My Writing

Epilogue - Sir Walter Raleigh

A Woman of Noble Wit is not Sir Walter Raleigh's story. It is his mother's story. Only in the epilogue is he given a voice as he awaits his fate in his cell on his final night on earth. in this extract his thoughts return to his childhood and the woman who taught him to read; the woman of noble wit who inspired him to follow his dreams.

Books had been his closest companions all his days. Though he’d sailed the wide oceans and seen wonders with his own eyes, it was the treasures in the chest of books he took with him everywhere that always proved his inspiration and his solace. Now there was but one book left to him, his Bible, in which he had written those last lines.

The last of so many words: all those paeans he had written to his gracious Queen, that glittering, clever, imperious lady, gone now; his history of the world, still unfinished; and all his other attempts, some …

A voyage on the River Dart

This excerpt from “A Woman of Noble Wit” sees Katherine and her husband Otho Gilbert sail down the River Dart aboard The Trinity in the Spring of 1538

A week later, Katherine set her foot upon the well-scrubbed deck of the three-masted vessel. She felt light-headed, dizzy with delight, her legs suddenly weak as water. She really was on board the Trinity! Messengers were speeding to Uncle Gawen, to her sisters and to Johnny. What a family reunion it would be, and, oh, the thrill of it! She would see London for the first time. Perhaps they’d even see the King!

She had dressed with care, selecting a blue-green gown that was more comfortable than fashionable. At the last moment she donned a bead-trimmed headdress. It would not …

"To Weave the Fabric of a Life" by Rosemary Griggs

A poem................on crafting a historical novel

Dare I dream that I can weave the fabric of a life lived long ago?
The warp, strong cords fixed firmly to a frame
Battles, wars, the deeds of Kings and Queens
Dates, players, actions; these the record can proclaim
A firm foundation for my cloth

The weft, names plucked from a family tree
Robust yarns that twine neatly through the warp
With many knots that cannot be untied
Lives well known, their imprint sharp
They build the structure of my cloth

Woman’s lives, silken webs stitched down
Marriage contract, heirs …

News reaches Devon - the fate of Queen Anne Boleyn

An extract from "A Woman of Noble Wit"

May 1536. All is calm at Greenway Court until Katherine's husband brings shocking news.............

May Day came. Katherine no longer went out early to wash her face in the morning dew as she had as a girl at Modbury. But Bessie had picked armfuls of spring flowers, and they were trying to encourage Katie to help weave them into garlands with hawthorn and woodbine.

“When you’re older, Katie, I’ll take you to the May fair at Modbury,” Katherine said with a bright smile.

But Katie was not to be won over with promises. She soon wandered off, to be found later pulling the heads off the primroses in the orchard.

Unbeknown to them all, …

The night before the wedding

1531, Modbury

The Court House seemed full of unfamiliar sounds as the guests slowly retired to bed, feet echoing on the stairs, voices and laughter slowly dying away. All night long the sound of pots and pans banging and rattling drifted in through the open window as, in the kitchens, the cook set everyone to work on the wedding feast. But it was not the unusual nocturnal activity that kept Katherine awake. It was her struggle with the demons of the morrow that held her rigid into the small hours, sent her eyes flitting toward the still-dark window, and kept her mind …