A Writer's Life

Jeopardy  It’s very difficult to write a novel when your readers are familiar with the plot and everyone knows how the story ends. Not much scope for surprise! That’s the challenge for anyone writing about 1066, and many writers and screen adaptors have crashed on those particular rocks.  There’s also the problem of historical authenticity; too much of it and the prose is dull and factual; too little of it and you’ll have knowledgeable readers calling you out on every social media platform.  And you also have to avoid info-dumps. How do you supply readers who know little of history, the necessary facts they need in order to understand the story and characters, without the novel turning into a history lesson? All these things make historical fiction one of the most difficult genres to write.  The Bewcastle Cross I’ve loved the Anglo-Saxons ever since I became interested in archaeology as a child. Being brought up in the north of England, not far from Hadrian’s wall, m...