Set against a richly evoked historical background, The Unrivalled Spangles is a haunting and tragic romance played out within the world of the circus. Daughters of the ringmaster of Spangles Circus, Ellen and Lucy perform a bareback horse riding spectacular. But, behind the glitter and glamour of the ring the huge tensions between them lead them into intrigue and danger.
This is the dramatic and colourful tale of the Spangles, a nineteenth century circus family, and their lives, loves, romances and rivalries against the backdrop of London town. The story follows Ellen, the ringmaster's daughter and one half of horse-riding duo, The Incredible Scarletta Sisters, as she struggles to break with family tradition and get an education - and to hide her sister's secret romance with a rival circus owner's son...This is a beautifully written historical adventure, from the author of "Wendy and Raspberries on the Yangtze".
I was born in Canada and grew up in a log cabin in Quebec. My childhood was spent playing in the forests and messing about on the Gatineau River. It was a wonderful wild time and in many ways is the source of all of my writing. Children's writers are an eccentric bunch. Someone once said they never grow up and in many ways, this is probably true in my case. I write books for children from five to fifteen years old. The ability to recall how you felt and what your world was like at a particular point in your childhood is something that all children's writers share. It's like pushing a rewind switch and going back in time. Many of my natural history books for children, like THINK OF AN EEL, which won awards on both sides of the Atlantic, IMAGINE YOU ARE A TIGER, or I AM A TYRANNOSAURUS REX all reflect my own sense of wonder exploring the woods and the river around me when I was a child. Years later, I wrote about this childhood in my first novel RASPBERRIES ON THE YANGTZE, which was shortlisted for the Guardian Fiction Prize.
