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Spotlight Part 5: The House at Kirtlebeck End

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And so, readers, we have reached the final book spotlight. The House at Kirtlebeck End is my most recent novel, published in 2019.

Cover for The House at Kirtlebeck End

The House at Kirtlebeck End is a dual narrative story which moves between the 1970s and present day as a young woman, Harry, and her grandmother, Eleanor, tell their respective stories. At the centre of the tale is an old house, filled with secrets and a murky family history which begs to be uncovered. In terms of genre, the book is undoubtedly a paranormal mystery and a ghost story, and is probably the spookiest thing I have written to date!

Weaving a story across two different timelines and from two different characters’ point of view was quite a challenge. I began by writing both narratives in turn, following the structure of the book. However, about a third of the way in, I found it more productive to focus on one character’s story at a time, completing one before returning to the other. I wrote Eleanor’s story, set in 1972, first; this made most sense to me as this timeline was the pivot upon which Harry’s various discoveries hung while she tried to solve her family’s mysteries. Nonetheless it was tricky to ensure that things came together, that the pacing was correct and that the chapters fell into the right order. A large part of the editing was a painstaking process of ensuring that it made sense, and that nothing was discovered by Harry before being revealed to the reader by Eleanor.

Promotional poster

The story itself was inspired by a Christmas holiday spent in southern Scotland a few years ago. We stayed in a big old Victorian house in a tiny village in the countryside. It was a truly beautiful place, not at all forbidding like the house at Kirtlebeck End. Nonetheless, it was full of interesting features, from the sweeping wooden staircase, to the antique iron towel rail in the bathroom. It got me thinking about the things that the house would have seen over the years, and the stories it held within its walls. I found myself wondering what the house might tell me, if it could speak. The idea stayed with me, and developed eventually into this ghostly tale which takes place in an old house, sitting alone at the end of a fictional village I named Kirtlebeck. Given my love of the Gothic, it’s little wonder things ended up this way!

Spotlight Part 3: Ethersay

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In today’s spotlight is my third novel, and first contemporary story, Ethersay, which was published in 2017. For me this novel marked a real shift in my creativity, as I went from re-imagining times and people long past, to crafting a story about modern characters who were entirely my own invention.

In 2016, around the time I was finishing A Woman Named Sellers, I had a really strange dream about a woman waking up on a beach with no recollection of what happened or how she got there. This, it turned out, was the seed of an idea which became Ethersay. After a lot of thought, I decided to set part of the narrative during the independence referendum here in Scotland in 2014 – a momentous, exciting time which provided my protagonist with just the right amount of upheaval and drama to propel her story along.

Of all my books, Ethersay is probably the hardest to describe or place in any sort of category. On one level it is about political activism, but that really isn’t the whole story – it’s also a mystery, with some strange twists and turns, and with plenty of suspense. If I had to describe it in one sentence, I’d say that ultimately it’s about a young woman having to face up to her past and its consequences.

Ethersay is also my only novel to have a book trailer. I worked with the very talented Stewart Kerr Brown of The Imagination Engine to create this film, which stars Jodi Findlay. We had an absolute ball filming this in Fife, Scotland.

A couple of years ago I wrote a blog post about how my experiences during the referendum inspired this novel.

You can find out more about Ethersay and where to buy it here.

Spotlight Part 2: A Woman Named Sellers

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Last week I started a series of ‘spotlight’ posts, focusing on each of my novels in the order I wrote them, and talking a little about their subjects and themes, what inspired me to write them, and so on. In today’s spotlight it’s my second novel, and the second book in the Witches of Pendle trilogy, A Woman Named Sellers.

Published in 2016, A Woman Named Sellers picks up the Pendle witches’ story twenty years after the first trials. It follows the story of former trial child witness Jennet Device, now living as Jennet Sellers. Following the death of her father, Jennet moves to a new village to live with relatives she hardly knows. She tries hard to carve out a new life for herself, and finds solace in new friendships, particularly with her fellow newcomer William Braithwaite, a stonemason from Cumberland. However, Jennet’s past continues to haunt her, and with witch hunters once again prowling the Pendle countryside, she’s not sure if she can ever be safe.

