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The Serpent Sword Examined

Posted on October 22, 2015 by Dianne Ascroft

We’re stepping back in time today to the early medieval period in Britain. Matthew Harffy joins me to discuss his novel, The Serpent Sword.

Welcome, Matthew. Let’s get started, shall we?

Tell us about your novel.

MH: THE SERPENT SWORD is the first book in the Bernicia Chronicles. Set in Britain in the first half of the seventh century, it tells the story of a young man who is lost and alone at the start. But on his quest for vengeance for his brother’s killer he finds love, a sense of belonging and his place amongst the warriors of a Northumbrian lord. Essentially, it is a coming-of-age tale of revenge, honour, betrayal and love.

What prompted you to write about this historical event?

MH: The events are the forming of the kingdom of Northumbria, made up of the two, now mostly-forgotten realms of Bernicia and Deira. I used to live in Northumberland (what would have been part of the ancient Bernicia) and loved the area, but I knew little about the history of the area. When I saw a documentary back in 2001 about Anglo-Saxon graves being exposed near the castle of Bamburgh (Bebbanburg in the seventh century), and heard about the importance of the castle as the seat of power of the kings of Bernicia, the story just called to me and I was compelled to start writing. It took a long time to complete that first book, but I got there in the end!

How closely did you stick to the historical facts? If you used them loosely, how did you decide whether to deviate from them?

MH: I stick pretty close to the historical facts where they are known. One of the advantages of writing about the so-called Dark Ages (now usually referred to as the Early Medieval period) is that there are very few written accounts, so the history is only known in the broadest of brush strokes. This gives great scope to create interesting stories without knowingly messing with the facts. I pick out a couple of known incidents as the skeleton of each novel and then add the fictional details as the flesh on the bones.

If I do deviate from the historical record, I let the reader know in the Historical Note at the end of the book.

What research did you do for this book?

MH: I read a lot. Over a period of several years, I would go into second-hand bookshops and buy any book I could find on the Anglo-Saxon age in Britain. I also contacted reenactment and living history groups, asking them questions when I would get stuck on a particularly niggly piece of detail. There are some groups out there, such as Wulfheodenas and Regia Anglorum, who really know their stuff, and they are eager to help make sure the history is correct. I’m sure this is true for any historical period.

When I was close to the end of the writing of The Serpent Sword, I also managed to visit some of the sites that appear in the novel. I’d been to some of them like Bamburgh Castle before, but managed to get to Yeavering (Gefrin) for the first time. I didn’t have long to visit these places, but a few hours on the actual ground that my characters would have walked on was invaluable. So many little things from that short trip made it into the final novel or its sequels. I hope to go back for a few days in the future while writing more of the Bernicia Chronicles.

Do you use a mixture of historic figures and invented characters in the novel? Which is more difficult to write?

MH: The main characters are really all fictional, though they interact closely with real historical figures, such as kings, bishops and the like. It is easier to write the purely fictional characters, because nobody can tell you you’ve got it wrong!

Which do you prefer to write and why?

MH: I prefer to write the fictional characters, I think, though I’ve never really thought about it before! I like the clean slate and the ability to just make stuff up. Though I actually do that quite a lot with the historical figures too!

In an historical novel you must vividly re-create a place and people in a bygone era. How did you bring the place and people you are writing about to life?

MH: I try to imagine how the people would think and how their

Matthew Harffy

environment would affect them. What gods did they believe in? What did they wear? What chores did they need to perform each day to survive? What did they eat and drink? All of these things help to put yourself in the characters shoes. I go camping with my family every year, and staying in a tent, using only fire to keep warm, makes you realise how the natural world and the weather impacts everything you do. 1,400 years ago men and women relied on good weather to help their crops grow, bad weather would rot barley in the fields, a long winter could lead to starvation as food ran out. So, when writing the Bernicia Chronicles, I add lots of details about the weather – some have said too much! I look at the natural world in which the characters dwell as another personality.

There often seems to be more scope in historical novels for male characters rather than female characters. Do you prefer to write one sex or the other. And, if so, why?

MH: There are more male characters in key roles in The Serpent Sword, it’s true. But the fact of the matter is that seventh century Britain was a very male-dominated society. They do all the fighting, and there is quite a bit of that in the book.

