A NOVEL set partly in Henley combines political intrigue, Regency-era romance and a dash of real figures and events from history.<\/p>\n
Sabrina Lund wrote Consequence of Power: Isabella\u2019s Season when she learned about the Hellfire Club, a mysterious secret society founded in the 18th century by politician Sir Francis Dashwood, a director of the Old East India Company.<\/p>\n
It tells the story of Isabella Thornbury, a debutante in high society London at the end of the Seven Years War. Amid lavish balls, she becomes embroiled between the Duke of Winterbourne and her childhood friend, Lord Augustus.<\/p>\n
When she hears hidden secrets, she has to choose between social hierarchies and staying true to her conscience.<\/p>\n
Sabrina, 38, says: \u201cIt was actually my partner who mentioned that there was this secret society and the more I looked into it, the more intrigued I became.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey were some of the most influential figures in our history. Dashwood is fascinating in himself and he\u2019s very charismatic and a great host, but he brings together a lot of the political elite. That sparked off going down a path of exploration of these characters and what was going on at the time.\u201d<\/p>\n
After gaining a BA (honours) degree in English literature, Sabrina studied for a master\u2019s in Shakespeare in history at University College London and an MSc in finance from the London School of Economics.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m on a sabbatical from my finance career, so it meant that I could immerse myself and fully invest myself in the novel.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s an immersive historical novel and it\u2019s set in 1763, with the background of the Seven Years War and the East India Company continuing its control and territorial expansion.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt that moment, Isabella Thornbury, a young debutante, steps out into high society for her first London season. She\u2019s a Henley girl and she\u2019s quite innocent.<\/p>\n
It was very typical of the time in that part of society to have a London season in search of a marriage match. Isabella steps out, hoping for love or romance and to make a marriage match but beneath the veneer of the society\u2019s elite, she discovers this world of power plays, political corruption and secrets. So there\u2019s what\u2019s going on on the surface and what\u2019s happening underneath.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a very typical trope of romance novels to have a lady stepping out into society to find romance, but I thought I would flip that premise on its head and then immerse my readers in the history, with a bit of suspense.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think a lot of the themes are universal, so these were real people, but we also have similar feelings today. We want romance or love potentially but there\u2019s also power and there\u2019s the discussion of power in those days.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of universal themes that can transcend time which I thought would be interesting and that we can relate to today.\u201d Sabrina and her partner live in Hampshire, but they tried to move to Henley. \u201cI\u2019ve got close family connections in Henley, I was going to move around about covid time.<\/p>\n
\u201cHalf of the novel is based in Henley and the other half is in London so I juxtaposed the two environments.<\/p>\n
\u201cVisiting family, I immersed myself in the countryside. It\u2019s so beautiful around Henley so it\u2019s really inspired and there\u2019s a lot of nature in my novel.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe actually made quite a number of offers, we were going to be living almost on the same road as my family, but then it fell through and then we had to just call it a day. House prices were going up quite a lot, it was so competitive.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have your very iconic red kites in Henley. When visiting family, they look out on to this beautiful nature reserve and they love animals and feeding the birds.<\/p>\n
\u201cI lived in London for many years, so when I visit them, I get to just look out into this beautiful expanse of countryside.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s the quiet solitude of nature, which connects you to your true self. You feel much more grounded. I didn\u2019t realise how observing birds is very calming.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt that I needed to bring that out in my novel so my characters feel what I feel and when they\u2019re in Henley, they\u2019re more themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sir Francis Dashwood (1708-1781), the founder of the Hellfire Club, built the Hellfire Caves at West Wycombe in the mid-18th century. The club became notorious for rumoured acts of depravity, some of which are depicted in Sabrina\u2019s novel.<\/p>\n
\u201cLegend has it that John Wilkes, who was part of Dashwood\u2019s society and quite a radical of the day, thought he would play a practical joke.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was an MP and a journalist and he waved the flag for liberty and free speech really. I understand that Dashwood was partial to a joke himself, but Wilkes took it a bit far.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe allowed a baboon to spring out from a chest and it was actually the Earl of Sandwich who got a major fright from this and it did cause a ruckus.<\/p>\n
\u201cSandwich and Wilkes had a bit of a feud for years to come afterwards.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought it was interesting to use that motif to spark the idea of guilt, so I have a fictional character who\u2019s carrying a lot of weight of guilt of what he\u2019s done and it spirals out of control.\u201d<\/p>\n
A video trailer has been made to go with the book.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe trailer really portrays the vibes of the book in a succinct manner.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m hoping to create a film one day.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe would love to work with someone to actually bring it on screen but that\u2019s a dream. I\u2019m now writing the next book.\u201d<\/p>\n
l Consequence of Power: Isabella\u2019s Season is out now, priced at \u00a312.99. For more information, visit www.sabrinalundauthor.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A NOVEL set partly in Henley combines political intrigue, Regency-era romance and a dash of real figures and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":44948,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[457,96,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-44947","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-books","8":"tag-books","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44947"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44947\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}