lag, I went out this morning shortly after daybreak to walk along the city’s Inner Harbour. Unexpectedly, looking out at a beloved place, I started to cry. I so wanted to find a place of beauty and potential for growth to call home, and indeed I have done that. But I wanted to have that without the accompanying loss I have experienced this year…
- PatienceA few days ago when I was on El Hierro, one of the Canary Islands, I visited a village that was lived in for hundreds of years and was only completely abandoned about fifty years ago. It was all built of rough lava rocks—even the painfully uneven floors of the homes—and few bigger than a single room. They all had small garden spaces enclosed by low walls also made of porous volcanic rocks. The surrounding lands would be suitable for goats to graze but little else. As often happens to me as a lifelong story teller (if only to myself most of…