When, in 1922, Vee Morgan accepts the job of gardener at a crumbling stately home in Wiltshire, she’s hoping for a fresh start where nobody knows her troubled history. But Harfold Manor is shadowed by grief and the memories of long-faded glory, its rooms haunted by the only surviving member of the family, Lady Arabella […]
Final Score by Sean Lusk (the 2025 HWA Dorothy Dunnett Short Story winner)
Sean Lusk’s Final Score won the 2025 HWA Dorothy Dunnett Short Story Competition. It’s with great pleasure that we publish it here in Historia. The competition judges called it: “A brilliantly-crafted and poignant story set in the wake of WWI. The dry, courageous narrator delivers a heart-rending and thought-provoking story of a veteran playing piano […]
Death in the Aviary by Victoria Dowd
New Year’s Eve, 1928. In the grand residence of Ravenswick Abbey, isolated in the wilds of Dartmoor, nine members of the household step into an ornate lift. The power fails. The lift stops. In the darkness, a single shot is fired. When the light returns, Charles Ravenswick — the heir to the Ravenswick fortune — […]
The Endeavour of Elsie Mackay by Flora Johnston
The Honourable Miss Elsie Mackay, glamorous ex-film star turned bold aviator, sets her sights on becoming the first woman to fly across the Atlantic. Her friend Stella Campbell once felt at the heart of world events, but post-war hopes are frayed and marriage and motherhood have worn away her sense of self. Meanwhile, Stella’s sister […]
Before Dorothy by Hazel Gaynor
Long before Dorothy visits Oz, her aunt, Emily Gale, sets off on her own unforgettable adventure much closer to home… When news reaches Kansas that her beloved sister has tragically died, Emily must become a mother overnight. Her sister’s orphaned child, Dorothy, desperately needs a home. But Emily doubts her ability to fill her sister’s […]
The Devil’s Draper by Donna Moore
When whispers of abuse at Arrol’s department store reach Mabel, a determined policewoman, she knows she must act. Enlisting the help of Johnnie, a cunning thief, and Beatrice, a savvy businesswoman, they embark on a perilous journey to uncover the truth. Set against the backdrop of 1920s Glasgow, where women’s voices are often silenced, this […]
Fashion research for historical novels
Fiona Veitch Smith immerses herself in researching her 1920s and 1930s novels, using period objects and recreating costumes – which she also wears. She tells Historia about her 10 years of historical fashion research and offers some tips for anyone who’d like to try this way of getting a feel for the era they’re writing […]
The Eights by Joanna Miller
Oxford in 1920. For the first time in its 1000-year history, the world’s most famous university has admitted female students. Giddy with dreams of equality, education and emancipation, four young women move into neighbouring rooms on Corridor Eight. They have come here from all walks of life, and they are thrown into an unlikely, life-affirming […]