Having said that, in Anglo-Saxon society women had more rights and privileges than we tend to expect from the medieval period of history. When they married they were given a gift, a morning gift, that was theirs alone and could not be touched by their husband. This was to provide them with some security should something happen to their spouse. Women could also own land and take positions of power.

So, to answer your question, there are strong women characters in the Bernicia Chronicles and I enjoy writing from their perspective. I live with my wife and two daughters and I’m still trying to understand how women think – so it is challenging and interesting to write women!

Thanks for taking the time to join me today, Matthew, and good luck with your new series.

Thanks for the interesting questions. It’s been fun answering them and they made me think.

Readers can learn more about Matthew and his books by visiting his website, Facebook page and Twitter. Copies of the book can be purchased by clicking this LINK.

Posted in October 2015, Uncategorized | Tagged early medieval Britain, historical fiction, Matthew Harffy, military fiction, The Serpent's Sword | Leave a comment

A Peek Into A House Divided

Posted on October 13, 2015 by Dianne Ascroft

There’s only two days left until the release of A House Divided by Margaret Skea. The novel, set in sixteenth century Scotland, is the sequel to Turn of the Tide, winner of the Beryl Bainbridge Best First Time Author award in 2014. I enjoyed the first book and am counting down the days until the release of the second one. In the meantime, I’ve invited the author to answer a few questions about the latest book.

Welcome, Margaret. Let’s get started, shall we?

What prompted you to write about this historical event?

MS: A House Divided is the sequel to Turn of the Tide, which had as its genesis a key point in an historic feud. I wanted to continue the story of my fictional family – the Munros – and so I began by looking at the broader history of the late 1590s, in order to find events in which they could be involved.

There were two that stood out for me – a widespread Scottish witch-hunt and the siege of Amiens. Both occurred in the same year – 1597 – which set the time frame, and both had significance.

How closely did you stick to the historical facts. If you used them loosely, how did you decide whether to deviate from them?

MS: I had a timetable of the key dates at Amiens and I stuck rigidly to that. There were fewer specific dates and locations available for the witch-hunt, but the date for the climax of the book was chosen specifically to fit in with a key change that arose from it. However, despite their significance, there is little detailed information available about either of these events, which allowed scope for my characters, both fictional and historic, to take the centre stage.

(I include an historical note at the end of the novel to clarify the extent to which the key events within it are based on fact.)

What research did you do for this book?

MS: I began by studying the historical context of the 1590s, both in Scotland and abroad, not only looking for interesting events, but also to steep myself in the period – food, clothing, travel, money, politics etc – so that I could write as naturally as possible about it, without having to stop every ten minutes to check something.

Having decided on my focus, I then put quite a considerable time and effort into attempting to research in more detail the events I had chosen to include. But there came a point when I had to accept that if there was more detailed information out there I wasn’t going to find it, and so I contented myself with research into the generalities of witch-hunts and sieges of this period.

Do you use a mix of historic and invented characters in the novel? Which are more difficult to write? And do you prefer one over the other?

MS: The balance for me is very much in favour of historic characters, only my main family and a few incidental people are fictional. The difficulty or otherwise of writing about historic characters depends on the amount of information available about them. Often, as in my case, the job of a novelist is to put flesh on the bare bones of dates and times, and I approach this by seeking to remain as true to the period and to any known facts about a character as I possibly can. Do I prefer one over the other? I don’t think I do, I have fun with all of my characters in different ways. Perhaps if I was writing about someone very well-known I would feel more restricted.

In an historical novel you must vividly re-create a place and people in a bygone era. How did you bring the place and people you are writing about to life?

MS: For me there are two keys to this. The first is authenticity – it is impossible to claim accuracy when depicting an earlier era – 1) I wasn’t there and 2) sources, even primary ones, were written from a particular person’s point of view and therefore, by definition, flawed. However I do believe in striving for authenticity, in so far as it’s possible. Secondly, of course the quality of writing – the best research in the world won’t bring an era to life if the writing doesn’t match up. And an essential ingredient in both is the careful use of detail, as compared to an overload of information-dumping.

There often seems to be more scope in historical novels for male rather than female characters. Do you pefer to write one sex or the other? If so, why?

MS: Discounting historical romances, a hugely popular genre in its

Margaret Skea

own right, that certainly used to be the case. However there has been a resurgence of interest in mainstream historical novels that focus on historic female characters. This is probably not good news for me as I definitely find it easier to write about men that women. (Not sure what that says about me… except that I was always a tomboy and so grew up feeling more comfortable around boys than girls.)

