Session outlines
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Unearthing Tacnbora: How an archaeological excavation brought a Lost Legend to Life
In 1955, archaeologist Brian Hope-Taylor began excavations at Yeavering (Ad Gefrin), an unassuming Northumbrian site that would yield one of the most significant archaeological discoveries of early medieval Britain. His work revealed the remnants of a royal Anglo-Saxon complex — a place of power, ritual, diplomacy, and culture. Among the structures and artefacts uncovered was a grave, laid beneath a threshold, of a man buried with a carved wooden pole bearing a stylised goat — a standard-bearer.
This session explores the intersection of history, archaeology, and imagination. Drawing on Hope-Taylor’s pioneering methodology and findings, I’ll trace how the evidence unearthed at Yeavering inspired Tacnbora, my novel that gives voice, identity, and narrative to the nameless man in that grave. I will discuss how meticulous archaeology can inform fiction without constraining it — how fragments of wood and patterns in soil can lead to characters, cultures, and epics.
Part historical case study, part creative exploration, this session will appeal to writers, readers, and historians curious about how legend is discovered — not just in chronicles, but in the ground beneath our feet.
Key Themes: • Yeavering as an early medieval royal centre • Reconstructing identity from partial evidence • Writing historical fiction from archaeological finds • Fiction as a bridge between legend and evidence
Takeaways for Attendees: • Insight into one of Britain’s most influential excavations • Understanding how archaeological practice can inform and inspire fiction • Discussion on how to ethically and imaginatively reconstruct characters from historical silence • Inspiration to “discover the legend” in their own research and writing
Era: Ancient World to 10th century
Genealogical research for your story
An expert on genealogical research will introduce you to the sources available for finding the ancestors whose stories are waiting to be told. Steven Smyrl has practiced as a specialist in legal and probate genealogical research for the past 30 years. He is Chairman of the Council of The Irish Genealogical Research Society.
Focus: Archives and historical research
Confronting the Legend
When we write historical fiction about characters such as King Arthur, much of the biographic source material is the stuff of legend.
Even more firmly established figures such as Cleopatra, Lady Godiva, Mata Hari, or Maria von Trapp have become pseudo-legendary inasmuch as apocryphal tales or pop-cultural depictions of their lives have taken on a life of their own, often eclipsing their biographies. Less-than-saintly figures such as St. Louis become remembered only for their deeds reflecting sanctity, and in still other instances, intentionally slanderous legends arise when women like Marguerite de Valois are falsely accused of being disreputable wantons.
This panel considers particular challenges and opportunities that arise when featuring such legendary, famous, or infamous characters in a novel. How and to what extent should we balance known history with inconsistent legends or apocrypha, or might there be reasons to lean into the more legendary elements even in historical fiction? If attempting to restore a legend to an accurate historical context, how do we navigate that boundary? What are some effective methods of reconciling history with the novelist's imperative to entertain and enlighten? And how do we manage reader expectations for a book that seeks to be faithful to history when that fidelity is at odds with familiar legends, archetypal legacies, or ubiquitous and sometimes beloved pop-cultural depictions of our characters?
Using examples from their own work and the wider field, the panelists will explore these and other questions.
Era: Ancient world to 10th C; 11th to 16th C, 20th C.
Focus: Biographical Historical Fiction; Craft of writing historical fiction.
Legends of the Irish Diaspora
The legend of the Irish diaspora is a hero’s journey: from adversity to achievement, from constraint to freedom, from fear to safety. It is a story of forging a new life in a new country while clinging to family connections and proudly preserving Irish heritage. A story that may be complicated by finding that, however bright the future, the past cannot be left behind, nor can the longing for the old country fade away.
A panel of HNS members will discuss how legends of the diaspora inspired them: Maybelle Wallis, who in Daughter of Strangers explored repercussions of the conflicts of the Great Famine among emigrants in 1850s New York. Anne McLoughlin, whose Lives trilogy follows a late 19th C Irish family through generations of betrayal, tragedy and survival, and who researched her own family tree for the inspiration for Lives Apart, Lives Without End and Lives Reunited. And Constance Emmett, who has drawn on her family legend of leaving Northern Ireland for New York in the 1930s to create her Finding Their Way Home series: Heroine of Her Own Life, its sequel Everything Will Be All Right, and a third novel currently underway.
