I was excited to receive an advance copy of this WW2 novel, due out on 7 May, as it ticked two boxes that interest me particularly about the period. The Air Transport Auxiliary, with its female pilots flying alongside male counterparts, and the Nazi occupation of Poland, neither of which seem to have had a…
Tag: Historical fiction
Frank Barnard – on ghosts and remembrances
I have been a fan of Frank Barnard’s work for years, first becoming aware of his writing back in 2006 with the novel Blue Man Falling, based around a Hawker Hurricane squadron in the Battle of France. Frank has a fascinating background, including a career as a journalist, national service in the RAF and even…
Revolt: The King’s Knight, by J.A. Ironside – review
‘Revolt’ is the perfect nugget of historical fiction. Gregory Maudseley is a knight on his uppers, trying to negotiate the windings of 14th Century bureaucracy to obtain his inheritance, and in so doing stumbles into the midst of a national emergency. What follows takes in brawls and riots, thieves and nobles, knock-kneed nags and Geoffrey…
Blog tour for A Black Matter for the King
A virtual blog tour for A Black Matter for the King, the second of the Oath and Crown novels about the events leading to the Norman conquest of England, is currently underway courtesy of Historical Fiction Blog Tours. Please take a look at the blog tour page here to find reviews, features and a giveaway…
Historical fiction – where to draw the line
The issue of factual inaccuracy in historical fiction is a perpetual source of debate, and occasional outbreaks of controversy. Reports in the media today pick up on this issue with aspects of the new film Mary Queen of Scots labelled ‘problematic’ by a historian in a BBC report with the Telegraph going as far as…
Blog Tour for An Argument of Blood
A virtual blog tour for An Argument of Blood, the first of the Oath and Crown novels about the events leading to the Norman conquest of England, is currently underway courtesy of Historical Fiction Blog Tours. Please take a look at the blog tour page here to find reviews, features and a giveaway for a…
An Argument of Blood giveaway
Enter a giveaway for a signed copy of An Argument of Blood – the first book in the Oath and Crown series – on Goodreads William, the nineteen-year-old duke of Normandy, is enjoying the full fruits of his station. Life is a succession of hunts, feasts, and revels, with little attention paid to the welfare…
“Vintener is Coming” – Fields of Glory review
When historical novelist Jemahl Evans recommended Michael Jecks’ Fields of Glory, the first in his Hundred Years War series, I knew there was a good chance I was in for a decent read. Moreover, having just launched a mediaeval novel myself (An Argument of Blood, co-written with J.A. Ironside, about the lead up to 1066),…
Duelling and dualling – co-writing ‘Oath and Crown’
When I suggested – a little casually, truth be told – to the Random Writers group in the Autumn of 2015 that I was considering writing a novel about the William the Conqueror and was hoping to find a co-writer, I should have known two things. First, that the almost immediate volunteer would be Jules…
Interview with ‘Last Roundhead’ author Jemahl Evans
Air and Sea Stories is pleased to welcome Jemahl Evans, author of the critically acclaimed The Last Roundhead (Caerus Press, 2015) and the forthcoming sequel This Deceitful Light, which is due for publication in September. Jemahl graduated with an MA in History, focussing on poetry and propaganda during the Wars of the Roses, and started…
Two new William the Conqueror novels
Today is the 950th anniversary of the Battle of Hastings – the single battle that has perhaps done more to shape the destiny of England than any other. The fate of England, and indeed, Europe, looked very different in the evening of 14 October 1066 than it had early that morning. This seems a good…
New book of short stories released
The second Random Writers anthology of short stories, which I have co-edited with J.A. Ironside, is to be released soon – ‘Something Rich And Strange: The Past Is Prologue’ will be available for download on 12 December, and as a paperback shortly afterwards. ‘It started with the Zhar-ptitsa, the Firebird, as these things must. No,…
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