OK, so this blog is WAY overdue an update. What can I say? I’ve been busy.
Today, July 13 2021, sees the release of ‘M, King’s Bodyguard,’ an historical thriller based on actual characters and events that I have been working on for over ten years, since I came across William Melville in a website article headed ‘Ten Amazing Irishmen You’ve Never Heard Of’. I am not the first to try and tell his story in fiction, but to the best of my knowledge I’m the first to get to publication.
William Melville left Ireland at fourteen, joined the London Metropolitan Police in 1872, and rose to become head of Special Branch and occasional bodyguard to British royals. In 1901, in the leadup to the funeral of Queen Victoria, he received a tipoff that a gang of European anarchists planned to attack the cortege and assassinate Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany. With the Kaiser’s bodyguard Gustav Steinhauer in tow, Melville set out to see off the plotters – but nothing went according to plan…
Last time I […] Continue Reading…