Thanks for answering my questions, Margaret, and good luck with your latest novel. Margaret welcomes visitors to her website and her Facebook page. Her books are available online on Amazon and other online shops. They are also available to order from any bricks and mortar bookshop in the UK.

Posted in October 2015 | Tagged A House Divided, historical fiction, Margaret Skea, Scottish fiction, sixteenth century Scotland, Turn of the Tide | 1 Comment

Does A Picture Say It All?

Posted on September 25, 2015 by Dianne Ascroft

What’s that saying about a picture and a thousand words? Yes, that one. If you read my previous post you’ll know I’ve been playing around with images lately. Since my first foray into ‘memeing’ I’ve ventured into the world of Canva.com. I’m trying to create images that will give give visitors to my Facebook page a flavour of some of my Short Reads before they open the books.

Below are several I’ve created for Keeping Her Pledge. What do you think of them? Here’s the first:

And another one:

And the last one::

Posted in September 2015 | Tagged Canva, Dianne Ascroft, historical fiction, Keeping Her Pledge, memes, Short Reads, wartime fiction, World War II | Leave a comment

M-m-m-meme-ing

Posted on September 7, 2015 by Dianne Ascroft

I recently discovered memes and I’ve been having fun learning about them and creating them – so much so that I even wrote about it on Writers Abroad’s blog this morning. CLICK HERE if you want to read the post.

Posted in September 2015, Uncategorized | Tagged blogging, historical fiction, memes, wartime fiction, Writers Abroad | Leave a comment

A Whirlwind Of Words

Posted on September 3, 2015 by Dianne Ascroft

Were you wondering where I’ve been this summer? You may have noticed that I’ve been very quiet since June. Although I haven’t posted much on Ascroft, eh? the past couple months have been a whirlwind of writing. I’m working on a new Short Read for The Yankee Years series and I’m also editing a full length novel for the series. That could easily have kept me occupied for ages but that just wasn’t enough – well, it was, but that didn’t stop me. I’ve also been involved in editing and proofreading writing collections for two local writers’ groups. So, while everyone else has been lying in the sun all summer – oops, I forgot, not in Britain this year…Well, they must have found something to do. And while they were occupied so was I. Getting all this writing, editing, and proofreading done. So have a bit of patience – I’ll be back here again soon.

Now to get myself back in the mood for my writing:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Dianne Ascroft, The Yankee Years, wartime fiction | Leave a comment

Sorrow Lake, My Kind Of Crime Novel

Posted on August 14, 2015 by Dianne Ascroft

A couple years ago I reviewed Michael McCann’s crime novel, The Rainy Day Killer. When reading crime fiction, I gravitate toward cosy mysteries so it was not what I was used to. It is much darker. So, when I began reading his most recent novel, Sorrow Lake, I steeled myself, expecting it to be similar. But, it isn’t. I found myself immersed in an interesting police procedural that doesn’t contain too much gore.

Here’s the publisher’s summary of the book: “Detective Inspector Ellie March of the Ontario Provincial Police is called in to investigate when a man from the village of Sparrow Lake is found shot to death, execution style, in a farmer’s field in rural eastern Ontario.

Leading an inexperienced team of detectives, she probes beneath the wintry surface of the township to discover the victim had a dark secret–one that may endanger others in the community as well.

For young and enthusiastic Detective Constable Kevin Walker, the chance to work with Ellie March is an honour, until the situation turns ugly and unexpected betrayal threatens to destroy his promising career.”

Sorrow Lake is the first book in McCann’s new March and Walker detective series and, as I’ve mentioned, it has a different tone from his Donaghue and Stainer crime series. I have to admit that it fits better with my comfort zone – a gripping plot that never loses its tension and picks up pace as it neared the climax but not too much graphic violence. There’s nothing in it that would make me squirm and screw my eyes shut but it still has nail biting moments.

Not surprisingly for a crime novel, the story centres on the hunt for a killer and the law enforcement officers involved in the case, particularly Detective Inspector Ellie Walker, an experienced detective, and Detective Constable Kevin Walker, who is new to homicide investigations. I thought there was a bit too much explanation of some of the investigation procedures and techniques as the story opened but, once those details had been explained, the story moved along at a good pace and I got involved in trying to put together the clues to find the killer. I also enjoyed the subplot revolving around the jealousies and power struggles within the police department, particularly when one officer was jockeying to be chosen to lead the investigation.

