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 […]
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 […]
When We Fall by Carolyn Kirby
England, 1943. Lost in fog, pilot Vee Katchatourian is forced to make an emergency landing where she meets enigmatic RAF airman Stefan Bergel, and then can’t get him out of her mind. In occupied Poland, Ewa Hartman hosts German officers in her father’s guest house, while secretly gathering intelligence for the Polish resistance. Mourning her […]
When We Fall by Carolyn Kirby
England, 1943. Lost in fog, pilot Vee Katchatourian is forced to make an emergency landing where she meets enigmatic RAF airman Stefan Bergel, and then can’t get him out of her mind. In occupied Poland, Ewa Hartman hosts German officers in her father’s guest house, while secretly gathering intelligence for the Polish resistance. Mourning her […]
Fifty years of fake news; the cover-up of the Katyn Massacre
Thursday, 10 April, 2020, marks the commemoration of a war crime 80 years ago in which the Soviet Union massacred thousands of Poles in locations including the Katyn Forest, near Smolensk, not far from Russia’s present western border. The atrocity was covered up for 50 years, and it took the fall of the USSR for […]
Historia’s books of the year for 2019
Whether you prefer reading historical fiction or non-fiction (or both, why not?), we hope you’ll find something to surprise, delight or intrigue you in this round-up of books featured in Historia during 2019. So if you’re looking for a Christmas present for a history lover or a good read for the long winter nights, have […]
The Conviction of Cora Burns by Carolyn Kirby
Birmingham, 1885. Born in a gaol and raised in a workhouse, Cora Burns has always struggled to control the violence inside her. Haunted by memories of a terrible crime, she seeks a new life working as a servant in the house of scientist Thomas Jerwood. Here, Cora befriends a young girl, Violet, who seems to […]
‘Paedo Hunter Turns Prey!’ The ironic fate of the father of tabloid journalism
In the past few years, amateur paedophile hunters have rarely been far from the headlines of Britain’s tabloid newspapers, writes author Carolyn Kirby. “The nation is in the grip of an extraordinary phenomenon involving possibly thousands of have-a-go investigators,” said the Daily Mail in June last year. Sometimes caught on the wrong side of the […]