Mixing real people with imaginary characters in Historical novels
When it comes to picking your characters for a historical novel you have almost as many possibilitie...
Writing my novel set in 16th Century Venice
After five novels with twin plots (present and historical), I’m currently working on my very first...
My Favourite Character
Everyone has a favourite character from a book they have read. Well, I have a favourite character I ...
Setting my novels in Renaissance Italy
Almost all of my historical mystery novels are set in Renaissance Italy....
Creating Scene-By-Scene outlines for Historical Novels
My brother once told me that he sometimes imagines me writing, and he sees me in a smoking jacket an...
The Hero’s Journey and Historical Novels
The idea of The Hero's Journey in Historical Novels is that all stories follow a pattern in which a ...
Writing the first chapter of a Historical Novel
Writing the first chapter of a Historical Novel. Often the first chapter in any genre is the hardest...
Future Historical Novels
I sometimes wonder what historical novels of the future will be like. What would a writer a hundred ...
My favourite historical novel
Answering the question ‘What is your favourite historical novel?’ is surprisingly difficult. The...
Fact and Fiction in Historical Novels
A major question any writer addresses before they start to write any form of historical fiction is: ...
Writing characters for historical novels
I’m often asked how writing differs for me when I’m working on a novel set in the past or one in...
Researching To Write Historical Novels
In researching to write historical novels, the internet is an indispensable tool as a first port of ...
Writing profiles for your Historical Novel characters
For almost all historical fiction there are two types of character populating the novel or short sto...
MEETING THE NEW CAST
There is a delicious early stage in the process of writing a novel in which I meet the cast. By that...
WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN? (WDIAM)
So, I’m now totally digitised. My wife, Lisa (known in our household as The Web Goddess) is fully ...
THE COMING WAR
In the lead up to the two great wars of the 20th century, anyone with any awareness of the world aro...
LOST IN TRANSLATION
One of the great thrills of being a writer is receiving finished copies of your latest book. The buz...
NOT SO SECRET HISTORY
Like many people, I’ve been thinking back to the events of September 11, 2001, and I began to wond...
THE LONELINESS OF A LONG DISTANCE WRITER
My brother once told me that he sometimes imagines me working on a book and pictures me putting on a...
SACRED COWS
It’s not only Hindus who have sacred cows – we all do. But, as I get older (and I hope, wise...
SHORT STORY: THE ADVERTISEMENT
He first met Hannah through an advertisement in the local newspaper. He had no income so he used the...
SHORT STORY: FLORA AND JACK
When they were first married they would go on long picnics in Epping Forest. That was before Nigel a...
SHORT STORY: A WORLD LIT ONLY BY FIRE
I left the camp to hunt as the dawn broke across the eastern sky. The snow was ankle-deep, cold righ...