The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – The Women of Chateau Lafayette by Stephanie Dray

Episode Date: April 12, 2021

The Women of Chateau Lafayette by Stephanie Dray Named one of 2021’s Most Anticipated Historical Novels by Oprah Magazine ∙ PopSugar ∙ SheReads ∙ Parade ∙ and more! An epic saga from New York Times bestselling author Stephanie Dray based on the true story of an extraordinary castle in the heart of France and the remarkable women bound by its legacy. Most castles are protected by men. This one by women. A founding mother... 1774. Gently-bred noblewoman Adrienne Lafayette becomes her husband, the Marquis de Lafayette’s political partner in the fight for American independence. But when their idealism sparks revolution in France and the guillotine threatens everything she holds dear, Adrienne must renounce the complicated man she loves, or risk her life for a legacy that will inspire generations to come. A daring visionary... 1914. Glittering New York socialite Beatrice Chanler is a force of nature, daunted by nothing—not her humble beginnings, her crumbling marriage, or the outbreak of war. But after witnessing the devastation in France firsthand, Beatrice takes on the challenge of a lifetime: convincing America to fight for what's right. A reluctant resistor... 1940. French school-teacher and aspiring artist Marthe Simone has an orphan's self-reliance and wants nothing to do with war. But as the realities of Nazi occupation transform her life in the isolated castle where she came of age, she makes a discovery that calls into question who she is, and more importantly, who she is willing to become. Intricately woven and powerfully told, The Women of Chateau Lafayette is a sweeping novel about duty and hope, love and courage, and the strength we take from those who came before us.

You wanted the best. You've got the best podcast, the hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. Get ready, get ready, strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms and legs inside the vehicle at all times. Because you're about to go on a monster education roller coaster with your brain now here's your host chris voss hi folks this is voss here from the chris voss show.com the chris voss show.com hey we're coming here with another great podcast we certainly appreciate you guys tuning in we have an amazing author on the show today she is the author of a multitude of books.

She's fairly well accomplished. Not fairly, she's well accomplished. And I think you'd be blown away by some of the books she's written and everything else. She is here today to talk to us about her latest book, The Women of Chateau Lafayette. And today's episode is brought to you by our sponsor, Restream. Restream Studio is a web-based live broadcasting solution. You can live stream a Zoom meeting or webinar to up to 30 plus social channels and platforms at the same time. We're actually using it to do our live broadcasting. You can get $10 credit towards their services using our affiliate link at restream.io forward slash join forward slash chris voss and her name is stephanie dray stephanie dray is a new york times wall street

journal and usa today best-selling author of historical women's fiction her award-winning work has been translated into eight languages and tops list for the most anticipated reads of the year. She lives near the nation's capital with her husband, cats, and history books. This book just came out on March 30th, 2021. It was named one of 2021's most anticipated historical novels by Oprah Magazine herself. Pop Sugar, She Reads, Parade, and more. Welcome to the show, Stephanie, how are thou? I am great, thank you for having me. Thank you for coming, we certainly appreciate it, and congratulations on another amazing book that's hit the market.

Thank you so much, I've been really gratified that people seem to love it so far. Knock on wood. There you go. How many books have you written total? Cause I, I, my browser won't even let me go over that far on the Amazon list. I believe this is my 10th historical fiction novel.

Awesome sauce, historical fiction too. So give us your plug, Stephanie, on where people can find you on the interwebs or to the book and all that good stuff. You can go, Stephanie, on where people can find you on the interwebs or to the book and all that good stuff. You can go to Stephanie. You can even go to thewomenofchateau.com and it'll get you to the same place.

There you go. There you go. So what motivated you after all these books to write another one or this one particularly? So some of your readers might know my work from America's First Daughter and Mind Your Hamilton, which are both books about American founding mothers, Patsy Jefferson, who was the daughter of Thomas Jefferson, and Eliza Skylar Hamilton, who was the wife of Alexander Hamilton, our Secretary of the Treasury, our first Secretary of the Treasury, and current Broadway star. They might have heard through those books and or from the many streets and parks

that are named after him of the Marquis de Lafayette, who is a young Frenchman who came to fight in the American Revolution at the age of 19 against the wishes of the French king. He went on to become an amazing revolutionary hero who plays a part in all of my previous

