Watch this space to see what I’m reading or listening to at the moment!
My debut novel, Anaesthesia. It’s a a love story set against the background of drug addiction in World War I.
The three most influential books on Anaesthesia were Hemmingway’s A Farewell to Arms, Rebecca West’s The Return of the Soldier and Irene Rathbone’s, We that were Young.
Because I want to recreate a feel of the times with my writing style, before I begin writing a story, I immerse myself in the literature of the period. My next book will be set in the 1920s, ’30s and ’40s and follow on from Anaesthesia through Liza’s point of view. At the moment I’m looking at novels by Rosamond Lehman and Rebecca West as well as Robert Graves and Alan Hodge’s social history, The Long Weekend.
I’ve become fascinated by the heroic activities of Sweden’s Red Cross in WW2 and have started a Sune Persson’s book, Escape From the Third Reich: Folke Bernadotte and the White Buses. If anyone can suggest further reading for my research, please get in touch.
I’ve just come across a book on espionage in WW2 Sweden called Liberty Lady by Pat Digeorge. It’s original research and has given me some great ideas for my heroine in my next novel.
Researching for a novel is a lot of fun. The writing is a bit trickier.