In my current project, I don’t quite know what I’m doing, though I’m hoping to strike lucky. As with metal detectorists and those who browse the shelves of charity shops for Ming vases, my hope is alw

ME? Post a Valentine’s card to a man – for you, Miss Dora?” Ellen, Dora Luscombe’s maid, gasped, her brown eyes wide with disbelief and curiosity. Studying her young mistress, bereft of her father jus

THE first billet-doux I ever received came from ...

Alice Loxton EleanorA 200-mile walk in search of England’slost queen352pp. Pan Macmillan. £22. Many are commemorated in stone, but few so grandly as Eleanor of Castile (d. 1290). Following her unexpec

LETTERS

I HOPE this is the last time I’ll sit at home watching the Winter Olympics on telly,” I said. Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean were kneeling on the ice. “In four years’ time, I want to be there, cov