The past is never dead, it isn’t even past
In this sequel to The Wall, Douglas Jackson takes his readers on a rollercoaster ride through lands riven by conflict – both political and military. He journeys from northern Britannia across to the Saxon homelands and from there southwards into the troubled Roman...
On 22nd August 1485 two armies assembled near Market Bosworth to contest the throne of England. One was vast and the other tiny, yet the ensuing battle provided one of the greatest upsets in English history. Once the fighting started at Bosworth, the outcome was in...
The Wars of the Roses draw to a close, along with Birks’ multi-generational historical saga in Crown of Fear – the seventh volume of the series. The Elder family’s fortunes have long been caught between the feuding houses of York and Lancaster in a war which has seen...
Derek Birks, can you first tell us a little about your short story in the collection Triumphs & Tragedies: The Emperor’s Sister, and how it fits in with your other novels? The Emperor’s Sister is a standalone short story which refers to an actual historical event...
It is a tall order, to say the least to analyse the pace and extent of change in London during the entire period of Roman influence; but Dominic Perring has managed to produce a convincing narrative of London’s development. His book charts the political and economic...
Derek Birks, The Last of the Romans is set in the dying days of the Roman Empire. What was it about this time that interests you, as there’s so much that is seemingly unknown? I’ve always had an interest in the fifth century perhaps because it was such a turbulent...
Blood, intrigue and lust for power dominate this tale - and that’s just among the Romans. Throw in the squabbling tribes north of the Wall and you have an explosive recipe for carnage. Marcus Flavius Victor is the Lord of the Wall, charged with defending northern...
Douglas Jackson, I’ve very much enjoyed reading The Wall – one of your very best books I would say. As one who has written about Britain in the fifth century, I appreciate the problems of trying to represent life in that shadowy period. How did you go about...
Mining for History Part One History tells us that the Romans left Britain in 410AD but, as the historian Michael Wood put it: “The Romans did not simply abandon Britain and sail back to Italy.” So, what did happen? This was certainly not a sudden blunt trauma injury...
Mining for History Researching British history can be both a pleasure and a trial. You might well start with the relevant secondary works, but in my experience that only serves to whet the appetite. It’s when you trawl through the minutiae of contemporary written...
