Anna Sayburn Lane

Thriller author

Stories Behind the Story

The stories behind the story

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Have you ever wondered how I research the my historical mysteries? Wonder no more, because I publish a blog on Substack all about my research. It’s called The Stories Behind the Story, and you can find it here. You can either read online, or subscribe to receive fortnightly emails.

Here’s a good place to start: my first year anniversary, which coincided with the publication day for Murder On The White Cliffs.

The post has links to articles about the history behind all six of the Marjorie Swallow books, as well as the prequel novella Murder At The Ritz.

I’m now revisiting stories about the research behind my thriller series featuring Helen Oddfellow, starting with A Dead Man In Deptford.

 

 

The Stories Behind the Story: Plant hunters

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Frank Kingdon-Ward, one of the inspirations behind Death At Chelsea, is the closest thing botany has to Indiana Jones. He was one of the last great explorers, seeking out the most remote regions and enduring hair-raising escapades in the search for new flora for British gardens.

Kingdon-Ward escaped death multiple times: when a tree fell on his tent; after impaling himself on a bamboo spike; clinging to a branch after falling over a precipice; drinking nectar from rhododendrons while lost for several days without food; surviving an earthquake; evading Japanese troops in China as a spy during the second world war… his writings read like the most thrilling of Boy’s Own adventures.

I learned about him after following up a mention in a gardening magazine about a 1920s gardener who had worked with a plant hunter while designing a garden for her aristocratic clients. Plant hunters travelled the globe looking for exotic species to bring back to the UK, where gardeners seized with delight on rhododendrons, azaleas, primulas, lilies and more. I was seeking inspiration for the plot of a novel to be set around the Chelsea Flower Show, to involve rival gardeners, sabotage of precious lilies and poisonous plants.  An intrepid plant hunter, I decided, was just the extra spice the story needed.

Kingdon-Ward, born in Manchester in 1885, was commissioned by a seed-grower to visit to Yunnan province, where he collected plants, seeds and bulbs, made drawings and took photographs. It was the first of 24 expeditions in a life of adventure.

His travels took him repeatedly to the mountains and valleys east of the Himalayas, crossing borders between south west China, north east India, Tibet, Bhutan, and Burma (now Myanmar). One of his most celebrated travels was to the steep and inhospitable Tsangpo Gorge, where the river slices through land held holy by Tibetan Buddhist pilgrims. This was where he discovered the Himalayan blue poppy and the Giant Tibetan Cowslip, among other finds.

He was still exploring at the age of 68, when he went climbing in Burma, only four years before his sudden death from a stroke.

I adapted Kingdon-Ward’s travels in Tibet for my fictional 1920s plant hunter, Ernest Buckler, who was a much nastier character than Kingdon-Ward had been! The blue poppies also influenced my imagining of the precious Himalayan Sapphire Lilies brought back from Tibet by Mr Buckler and his companions, due to be unveiled at the 1924 Chelsea Flower Show.

Mr Kingdon-Ward’s description of crossing vertiginous gorges by perilous rope bridges gave me an idea or two as well – but you’ll have to read the book to find out more!

To find out more about the hair-raising adventures of Kingdon-Ward, and the research I do for my novels, have a look at my Substack, The Stories Behind the Story.

The Stories Behind the Story: Venice

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If you enjoyed my Christmas story for newsletter subscribers, A  Venetian Masquerade, you might like to hear about the research behind it. The story was prompted by my favourite trip of 2024, a visit to the magical floating city of Venice. As the city shimmered from the waters of the lagoon and the vaporetto ferried us to the city, I fell under enchantment. I already knew I’d want to write about Venice one day.

Lots of details from that trip stayed with me and made it into the story. We ate chichetti and drank Campari spritz at a bar on the corner of Campo S. Toma, right next to a mask and carnival costume shop. I marvelled at the ornate costumes and masks, so beautiful and colourful. The idea of donning a mask and gliding through the city incognito immediately lodged in my mind.

I didn’t fix on the story I wanted to tell until I discovered that carnival season starts right after Christmas, on December 26, or St Stephen’s Day. Online research then told me that masks and gambling were associated with carnival, and masked gambling in ‘ridotto’ entertainments were only allowed during the carnival season.

I immediately wanted to see my redoubtable sleuth Mrs Jameson, newly married, unmask a card cheat. I knew she would learn something about her husband, perhaps something she didn’t want to know. And I liked the idea that masks came into it somehow, so decided to learn more about Venetian masks.

I remembered the close-fitting Volto masks, the classic full-faced masks, at the little shop in Campo San Toma, and the white Bauta masks, flared at the bottom to allow the wearer to eat and drink. The pretty Columbina masks are familiar from the Commedia dell’Arte , and I’d seen the sinister Medico della Peste, or plague doctor masks, with their long beaked nose.

But there was one mask I’d only seen in paintings of carnival – the Moretta. I found it shocking and rather horrible. It’s an oval mask, made of black velvet, with holes for eyes but no mouth. It has no ribbon, but it held in place by the woman (they are only worn by women) holding a button on the back in their teeth. Speak, and the mask falls.

The Moretta mask

To find out more about Venetian masks and see photographs from my trip, have a look at my Substack, The Stories Behind the Story.

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