Weekly Geeks: Fun Facts about Helen Hollick

For Weekly Geeks this week, I would like to revisit one of my favorites from the past. This particular geeky assignment was posted by Dewey back in November of 2008, just weeks before she died. Here's what she posted then:

This week’s theme is: fun facts about authors.

How to:

1. Choose a writer you like.
2. Using resources such as Wikipedia, the author’s website, whatever you can find, make a list of interesting facts about the author.
3. Post your fun facts list in your blog, maybe with a photo of the writer, a collage of his or her books, whatever you want.
4. Come sign the Mr Linky below with the url to your fun facts post.
5. As you run into (or deliberately seek out) other Weekly Geeks’ lists, add links to your post for authors you like or authors you think your readers are interested in.

As you can see, the task is simple this week! Of course, if you did this one before, pick a different author to write about. If you are like me, and can't choose just one, go ahead and write about two (or three.)

I remember this challenge from last November well. The last time I participated, I chose Victoria Holt as my author—I chose her because I was reading and enjoying Mistress of Mellyn at the time. This time I figured I’d do the same with my current read: A Hollow Crown, Helen Hollick (I needed something chunky, as with about two feet of snow on the ground, I'm trapped for the present moment!).

Hollick is the author of the Arthurian trilogy series, which many of you have read (I haven’t, yet), as well as a couple of novels set before and during the Conquest (A Hollow Crown and Harold the King). She also write a historical fantasy series called the Seat Witch series. Technically, AHC, which is about Emma of Normandy, wife to King Aethelred of England and then Cnut, is a prequel to Harold the King, which is set during the conquest, but it was written afterwards. A Hollow Crown opens with Emma's marriage in 1002, and follows her story up through 1042. Emma was the mother of Edward the Confessor, and the great-aunt of William the Conqueror. At over 800 pages, it's an ambitious undertaking, but I'm really enjoying the story. Well not enjoying so much (there's a fair amount of violence and death 150 pages in, but what else can you expect from Danish raiders?), but Hollick is a very good writer who tells her story well.

On to the author herself: according to Wikipedia, Helen Hollick was born in 1953, and worked for a number of years as a library assistant, where she developed her interest in the medieval period. Her Arthurian trilogy was accepted just around the time of her 40th birthday. She lives in Walthamstow, England with her husband and adult daughter, both of which ironically suffer from dyslexia. She is a member of the society of authors, and served as a consultant on the film 1066. In 2009, Sourcebooks began reprinting her Arthurian trilogy; Harold the King and A Hollow Crown are due to be republished in the near future (I heard somewhere that one of them is getting a new title?).

Photograph of the author taken from the author’s website.