American fiction books. And I really began to wonder what were the female influences in his life that made him actually be probably one of the more sensitive founding fathers to women in history. And I found his amazing, courageous wife, Adrienne, our French founding mother, and their love story, which spans the American Revolution and the French Revolution beyond, is one for the ages. And so I couldn't wait to tell her story. But that's when I stumbled over the fact that the castle over which she was a mistress, where Lafayette was born, served as a sanctuary for Jewish children hiding from the Nazis during the Holocaust. It was run by Americans. And when I discovered that connection, I thought, oh my gosh,

the Lafayettes would be overjoyed to know that their legacy of humanitarianism extended all the way to World War II, where their reputation was still protecting the lives of people and ensuring religious freedom. And so I had to write the story of how their legacy was passed down generation after generation. And so this book is based on the extraordinary true story of this castle and how it served as a beacon of hope in three of history's darkest hours. That's amazing. That's amazing. This

sounds interesting just from when you said mistress in a castle or mistress in a tower or something. I was like, that sounds interesting. Let's find out. Sounds like Rapunzel or something. I don't know. No, this is really cool so a historical novel or yeah so you're doing your historical research adding some flair now there's three different parts to this three different timelines that intersect tell us a little bit about why you chose to do it that way you did but give us a better insight of how they intersect i'd love to expand on that because when I found out that there were children being hidden by,

by the staff at the castle in world war two, when it was then a preventorium for sick children, which is sort of a fancy hospital for children before the invention of penicillin. I had to know how this came about. How on earth did Lafayette's castle get transformed in this way? And that's when I discovered a woman named Beatrice Chandler,

who was a movie, not a movie star, a stage star in her day. She was a Broadway star who married a millionaire and then became a philanthropist. And she got trapped in Paris at the start of World War I. And she, being a very audacious kind of woman, thought, someone has to do something about this war, and it might as well be me. And so she started the Lafayette Fund, during which she raised funds from Americans to help equip French soldiers in the trenches. And her goal was to help get the

American public to accept that we were going to have to intervene in this war. She eventually purchases the chateau and renovates it in Lafayette's name for displaced and refugee children. And so I realized that this is a story about women picking up the torch from each other, generation after generation. And this castle is at the center of it all. So I wanted to write about this one special place on Earth where liberty has flourished. And I wanted to show it through the eyes of three incredibly brave heroines. The first being Lafayette's wife, Adrienne. The second being Beatrice Chandler during World War I. And the third being a composite character named Marta Simone,

who is a forger who helps hide children from the Nazis. Wow. Now, this property, I imagine, is a real place. I didn't get my research done on that. I guess you've been able over the years or recently to go tour it and see it and stuff. Yes, I visited in 2017. It is now a museum and it is open to the public except for the pandemic. So when that's over, we can all start to go back and go visit. It's an amazing place. When you get there, it actually looks shabby on the outside. You're like, really, this is a castle? I'm not sure I would call it a castle, but it's because

it's deceptively simple. When you get inside, you realize how big it really is and that there's even a third tower. And if you look at it from different angles, it looks different from every angle. There you go. What was the most surprising thing you found in touring it and seeing it? I imagine it helped you with the layout of the book and using the different hallways and rooms and the design of it to provide the texture for your story. The first thing that struck me is that there is a capstone over the door, which is carved out of an actual stone from the Bastille, which was a French prison that was torn down by the peasants during the French Revolution. That stone was given to Lafayette and carved into a liberty cap. But once you're inside, I was on the hunt for these secret tunnels that I knew existed

in the castle, but I wanted to see. And I don't know if it was a language barrier or whatever but they did not really the guides there were not able to show me the tunnels and so I mostly stumbled over myself in the beautiful parts of the house including the philosopher's salon and thinking oh my gosh this house has seen so much history if only these stones could. But there is a footnote to that, and that is when I got back to New York City to do some research about Beatrice Chandler, I went through her papers and she had taken pictures of the secret tunnels and helpfully labeled them secret tunnels. Yeah, so I know that they exist and that they were used to help people escape during various wars.

Here is the pictures and design of our secret tunnels. You gotta love it. Now, these secret tunnels, I believe, play a part in your book. Do they not? They do indeed. They are used by Adrienne during the French Revolution when she was hiding from the Jacobins who were out to arrest her because she refused to disown or leave behind the name of Lafayette.

