Also the clothing, people often ask why I talk about what characters are wearing. And that’s really important to me, because you have to have a picture of how people moved in their clothes.

I love time with family and friends, but completely relish time on my own when I have no agenda to follow, no to-do’s, just me and time alone.

Yes, it does make the load rather heavy if you carry tools for every eventuality.

I’ll tell you this. Leaving that which you love breaks your heart open. But you will find a jewel inside, and this precious jewel is the opening of your heart to all that is new and all that is different, and it will be the making of you-if you allow it to be.

Memories are links in a golden chain that bind us until we meet again.

My favorite way to unwind is to go for a walk with my husband and the dog at the end of the working day, then we go to our local health club for a swim and to sit by the pool and read for a while.

I often think it would be really interesting to take all of those who would wage war to the battlefield cemeteries, and say, explain yourself to the dead. Explain yourself to the dead!

a question has the most power before we rush to answer it, when it is still making us think, still testing us.

Coincidence is a messenger sent by truth.

if the way ahead is not clear, time is often the best editor of one’s intentions.

My first ever job after college was as a flight attendant. I wanted to travel and could not afford it, so I decided to get myself a job where I could travel. I did it for two years and had great fun.

I think that one of the things that we all ask ourselves, whoever we are, is: who stands to make a lot of money out of this [wars]? And, certainly, it comes back to people like armaments makers, and so on and so forth.

I’m a storyteller; that is what I do. And I’m particularly interested in history; and in history of a certain era. But what is interesting for me is how many, how many things you see repeated.

Shame, isn’t it? That we only like our heroes out in the street when they are looking their best and their uniforms are ‘spit and polished,’ and not when they’re showing us the wounds they suffered on our behalf.

It is indeed a wondrous universal alchemy, is it not? When one’s heartfelt intentions cause mountains to move.

If you look at the First World War, the Kaiser was actually, actively buying a lot of the armaments from Britain! in the years, in the run-up to the First World War. And I mean, there was a connection there. He was, indeed, Queen Victoria‘s grandson. You know, they were all related, all these royal families.

It’s really important in any historical fiction, I think, to anchor the story in its time. And you do that by weaving in those details, by, believe it or not, by the plumbing.