The past is never dead, it isn’t even past
Deborah Swift on The Silk Code Deborah, congratulations on The Silk Code. What encouraged you to write about the Special Operations Executive (SOE) in the Second World War? Like most people, I’m fascinated by those who are prepared to risk death in order to further a...
Ivan Menchell, can I first just congratulate you on the critical and commercial success of the show. It takes a village of course, but you and the village must be justly proud. What initially attracted you to the story of Bonnie & Clyde - and then how did you...
In his latest biography on royalty, Matthew Dennison has written an empathetic, and balanced, life story of our Sovereign, Queen Elizabeth. His book is not just another narrative of her life; rather, an informed analysis of her personality, the pressures and...
The story of Bonnie and Clyde has been told in plenty of books (some more salacious than accurate it seems). Interest in the colourful criminals was revived through the superb 1967 film starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway (there is also an underrated film called...
When writing The Secrets of Hartwood Hall, I wanted to look at the position of women within the Victorian period – and I wanted to focus on the women who didn’t quite fit in to. the social structure. I gave my protagonist, Margaret Lennox, two roles that place her in...
Deborah, congratulations on The Fortune Keeper. What drew you to Renaissance Italy? I’ve always been fascinated by Renaissance art and science and its effect on cultural life. In these novels I explore the artist Bernini and the legacy of Galileo Galilei as well as...
Ronald Hutton’s Queens of the Wild: Pagan Goddesses in Christian Europe examines four goddess-like figures from the medieval period to the present day: Mother Earth, the Fairy Queen, the Lady of the Night, and the Cailleach. Packed with detail and insight – Hutton...
Miranda Malins, author of The Puritan Princess, has returned to the Cromwell’s and provided a real treat: a step back in time, to the 1640s, to trace the family’s uneasy rise to power. This time, however, a different Cromwell daughter - Bridget - takes centre stage....
When I first read about the Rosenstraße protests, the only successful event that lasted for several days and resulted in the protesters’ victory, I just knew I had to write the story of these incredible women. Yes, it was mostly women who gathered in front of the...
Immediately the tone of The Woman Who Risked Everything is introduced as one that is tense and threatening. The Prologue takes the reader to a point in the future, demonstrating how the novel will escalate. The tension in this small section is built effectively as our...