And also she was of course a noble woman. So that put an extra burden on her. Those Jacobins, you always have to watch those guys. They're always trouble. Yeah. They're a little bloodthirsty. And then in world war two,

I, in that storyline, I have those tunnels play a part including your readers might not know but george washington gifted his dueling pistol to the marquis de la fayette and they were at the chateau and they went missing sometime around the nazi occupation because they were hidden from the nazis they didn't want them to get the treasures so i had to do a little detective work and some guesswork as to where they might have gone oh wow wow yeah that's that would be something you definitely because they collected all the treasures the nazis did and send them to switzerland or something but that's pretty interesting and then how did the tunnels get used in the third the third kind of i anticipated that

they were used to help smuggle children out of the castle there you go the this is quite extraordinary because people love castles there's a romanticism to the castles and and what takes place as you went did most of your research what was there anything really surprised you or shocked you or went you had like an aha epiphany moment and you went wow this is really amazing my My readers will love this. So many things. But I will just quickly say about the castle that it's a special castle because most castles are very imposing

and they're meant to project authoritarian power, right? Lafayette's castle is purposefully downplayed because he meant for it to be a fortress of liberty. He meant for people to understand that the era of feudalism should be over and that people should be allowed to govern themselves. And he even shut up his dungeon to make sure that no one would be held in bondage. So that's something really special about that castle to me.

I think I pulled up the right one on the internet. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, it doesn't look as scary as some castles. It's not. And it has the American and French flags flying side by side in the front courtyard in the Court of Honor there because he believed, as generations since then have believed, that the French and American alliance could be the salvation of the world.

And it has proved to be at least three times over. Let's hope it's not tested again. If you could buy the castle and move into it, we just need to sell a few more books, I'm sure. Would you? Would I live there? Yes. Would I keep it open for everyone?

Absolutely. Because it does not belong. It belongs to the ages, not to any one person. But it is such a beautiful countryside and you can't beat the croissants and the pastries in france you just really that's true anything in france really i wish that i could eat like those people do the what they eat it's so rich and stay as skinny as they do they're just wonderful and how they pull that one off i don't know how they pull it off either. Everyone was skinny and

beautiful in Paris. Let me tell you, I was jealous. Yeah, something else. As you go through the thing, the characters are mainly the women in the book. Is that correct? Yes. And then what do you find if you could meet any one of the three women, which were maybe your favorite? Do you want to choose a favorite? I don't want to put you on the spot. Now, of course, I love all of my babies in any book, but I will say that Beatrice Chandler was the most fascinating of the women for one particular reason, and that is that she was keeping a secret, one that I discovered in the process of my research. I went to the New York Historical Society to look through her papers there I had already drafted her story I thought I knew her I I knew certainly what the historical sources said about her which

is that she was a well-heeled society maven who was having a she had a troubled marriage but somehow it survived the world war and I thought okay I know this story. So I had drafted it. Then at the New York Historical Society, in these many boxes of unsorted papers, I found a cache of letters, and they were love letters, and they were not from her husband. Oh! Busted! Yeah. They were from a French officer at the front. And I didn't realize it right away because they were written in code, because they were trying to avoid the censors. But because I had been working with Beatrice Chandler's grandson,

I had her private letters as well. So I was able to put them together. And that's when I realized they fit like a glove. And that I had discovered a century-old secret love affair. Holy crap. You're going to sell 5,000 copies of this book right now. Fun thing to tell the family. Getting love letters from somebody else.

That's right. And then she surprised me a third time because I'd already written the second version of her story when her grandson, who I'd been working with called me up and he said some of the pictures that you sent me from the New York Historical Society made me go down a rabbit hole of research and I have come out with a rabbit and that rabbit is that my grandmother was not who she said she was lying about her identity her entire life whoa yes and Yes. Now, I'm not going to say who she really was because that's a spoiler. There's the book tease.

Right. Got to buy the book. But she was a more extraordinary heroine than anyone knew. Wow. And if I could meet with her and ask her about what other secrets she's keeping from me, that would be a delight. That is awesome. I pulled her up here on the side on the wiki.

Pretty interesting. It says here she was, wait, Minnie Ashley was courted by William Randolph first. You're giving away spoilers now. Oh, am I? Oh, sorry. The wiki is bad wiki. Bad. Spoilers.