After writing The Gisburn Witch, I really wanted to focus on the story of the other, arguably more famous Jennet in the Pendle witch tale. Originally I planned to cover her whole life story but realised that her childhood and adult tales were too lengthy and complex to put into one novel. So, I decided to focus instead on her adulthood and possible involvement in the 1634 trials. Due to some of the gaps and contradictions in the evidence, we can’t know for certain that the Jennet Device named in the 1634 trial records was the same as the Jennet Device of 1612, although, on balance, it seems likely. I was really captured by the notion that her tragic life probably did come full circle – from witness to accused.

When I was writing this book, I was also really interested in reflecting some of the changes going on in wider society in the 1630s. These were the years leading up to the civil wars, and society was changing – we can see that in the shifting attitudes to witch-hunting, but also in the religious landscape, with many new Christian groups emerging. One of the major characters in the book, William Braithwaite, is a Grindletonian, a sect which sprang up in the northern village of Grindleton during these years. Groups like the Grindletonians were really very radical, placing emphasis on the individual’s relationship with God, rejecting the need to be ordained to preach, and believing that accepting God’s spirit was all that was required to attain salvation. William is one of the few fictional characters in the story, and to this day he remains one of my favourites. Some readers have also commented on how much they liked him, and a few have even asked if I’d consider writing a spin-off about him!

The 1634 trials are less well known that those in 1612, which is a shame as they are fascinating in their own right. Indeed, the echoes of 1612 are all there – child witnesses, tensions between neighbours, outlandish accusations, and the persistence of witch-hunting zeal in the north of the country. The results, however, were somewhat different from 1612. You can read more about the 1634 trials and Jennet’s possible involvement here.

More information about A Woman Named Sellers, including where to buy, is available here.

Spotlight: The Gisburn Witch

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As the year tumbles towards its conclusion, I’ve found myself in a reflective mood. Let’s be honest, there’s a lot to reflect on this year, and not a whole lot of it has been good! However, in recent weeks I have been staying positive (mostly) and busy, working on the first draft of my next novel, and really enjoying the experience of delving into a different world which writing it affords. After all, 2020 could not be a better excuse for a little escapism, could it?

I’ve also found myself looking back on the books I’ve written and the things I’ve achieved so far. It is good to take stock once in a while, to look at your work and to think ‘wow, I did that’. I began writing my first novel in 2014, published it in 2015 and I haven’t really stopped since. As it is almost the end of another year, I thought it would be fun to shine a spotlight on my books in the order I wrote them, and say a little bit about them – what they’re about, what inspired me to write them, and so on.

So, in today’s spotlight is my debut novel, The Gisburn Witch.

Published in 2015, The Gisburn Witch is a historical fiction novel which tells the story of Jennet Preston, one of the so-called Pendle witches, who found herself caught up in the trials in Lancashire in 1612. I’d always had an interest in the Pendle witch trials, and wrote my university dissertation on the subject. Jennet had particularly drawn my interest as she was geographically separate from the other accused, living in Gisburn in the Yorkshire/Lancashire borderlands. She was tried separately, too, in York rather than Lancaster. I really wanted to dig deep into Jennet’s story, to understand how she ended up being accused of witchcraft. The Gisburn Witch is my imagining of that story.

In 2016, I wrote an article for Edinburgh University’s Dangerous Women Project, all about Jennet and the other ‘witches’ and some of the aspects of their lives and stories which made them vulnerable to witchcraft accusations. You can find it here.

You can find out more about The Gisburn Witch and where you can get a copy here.

Next time in the spotlight will be my second novel, and the second book in the Witches of Pendle series, A Woman Named Sellers.