My research for The Royal Maids series started here, at Dowlais Library in Merthyr Tydfil where I met the highly knowledgeable historian Huw Williams. As the afternoon progressed I remember feeling so excited, soaking up with Welsh atmosphere and utterly absorbed by its history.

It was here that my mind went into overdrive as Rosa’s story began to take form in my head. I couldn’t wait to start writing about Rosa’s life, a seventeen-year-old girl who in real life was a poor pit miner’s daughter during WWII and became a maid at Buckingham Palace. How brave that was, such a huge leap for her to take into the unknown at a time when London was under air attack and Merthyr was unscathed.

Where better to launch book 2 in the series, The Royal Maid Finds Love, than in Merthyr, three years on from my visit to Dowlais, on 22nd October. Tickets for the event at Cyfarthfa Castle are free and can be booked here: https://www.ticketsource.com/cyfar…/annie-seymour/e-pmgydl