Author Michael McCann with his dog, Cody

As I’ve said, the story is about the hunt for a killer and the people involved in it. I found the interaction and sometimes tension between the characters as interesting and absorbing as the actual case. I liked the main characters, Ellie March and Kevin Walker, and I think this was partly because the author gives readers glimpses of their private lives in between the scenes involving the investigation. This adds depth to the story as readers develop a better understanding of characters’ actions and decisions. In tightly written scenes, the author also produces well drawn secondary characters. Especially memorable characters are the underhanded Detective Constable Dart, Ellie March’s musician neighbour, Ballantyne Ridge, and the elderly, nosy woman who lives opposite the victim’s widow.

The story is set in a small town and the surrounding countryside in Northern Ontario, Canada during winter. The landscape and the weather are both important to the story and the author vividly paints a scene that the reader can step into. He also has a good grasp of the internal structure of the regional police force and the details he includes about it add authenticity to the story. It isn’t a location that is frequently used as the setting for novels and it is more intriguing as a result.

I found Sorrow Lake an entertaining and engrossing read. I liked the characters and was grabbed by the plot. I will happily read other books in this series as I think the characters are worth re-visiting. So I have no hesitation wholeheartedly recommending this book.

Posted in August 2015 | Tagged crime fiction, Michael McCann, northern Ontario, Ontario Provincial Police, police procedurals, Sorrow Lake, The Rainy Day Killer | 1 Comment

Bitter Bronx: Charyn’s World

Posted on June 16, 2015 by Dianne Ascroft

During the past four or five years, I have read several historical novels and a crime novel by Jerome Charyn. Bitter Bronx is my first foray into his short stories.

This is how the publisher describes the short story collection: “Brooklyn is dead. Long live the Bronx! In Bitter Bronx, Jerome Charyn returns to his roots and leads the literary renaissance of an oft-overlooked borough in this surprising new collection.
In Bitter Bronx, one of our most gifted and original novelists depicts a world before and after modern urban renewal destroyed the gritty sanctity of a land made famous by Ruth, Gehrig, and Joltin’ Joe.

Bitter Bronx is suffused with the texture and nostalgia of a lost time and place, combining a keen eye for detail with Jerome Charyn’s lived experience. These stories are informed by a childhood growing up near that middle-class mecca, the Grand Concourse; falling in love with three voluptuous librarians at a public library in the Lower Depths of the South Bronx; and eating at Mafia-owned restaurants along Arthur Avenue’s restaurant row, amid a “land of deprivation…where fathers trundled home…with a monumental sadness on their shoulders.”

In “Lorelei,” a lonely hearts grifter returns home and finds his childhood sweetheart still living in the same apartment house on the Concourse; in “Archy and Mehitabel” a high school romance blossoms around a newspaper comic strip; in “Major Leaguer” a former New York Yankee confronts both a gang of drug dealers and the wreckage that Robert Moses wrought in his old neighborhood; and in three interconnected stories—”Silk & Silk,” “Little Sister,” and “Marla”—Marla Silk, a successful Manhattan attorney, discovers her father’s past in the Bronx and a mysterious younger sister who was hidden from her, kept in a fancy rest home near the Botanical Garden. In these stories and others, the past and present tumble together in Charyn’s singular and distinctly “New York prose, street-smart, sly, and full of lurches” (John Leonard, New York Times).

Throughout it all looms the “master builder” Robert Moses, a man who believed he could “save” the Bronx by building a highway through it, dynamiting whole neighborhoods in the process. Bitter Bronx stands as both a fictional eulogy for the people and places paved over by Moses’ expressway and an affirmation of Charyn’s “brilliant imagination” (Elizabeth Taylor, Chicago Tribune).”

I’ve never found Charyn’s writing straightforward or easy to read. When I first read one of his novels several years ago, I found that I needed to acquire a taste for his writing style. It took some effort but it was worth persevering. His storytelling style in this collection is best described as picaresque: the plot is often episodic rather than unfolding in a linear manner and many of the characters are likeable rogues in a corrupt society.

