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The Titanic sailed 114 years ago today with a Pig on Board… and recalling the glam of the First Class Ladies by Jina Bacarr

April 11, 2026 by Jina Bacarr in category historical fiction, Jina’s Book Chat, Reading, Titanic, women's fiction, Writing tagged as #Historical, 1912. historical romance, British, countess, England, Ireland, Irish, pig, romance', ship of dreams, Southampton, Titanic, Titanic 114

Photos: Dreamstime.com — using RF stock, my interpretation of the ship and female passenger and of course, the little pig.

Since I’m sitting at my computer in lovely, old scarlet velvet slippers, yoga pants, and a sweatshirt, it’s time to remind myself that once upon a time I wore high heels, sexy jeans, and crop tops. And before that, glam dresses with sequins.

Like this photo of me at the end of this post. Check it out. Look at those strappy silver stilettos, will you?

I love dressing up and adore the fashions of the era, marveling how First Class Ladies wore corsets under their nightgowns when they got into the lifeboats. So every year in April I go through my Titanic memorabilia, put on a pretty dress and my white lace-up boots with the pretty embroidery and listen to the novel I wrote about the Titanic, The Runaway Girl, and embark once again on the journey from Ireland on the Ship of Dreams sans corset.

On the Titanic.

Hard to believe it’s 114 years ago today the grand ship Titanic left Queenstown.

So in honor of the souls who perished that night and those who survived, here is a lesser known story about the Titanic.

And the little pig on board.

According to the New York Herald on April 19, 1912: Five women saved their pet dogs and another woman saved a pig, which she said was her mascot.

The reporter goes on to say that she didn’t know how the woman cared for her pig aboard the Titanic, but she carried it up the side of the ship [the Carpathia, rescue ship] in a big bag.

Good Lord, how did the pig get into the lifeboat? Squealing, wiggling, I imagine… maybe not.

Was the little pig traveling first class?

In a word, yes.

More about this intrepid little piggy and the important part it played in the sinking of the Titanic later. First, you can’t get away from pigs and the Titanic.

In the Julian Fellowes’ mini-series Titanic, a passenger in third class isn’t happy about traveling steerage to New York. She tells her husband that her daughter said their Irish Catholic family is like six little pigs packed into that cabin, all trussed and bound for market.

They’re not the only Irish aboard the ship with pigs on their mind.

Ava O’Reilly, the heroine in my historical romance, THE RUNAWAY GIRL nearly doesn’t make it on board the ship because of a pig.

Ava runs away from the grand house where she is in service after she is wrongly accused of stealing a diamond bracelet. The law is after her, but she has one chance to escape.

The Titanic.

Will Ava make it on board the Titanic before she sails? Only by the skin of her teeth.

Does she see the pig during the crossing?

Few passengers did because the cute little pig with the curly tail was the lucky mascot of Miss Edith Russell.

She loved to wind up its tail and it would play a lively musical tune similar to a two-step called Maxixe.

You see, the pig was musical pig.

The reporter on the Carpathia didn’t know the real story behind Miss Russell’s pig. How it was given to her after she survived a horrific motorcar crash. She promised her mother it would never be out of her sight. When she realized the Titanic was sinking and she’d left her mascot in her cabin, she sent the steward to retrieve her lucky pig.

Still, Edith was hesitant to get into a lifeboat. When a seaman tossed her pig into a boat (believing it was a baby wrapped up in a bag), Edith insisted on getting into the boat, too. Its nose was gone and its legs broken, but Edith and her little pig escaped in lifeboat no. 11.

Overcrowded with sixty-eight passengers (nearly one-third were children), Edith realized her little pig could comfort others as it had her. She wound up its tail so it would play music for the children. Most of the little ones stopped crying as the pig’s sparkling musical notes calmed their fears.

Its furry, white-gray body wet with sea spray.

Its cute grin giving them hope they would be saved.

It was the little Titanic pig that could.

