Today I'm delighted to participate in the blog tour for The Legacy by Alison Knight and host a guest post by the author of this novella. About the book: The Legacy An unexpected inheritance. A web of deceit. A desperate escape. London, 1969. James has his dreams of an easy life shattered when his aunt disinherits him, leaving her fortune to her god-daughter, Charlotte. He turns to his friend, Percy, to help him reclaim his inheritance – and to pay off his creditors. But when their plans backfire, James becomes the pawn of Percy and his criminal associates. Charlotte is stunned when she is told of her windfall. After an attempt at cheating her out of her inheritance fails, James tries to intimidate her. But she is stronger than he thinks, having secrets of her own to guard, and sends him away with a bloody nose and no choice but to retreat for now. Resigned, James and his spoilt, pampered girlfriend, Fliss, Percy’s sister, travel across France on a mission that promises to free James from the criminals for good. But James isn’t convinced he can trust Fliss, so he makes his own plans to start a new life. Will James be able to get away, or will his past catch up with him? Will Charlotte’s secrets turn the legacy into a curse? BUY LINK – The Legacy by Alison Knight is published by Darkstroke Books and is available from: https://mybook.to/legacy My Inspiration for The Legacy by Alison Knight Like most authors, I’m often asked where I get the inspiration for my books. I usually get my ideas from all sorts of sources – a snippet of conversation, a picture, a memory … but my inspiration for The Legacy came from an unusual source – my previous book! It took me many, many years to write my last book, Mine, because it was based on events that happened in my family and was very hard for me to get down on paper. It was eventually published by Darkstroke Books in November 2020. I was child at the time the events depicted in Mine took place, so there were huge gaps in my knowledge of what was going on around me then. In some cases, I could find out what actually happened from official documents or family memories, but there were some instances where, fifty years after the event, there was no way of finding this out. I needed to use my imagination, my knowledge of the people involved and the culture of the time to create fictional scenes to fill the gaps. One such scene involved two of the main characters visiting an elderly spinster in a nursing home to witness her new will. She had decided, just days before her death, to leave her fortune to her god-daughter, with a relatively small gift to her nephew, who had previously been her main heir. She explains that she disapproves of his ‘profligate lifestyle’ and wants him to buck his ideas up. After I’d finished writing Mine, I kept thinking about that scene. What sort of mischief had her nephew been getting up to? How would her god-daughter react to her new-found riches? Was it a simple case of the good, attentive god-daughter triumphing over the self-obsessed, lazy nephew? What secrets will the spinster reveal from beyond the grave? In the end, I had to write their story. That spark of an idea which started in one book lead to a story of greed, intrigue and desperation. Hard lessons are learned by all the characters as they try to protect themselves from the fallout from the legacy. After the emotional roller-coaster of writing the very personal story in Mine, writing The Legacy was an absolute delight. It starts with a prologue – the will-signing scene from Mine – and takes us on a journey with James and Charlotte as they deal with the repercussions of their unexpected legacies. There are some cameo appearances from some characters from Mine. The difference is that The Legacy is pure fiction and although it contains some nods to Mine, The Legacy is a standalone story. Taking inspiration from my previous book seems to have set a precedent. My next book, due to be published in December 2021, follows the story of James’s girlfriend, Fliss. Three years after the end of story told in The Legacy, she is living in another country, using a different name and living a life that seems completely alien to the pampered, party-loving girl she is in The Legacy. I hope you enjoy reading The Legacy and that you’ll then want to find out what happens to Fliss. ALISON KNIGHT, AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY Alison has been a legal executive, a registered childminder, a professional fund-raiser and a teacher. She has travelled the world – from spending a year as an exchange student in the US in the 1970s and trekking the Great Wall of China to celebrate her fortieth year and lots of other interesting places in between. In her mid-forties Alison went to university part-time and gained a first-class degree in Creative Writing at Bath Spa University and an MA in the same subject from Oxford Brookes University, both while still working full-time. She signed her first three-book publishing contract a year after she completed her master’s degree. The Legacy is her fifth novel and the second book published by Darkstroke Books. It is a drama set in 1960s London and France, exploring how we don’t always get what we want, exploring themes of greed, intrigue and desperation. Her previous Darkstroke book, Mine, is a drama also set in 1960s London, based on real events in her family, exploring themes of class, ambition and sexual politics. Some of the characters from Mine also appear in The Legacy, although this is a standalone story. Alison teaches creative and life-writing, runs workshops and retreats with Imagine Creative Writing Workshops (www.imaginecreativewriting.co.uk) as well as working as a freelance editor. She is a member of the Society of Authors and the Romantic Novelists’ Association. She lives in Somerset, within sight of Glastonbury Tor. SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS – ALISON KNIGHT www.facebook.com/alison.knight.942 www.alisonroseknight.com @Alison_Knight59 on Twitter www.imaginecreativewriting.co.uk www.darkstroke.com/dark-stroke/alison-knight/ Thank you to Alison Knight for her guest post giving us an insight into her inspiration for the book! If you would like to find out what other bloggers thought of The Legacy or read some extracts from the book, here is the full blog tour schedule:
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