One of the most distinctive traits of Charyn’s writing is how he uses language. When I interviewed him on this blog regarding his novel Johnny One-eye, he said that he grew up in the Bronx having no language. He had no idea newspapers such as the New York Times existed. His friendship with several librarians in a South Bronx library introduced him to the world of words and literature. From these early encounters, he developed a love of words, which fostered his own unique writing style. Often his prose seems to ramble along, tumbling together his characters’ thoughts as well as the unfolding action. His descriptions of people and places are vivid, aided by unusual metaphors and ornate language.

Characters and settings seem to interest Charyn more than the plot of the story. His characters are always unusual, often beguiling but with dark currents never too far beneath the surface. They are diverse, each with a unique, captivating voice. Like other aspects of his work, his characters are rarely straightforward. They are complex, motivated by a plethora of values and desires that often war with each other. They are also duplicitous with each other and the reader, leaving the reader wondering what to believe in the narrative.

Place is important in Charyn’s writing and nowhere more so than in this collection of stories. Set in the Bronx, these stories are conjured from the writer’s memories of his boyhood home and, no doubt, this helps to bring the place to life. The stories are mainly set in 1940s gangster run New York City, a world of violence and opulence with a moral code all its own. They evoke this place and time vividly and fondly. Despite the brutality of the criminal underworld, it is a place of lavish excess and vitality. The place and the people are larger than life.

In my interview with Charyn regarding Johnny One-eye, he said, “Fiction often has a greater truth than most historical texts…Novelists see history as story. We’re not burdened by ‘inaccuracies’.” I think this is how the reader should approach Charyn’s short story collection: suspend disbelief and enjoy the language that spills onto the page and the world the author creates. Charyn’s writing style may not appeal to every reader but it is worth giving it a try to discover the delights of his stories.

Readers can learn more about Jerome Charyn and Bitter Bronx by visiting the author’s website and the book’s Facebook page.

About Jerome Charyn: Charyn’s stories have appeared in The Atlantic, The Paris Review, The American Scholar, Epoch, Narrative, Ellery Queen, and other magazines. His most recent novel is I Am Abraham. He lived for many years in Paris and currently resides in Manhattan.

Posted in June 2015 | Tagged American fiction, American short stories, Bitter Bronx, Jerome Charyn, New York, the Bronx | 1 Comment

Stepping Into Eighteenth Century America

Posted on June 11, 2015 by Dianne Ascroft

Today we are stepping into the American past. I have invited Allen Woods to visit Ascroft, eh? to answer a few questions about The Sword and Scabbard, the first novel in his series set in eighteenth century America.

Welcome, Allen. Let’s get started, shall we?

Tell us about your novel.

AW: It is essentially a crime novel set in 1760s Boston. Political events are central to everyone’s life at the time and force the main characters to take actions they might not otherwise. The book shows a side of Boston rarely seen in standard histories and the accepted narrative – it is told from the viewpoint of common people on the street, rather than the lords and leaders at the time.

What prompted you to write about this historical event?

AW: I’ve been a writer my entire adult life, and as a part of other research, I found the events and people of the period fascinating. It seemed a story waiting to be told. Nearly all Americans have some view of the events in the book, but they are generally just a vague knowledge that paints the Americans as heroic freedom fighters and the British as generally stupid and greedy.

How closely did you stick to the historical facts? If you used them loosely, how did you decide whether to deviate from them?

AW: All the political and historic events are factual. For some characters, such as the victims of the Massacre, I invented dialogue and interactions that are entirely plausible, but not documented anywhere because the characters are lower class and either couldn’t read and write or had no time to keep a diary. Everything else, such as British and American leaders’ actions, are accurate. There is widespread documentation of smuggling and Customs graft during this period, but not specifics that were required for the action in the book, so those details are invented as well.

What research did you do for this book?

AW: I estimate that I read or consulted about 50 books and many more articles and other sources. I also live near Boston and visited the main sites many times.

Do you use a mixture of historic figures and invented characters in the novel. Which is more difficult to write? Which to you prefer to write and why?

AW: The fictional characters are heavily influenced by historic figures and events. Because I used factual figures and events, the 1^st person narrator reacts to them and describes them from his point of view. His perspective is one that I believe was common at the time, but mostly undocumented. The tavern, Nicholas, Maggie, and the others are fictional, although their stories are completely plausible and don’t require any leap of faith or suspension of disbelief. Their actions flowed easily from my imagination.

