The Lady Chosen

Author’s Note

The Bastion Club novels came about when I returned to a character who appeared in my novel Captain Jack’s Woman, with a view to writing his story. Anthony “Tony” Blake, a secondary character in that earlier work, was always destined to be a hero in his own right.

In asking the question, What happened to Tony? the answer grew from and was based on a logical extension of the adventures and dangerous life we’d seen Tony living in 1812 in Captain Jack’s Woman, that of a secret operative going behind enemy lines, exploiting his French background to identify and nullify French spy networks which were, at that time, trying to get details of Wellington’s campaign plans back to France for Napoleon and his generals.

Captain Jack’s Woman therefore stands as a prequel to the Bastion Club novels, establishing the reality of how the gentlemen of the Bastion Club served throughout the Peninsula Wars, as well as telling the story of Jack and Kit, both of whom reappear in Tony’s story.

However, in telling Tony’s story, I found that, of necessity, I had to tell the story of the Bastion Club itself, and ultimately the stories of all seven of its members, for these stories are all interwoven. The Lady Chosen was the first novel of the group; in it, you’ve learned how the club came about and seen it established. Tony’s story will be the second volume in the series, A Gentleman’s Honor, to be released in October 2003.