Author's Note

I can't claim to know anything much, but I can state with certainty that I have read a lot. And I can add with trepidation that this doesn't always correspond with writing well. I have read an awful lot about the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries in Britain. In particular, a lot of Georgette Heyer and a lot of Jane Austen. In terms of books, this is what I know, and - after all - novice writers are often counseled with the maxim "Write about what you know."

While I don't claim to be as good as the ladies I named, the fact remains that they are the authors whose works remain in my head and infuse my grey matter with their colour, whose characters I greet as old friends when a dog-eared copy of a well-loved story falls off the shelf to dissolve in my palms. I can't claim to be an expert, but I certainly claim to be an enthusiast.

It might disappoint some, but what I have produced is much less Colonial Britain and much more Post-colonial Australia. Although it hardly receives a mention in the text, my savage colonial notions have given "the Motherland" a distinctly non-Heyer and non-Austen quality.

For a long while, I was concerned that I would make historical inaccuracies, and I held myself back from writing because I couldn't satisfy myself that I knew enough specifics. I can't tell you what time the Post ran from London to Bath, for example. This knowledge seemed to me an absolute pre-requisite for venturing into print.

Then, one day - proving that sophistry isn't always pointless - I came to the realisation that in my texts the Post from London to Bath runs exactly when I say it does. I wasn't setting out to compile a timetable for the benefit of users of public transport, who would have to be most resourceful anyway in order to overcome the problem of time travel necessary for the use of these services, and would, therefore, be well-equipped to meet the challenge posed to them by an inaccurate statement about when to expect the next carriage and so could safely be left to their own devices. No, what I wanted to do was to create a text in which to explore certain ideas.

The more I considered the matter, the happier I felt with the limits of my research. I knew enough to do what I wanted to do, and that was ... well, it was enough. I would never know all there is to know, no matter how meticulously I unearthed the Regency period, because I am writing in the early twenty-first century ... and I don't even know all there is to know about it! (In fact, I am ignorant of my own local bus timetable, and despite this factual omission I continue to function.)

So, the Post runs when I say it does. My characters say exactly what I put in their mouths, they wear just what it says they wore; and if, at any time you, my dear reader, are tempted to interrupt the flow of your reading by saying anything like, but this simply wouldn't have happened like that in those days, then save yourself the bother - remember that it happened just like it says it did, because it says so in the text.

I suspect that the Aldace family is connected to the Darcy family of Pemberley (obviously not too closely, or they would be wealthier and more influential). Also that Aldace probably had the good fortune of knowing Mr Hornblower in the course of his naval service. The Ffouldes are, as I have said in the text, recluses and living beyond the fringe of the haute ton, but I am certain that there are many Heyer-heroines who would have been happy to make Kit and Iphigenia's acquaintance at Almack's (had only the patronesses given them vouchers to attend, of course). And if a certain minister's daughter who is noted for her own masterly use of the pen were to notice some similarities between the attraction felt by Iphigenia and Aldace and by characters of her own, I like to think that she would have the generosity to recognise the inevitability of such co-incidences occurring where volatile people are expected to repress their emotions. She would also notice some very telling differences between the two cases, I am sure!

Beyond this, you will have to make your own inferences about the characters' lineage. Lord Wynleigh is most definitely a Wicked Uncle, so it is possible that the family has Italian connections of the Radcliffean variety. I encourage you to indulge your fancy.

Interestingly, although I mention Lord Byron, he is almost the only poet of the era whose works I have never read. The closest I have come is to watch the Errol Flynn version of Don Juan. So, instead of feeling outraged at any similarities between what you read here and what you have read in connection with him, aim instead for feelings of surprise and, maybe, a pleasant spookiness at how co-incidence really is alive and well in the world (if, indeed, there happen to be any such co-incidences). Any other similarities are also co-incidental.

I would strongly like to point out that I have not attempted to caricature anyone of my acquaintance in creating the characters who grace the following pages. In some way, everything that I have experienced has gone into creating them, of course, but any strange Oedipal, therapy-esque nonsense is entirely the product of my sub-conscience and therefore it would be paltry of me to take credit for its invention. Don't start looking into my childhood for a resemblance between my own mother and Lady Adeline. All of my uncles - indeed, my male relatives - are very pleasant men who conduct themselves with propriety toward their niece. I hesitate to deprive my acquaintance the joy of looking for themselves in here somewhere ... but there are times when some things need to be made Quite Clear!

I have deliberately left plenty of gaps (and there are, more than likely, quite a few unintentional ones as well) so please insert your own explanations wherever you feel they are needed. Your guess is a s good as mine would be (except where London to Bath Posts are concerned, of course. And local buses).

As I said earlier, I wrote this to satisfy an urge to write, to play with the forms I had absorbed during my own reading, and to create a place where I could explore ideas - specifically Post-colonial ideas - about how people and the world interrelate. If I have managed to amuse you while doing all of the above, then that is another point upon which I may reflect with satisfaction.