What inspired Roma Nova?

I’m often asked this when I do interviews, talks or simply chatting to readers, but I don’t think I’ve ever put it all in one place on this my own blog.

Well, three things!

Ampurias mosaic

The first was when I was on holiday in north-east Spain one summer. Here’s the story…

A […]

"What if" stories – historical fiction?

Historical fiction is a broad church; a re-telling real events, quasi-biographical fiction, romantic, adventure, fantastical and detective stories, tales from the cave to the 1960s and set in every country and social situation you can imagine. And within that mix are counter-factual, alternative history stories, the ‘what ifs’ which project a possible different timeline from […]

Rome and Washington DC

As I walked past the colonnaded white buildings around the Capitol, the National Mall and the Federal Triangle, I knew I couldn’t be the first visitor to make a connection between Washington DC and ancient Rome.

Both sat/sit on a series of hills and both were/are centres of world power.

The massive scale of prestigious […]