is a historical romance, a love story with a serious heart that shows how difficult it was to marry for love in a particular part of society which believed that money, land, titles and bloodline were the only reasons for marriage. In this society the bride- and groom-to-be were often treated like pawns, not human beings with beating hearts and enquiring minds.

I wrote THE DANCE of LOVE long before I wrote THE ARISTOCRAT & THE ABLE SEAMAN but although the Titanic features in THE DANCE of LOVE, I invented the passengers who sail to New York and Natalie Edwardes, the character who’s very loosely based on my great-grandmother, doesn’t set foot on board Titanic, let alone sail. These two books are entirely different: THE DANCE of LOVE is my invention; THE ARISTOCRAT & THE ABLE SEAMAN is a factual account.

THE DANCE of LOVE is set in the British, Edwardian, aristocratic Downton-Abbey society whose strictures and rules the novel’s protagonist, the young, spirited and beautiful Natalie Edwardes, wants to outwit. But the effect of the tragic sinking of RMS Titanic is profound: Natalie discovers what love really means and the sacrifice she must make. And, as she changes, so the society in which she lives is irrevocably changed by the First World War.

THE DANCE of LOVE is a coming-of-age novel set between 1899 and 1919. It was published in 2014 by Buried River Press. Joffe Books published a new edition in 2019. You can order the novel from amazon as an ebook here or paperback, in its first edition, here.

This video was made by Jim Burge at Burgeoning Media in 2014, when the first edition of THE DANCE of LOVE was published.

Arts Council England awarded me a grant to rewrite this book and I'm very grateful. It would have been a struggle to continue without it.