Sean Lusk’s debut novel, The Second Sight of Zachary Cloudesley, was inspired by an 18th-century clock he found in a back alley of Istanbul’s Grand Bazaar. Why would British clockwork be of interest in the Ottoman Empire? So began his interest in the Levant Company, once a powerful force, now hardly remembered. Almost everyone knows […]
The Sword by Fil Reid
Gwen, a girl from the 21st century, was kidnapped back in time to become King Arthur’s Queen Guinevere in book one, The Dragon Ring. In book two, The Bear’s Heart, she presented Arthur with his heir. But a dark cloud hangs over her son’s birth, and she can’t be sure Arthur believes the baby is […]
Who was King Arthur? And did he exist?
Fil Read examines the evidence for the existence of King Arthur, or someone very like him, from early texts in Latin, Old Welsh and Old English, and finds conflicting accounts. This has left her plenty of space to choose which elements of the Arthur stories to use in her Guinevere series of time-slip novels, including […]
King by Ben Kane
Autumn 1192, and with Jerusalem still in the Saracens’ hands and a peace treaty agreed with their leader Saladin, Richard the Lionheart is free at last to travel back to his strife-ridden kingdom. By his side at every turn is the loyal knight Ferdia, also known as Rufus. Together they will face not just Richard’s […]
Spear by Nicola Griffith
She grows up in the wild wood, in a cave with her mother, but visions of a faraway lake drift to her on the spring breeze, scented with promise. And when she hears a traveller speak of Artos, king of Caer Leon, she decides her future lies at his court. So, brimming with magic and […]
History, historicity, historiography and Arthurian legend
Does it matter whether King Arthur, or someone who the legend is built on, existed in history? For Nicola Griffith, author of Spear, it doesn’t. What was important when she was writing her book was to make a place and a voice for people who have been left out of the stories, and to create […]
The Lying Dutchman by Graham Brack
Master Mercurius has once again been summoned to The Hague by Stadhouder William of Orange. And a letter from William is never good news. King Charles II of England has died and William, with his wife Mary, is now next in line to the throne once the current king, James II dies. But Charles II’s […]
Dead in the Water by Mark Ellis
Summer, 1942. The Second World War rages on, but Britain now faces the Nazi threat with America at its side. In a bombed-out London swarming with gangsters and spies, DCI Frank Merlin continues his battle against rampant wartime crime. A mangled body is found in the Thames just as some items of priceless art go […]