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Writing
Outlining some of the sources supporting my historical fiction - things I use to help me try and get it right.


No. 18 - A Helping Hand
1930's issues of Health and Strength magazine. Physical Culture In Until the Real Thing Comes Along , Malcolm Trevelyan, a young man...
bluecity86
May 125 min read
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No.17 - Prince Monolulu - In Town Tonight.
Cigarette Cards In the 1930's they had their ‘celebrities’ just as we have today, but to a modern eye, most of their household names seem...
bluecity86
Apr 305 min read
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No. 16 - 'Imperial' - Reaching for the Sky
Between the wars, aviation became a national obsession. Besides the thrill of it, its potential for drawing the rest of the empire closer...
bluecity86
Apr 115 min read
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No. 13 - Minding My Language
When I read a book or watch a film set in the past, I want to be taken there. I want to live it - to feel the good and the bad of that...
bluecity86
Mar 115 min read
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No. 12 - Making Jago
The everyday experience of ordinary people in any era has little to do with the words and deeds of monarchs and politicians, and...
bluecity86
Feb 275 min read
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No. 11 - The Case for the Explicit
Some of the many books I bought from Gay's The Word over the years. Growing up in a Saucy Postcard World The occasional sex scenes in my...
bluecity86
Feb 185 min read
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No. 7 - Addressing a Land of Promise
It is fortunate for me, that the era I choose to write about is well-covered by some wonderful documentary films, as the genre was really...
bluecity86
Jan 214 min read
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No. 6 - It's just a silent film after all.
To write about people in the 1920s and 1930s I attempt to immerse myself in the period as completely as I can. I listen to the music. I...
bluecity86
Jan 143 min read
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No. 5 - Fools Rush In...
When young people buy gifts of music for older people they often assume that if it’s from their era, then they’ll like it. My brother...
bluecity86
Jan 74 min read
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No. 3 - Destination Cubitt Town
A few readers have been kind enough to comment that the London I have tried to recreate in the first two novels seems real - in the case...
bluecity86
Dec 5, 20243 min read
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No. 2 - People at the Edge of the Night
My second novel When Summer is Gone is published tomorrow, being the second part of The Likes of Us series covering the experiences of...
bluecity86
Nov 25, 20243 min read
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