Not long ago I faced an unusual task: shifting my novel’s time period from 1897 to 1907. I won’t go into all the reasons for…
My blog has been quiet lately because I’ve been immersed in a major revision of my latest novel. When I start a major revision I…
Inspired by a blog post written by my agent, Laura Crockett, I decided to put together a top five list of my own. On average,…
The protagonist of my novel Impossible Saints is not only a suffragette but a leader of the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU), so I’ve…
I recently returned from a week-long writers’ retreat and workshop led by one of my favourite poets and non-fiction authors, Kathleen Norris. The workshop was…
This week there was an online furor over the Vox article by Sarah A. Chrisman entitled “I love the Victorian Era. So I decided to…
Ah, summertime. A time to turn off your brain, lie on the beach, read magazines with shiny, colourful photos, watch mindless television . . .…
Several years ago at a writing conference I was inspired by Susanna Kearsley’s excellent talk, in which she mentioned that writers should write what they…
A few months ago I joined the reviewing team of the Historical Novel Society. I’ve been a member of the HNS for years and am…
My teaching workload will be doubling over the next few months, so I expect my blog posts to be shorter and more sporadic than usual.…