The History Behind the Books

If you go into All Saint’s Church in Fulham, London, you’ll find this plaque on the wall. It may be the only piece of Susanna Horenbout’s work that survives today. The plaque commemorates her mother, and as Susanna lived in Fulham, it seems highly likely that she created the piece.

The tragedy is that although Albrecht Dürer praised her work highly when she was only eighteen, and on her death several Italian master painters eulogized her as an exceptional illuminator, we do not have any work attributed to her now, except the brass plaque, which may or may not have been made and designed by her.

Her brother, Lucas, became Henry VIII’s court painter, but art historians have speculated that Susanna preceded both her father and brother to Henry’s court, because of her marriage to one of Henry’s courtiers, John Parker.

IN A TREACHEROUS COURT is my fictional version of why Susanna was sent ahead of her brother, what happened to her, and how she met and became involved with John Parker. And while I may land her in extremely hot water, and plunge her deep in the pool of international intrigue, where I can, and far more often than even I thought possible, much of my plot is based on fact.