Join Emma Cowing, Fiza Saeed McLynn and Joanna Miller, 3 exciting 2025 debut authors, to talk about their dazzling historical fiction novels. From the glitzy jazz clubs of 1920s Chicago and mysterious fairground rides, to the empowering story of the first female student at Oxford, to a captivating tale of a travelling womens circus in Edwardian Scotland, these books offer something special and unique readers will love. All three authors will talk about the inspiration for their novels, why they chose to focus on historical fiction and why they find it so important to tell womens stories throughout history that might have previously gone ignored. THE SHOW WOMAN is the spellbinding and enchanting story of four pioneering women who defy the odds to set up a ladies circus. In 2021 journalist Emma uncovered her own family links to Edwardian show people who went on to inspire the characters of Violet, Lena, Rosie and Carmen. When Lenas father passes away, she is left with the choice of marrying, securing a job in a factory or joining forces with outspoken trapeze artist Violet to form their own fairground show. Alongside bareback horse rider Rosie, and Spanish acrobat Carmen, they form a travelling womens circus. But not all in the community support their enterprise and soon the women find themselves in danger The Midnight Carousel is Water for Elephants meets Moulin Rouge, a spellbinding, sweeping, suspenseful novel about love and loss as an outsider in a shimmering world of fairgrounds, stately homes and jazz clubs. Its a mystery and a love story, a novel inspired by Fizas time counselling the bereaved and her own experiences as an outsider as a mixed race British-Pakistani woman in the U.K. THE EIGHTS is an gorgeously written, evocative novel based in 1920 around the first women to matriculate at the University of Oxford; it's about women taking their place in a man's world and the power and beauty of friendship and love in the wake of extraordinary loss. Your ticket includes a free welcome drink.