Thanks for stopping by!

~Jina

The Runaway Girl

Buy Links:

Amazon:

US https://amzn.to/30yll8P

UK https://amzn.to/2NCqTty

Audible https://www.amazon.com/dp/B084MM1D4R

Spotify https://open.spotify.com/album/3A08bcsCeI6LHWRQTmAM30

Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-runaway-girl-jina-bacarr/1135653540?ean=9781838893736

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the-runaway-girl-1

Apple Books: https://books.apple.com/us/book/the-runaway-girl/id1492269132

PS check out TITANIC AND ME, my story behind the story on the BOLDWOOD BOOKS Blog.

Once upon the ship of dreams… me dressed as a first class lady

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Once upon a translation… make that three… c’est si bon!

March 11, 2026 by Jina Bacarr in category Jina’s Book Chat, translation, Writing tagged as #Boldwood Books, books, Paris, Translation, writing

The Resistance Girl in Dutch

The Lost Girl in Paris in Spanish

Words… words… words.

They drive us authors crazy, the right words, the passionate words… the words that make your characters do stupid things and wonderful things, too.

Even more surprising to an author is when your words are translated into thousands of words in another language. Will the reader ‘get’ what you’re trying to say? Will they feel the love, the pain?

You bet they will.

The art of being a translator is one I can attest to personally when I was a tour guide at Universal Studios. I gave the tour in German and also learned it in French as a backup for our French guides.

My Universal Studios ‘stuff’ — name tag, parking sticker, studio ID (love the hair!), photo of me in Paris, and my Universal Studios Tour Guide Manual in English — I had to translate it into German.

I had to do the translation myself, which had its moments on the tram when I was trying to explain Bruce the shark in ‘Jaws’, or the early days with Boris Karloff as ‘The Monster’ wearing a paper bag over his head when he went to lunch between takes so no one would see his makeup job. I’d stumble and fall over words, but as one visitor from Munich told me, ‘You have such heart for what you do. Even if you don’t know the right word, we understand.’

I never forgot that.

I also acted as a ‘translator’ for my sensei, teacher, in class when American tourists came into the kimono shop after hours when we having a kimono and dance class on the small stage. However, here I was translating from Japanese to English.

So you can imagine I have the deepest respect for these fabulous professionals who put their hearts and souls into translating my books into other languages. It’s not unusual for a translator to contact me by email, asking me for clarification on something because they want to get it ‘right’. Merci, Bedankt, and Gracias.

For the first part of this year, I’m thrilled to have 3 of my Boldwood Books coming out in Spanish, Dutch, and French. La chica perdida en Paris (The Lost Girl in Paris) came out in the worldwide Spanish market in February; Her meisje in het verzet (The Resistance Girl) came out in Dutch on March 8. Les enfants volés de la guerre (The Stolen Children of War) comes out in French on April 1st. (no cover yet! I’ll update when we do.)

So for now, mes amis, I shall say, Au revoir — until we meet again and we shall. For words are like stars in the sky. I never tire of them.

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Rain, rain, and more rain…

February 11, 2026 by Jina Bacarr in category Jina’s Book Chat, Writing tagged as book, Deadline, rain

We writers live in a different world when we’re on deadline… nothing gets dusted, wash piles up, dishes done only when we run out of coffee cups.

I’m struggling (as always) with this book, trying to fit all the pieces together; my research books look like I’m building the pyramids, and my characters are yelling at me to hurry up.

Still, that’s no excuse for being late here, but I am. Late. But not I’m giving up, so here’s a short video about the lovely rain we’re having.

And a poem to go with it.

@jinabacarrauthor
waiting for rain on Umbrella Day here in Southern California… and writing, too! #umbrelladay #booktokauth#authorlife @theboldbookclub
♬ original sound – Jina Bacarr Historical Author♥ – Jina Bacarr Historical Author♥

I’ll be back next month… and thank you for listening!