It's my guy teasing it. It does not give away the mystery of her. Yeah. Well, evidently he's talking about mini ashley so that's a complete stage name um oh performed with on stage okay i didn't get time to read that i just that's okay so definitely some uh interesting tidbits some teasing tidbits for people to buy the book and stuff what makes you just you have a love for the historical genre a novel genre what makes you keep writing in this genre? And then do you see like more books

coming? Do you see more books coming from what you did in this book, maybe a series? So I love writing historical fiction because I think it helps explain how we got where we are. And everyone is always bickering about our current circumstances without necessarily understanding what came before us. And having that perspective is really helpful. And I'm going to admit that I was finishing this book at the start of the pandemic when it was at its absolute scariest, when we didn't know what we were dealing with yet. And I thought to myself, okay, things are not great right now. But when I'm looking at these women in history, I see that they were dealing with extremely difficult circumstances

and that they reached within themselves and found the courage to meet their moment. And so how could we do any less? Whatever we're facing, we can look for inspiration to the people who came before us. That's a beautiful thing right there. The fact that we can, there were some tough times these people lived through. They didn't have a Starbucks and electricity and all know beatrice lived through the spanish flu yeah she was on the in france during the war when it broke out and they didn't have zoom calls podcast to there you go they didn't have the chris vosh show to keep them happy during i think back then if you stub your toe and you got an infection, you're pretty much done.

It was like, that goes that leg. Yeah, there was a toughness to the people from that age. Even my grandparents were pretty tough. They'd have an arm ripped off and they'd be like, yeah, it's a flesh wound, that sort of thing. But yeah, you really had to be tough back in those ages. So I think what you beautifully said that, yeah, it's really inspiring on how they do this. Do you see more, do you have any projects currently in the works or do you see that, like I said, this becoming a series maybe of an extension? the women of Chateau Lafayette, but certainly with Beatrice Chandler, even after publishing the book, I have discovered a few more secrets in her closet. And so I would love to write about her life as a young woman rising on the stage in the 1800s. So I think that would be fun.

But first, before I can return to my wonderful Lafayette ladies, I have a new project coming out. It is tentatively titled Madam Secretary. And it's going to be about our America's very first female cabinet secretary, Frances Perkins, who is the most influential woman in American history. She was the architect of the New Deal and there is not a single American listening to this right now whose life has not been touched by Francis Perkins. Oh, wow. She was alive. Oh, she was Secretary of Labor, 1933

to 1945, the longest serving. Yeah. This should be extraordinary, especially if no one's written about her and stuff. But it looks like she did quite a few things under FDR and Truman. Yes. She's a great character because FDR was not an angel. And so Francis and he often butted heads.

She was like the Jiminy Cricket on his shoulder. And I think that'll be really fun to show that sort of interplay between these big, giant historical figures. And no one has written about her before in fiction that I'm aware of, which makes me both excited and a little nervous, right? Because this is a big figure to tackle. So hopefully I'm up for it. I think you will be. It's looking across this wiki that I just pulled up on the side. She looks quite extraordinary. One of the longest serving secretaries of labor. And it looks like she did some great work for labor unions and had a labor department that worked to stop strikes and did different things to help things. World War II skilled labor and women were moving into formerly male jobs.

She was subject of a documentary film, Summoned, in 2020. So, yeah, you might be on the cusp of writing a really cool book about that. So do you have a print date or an anticipated date that you're going to release that? Not yet. But I think one of the most interesting things about Frances is that at the start of World War II, not everyone was sure that we should take in Jewish refugees. People weren't even sure that they believed these stories about the death camps. Francis did believe it. And Francis was one of the only people inside the administration warning in advance about Hitler and about the Holocaust.

So she fought the good fight. And I'm really excited to show that's awesome. There's that horrific story of them turning back that ship and sending it back to Germany and pretty much people to their death, which is a horrible time of nationalism in our country. And we think we'd have learned from that. But on the women of Chateau Lafayette, do you see this becoming a movie? And if you did, do you have any actresses picked out for the roles? I would love for it to become a movie i don't know that i'm really up on my current actresses or not but i think i would love to see a french actress play adrian angelic and and soft and she contrasts really lovely in a lovely way with beatrice

who is funny and i know she was funny because I get to read her letters and her book. And then Marta, who is a character who is very cynical. The other characters, of course, they adore Lafayette. They just think the sun rises and sets by him. Marta is a more modern person who does not care about this at all. She's not interested in politics. She's not interested in any legacy about liberty. All she wants is to paint and to get out of this little town in the mountains where she was raised in this crumbling castle. She wants to get out. But when the Nazis invade, she's forced to make a choice about what side she's on and what's really important to her and what she's willing to risk and who she's willing to become. So that's an exciting part of

