Author and academic Phyllis Richardson takes us on a journey through history to discover how authors’ personal experiences in their homes helped to shape the imaginative dwellings that have become icons of English literature in her widely acclaimed book HOUSE OF FICTION.

Virginia Woolf’s love of Talland House in Cornwall is palpable in To The Lighthouse, just as London’s Bloomsbury is ever-present in Mrs Dalloway. E.M. Forster’s childhood home at Rook’s Nest mirrors the idyllic charm of Howards End. Evelyn Waugh plotted Charles Ryder’s return to Brideshead while a guest at Madresfield, Jane Austen was no stranger to a manor house or a good ballroom. And Horace Walpole’s ‘little Gothic castle’ in Twickenham inspired him to write the first English Gothic novel, The Castle of Otranto.

But the English country house, from the idyllic to the unloved, is also viewed through a modern lens – Kazuo Ishiguro’s Darlington Hall, Ian McEwan’s Tallis House, Alan Hollinghurts’s Two Acres.

Phyllis Richardson will present some of the most influential houses in Britain through the stories they inspired, while offering candid glimpses of the writers who brought them to life. Tickets £5 to include a glass of wine or cordial.  OR ATTEND THE EVENT FREE IF YOU PRE-ORDER A COPY OF THE BOOK (RRP £20).  JUST CLICK ON THE EVENT + BOOK LINK ON THE EVENTS PAGE. THE PERFECT XMAS GIFT FOR EVERY FICTION LOVER.