The seal of the confessional
The second of two guest posts this week (three if you count Tammy's regular journal entry on Thursday). This time it's Anna Legat talking about one of the key issues in her new novel, Broken. Father Joseph is one of the two main protagonists of my domestic noir...
Journal of the Covid years: another quiet birthday
Last week we celebrated my birthday with a couple of days away on the South Downs. Two years ago was rather different. While Boris Johnson was comfortably accepting assurances that he never broke any rules, we were worrying about whether we were allowed to sit down...
A Medieval Love Triangle
A guest post this week from Carol McGrath whose latest novel, The Stone Rose, is published on 21 April. Isabella of France, the protagonist of my new novel, The Stone Rose, left her homeland in 1308 on 7th February, aged twelve. She had married Edward II of England in...
Buildwas Abbey
One of the lovely things about living in Britain is how you are really surrounded by history. Most of the time we don’t notice it. Of course, living in London, I know that there are medieval places like the Tower of London, but most people don’t visit them very often....
Journal of the Covid years: different folks different ways of coping.
Saturday 11 April 2020 (Easter Saturday) So how is everyone? Let’s start with V who left for Mumbai on 14 March, planning to return on 29 March. That didn’t happen, so she is now locked down with her two sisters and brother in a small hot flat, attempting to carry on...
People say such lovely things about ‘The White Rajah’. Now I’m just waiting for sales to catch up.
I’ve had a couple of really lovely reviews for The White Rajah recently. The latest was last Friday. Here it is: It’s amazing how much difference something like that makes. I saw it late in the day and I was quite choked up. Believe me: most writers who say they don’t...
Journal of the Covid Years: Adapting
We continue with a weekly summary of life two years ago from the perspective of my beloved's journal. This week we begin to adapt to lockdown life. Looking back from today, with Johnson's allies assuring us that nobody ever took it all that seriously, it's difficult...
The homes of the rich in Ironbridge
When we went to Ironbridge we stayed at the Best Western Valley Hotel. It’s a very short walk from the bridge and I’m happy to recommend it. (No they haven’t paid me.) Significantly, as far as this week’s blog post goes, it was built in 1757 as Severn House, the home...
Journal of the Covid Years: Happy(-ish) Birthday
Two years ago this week was my beloved's birthday. We'd been planning a big party, but that obviously wasn't happening. Instead life was all about sprucing up the house so we could do everything at home that we used to do everywhere else. For Tammy, that meant...
The Ides of April: Lindsay Davis
I used to be a huge fan of Lindsay Davis’s Falco stories – a model of how to write historical crime fiction. Falco eventually grew a little too middle aged to keep on with his criminal investigations and the torch was passed to his daughter, Albia. The Ides of April...