As a history lover and massive book worm I’m always intrigued to see which books or authors are connected to places – especially those local to me like Swindon.
Swindon has a very notable literary connection in that Ian Fleming, the author of the James Bond books, is buried in St James’ Church, Sevenhampton along with his wife Ann and son Casper. He bought Warneford Place in the village in the 1950s and pulled it down to replace it with Sevenhampton Place. He sadly only lived in the new house for a year before he died.
I also love that The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon was set in Swindon. Although there are of course other books set in the area, this is one I particularly enjoyed. It provided an interesting perspective of life through the eyes of Christopher, who is on the autistic spectrum.
Another interesting piece of literary history is that many streets from the Thames Reach housing development were named after characters in the Thursday Next series of books by Oxford-based author Jasper Fforde. When Jasper Fforde was contacted by Swindon Planning office he thought, “this is the closest shot at immortality that I have yet managed to wangle.” So those who live on Thursday Street, Friday Street, Braxton Road, Bradshaw Court and Mycroft Road know that you are part of Swindon’s growing literary history of the future.
In my role as a writing coach, I hope that I can contribute to putting more authors from Swindon on the map giving it a reputation as a great literary town. To find out how you can get your idea for a non-fiction book from your brain into a manuscript on a publisher’s desk head over to my website Popple Services.
Charlotte Booth, Popple Services