Jemahl Evans reviews Matthew Harffy’s A Night of Flames, set in Northumbria and Norway in the late 8th century, and finds it rich with “humour and heartbreak, and a plot which rattles along at a breathless pace”. I am always chuffed when I get one of Matthew Harffy’s books to review. A Night of Flames […]
Stealing the secret of silk: the first international industrial spies?
Into the crisis-ridden Eastern Roman Empire of the 6th century two monks arrived with an audacious plan: to steal the secret of silk production from China. Why was this idea so important to Emperor Justinian? Jemahl Evans, author of The Charioteer, unravels what may have been the first recorded case of international industrial espionage in […]
The Charioteer by Jemahl Evans
Constantinople, AD550. The Roman Empire is in crisis with war in Italy and plague ravaging the cities. Emperor Justinian’s reconquest of the west has stalled, and his treasury is bankrupt. Porphyrius the Charioteer, a bitter former slave, is the greatest competitor to ever ride in the Hippodrome, but when he loses his last race an […]
Reinventing Thomas Becket
Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, was assassinated on 29 December, 1170. He was almost immediately venerated as a martyr and, on 21 February, 1173, Pope Alexander III canonised him. From turbulent priest to Chaucer’s “holy blissful martir”, “stubborn man” to counter-culture agitator, Becket has been reinterpreted over the centuries to suit the purposes of the […]
A Turbulent Priest: The Story of Thomas Becket by Jemahl Evans
1159, Toulouse. Thomas of London, Chancellor of England, has spent a lifetime as a clerk, administrator, and ambassador. Now he must prove himself a warrior and leader of men, if his friend and master King Henry II of England is to achieve his ambition to rule all France. The fiery King and calculating Chancellor are […]
The Emerald Cross by Jemahl Evans
It’s 1646. Blandford Candy, rake and spy, travels to the colonies on family business. He becomes embroiled in a quest for a priceless emerald cross, once destined for the Pope in Rome but lost in the American wilderness. Our hero has to escape a mutinous pirate crew, warring settlers, and hostile native tribes, but Blandford […]
Merkins and masochists: a brief history of sex
Sex was just as naughty and inventive in previous centuries as in our lifetimes, despite our perceptions of the past as often prudish, writes author Jemahl Evans. It’s just public attitudes that have changed
Review: Storm of Steel by Matthew Harffy
It’s been an exciting few days for readers of Matthew Harffy’s Bernicia Chronicles, his series set in 7th-century Britain. The fourth book, Killer of Kings, came out in paperback on 2 May, 2019, the same day that its sequel, Warrior of Woden, was published. A week later, Beobrand returns in a “stunning new instalment”, Storm […]