Dorothy Dunnett: Colinton’s Queen of Historical Fiction

Admired by academics, feted by peers, loved by readers, historical novelist (and Colinton resident) Dorothy Dunnett was one of the greatest Scottish writers of the 20th century. Her extraordinary canon of meticulously researched books is vibrant with life, wit, and consummate storytelling. Legions of fans from all over the world still meet to debate her deviously-plotted novels.

Dorothy started writing when, wanting something decent to read, her husband suggested she write herself. The result, the famous six-book Lymond Chronicles, was snapped-up by legendary editor Lois Dwight Cole, who discovered Gone With the Wind. The Lymond Chronicles were interspersed with a series of light-hearted detective stories featuring a gentleman sailor-spy, Johnson Johnson. Then, after years of intense, exhaustive, research, came King Hereafter, which examined Macbeth’s ‘real’ identity and produced a theory which set historians aquiver.

Dorothy’s final work – the House of Niccolò series – was set during the Renaissance (as 15th-century commerce and banking had captured her imagination) and introduced another extraordinary man, Nicholas de Fleury, as its hero.

In Dorothy Dunnett's Centenary year, Pamela Gordon Hoad, member of the Dorothy Dunnett Society and writer of the Harry Somers historical thrillers, celebrates Dunnett’s fiction, unsurpassed for vivid characters, drama and thought-provoking subtlety.