Annie Garthwaite grew up in a working class community in the north-east of England. A school-girl interest in medieval history became a lifelong obsession with Cecily Neville, so, at age fifty-five, she enrolled on the Warwick Writing MA programme. Three years later, this extraordinary novel is the result. During a thirty-year international business career she frequently found herself the only woman at the table, which gave her valuable insights into how a woman like Cecily might have operated. She lives with her partner near the Yorkist stronghold of Ludlow.