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****Margaret Porter’s BEAUTIFUL INVENTION:
A NOVEL OF HEDY LAMARR is #67 in the never-ending series called INSIDE THE EMOTION OF FICTION where
the Chris Rice Cooper Blog (CRC)
focuses on one specific excerpt from a fiction genre and how that fiction
writer wrote that specific excerpt. All INSIDE THE EMOTION OF FICTION links
are at the end of this piece.
Has
this been published? If yes, what publisher and what publication
date? Published October, 2018 by Gallica
Press.
What is
the date you began writing this piece of fiction and the date when you
completely finished the piece of fiction? I began
intensive research in Spring 2016, began writing in July 2016, completed the
novel before spring 2018.
Where
did you do most of your writing for this fiction work? And please describe in detail. I started writing
the first chapter at my mother’s house during a visit. But mostly I wrote it on
the sofa in the sitting room/library (Right) of my main house, or on the screened porch
at our lake house (Below Left)
What
were your writing habits while writing this work- did you drink something as
you wrote, listen to music, write in pen and paper, directly on laptop;
specific time of day? I write on a laptop, seated in
a sofa or comfy chair. Sometimes I write scenes in longhand, with pen and
paper. I drink tea with milk. When writing I listen to music, I even “watch”
television. I like having ambient sound of some sort. Normally I write only
during the day, but when close to deadline I will work in the evening as well. I
collected numerous photographs of Hedy Lamarr, vintage magazines with articles
about her, and other ephemera like Hedy Lamarr paper dolls, and even a
household object that is supposed to have belonged to her.
What is
the summary of this specific fiction work? Hollywood Beauty. Brilliant inventor. The incredible
true story of a remarkable and misunderstood woman.
Ambitious young Austrian actress Hedwig Kiesler
is tainted by her nudity in the art film Ecstasy, but a hasty marriage to a
munitions mogul is no refuge from scandal. Repelled by his possessiveness—and
her discovery that he supplies arms to Hitler—Hedy flees husband and homeland
for Hollywood. But professional success as glamorous Hedy Lamarr clashes with
her personal life as marriage and motherhood compete with the demands of studio
and stardom. Roused to action by Nazi atrocities during World War II, Hedy
secretly invents a new technology intended for her adopted country’s
defense—and unexpectedly changes the world.
Click on below link to watch Hedwig Kiesler in ECSTACY
Can you
give the reader just enough information for them to understand what is going on
in the excerpt? At this point in the
novel, Hedy is tortured by news of the latest German attack on a ship carrying
British children away from Luftwaffe bombings to safety in Canada.
Please
include just one excerpt and include page numbers as reference. This one excerpt can be as short or as long
as you prefer. pp. 275-275
Going to the
nursery, Hedy found Jamesie awake but drowsy from his afternoon nap. She lifted
him from the crib and carried him to her workroom. While he amused himself with
a stuffed piglet, she searched her bookshelves for the latest edition of Mellor’s Modern Inorganic Chemistry. Her hand closed on the
spine as the London bulletin began. The lead report carried the news she
dreaded most.
Not again.
Another German
U-boat had torpedoed another British transport bound for Montreal. A Royal Navy
destroyer in the vicinity was able to rescue the survivors who had boarded
lifeboats. The crew and an unknown number of the passengers—evacuees, mostly
children—had gone down with the ship.
Rage and
wretchedness consumed Hedy as she gazed at her son, unaffected by the
inhumanity of war. Motivated by love and desperation, mothers and fathers had
unselfishly placed their sons and daughters on that unnamed vessel, believing
it would carry them to safety, far away from the Nazi menace. Their present
agony was beyond imagining. Their losses shredded her heart.
The remainder of
the broadcast was devoted to the usual recounting of bombing sorties over
Britain.
She stared at the
papers spread across her desk. Her eyes were riveted to a summary of that
long-ago conversation with the German propulsion engineer. Had one of Hellmuth
Walter’s wire-guided torpedoes blasted the British ship into bits? He’d been
trying to perfect an alternative method of directing the weapon to its target. Aircraft missiles, he’d told her, could be controlled
remotely, by a specific and unique radio frequency that couldn’t be blocked by
an adversary. Jamming, he’d called it.
The Allies would gain a much-needed
advantage in naval combat, if they possessed an underwater torpedo that was
impervious to signal interception. And when the United States entered the
war—it was essential, for the future of mankind—the military would require
significant technological innovation to prevail. For that very reason, the
government had convened the National Inventors’ Council.
It was Jamesie’s suppertime, so Hedy
couldn’t pursue this train of thought. He was more interested in rolling his
meatballs across the plate with his plump forefinger than in eating them, but
she couldn’t bring herself to discipline him tonight. On the other side of the
world, grieving mothers of drowned children were remembering moments like this
one.
Why is
this excerpt so emotional for you as a writer to write? And can you describe your own emotional
experience of writing this specific excerpt? I shared
the heartbreak that Hedy felt, and reading the news accounts and reactions of
parents who lost children was wrenching. This scene doesn’t only depict Hedy’s
emotional response to a tragedy, it’s crucial to the creation of the “beautiful
invention.” During World War II, Hedy Lamarr developed frequency hopping and
spread spectrum technology to give the Allies an advantage over the Germans at
sea. After repeated torpedo attacks on child evacuee transport ships, she was
motivated to use information she absorbed as wife of an Austrian weapons
manufacturer to devise a wireless torpedo for the Allies that couldn’t be
intercepted by the enemy.
Her invention resulted from maternal emotion and
empathy, grief from the many deaths of innocent children, combined with intense
desire to defeat Hitler, who had invaded her native Austria and committed
atrocities against Jews and other groups.
Were
there any deletions from this excerpt that you can share with us? And can you
please include a photo of your marked up rough drafts of this excerpt. I don’t remember that this section changed much from the
original. I haven’t got an original draft, or anything marked up that I can
share.
Other
works you have published? I’m the author of 12 other
novels. The one before Beautiful Invention was A
Pledge of Better Times, also biographical fiction, set in the royal
courts of the late 17th century.
Website:
Instagram:
@authormargaretporter
Twitter:
@MargaretAuthor
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BEAUTIFUL
INVENTION: A NOVEL OF HEDY LAMARR
