When I read about Ashoka the 3rd century BC ruler of much of India, my curiosity was aroused. Ashoka began as a warlord but felt remorse at the waste of life on the battlefield. He invited followers of the Buddha
When Claret Press suggested my tagline should be ‘Stories for the Global Reader’ , I froze for a moment. It became obvious to me – that is what I had been writing since 1998 when I started freelance journalism
Has Covid affected readers of my blog as it has me? Because many of us have more reflection time have you found yourselves remembering something which leads you on a nostalgic journey? Every time I walk by the Radcliffe Observatory
I wanted to take my mind off the issues surrounding Black Lives Matter and my latest novel with Nancy Mudenyo Hunt - Not so Black and White. The arrival of the German translation of Brushstrokes in Time has done
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000djk8 Last night Saturday Review discussed American Dirt and Cultural Appropriation. I have a personal interest in the subject . When I was writing Brushstrokes in Time at the same time, in Montreal, Madeleine Thien was writing Don’t Say We have Nothing.
Women's Mosques in Chinese Islam https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DewWSGTwOXo China used to be surprisingly tolerant of Muslims and uniquely had 500 women’s mosques run by female imams . I learned about them from Dr Maria Jaschok, Director of International Gender Studies at Oxford.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-50890519 There really is nothing new about this story . In Brushstrokes in Time my coming of age novel about a Chinese artist on the fringe of real events in China , two chapters are set in a Labour camp
The disgraceful scenes in Bulgaria gives this recent email of mine to BBC Radio4 Feedback relevance. ‘My husband is not white and we married when that was unusual. In the seventies I wrote to Hugh Weldon and the Director General saying that black,
Tuesday October 1 is China’s National Day it marks the seventieth anniversary of the Chinese Revolution. It is also the 40th anniversary of the day the Stars Artists marched to Tiananmen Square under a banner saying ‘In Politics we want
I spent a delightful Saturday revisiting Chiang Yee -the charming artist who was ‘The Silent Traveller in Oxford etc. I first encountered his books when I ran the Jam Factory (1987-1998) and I loved them. After a symposium at the