In an historical novel you must vividly re-create a place and people in a bygone era. How did you bring the place and people you are writing about to life?

AW: I was so steeped in the historical facts and background that I came to feel I was almost living in that era. Everything, from food and clothing to the look of the streets and the buildings, became similar to a movie scene in my mind’s eye. I believe good writing needs to be visual and immediate.

There often seems to be more scope in historical novels for male characters rather than female characters. Do you prefer to write one sex or the other. And, if so, why?

AW: The narrator is a male and is a bit baffled by some female attitudes and behavior, which I don’t find uncommon. However, I feel that the motivations and actions of Maggie, the main female character, are believable and consistent. I look forward to developing her character more completely in the planned series of books.

Thank you for answering my questions, Allen, and good luck with the series.

Readers can learn more about Allen and The Sword and Scabbard by visiting his website and his Goodreads page.

About Allen Woods: Allen has been a full-time freelance writer and editor for almost 30 years, writing everything from magazine and newspaper features to sales training for corporate clients. Recently he has specialized in social studies and reading textbooks for all ages. The spark for The Sword and Scabbard came while doing research for an American history text. He lives 100 miles from the site of the Boston Massacre and plans a series which will follow Nicholas and Maggie through the Tea Party, Lexington and Concord, the Revolutionary War, and beyond. He welcomes e-mail at the book web site that will be functional shortly.

Posted in June 2015 | Tagged Allen Woods, Boston, eighteenth century America, historical fiction, The Sword and Scabbard | Leave a comment

Launching The Yankee Years Series

Posted on June 10, 2015 by Dianne Ascroft

This week we marked the anniversary of D-Day, more than seventy years after the invasion began. Even after so many years have elapsed, the events of that day and the weeks and months that followed still resonate with us. As we remember this pivotal point in the Second World War, I thought it was an appropriate time to launch the first book in The Yankee Years, my new series, which tells stories of a little known part of Britain’s war history.

During the Second World War Northern Ireland hosted American, British and Canadian troops. County Fermanagh welcomed Air Force squadrons hunting U-boats and defending shipping convoys in the Atlantic Ocean and Army battalions training and preparing for deployment to Europe’s Western Front. After the Allied troops arrived, life in Northern Ireland would never be the same again. In The Yankee Years novels and Short Reads I endeavour to weave thrilling and romantic tales of the people and the era.

The Yankee Years series will be a mix of Short Reads and novels. The first book, Keeping Her Pledge, which was released this week, is a short read – approximately 90 minutes reading time.

Let me introduce Keeping Her Pledge:

June 1942: Pearl Grainger’s life is much more exciting and fun since the Allied troops arrived in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. Although she has to steel her nerve to help her brother, Davy, on smuggling runs across the border to the Republic of Ireland, she’s out dancing several times each week and meets an RCAF seaplane navigator, Pilot Officer Chuck Walker who quickly becomes special to her.

The harsh realities of war are far removed from her until the evening an RCAF seaplane crashes into a field on her family’s farm. Watching her family attempt to rescue the crew from the burning wreckage, she realises it’s time she played her part in the war effort. Pearl resolves to volunteer at the nearby US Army Station Hospital.

It’s not an easy promise to keep. Pearl’s intentions are good but nothing in her life has prepared her for the horrific sights, sounds and smells of a hospital ward during wartime. And Chuck’s disapproval and jealousy don’t make it any easier.

Can Pearl keep her pledge to do her bit for the war effort without losing the man she loves?

To learn more about Keeping Her Pledge, visit:

UK Amazon page

US Amazon page

I hope you will enjoy Keeping Her Pledge and the rest of the series as the novels and short reads are released. If you would like to be informed about the new releases and occasional special offers, please sign up for my newsletter here.

Posted in June 2015 | Tagged D-Day, flying boats, historical fiction, historical war sagas, homefront fiction, Irish fiction, Northern Ireland, second world war, World War II | 1 Comment

The Graham Saga Comes To A Close

Posted on May 7, 2015 by Dianne Ascroft

I’ve been reading the Graham Saga historical novels for just over a year now. To Catch A Falling Star by Anna Belfrage, who is on a Historical Fiction Virtual Blog Tour with the book, is the last in the eight book timeslip historical fiction series set in the seventeenth century. I began reading the series at Book 5, Serpents in the Garden, in April 2014 and followed it with Book 6, Revenge and Retribution, in September 2014 then Whither Thou Goest in December 2014. I have now finished To Catch A Falling Star, the conclusion of the series. I received a free copy of each book in exchange for an honest review of it.