this book. There you go. She finds her purpose. So this sounds really extraordinary. Anything more you want to tease out or talk about the book that we haven't touched on that would motivate people to pick this baby up? I just think it's so great to learn about this in a time when we are facing challenges of our own. This is a story that is so inspirational and so moving. And it made me feel more courageous in my life. So I hope it will give readers a chance to find their own courage to face whatever difficulties they are encountering in their lives right now. And also, since we all have a little bit of travel wanderlust, like we all would love

to travel right now, this will take you on an epic journey through France and New York City. Ooh, France and New York City. We definitely need that right now. I got cabin fever so bad. I think it's cabin fever where I'm just, I'm really tired of being in my little home prison, but I recently got the second shot, I think a week ago of Moderna. And I got to tell you, it's so freeing knowing that technically we're not supposed to be able to die from coronavirus anymore if you get the second shot. And so I've been going out, of course, still

wearing my mask, being responsible. I'll wear my mask as long as it takes. I don't want to get that damn thing, even though I got the vaccine. But I've been going out eating and I want to travel and do some stuff and just mostly travel and drive the car, go down to Vegas or something. But yeah, it's opened up like a whole new thing inside me where I'm like, I want to get the hell out of this prison. Yeah. And it feels like we took so much for granted or at least that even the littlest pleasures are going to be amazing to me. I get my second shot at the end of the month. All right. And I didn't, I thought there's so many huge things that I would love to do, but honestly, just being able to see my family without fear of hurting them or infecting them will be the most amazing feeling. Yeah.

My sister, she has MS and she's in a care center and we haven't been able to see, hug her or touch her or come near her for a year and a half. Oh God, I can't feel you. Just recently, my mom, she'd gotten the vaccine before me. She's in her seventies. And so she recently has been able to start going and seeing her on a regular basis and just being able to touch and hug your loved ones. I was telling people, I do the joke lately that as soon as everyone gets vaccinated, I'm going to run around and lick every doorknob and I'm going to run up to people and say,

hey, you want to make out? We can make out now. We'll just all make out. I'll just give hugs to everyone. I'll get a big shirt. This is free hugs. Because the other thing is I'm worried there might be another pandemic. So I'm going to enjoy myself. And there's some people saying it might be a roaring 20s experience where we're going to go through an economic. I was just

thinking that's likely what happened before. It's likely again. My dad is in his 70s and he is a polio victim. One of the last kids who got polio before back then. And so he's been really vulnerable to this virus. So when I get to hug him, I'm probably going to cry. Yeah, that's going to be awesome. I think we're going to hug a lot of people and appreciate them a lot more. And I hope we remember and we learn from this. I certainly hope I do because it really focused me on, okay, who's important in this world and the cars and houses and things like they don't get coronavirus and they don't pass away and they're replaceable. So I should focus on the people in my life as opposed to just whatever, whatever I think is important material wise. But yeah, it'll be really nice. I can't wait to go to dinner with

people and sit across from them and have lunch and coffee. And I think what I'm going to basically going to do is I'm just going to go find me a 24 seven restaurant and I'm just going to take a corner thing and I'm not coming home for a month. More power to you. But it will give me time to read your book. So that's important. There you go, guys. Wonderful. You guys want to pick up the book and her other books. You want to give a quick shout out and plug your other books. So people take a look at those as well. Yes, I hope they'll check out America's First Daughter and My Dear Hamilton and even maybe my debut

novel, which is Lily of the Nile, which is about Cleopatra's daughter. All right. Check it out, guys. Order it up. Give us your plugs one last time. Stephanie, as we go out. Go to stephaniedre.com. There you go. stephaniedre.com. It's go. stephaniedre.com.

It's been wonderful to have you here, Stephanie, and spending some time with us. And we'll look forward to your future projects. Thanks for coming. Thank you so much. Thank you. And thanks to my audience for being here. Go pick up the book, The Women of Chateau Lafayette, March 30th, 2021.

It's just still hot off those presses. So you can take an order up and check it out. Be probably on the first person in your book club to get it, or at least get bragging rights in for it. And before it comes out as a movie, you never know. Be sure to go to youtube.com. Forge. That's Chris Foss. Go to goodreads.com. Forge. That's Chris Foss. Go to our groups on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram and all that good stuff. Thanks guys for tuning in, wear your mask, stay safe, and we'll see you guys next time.