Frances Brody's Blog

Frances in Filey

The seaside town of Filey, a former fishing village on the east coast of Yorkshire between Scarborough and Bridlington, held its inaugural literature festival in May this year. I had the pleasure of taking part. There were walks and talks and a film about the life of Hannah Hauxwell, solitary elderly farmer who lived and worked alone in the Yorkshire Dales. The festival festival was a long time coming, because of lockdown. Congratulations to Jeannie Williams and all who made it ...

LD50

During the past two weeks my home city has been marking a special anniversary: 50 years of town twinning between Leeds and Dortmund, Germany. Twinning was set up shortly after the Second World War with the aim of encouraging friendship, co-operation and understanding between people, with the aim that Europe should never again be torn apart by war.

In Leeds we have a Dortmund Square. In Dortmund there is a Leeds Square. The Barrel Man statue in Dortmund Square was a gift to the peo...

I’m delighted that DYING IN THE WOOL, first book in the Kate Shackleton series, has been chosen as a Wiki Enthralling Historical Mystery.
Hope you enjoy the video

Kate’s hobby is photography. She takes her camera wherever she goes. Researching the background for Kate’s first adventure, I looked at early copies of photographic journals. Every district in England had its photographic clubs and societies. Young Arthur Conan Doyle supplemented his income by writing witty accounts of his photograp...

New Year’s Eve. We’ve almost reached the end of the celebrations of Emily Brontë’s 200th anniversary. What better way to close 2018 than with a Channel 4 documentary film inspired by Emily Brontë’s life, and by Wuthering Heights: The Secret World of Emily Brontë. Throughout the year, the Brontë Parsonage Museum worked in creative partnership with Lily Cole, literacy campaigner, model and actor. Cole first read Wuthering Heights as a teenager. Her fascination and curiosity shine through this e...

On the Pennine Way near Stanbury, three miles from Haworth, stands a house with a history. A former farmhouse, Ponden Hall was occupied by the Heaton family from the mid seventeenth century until 1898. The Brontë family were neighbours. It’s said that the Brontë children liked to spend time in the library, reputedly the finest private library for miles.

Julie Akhurst, co-owner with her husband Steve Brown, is writing a history of the house that inspired the Brontës. It’s an amazing pl...

A SUFFRAGE ANNIVERSARY

There is always a huge amount of interesting background information that never finds its way into a novel. The next Kate Shackleton mystery takes place in 1928. In that year, a wealthy industrialist bought the Brontë Parsonage and donated the deeds to the Brontë Society to create a new museum for the benefit of the nation. That story does feature in the next Kate Shackleton story, to be published in October. Ninety years ago today, Thursday, 29 March, 1928, the Represen...

I’m recently back from a trip to Germany where I was honoured to be guest speaker at the 2017 Mörderische Schwestern Conference that took place over the weekend of 30 November to 2 December at Kloester-Schoental.  Fenna Williams and Gitta Edelmann met me at Frankfurt airport. Gitta and I stayed overnight at Fenna’s home in Wiesbaden, setting off for Kloester-Schoental the next morning.

I love to do a road trip with other authors. This one offered some spectacular seasonal scenery. We drove a...

It’s an honour and a pleasure to be guest speaker at this conference in Kloester-Schoental.

Here are the links to my talk, in German and in English.

German talk (in German)
German talk (in English))

It’s an honour and a pleasure to be guest speaker at this conference in Kloester-Schoental.

Here are the links to my talk, in German and in English.

German talk (in German)

German talk (EN)

I was recently invited to contribute a post to Suzanne’s Dear Reader Column and was happy to oblige. The brief was to write on whatever topic I chose. Mushrooms came to mind.

I have some very old recipe books. Here’s a picture of the page that prompted my column.

Stewed mushrooms in gravy was a dish my mother used to make. It looked so disgusting that I never tried it until this year. Some of the readers of Suzanne’s blog asked me for the recipe. Since it’s not easy to read from this photogr...