Historical fiction author Annie Garthwaite talks to us about her latest novel 'The King's Mother' and how Cecily Neville, the main character in her books, had connections with Clare in Suffolk.
Annie Garthwaite grew up in a working-class community in the northeast of England. She studied English at the University of Wales before embarking on a thirty-year international business career. In 2017 she studied for an MA in Creative Writing at Warwick University and, during two years of study, wrote her debut novel Cecily which was published by Penguin in 2021. Cecily was named a 'top pick' by The Times and Sunday Times, a 'Best Book of 2021' by independent bookshops and Waterstones, and has recently been optioned for TV. Annie's second novel, The King's Mother, was published by Penguin on 11 July 2024. You can find Annie's books on the Suffolk Libraries catalogue.
I learned to read long before I went to school. Mum taught me. When my elder brothers had been bundled off to school and whatever housework needed doing had been done, she’d sit down with me for an hour or more. ‘Our time,’ she called it. We progressed beyond children’s books quickly enough. By ten or so I’d just read whatever she was reading. Often it was historical fiction; Jean Plaidy, Georgette Heyer, that sort of thing. Ultimately she gifted me with a love of reading and an untutored conviction that story-telling and history were two sides of the same coin.
I think it’s just the natural next step for a strong reader. I was in love with words on the page and wanted to put some there myself. What I needed was a story, and my history teacher gave me that. In a very ordinary non-academic comprehensive school, he was a breath of invigorating air. He taught history as if it happened yesterday – and as if its people really mattered. It was Wars of the Roses for A level and I was entranced. I became fascinated by the women of the Wars of the Roses and so, long before I left school, the idea for these novels – first Cecily and then The King’s Mother – was born.
Well, yes it was, but it was also a long term plan. On leaving university my intention had been to get a job in publishing and write these novels at the same time. I did get a publishing job, but the pay then was so poor I had to work bars at night and bookshops at weekends just to pay rent in London. Publishing was then – and remains now – a tough industry for working class people to break into. So, I decided to go into business, where I knew I could make money, and put off the writing till later. I promised myself that, at age 55, I would give up the day job and write. In February 2017 I was fifty-five, so I closed my business and gave myself two years to write the first novel. Cecily was finished in 2019 and published eighteen months later. I think this is the great thing about writing – you can start at any age. And life experience helps too. I understood Cecily and her contemporaries much better in my fifties than in my twenties!
Gosh, I hope so! She’s been so overlooked. Nobody had even written a serious historical biography of her until Joanna Laynesmith did so in 2017 (perfect timing for me). In some ways I blame Shakespeare for this neglect. In his history plays Cecily is old, pious, dull and powerless – and people have assumed that portrayal to be accurate. The reality couldn’t be more different! Cecily lived for eighty epoch-defining years and was never far from the centre of political power. She wasn’t just involved in the defining events of her time, she was driving them. More generally, I think we’ve been led to believe that medieval women were powerless – nothing more than the adored decorations of the court at one extreme, or abused victims at the other. Both of these cliches are nonsense, of course. Cecily was extraordinary, but she was not alone. The Middle Ages are littered with powerful women who acted with their own agency – they were educated, literate women of politics and business who wielded significant authority and got things done! Traditional historians – chiefly male – have tried to deflect us from that truth.
Countless! Every woman who is trying to balance the demands of a career with the obligations of motherhood has a lot in common with Cecily. I see in her many of the traits I see in my own contemporaries – women managing the competing demands of business and domesticity with aplomb, women who believe they have a contribution to make and that they are at least as well equipped as men to make it!
That’s right, The King’s Mother is primarily concerned with Cecily’s relationship with three of her powerful female contemporaries – Marguerite of Anjou, Elizabeth Woodville and Margaret Beaufort. But you can’t write about the Wars of the Roses without writing about Cecily’s most famous son – Richard III. For sure, he is one of the most contested characters in English history. Was he a child-murdering tyrant or the victim of a Tudor smear campaign after his death? It’s a shame to me that, when assessing his character, most people only look at two years of his life – from when he took the throne in 1483 to his death in 1485 – and on that they pass judgement. In my research, I looked at his whole career and drew what conclusions I could about his character and temperament. Then I asked myself, what would a man of that character, temperament and experience most likely do when faced with the unique dangers and challenges Richard faced in 1483. I’ll say no more. You’ll need to read the book to see in which direction that research led me!
Yes, absolutely. Cecily herself had important connections to Suffolk and owned a lot of land here. Most notably she was lady of Clare. She often resided in the town’s castle and patronised its abbey, commissioning books from the monks resident there. In fact, I’ll be coming to Clare on 25 July. Courtesy of Harris & Harris Books, I’ll be giving a talk about The King’s Mother in Clare Church, which Cecily would have known and where she would have worshipped. And I’ll be at Halesworth Bookshop the following day.
Well, at the moment I’m very much focused on a nationwide tour to support The King’s Mother, and Cecily has been optioned for television, so I expect to be busy with that. I also have a third novel on the boil, which takes us back to an earlier period of history and another pivotal royal woman. More of that later – I need to keep my powder dry!
Oh, there’s a couple of things I’ve read recently and would really recommend. First, Fifteen Wild Decembers by Karen Powell, which recreates the lives of the Bronte sisters. Just such a great insight to their experience and so beautifully written. Next, Lauren Groff’s Matrix, which takes us to an obscure 12th century English nunnery – where there’s a lot more going on than you might imagine!
When I sat down to begin writing Cecily in 2017 I had an almost immediate crisis of confidence. Though I’d kept up my writing as much as I could during my career, I’d done very little in the several years immediately prior to stopping work. I was suddenly afraid I’d lost the skill – unsure I’d ever had it. The author Chris Cleave, who had read some of my early scribblings, said, ‘If you could write this well then you can write this well now. You just need some WD40 on your writing engine!’ He told me to keep writing badly until I started writing well. I needed to flex my writing muscle and get it up to strength. He kept me at it – he gave me hope. I owe him a great deal.