Jina

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January Book Sale: ‘The Stolen Children of War’ is in Amazon Prime Reading by Jina Bacarr

January 11, 2026 by Jina Bacarr in category circus, Jina’s Book Chat tagged as Amazon Prime Reading, circus, historical, Jina Bacarr, The Stolen Children of War

I love this photo of ladies standing in line with their precious books to give to sailors and soldiers during a war that happened more than a hundred years ago. (Can you believe it?)

We’re so fortunate today we have e-Books. It gets even better when as an author, your book goes into Amazon Prime Reading… globally! If you’re a Prime member, ‘The Stolen Children of War‘ is available to read for FREE (pick up your copy before March 31st).

So, what is my book about? In one word (make that three), being a mom. The joys and little things moms love… like hugging your babies and watching them smile when they befriend a baby elephant (not the norm, but it happens in my story). My heroine in book 1 of the series ‘Lia’s Story’ is a circus performer who saves Jewish and Roma children from the Nazis (her own baby was stolen from her years ago). Lia joins the Resistance and will do anything to save the children.

The fate of these children was more awful than you can imagine.

When Jewish mothers arrived at Auschwitz holding tight onto their children, they had no idea their little ones would be ‘stolen’ from them and murdered after the selection. Innocent babes with chubby cheeks and big eyes along with young boys still in short pants and shy little girls in pigtails.

Children died during the Holocaust. No one knows exactly how many, but the estimate is around one and half million Jewish children who often died alone without their mother’s arms around them, her gentle voice whispering in their ear.

Hug your children tight today. Even if they tower over you and aren’t babies anymore. Because somewhere in the world, a mother can’t do that. Her tears have dried, but not the pain in her heart. That’s what we’re still fighting for. To save the children. God help us.

Jina

‘The Stolen Children of War’

A story told in Book 1 of this 2 book series about children hidden in plain sight in Occupied Paris 1943. In the circus.

If it’s not horrible enough my heroine Lia de Montieri, Queen of the Trapeze, has to fight the Nazis and a despicable Gestapo man in 1943 Occupied Paris, she also comes up against a depraved creature known as ‘The Magician’ because of his amazing ability to restore a woman’s face…

He lurks in the shadows only coming out to threaten what Lia holds most dear…

‘The Stolen Children of War’ is the story of a mother’s sacrifice, make that ‘mothers’, when Lia helps a Jewish woman about to be deported by helping her little girl and young boy escape.

And oh, there’s that adorable baby elephant, too.

‘The Stolen Children of War’

Amazon Kindle:
US: https://a.co/d/7iR9Xar
UK: https://amzn.eu/d/9RF8E77
AU https://amzn.asia/d/9hlZVS3

It is 1943 in Nazi-occupied Paris, and nobody is safe. Nobody, except perhaps one small group of people, who’ve always existed outside the law… in the circus.
Boldwood Books

What family isn’t a circus? My family have starring roles in telling the story of ‘The Stolen Children War’ in my old home movies.

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My WW2 Christmas Novella ‘A Soldier’s Italian Christmas’ was inspired by a special Christmas Eve in Italy and me getting kicked out of the convent by Jina Bacarr

December 11, 2025 by Jina Bacarr in category Jina’s Book Chat, Writing tagged as Christmas eve, comics, Italy, World War 2, writing

‘I regret to inform you, but your daughter is no longer enrolled here,’ the Mother Superior announced to my parents on a cold, winter day in Bethlehem, PA. I was thirteen.

I hung my head, sad for my parents, but still not understanding what the hullabaloo was all about. It wasn’t like I was a longtime student at the convent school. I’d only been there a short time. Very short.

When my poor father asked why I wasn’t staying, the stern nun said in a crisp, clear voice: ‘She reads comics.’

Really?