These authors will explore their relationships to Ireland and its diaspora, the legends of the diaspora and how they researched and reconstructed them, and how they managed the complex and sometimes worrying relationships between fact and fiction in their writing process.
Era: 19th to 20th C
Focus: Archives and historical research
Deconstructing the Legend: Humanising Heroes in Historical Fiction
“Some of these things are true and some of them lies. But they are all good stories.” (Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall)
Historical novels often tread a delicate line between truth and imagination, especially when they depict figures who have been mythologized over time. Whether saints or villains, revolutionaries or monarchs, these individuals are frequently remembered as symbols – flattened into icons that serve political, cultural, religious or national narratives. Occasionally straying into contentious territory, historical fiction deconstructs and re-presents mythologized lives, not to reaffirm the legend, but to retrieve traces of the complex and flawed human being beneath the weight of cultural iconography.
Focussing on two contrasting figures from two very different eras – Lord Edward FitzGerald (1763–1798), a romanticised Irish revolutionary, and Cuthbert of Lindisfarne (634–687), an iconic medieval saint – this session examines the challenges and craft of portraying larger-than-life historical characters in fiction. Drawing on their own novels, Laura McKenna and Fiona Whyte will discuss how writers confront the embedded legend and seek nuanced interpretations by exploring the gaps in received versions of the characters’ lives, raising new questions, and, often, resisting the urge to fill all the silences in the story. They will also reflect on that lightbulb moment of finding the person within the legend, where research reveals a vulnerability or hitherto unexplored aspect of the iconic figure, providing the writer with an opening to convey an authentic and compelling character in the novel.
Era: Ancient World to 10th century; 17th to 19th century
Focus: Biographical Historical Fiction; Archives and historical research; Craft of writing historical fiction; Publishing and publicity
Beyond Kings and Queens: giving voice to the hidden folk
To make their characters real, historical novelists have to bridge the gap between the modern mindset and that of the past. This is even more difficult in the Early Middle Ages, when textual evidence is scarce. Jean Gill, Matthew Harffy and Justin Hill will talk about their approaches to weaving tales in this period.
Expect an animated discussion about writing women back into history; bringing to life slaves and servants, warriors and thieves, monks and Muslims, and all that is missing or ‘other’ in cultures of the far-off past.
What’s the difference between historical accuracy and historical authenticity? Do you stay true to the saga (or myth)? And why aim for ‘the truth’ when the legend is better? These three authors will share their answers, and some surprising discoveries, to help you find your own way of telling an old story - or even a new one.
Era: Ancient World to 10th century; 11th to 16th century
Focus: Historical Adventure
Tudor Secrets in Film, Fiction and Fact
Era: 11th to 16th century
Focus: Historical Romance; Biographical Historical Fiction; Historical Adventure
The panel will discuss Tudor secrets: those that have become distorted or erased by legend, and those buried in the past - until now...
They will examine reinterpretations of the Tudors in film for TV and cinema, in particular the ‘Wolf Hall’ series and ‘Elizabeth: The Golden Age’, consider how these films have been informed by novels, how they continue to perpetuate and create myths, and the relevance of truth to entertainment.
Joanna’s recent research into the Seymour family, Carol’s into Thomas Cromwell, and Jenny’s focus on the Spanish Armada, will provide a platform for a lively look at the hook of secrets in the context of the relationship between fact and fiction, history and legend.
Carol will reveal Cromwell's methods of serving Henry VIII via an extensive spy network whilst keeping his own hands clean. Yet, he ended up on the scaffold. Joanna will examine why this ruthless king would seek solace in the lap of a country-raised woman and send the Garter King of Heralds to turn a Seymour into marriageable material as his queen. Jenny will probe the secrets of England’s success against the mightiest fleet to have ever sailed. Was it as simple as: ‘God blew and they were scattered’? Or were piracy, treachery and rivalry involved?
Along the way, the panel will refer to methods of research, compare their approach to bringing the past alive through storytelling, and the difficulties of conjuring up the lost voices of women in history.
