Margaret Duffy is the author of numerous bestselling books and has also worked for both the UK's Inland Revenue and the Ministry of Defence.Her latest Patrick Gillard and Ingrid Langley mystery is Murders.com.
Recently I asked the author about what she was reading. Duffy's reply:
I haven’t read any fiction for a while as the following are wonderful books in which it would be criminal not to to immerse oneself. I have been reading Peter Ackroyd’s The History of England. Right now I am on Volume Four, Revolution. This deals with events from the end of the reign ofVisit Margaret Duffy's website.James the Second to the abdication of Napoleon. At the time, and having fled to France following the invasion of William of Orange, James didn’t think it was all over for him but it was. He had been what childrens’ history books would call A Bad King.
Of particular interest to U.S. readers would be the section on the American War Of Independence. There is hardly space to deal with it here but the political ins-and-outs, the wheeler-dealering, that went on behind the scenes is staggering. After a series of ignominious defeats – it was expensive to wage war in a country thousands of miles away let alone in the 18th Century – Britain was broke. Let them have their independence, Members of Parliament pleaded with the king,George the Third. Finally, he had to agree but regarded it as a huge loss of face.
These volumes are not merely historical accounts, but are written with humour and plenty of gruesome and stomach-churning details therefore are entertaining as well as eye-opening. They are certainly opening mine.
Another book I have read fairly recently is Richard Mabey’s The Cabaret of Plants. This is a fascinating study of man’s dependence on plants for almost everything in life. It ranges across science, art and cultural history, together with the author’s personal experience. He traces the history of our encounters with them from Ice Age cave art to recent studies on how mimosas remember and learn. Now I don’t think people who talk to their cacti are strange.
The Page 69 Test: Murders.com.
My Book, The Movie: Murders.com.
--Marshal Zeringue
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