In the quiet of the Grand-Moûtier at Fontevraud Abbey, the wind carried on it the constant whisper of a thousand years.
I sat, regretful in my exhale, as the Abbey slept.
It is the silence when I am the most terrified and at peace. I lingered on the waxing moon, just three days short of full release, and shook.
This place—this holy, sacred, venomous, cruel place—soothed me in the darkness, and I submit.
Midnight, at Fontevraud.
The Discovery of The Mother House at Fontevraud
The twenty-four hours I spent in seclusion at Fontevraud Abbey in October of 2019 reshaped me as a person and also reshaped the storyline of Woman On The Wall in profound sorts of ways.
It was there that I learned of the legacy of the Bourbons during the Renaissance. Of the underground river beneath Fontevraud. I stood in the cloisters. I read about the immense power of the Abbess of Fontevraud. The remarkable features of this place help us all reach beyond the veil.
It was at that moment, I realized I discovered The Mother House. It quickly became the pivot point which every story/novel that comes from my work on Woman On The Wall revolves.
The Pièce De Résistance
For me, it was the perfect marriage of ancient and near past. Fontevraud is 1,000 years old, built to house men and women in a community that to this day is considered unique. It became one of the most powerful abbeys in Europe. After the French Revolution, it transformed into one of the most notorious prisons in France and remained so for the next 150 years. I would be able to include both versions of it in the novel, turning Fontevraud into the Sibylline Mother House in the Renaissance and the prison where Marie ends up hunting for her daughter after World War II.
The abbey complex at Fontevraud is home today to many interesting elements beyond that including the necropolis of the Planteganets. Even if I had never considered it for a tentpole setting in Woman On The Wall, I will most definitely return to France just to spend more time at Fontevraud Abbey in its gorgeous silence.