Sister stories - Illuminating the past and firing up your fiction
Some of our best loved novels are sister stories: Pride and Prejudice and Little Women; The Poisonwood Bible and Blue Sisters; The Virgin Suicides and My Sister the Serial Killer. In historical fiction, consider the enduring popularity of The Other Boleyn Girl and The Nightingale, and recent TV hits, Miss Austen and Outrageous, based on the Mitford family.
Sister stories can be uplifting. They can also be explosive. Always, they offer readers a relationship dynamic they can relate to. This session highlights historical sister stories across sub-genres, time periods, and geographies, and showcases a wealth of lesser-known sisters waiting to be discovered.
Did you know Florence Nightingale’s sister, Parthenope, once described her sibling as a terrible nurse? Or that in the American suffrage movement, the Nathan sisters took up opposing sides of the cause? Ever heard of Zoe and Theordora Porphyrogenita, joint Empresses of the Byzantine empire? Or the Mancini sisters in 17th century France? At least two were lovers of kings, two were accused poisoners, and the youngest became a nun. As we’re in Ireland, I’ll definitely talk about the Yeats sisters, Susan and Elizabeth, about Eva and Constance Gore-Booth, and Anna and Fanny Parnell.
Using multiple examples of published novels and historical sisters, the session explores the versatility of sister stories for stand-alone and serial fiction, identifying approaches to characterization, point of view, and plotting. Finally, I’ll cover initial steps in research and issues of biographical accuracy, based on my experience as an author and HNS editor.
Era: From Ancient World through to 20th Century
Focus: Archives and historical research; craft of writing historical fiction
Research and Writing Across Time Periods
Some historical fiction authors choose one period and place in time for their setting. Others choose to explore many different historical periods.
Kate Forsyth has researched and written books set in Scotland during the reign of Mary, Queen of Scots (The Changeling); in Crete during the Nazi invasion and occupation 1941-1945 (The Crimson Thread); in 18th century China and France during the French Revolution (The Blue Rose); in the pre-Raphaelite circle of artists and poets in Victorian Britain (Beauty in Thorns); in Berlin in the time of the Third Reich (The Beast’s Garden); in Renaissance Venice and 17th century Versailles in the time of the Sun King (Bitter Greens); in Germany during the Napoleonic wars (The Wild Girl); and in Kent during the time of Charles II and Oliver Cromwell (The Gypsy Crown);
With each novel, Kate has had to totally immerse herself in the place and the time, being careful to remember when spinning wheels were invented; when windows began to have glass in them instead of a flap of ox-skin; whether one drank out of pewter mugs or crystal glass; who wore underwear and who did not; and what use they had for their urine. Researching can be one of the most difficult, time-consuming and exhausting aspects of being a historical novelist, or it can be one of the most enjoyable parts. Kate firmly believes in the latter. In this session, she shares some of the most hilarious and heart-rending things discovered during her years of researching novels.
Era:
Focus:
Unearthing the Irish Past With a Digital Spade
This session will examine the various ways available to us to excavate the Irish past by examining a wealth of freely available digital resources. The session will illustrate the opportunities we have to explore themes, persons, places, conditions, customs etc to provide fact and context for writing projects. These will include:
The Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland (VRTI)-a growing resource created by an international partnership which seeks to rebuild the Public Record Office of Ireland archives destroyed in 1922.
The Digital Repository of Ireland (DRI) which provides open access to Ireland’s social and cultural digital data.
ouririshheritage.org that documents and shares our history and heritage online under the auspices of the National Museum of Ireland including the Irish Community Archive Network (iCAN) where communities share their research projects online.
Duchas-The Irish Folklore Collection UCD digitization project which consists of partners from National Folklore Collection, UCD, the National Folklore Foundation and UCD Digital Library Gaois, Fiontar & Scoil na Gaeilge, DCU; Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media.
The archived collections of the National Archives of Ireland and the National Library of Ireland.
In addition to the digital resources I will also examine some physical resources such as those of the National Archives of Ireland and the National Library of Ireland.
Focus: Archives and Historical Research
Looking for Stories in Art
Visual art can be a treasure trove of story inspiration for historical novelists. But how do we learn to "see" the narrative possibilities hidden within a painting, photograph, or sculpture? What transforms a static image into the spark for a compelling historical novel? In this interactive discussion, art historian and novelist Laura Morelli facilitates an exploration of how visual art can serve as primary source material and creative catalyst for historical fiction.
