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Most books set in England between 1800 and 1840 have a 'Regency' feel. The reason that era is so useful for romance authors stems from the wide-ranging social changes that were occurring over that time, and the parallels, or echoes, those create with our time and the lives of our readers.

History is rich with adventurous men, long on charisma, with a highly developed instinct for their own interests, who have pursued personal power - bypassing parliaments and constitutions, distributing favours to their minions, and conflating their own desires with the interests of the community.

We're past the age of heroes and hero kings... Most of our lives are basically mundane and dull, and it's up to the writer to find ways to make them interesting.

In every age poets and social reformers have tried to stimulate the people of their own time to a nobler life by enchanting stories of the virtues of the heroes of old.

Coming out of university, one of my obsessions was that in the novels I was reading, they seemed to be portraying a world that had a social fabric. People knew each other in 'War and Peace.' They went to all the same balls. These were societies with tightly wound, woven, social textures.

The institution of chivalry forms one of the most remarkable features in the history of the Middle Ages.

Health, money. That's what people worried about in the 14th century as much as today. I find it so much more interesting than the supposed activities of kings, queens, generals.

The idea of the peace movement and of people who spent their entire lives trying to have a more egalitarian, just society, suddenly became swamped by the record industry, by the new rock and roll culture, and by the idea of not trusting anyone over thirty.