The house I grew up in was a tall Victorian town house in Bristol. There were very big rooms, which were under-furnished and always cold.
Being a stepmother has worked out very well for me. I love my stepchildren very much.
The moment that changed me for ever was when I had my first seminar with my history professor at the University of Sussex. I realised that history would answer all the questions I had spent my life asking. It was an extraordinary moment.
When I was a child I wanted to be a vet. I'd come home with "lost" kittens and dogs. My mother would tell me to put them back.
I like writing historical fiction.
I am in the interesting position of being sometimes skimmed by the critics and called literature and sometimes called historical fiction.