Works of visual art offer windows into vanished worlds, untold stories, and forgotten voices. We'll examine how successful authors have transformed artistic inspiration into memorable narratives, discover practical research strategies for working with visual sources, and explore the unique challenges of translating visual media into compelling prose. Through collaborative discussion, we'll look at art with fresh eyes as we uncover the stories waiting to be discovered.
Session Outline:
Welcome & session overview
Why works of art and artists make compelling subjects for historical fiction
Research using art historical sources
Interactive activity using a work of art and story questions
The unique challenges of writing art-based historical fiction
Untapped opportunities in art historical fiction
Wrap-Up / Q & A
This session will be interactive, with opportunities to share insights, ask questions, and brainstorm ideas so participants leave inspired to write their own compelling art-centred stories. A handout includes a list of historical novels featuring works of art.
Focus: Archives and historical research; Craft of writing historical fiction
Pitching Your Novel - The Essence of Marketing
This session will cover how to make your novel shine with a killer pitch that grabs agents, publishers, and readers.
We’ll start by finding your story’s unique hook—its theme, genre, or stakes—and turning it into a catchy, memorable hook. You’ll learn to craft a short, exciting pitch that captures your novel’s core, avoiding clichés and keeping it fresh. We’ll also talk about delivering your pitch with confidence, whether it’s a quick elevator spiel or a polished query letter, letting your passion come through.
Beyond that, we’ll explore using your pitch to fuel social media buzz and build industry connections. You’ll get tips on refining your pitch with feedback and using it for blurbs or promos.
Join this fun, hands-on session to walk away ready to market your novel like a pro, with practical skills to make your story stand out!
Focus: Publishing the Legend
Winning First Chapters: Targeting Novel Competitions And Crafting Competitive Submissions
Lenore Hart won a Genre Prize and Grand Prize in HNS's 2024 First Chapters competition (plus other prizes and shortlists over the years).
She’ll discuss choosing contests that best suit your work, and selecting submissions with the best chance of placing, or winning. Past winners provide clues for selecting manuscripts or excerpts that will appeal to judges, along with the importance of following submission guidelines to avoid disqualification. We’ll look at the basic components of a competitive entry, from opening page to final sentence, and introducing protagonists whose crises, life situations, or dilemmas will evoke empathy immediately.
Other topics: establishing strong plots, compelling story arcs, and using conflict / complications to drive narrative tension. And, why sensory information and specific, period-correct details are vital.
Lenore will also identify common pitfalls, such as opening too soon or too late, withholding basic information and confusing readers, lack of summary/scene balance, no clear transitions, and incorrect pacing. Participants will learn an acronym to help recall the five elements that create a compelling first page. Also, why we need first readers familiar with our genres.
She’ll discuss her experience with the 2024 HNS First Chapters competition, and what she's learned as a contest judge herself, including timing a submission, structuring cover letters, synopses, and author bios, how much to submit, and where to end.
The object isn’t to make judges read more words than requested; it’s to enter pages so well-crafted and well-selected, so vivid, polished, and riveting, they’ll wish they had more!
Focus: Craft of writing historical fiction
When The Facts About The Legends Are So Juicy - Tell The Truth!
In "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance," Shinbone’s newspaper editor Maxwell Scott tells Senator Ranse Stoddard (elected because the townsfolk [mistakenly] believed he rid them of their violent nemesis): “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.”
We three authors challenge this! Why can’t the storyteller also be a truth teller? If people have learned to love a lie, shouldn’t the protagonist get to correct the record? Defend their lives; set the record straight? Tell their own story? Especially when the truth is often a much more exciting yarn!
Nero never fiddled while Rome burned!
“Since I cannot prove a lover, I am determined to prove a villain” aren’t Richard III’s word’s—they’re Shakespeare’s!
And Marie Antoinette never said “Let them eat cake”—or “brioche.”
Please join three internationally multi-published historical novelists to hear how we went about our research, walked in our characters’ footsteps, and more! In search of the truth, we have spent years researching the lives of three much-propagandized, villainized, and vilified legends: Nero, Richard III, and Marie Antoinette, to tell their just-as-juicy stories from fact-based perspectives.