The publisher, Silverwood Books, describes To Catch a Falling Star as “the eighth book in Anna Belfrage’s series featuring time traveller Alexandra Lind and her seventeenth century husband, Matthew Graham.

Some gifts are double-edged swords …

For Matthew Graham, being given the gift of his former Scottish manor is a dream come true. For his wife, Alex, this gift will force her to undertake a perilous sea journey, leaving most of their extensive family in the Colony of Maryland. Alex is torn apart by this, but staying behind while her husband travels to Scotland is no option.
Scotland in 1688 is a divided country, torn between the papist Stuart king and the foreign but Protestant William of Orange. In the Lowlands, popular opinion is with Dutch William, and Matthew’s reluctance to openly support him does not endear him to his former friends and neighbours.

While Matthew struggles to come to terms with the fact that Scotland of 1688 bears little resemblance to his lovingly conserved memories, Alex is forced to confront unresolved issues from her past, including her overly curious brother-in-law, Luke Graham. And then there’s the further complication of the dashing, flamboyant Viscount Dundee, a man who knocks Alex completely off her feet.

All the turmoil that accompanies their return to Scotland pales into insignificance when a letter arrives, detailing the calamities threatening their youngest daughter in Maryland – at the hand of that most obnoxious minister, Richard Campbell. Matthew and Alex have no choice but to hasten back, no matter the heartache this causes.

Will they make it back in time? And what will Richard Campbell do?”

Everything I’ve written about the previous books in the series holds true for this one so I apologise in advance for repeating myself. To Catch A Falling Star is well written with a plot that keeps the reader turning the pages.

The settings in this series of novels seem to have a life of their own and I love their diversity. This time we are back in Maryland as well as venturing across the ocean to revisit the Grahams’ Scottish home place as the Jacobite risings are beginning. The author skilfully contrasts the geographic and climatic features of these two places, vividly describing them so that they are easy for the reader to imagine. With Alex, I felt the cold loneliness of the Scottish countryside and longed to sit in the warmth of a Maryland meadow.

In each book in this series, I’ve found the characters believable and engaging and I became immersed in their stories. I enjoyed following the developments in Sarah’s and Samuel’s lives this time and meeting Alex’s adult son, Isaac. I was also delighted when one of my favourite characters, Fr Carlos Munoz returned to the story. Alex’s wily brother-in-law, Simon Melville, acquitted himself much better in this book than he did in a previous one and I found myself liking him again. In this book I especially enjoyed the convincing way historic figures were woven into the story – meeting Viscount Dundee was indeed a pleasure.

For readers who haven’t followed the saga, it wouldn’t be difficult to pick up the threads of the story even though this is the last book in the series. Details from previous books are seamlessly woven into the novel and explained so that the reader isn’t confused. It’s possible to read To Catch A Falling Star as a standalone book or as part of the series. And for the reader who has been engrossed in the saga, all the threads from previous books come together in this book for a satisfying conclusion to the story.

I can honestly recommend this novel to anyone who enjoys historical fiction, fantasy/time-slip or just a good story.

About Anna Belfrage: Anna was raised abroad, on a pungent mix of Latin American culture, English history and Swedish traditions. As a result she is multilingual and most of her reading is historical – both non-fiction and fiction.

She was always going to be a writer – or a historian, preferably both. Instead she ended up with a degree in Business and Finance, with very little time to spare for her most favourite pursuit. Still, one does as one must, and in between juggling a challenging career she raised her four children on a potent combination of invented stories, historical debates and masses of good food and homemade cakes. They seem to thrive … Nowadays she spends most of her spare time at her writing desk. The children are half grown, the house is at times eerily silent and she slips away into her imaginary world, with her imaginary characters. Every now and then the one and only man in her life pops his head in to ensure she’s still there. She was always going to be a writer. Now she is – she has achieved her dream.

For more information about the author of the Graham Saga novels, please visit Anna Belfrage’s website and blog. You can also find her on Facebook, Twitter, and Goodreads.