Catherine Kullmann

I was born and educated in Dublin, Ireland. Following a three-year courtship conducted mostly by letter, I moved to Germany where I lived for over twenty-five years before returning to Ireland. I have worked in the Irish and New Zealand public services and in the private sector. I have a keen sense of history and of connection with the past which so often determines the present. I am fascinated by people. I love a good story, especially when characters come to life in a book.

I have always enjoyed writing, I love the fall of words, the shaping of an expressive phrase, the satisfaction when a sentence conveys my meaning exactly. I enjoy plotting and revel in the challenge of evoking a historic era for characters who behave authentically in their period while making their actions and decisions plausible and sympathetic to a modern reader. In addition, I am fanatical about language, especially using the right language as it would have been used during the period about which I am writing. But rewarding as all this craft is, there is nothing to match the moment when a book takes flight, when your characters suddenly determine the route of their journey.

My novels are set in the newly created United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland during the extended Regency period. The Act of Union between Great Britain and Ireland of 1800, the Anglo-American war of 1812 and more than a decade of war that ended in the final defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo in 1815 are all events that continue to shape our modern world. It was a time of revolution and inspiration, still a patriarchal world where women had few or no rights, but they lived and loved and died, making the best lives they could for themselves and their children. And they began to raise their voices, demanding equality and emancipation.

At the same time, the aristocracy-led society was under attack from those who demanded social and political reform, while the industrial revolution saw the beginning of the transfer of wealth and ultimately power to those who knew how to exploit the new technologies. Come and join me in exploring this world.