Proof our protagonists endure: In 2021,The British Museum presented "Nero; The Man Behind the Myth." Margaret's novels were sold in the bookshop. In June 2025, BBC History Magazine marked its 25th Anniversary by asking 13 editors to select their favorite covers over the past quarter-century. Two of the 13 covers featured Richard III. And, in September 2025, the V&A curated a blockbuster exhibition celebrating Marie Antoinette’s 250-year influence on fashion & décor.
Focus: Biographical Historical Fiction; Craft of writing historical fiction
Discovering The One: How to find that attention-grabbing historical fiction idea
How do you know if the idea for a novel you have had burning in the back of your mind for the last few years could be The One! How do you hone it and tease out the hook so it will become the novel that will snag you an agent, a book deal, become a bestseller and make all your dreams come true?
You are pretty sure it’s a great idea, in your head it really is, but when you sit down to write it, when you are halfway through, it really doesn’t live up to that beautiful vision in your mind. Should you persevere or give up and start again with something else?
Bestselling authors, Amanda Geard, Frances Quinn and Louise Fein will explore where to mine for ideas, how to find that elusive hook that will get everyone talking about your book, how to decide whether an idea has the legs it needs to become a full novel, and tips and tricks to help you interrogate your own work. They will also discuss how to find an unusual angle on a story that will make it feel fresh and different, how to know whether an idea might be commercial or not, and how to tell if something really isn’t working.
In the course of their discussions, this panel will use examples of historical fiction novels that really stand out for their unique angles or brilliant hooks.
Focus: Craft of writing historical fiction
History in Historical Fiction: Icing on the Cake? Or Main Ingredient?
How important is real history in historical fiction? There are two dangers – focusing on the story and disregarding the history; or focusing so hard on the history that the story is lost.
This interactive session will focus on how to find an appropriate balance which preserves history as a main ingredient, while developing a great story. We will consider ways to use history effectively through an examination of the inter-relationship with, and the impact of history on the following aspects of story:
Inspiration (providing the catalyst for the story)
Context (where/when + wider context: eg political/religious/social/economic/cultural)
Plot (what/how - events: real or imaginary)
Character (who/why - historic or fictional)
Colour (creating/presenting a believable world through research / details / senses)
Constraint (balance between fact and fiction - plausibility / responsibility)
Prism (shedding light on the present – universal themes)
Accuracy v authenticity (what can we / should we aim for)
All of these aspects are of course woven together within story, but we will look at them individually in order to tease out main principles.
Key Takeaways:
The history - should be relevant to the characters
The story should present the characters interacting with history.
Historical fiction is NOT a history lesson NOR a travelogue into the past.
Historical Fiction IS a good story, well told, with the author making history work for the story.
Era: 11th to 16th century
Focus: Biographical Historical Fiction; Historical Adventure; Craft of writing historical fiction
Location, Location, Location: On-location research and how to use it in historical fiction
On-location research can help develop the setting of a novel as more than window dressing for the action. Details of landscape, climate, and culture not only enhance mood or atmosphere, but can also influence a characters’ decisions, actions, and ability to accomplish their goals. This workshop will encourage participants to tap into personal learning styles and potential synchronicity to aid their research efforts. Participants will come away with strategies to develop an on-location research plan that will enhance their natural writing process and increase the overall credibility of their story-world.
Goal/Objective: To explore investigative research techniques for on-location research; to provide tips for using your personal learning style to gather research; to explore ways to use research in writing historical fiction
Activities:
Develop a research plan—with allowances for synchronicity
Tap into personal learning styles to aid research efforts
Link on-location research to plot and character (not just setting)
Era: 11th to 16th century
Focus: Biographical Historical Fiction; Historical Adventure; Historical Fantasy, Timeslip, Alternate History; Archives and historical research
Who Owns the Legend’s Story? Navigating Ancestry, Authority, and Authorial License
This panel will delve into the complex issues authors must consider when writing about real people. It will:
Explore nuances regarding ownership of the story. Do descendants have a right to control the telling of the story? Does public memory “belong” to a descendant or the broader community? The panel will discuss how authors can navigate the tensions among descendants’ wishes to control the narrative, the public’s desire for the “inside story,” and publishers’ interests in saleability and risk.
