Mark Holinshed

“There is no friend as loyal as a book.”

Mark Holinshed spent several decades in the world of corporation and commerce, amid the egocentrics, the politics and the factions operating in and around the corridors of power – much he says as it must have been in and around the Tudor court, then, as now, motivated by inherent urges; control, supremacy and of course sex.

His underlying interest in history was fuelled by the Michael Wood series In Search of Shakespeare. Undertaking some of his own research about the bard led to exploring local links to the Gun Powder Plot, and then further afield to the Pilgrimage of Grace – the setting of the Pilgrim’s Rebellion – and ultimately an exploration of the entire reign of Henry VIII.

Holinshed lives in the English Midlands and while playing football, beyond the day when he should have hung his boots up, suffered a heart attack. Were it not for the skill and dedication of the paramedics, doctors and the invention of the heart stent, he probably would not be here to write about anything at all!

Please have a read, it is the inspiration for an author to write more – conversely, sadly, less.