I think that with Hester’s ethnicity I was riled about Georgian Britain so often being presented as an all-white space, whereas we’d been taught quite a decolonised English curriculum at university in 1998-2001, so I knew that wasn’t the case. The world Heyer introduced me to definitely provided a backdrop. I did think about the points you’ve raised, though, especially later on. At that point I was writing very instinctively and purely for my own entertainment, so I’m not sure how conscious my decisions were. When my baby was born, I was really lucky and he slept a lot during the day, so I was then able to write even more even after he was born. I started writing the first book in 2014 when I was immobilised on the sofa with hyperemesis, and the story provided an escape. Also, prior to Waterloo, people in England feared a French invasion even if in reality this was an object Napoleon was unlikely to succeed in. With this alternative history, I wasn’t that concerned about plausibility – it was more about how Crow, Hester, Kitto and the rest of my cast respond to what happens in a way that feels emotionally convincing, as you say. I think this comes down to worldbuilding and inviting readers into a space that feels realistic in three-dimensional technicololour detail. Given that freedom, what exactly do you think AH fiction needs to get right about real history? Are you concerned at all about the plausibility of the changes you make or do you view it more as 'that's the high concept, the best way of selling that is for my characters to react to those changes in a way that feels emotionally realistic rather than justifying the change itself'? You use the Alternate History setting to play somewhat fast and loose with some details of history (people living longer, languages surviving longer etc.) in a way you couldn't in straight historical fiction.
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