Blog

Gwen’s Easy Blackberry Ice-Cream Recipe from Welcome To The Cornish Country Hospital Ingredients 300g of freshly picked or frozen blackberries 300ml of double cream One small can of condensed milk Half a teaspoon of cinnamon (ground) One teaspoon of vanilla extract...

Ten years ago, my husband Haydn took me to the most amazing hotel, Wrea Head Hall in Scalby near Scarborough, for my birthday (which is at Christmas). I still vividly remember walking in through the big, old, Victorian entrance doors and feeling as though I’d...

I was inspired to write The Tuscan Orphan when a friend told me about how his parents met for the first time in northern Italy when his mother was with the American Army Nurse Corps and that she’d looked after a group of orphans in the immediate aftermath of the...

Why No One Ever 'Owns' a Chateau Personally, although I love living in France, I’ve never been tempted to buy a chateau. While they look great in pictures and on paper, I’m not sure I could cope with the upkeep of such an enormous building – I can barely clean the...

Detective Sergeant Ashley Knight An experienced and well-respected officer with a past. A strong member of the team for eight years. Transferred from Sheffield to Cromer, which suits. Single, no children. Getting twitchy with the approach of middle age. Detective...

"Fight!": Heather Atkinson on her love of writing fight scenes I love to fight! In my head anyway. In real life, I’m much more of a pacifist. I’ve lost count of the number of fight scenes I’ve written over the years and I really enjoy them. I’ve studied, in theory at...

The inspiration behind My Best Friend's Secret is three thriller films: Fatal Attraction (1987), Pacific Heights (1990), and Single White Female (1992). The premise for all three is to be careful of who you invite into your life. Pacific Heights and Single White...

Mention the Great War and most people’s thoughts will turn to the Somme, to Ypres and Mons and the slaughter of men in their thousands, the muddy trenches, the mustard gas, the senseless waste. The first soldier, Private John Parr was killed on 21st August 1914 but...