As the First World War rages on, Leonora has been separated from best friend Victoria as they both do their bit for the war effort by volunteering for the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry. Despite the hardships of war, Leonora is delighted to be reunited with her sweetheart Colonel Malkovic. But her happiness is short-lived when […]
Liberation by Imogen Kealey
Nancy Wake was an Australian girl who, aged, 16 ran away from her abusive mother to the other side of the world. Nancy Wake was a wife who, when her husband was snatched by the Gestapo, fought to be trained by SOE and returned to France to take her revenge. Nancy Wake was a soldier […]
Review: A Prince and a Spy by Rory Clements
Author Carolyn Kirby reviews A Prince and A Spy by Rory Clements, the fifth novel in his Tom Wilde series of thrillers set before and during the Second World War. When it comes to historical accuracy, Kate Atkinson says of her novel Transcription (2018) that the story was created through “…a wrenching apart of history […]
The Lifeline by Deborah Swift
1942, Nazi-occupied Norway. Schoolteacher Astrid Dahl has always kept out of trouble. But when she is told to teach the fascist Nazi curriculum, she refuses and starts a teachers’ rebellion, persuading 8,000 teachers to go on strike. The Germans arrest her, and terrified of what punishment her trial might bring, she is forced to go […]
A different kind of WWII resistance
There were many ways to resist the Nazi regime. Deborah Swift tells Historia about a quiet, but very effective, form of resistance which she came across while researching her new book, The Lifeline, set in Norway and Shetland during the Second World War. I’ve always been interested in the French Resistance, but when I was […]
“Put those Christmas lights out!” The Home Front during World War Two
Jean Fullerton’s novels draw on the history of her native East End of London. Her Ration Book series, set during the Second World War, vividly describes Christmas at a time when cupboards were, if not bare, not stocked with treats, either. She tells Historia what wartime Christmases were like. For centuries Christmas has been a […]
A Ration Book Christmas Kiss by Jean Fullerton
When the local girls’ school gets bombed out in December of 1942, Michael Brogan and his friends are forced to share classes with the young ladies of Stepney Green. And when Michael meets Jane in one of those lessons, he knows it’s the best thing that has ever happened to him. He may only be […]
Historia interviews: Clare Mulley and Carolyn Kirby
The biographer Clare Mulley has been in the news recently for her success in obtaining an English Heritage blue plaque to commemorate wartime SOE agent Krystyna Skarbek, also known as Christine Granville, who was said to be ‘Churchill’s favourite spy.’ Krystyna was the subject of Clare’s bestselling 2012 biography The Spy Who Loved and Clare […]