True, the Sisters of Mercy catered to young girls thinking about joining the Order and with my sassy poetry writing and short skirts I was borderline — below borderline — but comics stashed under my hard pillow with my missal and rosary beads was the last straw for the pious woman. She knew I wasn’t nun material. I wanted to travel, meet cute guys, dance, eat chocolates at Ladurée in Paris…

And so I did. I had wild adventures up and down the Continent and spent Christmas with the troops in Italy. Yes, that’s me in the photo reading comics — I was with US Army Special Services on a trip with soldiers and their families to Abetone in the Italian Alps for a skiing trip. I found an Uncle Scrooge comic book in Italian and devoured it. I often read comics in different languages to learn the vernacular, slang, everyday expressions.

Not the catechism required at the convent.

But the good Sisters taught me about humility, giving, discipline. Traits that kept me out of trouble and helped me become a writer. So even though I wasn’t a good ‘fit’ to take the veil, I will always be grateful to the Sisters behind the revolving door of parochial and convent schools I attended. Sometimes the nuns uttered a sigh of relief when I left, others hugged me and cried over me leaving. They ‘got’ me with one nun giving me time during study hall to write my ‘Paris mystery novel’ when I was fourteen.

I often wondered if I should have entered a life of religious service since I have a strong need for detail and strict discipline to finish what I started, along with my fanatical dive into deep research mode for my stories, and my love of teaching children. Qualities needed to take that path and I just didn’t see it. That question prompted me to write a WW2 Christmas novella about a young woman who hides from the Nazis by becoming ‘Sister Angelina’ in charge of a motely group of orphan boys… then she meets Captain Mack O’Casey, an American Army captain who tests her faith…

Add to it a Christmas Eve memory at the service club where I worked in Livorno, Italy (we hosted a Christmas party for orphan boys and the nuns and how the EMs Enlisted Men helped me locate a lost little orphan named Daniele), and you have ‘A Soldier’s Italian Christmas’.

I hope you enjoy my video posted below near the end of this post! Merry Christmas!!

Jina xx

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My time travel back to WW2:

HER LOST LOVE:

Enjoy a trip back to Posey Creek, PA during WW 2 on the home front as Kate Arden prepares for the holidays… until her world comes crashing down when her fiancé ships overseas in ‘Her Lost Love’.

Available at e-tailers everywhere… print and audio book, too.

Find out more in HER LOST LOVE E-book links:

US Amazon https://amzn.to/2pcz2eN

UK Amazon https://amzn.to/31rF4pZ

Follow me on BookBub for new releases and promo deals!

https://www.bookbub.com/profile/jina-bacarr

Time travel back to Christmas 1943 on the home front with my holiday Women’s Fiction novel HER LOST LOVE

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On a cold December day in 1955, Kate Arden got on a train to go home for Christmas. This is the story of what happened when she got off that train. In 1943. In 1943 Kate Arden was engaged to the man she loved, Jeffrey Rushbrooke. She was devastated and heartbroken when he was called up for wartime duty and later killed on a secret mission in France.

But what if Kate could change that? What if she could warn him and save his life before Christmas? Or will fate have a bigger surprise in store for her?

Her Lost Love is a sweeping, heartbreakingly romantic novel – it’s one woman’s chance to follow a different path and mend her broken heart…

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HER LOST LOVE

Thank you for stopping by! If you like WW 2 romance, check out my holiday novella that takes place in Italy on the road to Rome on Christmas Eve during the cold winter of 1943: A Soldier’s Italian Christmas.

December 1943 Italy

He is a US Army captain, a battle-weary soldier who has lost his faith.

She is a nun, her life dedicated to God.

Together they are going to commit an act the civilized world will not tolerate.

They are about to fall in love.

Winner in the Novella Category in the I Heart Indie contest A Soldier’s Italian Christmas is available on Kindle ~Jina

Also, my Civil War medical drama: LOVE ME FOREVER is available on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited Liberty Jordan travels back to 1862 as an re-enactor– I love the Christmas scene with Liberty tending to the wounded from both the North and the South…

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