Discuss the ethics of fictionalizing real people/events. How do authors balance historical accuracy with narrative freedom? Can authors create new “truths” that might enrich or diminish public understanding? What are the consequences of misrepresenting or misappropriating history? When is it appropriate to fictionalize, and when does it become exploitative or disrespectful? The presenters will propose an ethical framework for making decisions about fictionalizing actual persons.
Review legal considerations for authors. How do authors navigate potential defamation or libel risks when writing about real people, especially when their portrayal might be unfavorable or controversial? How can authors navigate objections from those who claim ownership? How do public domain laws affect a novelist’s ability to fictionalize or use real people? How do legal considerations intersect with the creative process? The presenters will summarize legal issues authors should consider when writing about real people.
Present illustrative case examples of novels and shows, e.g., The Secrets We Kept, The Crown, Angle of Repose, and The Da Vinci Code, as well as the authors’ own works.
Era: 17th through to 20th century
Focus: Biographical Historical Fiction; Craft of writing historical fiction
Historical Mystery & Crime: Creating a Vintage Detective Series
Step into the fog-shrouded streets, and shadowy alleyways of the past, where every clue is a fragment of history and every suspect hides behind the manners of a bygone age. A vintage detective series offers not only the intellectual satisfaction of an intricate whodunnit but also the immersive pleasure of traveling through another era.
In this panel, we will explore the craft of weaving mystery and history into a seamless whole—where plot twists are as compelling as the period details. Our discussion will cover the essential ingredients for bringing an historical sleuth to life: authentic voice and mannerisms, a deep understanding of the chosen era’s culture, politics, and social hierarchies, and the atmospheric worldbuilding that makes readers feel the cobblestones underfoot.
We’ll also examine how authors can balance fact and fiction—integrating real historical events and figures without overwhelming the narrative—and how a detective’s methods and morals might be shaped (and constrained) by the technology, gender roles, and laws of their time. From creating richly layered suspects to embedding the mystery in the tensions of a particular decade, this session will uncover how to craft a detective who not only solves crimes but also reflects—and challenges—the society in which they live.
We hope this panel discussion will give readers and writers alike, a deeper understanding of how to design a vintage detective series that is at once gripping, authentic, and steeped in the fascinating complexities of history.
Era: 17th through to 20th century
Focus: Historical Crime
Making Your Historical Setting a Character
The most memorable stories feature evocative settings that exude their own subtle (and sometimes not so subtle) personalities. A great setting is more than just time and place, especially in the case of the historical backdrop. In this workshop we will explore how to make full use of macro and micro settings, because the more you endeavor to make your setting a character, the more you can use it to influence your characters' quest as their ally, observer, or outright adversary.
This workshop is designed to be accessible to the writer at any stage of his or her career. We will discuss how readers imagine the story within the visual framework that the author creates. They will take their cues from the author’s descriptions of the environments that the flesh-and-blood characters operate within. How the characters feel about the setting will be how readers feel about it. And if a protagonist feels nothing in relation to the setting (both the macro settings and the individual micro settings within each scene), then so will the readers. A sensory-rich setting will have a sense of being that naturally causes the reader to feel a certain way about it.
We will look at the archetypal settings (The River, The Garden, The Wasteland, The Castle, etc.), discuss the advantages and limitations of each, and compare them with the historical settings in some of our favorite classic novels and current works in progress.
Focus: Archives and historical research; Craft of writing historical fiction
Transforming Sources into Fiction: Vikings and Normans in Ireland
‘I’ve a crick in my neck,/ and tend to fall on my head,/ my trouser-snake is soft,/ and my hearing’s gone away.’ Egil Skallagrimsson (10th century)
Several of my novels make landfall in Ireland with Vikings and the Cambro-Norman Fitzgerald family.
In this session, I talk about transforming material from chronicles, sagas, poetry and museums into historical fiction.
I have found my legends in 10th-12th century sources, such as Welsh and Viking poetry, Ademar de Chabannes’ Chronique, the Welsh Brut y Tywysogion, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and the Saga of Olafr Tryggvason.
I will talk about finding the voice and feel of the time in literature and artefacts and turning that into plots, settings, and characters.
Era: Ancient World to 10th century; 11th to 16th century
"When the legend becomes fact, print the legend..."
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