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Caroline Shenton

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How I Got to Here

2 August 2012 By Caroline Shenton

So, with just a week to go until publication of The Day Parliament Burned Down, the story behind the story…

When I began work at the Parliamentary Archives in 1999, I often found myself  having to tell readers in our public searchroom that nearly all of the historic Commons’ records were lost in the fire of 1834. I became increasingly curious about it. But I couldn’t discover very much – mention of the disaster was usually confined to a paragraph or two in books about the new Palace of Westminster, and its architects Charles Barry and AWN Pugin. Then I became frustrated. Why had almost everyone forgotten about this monumental catastrophe – one which changed the face of London and Parliament forever? Surely it must have had a massive impact on contemporaries? What did people think at the time? What was the old Palace like? Why did the fire spread so quickly? What treasures were lost and what was saved? Who was killed? And why had no-one written in detail about it before? I I found the report of the official inquiry on the cause of the fire. Then I looked at a few newspaper accounts of the disaster. I remembered some items I’d catalogued years before in a previous job at the (then) Public Record Office. Things started to connect in my head. One thing led to another, and eventually some nine years later I found I had gradually gathered enough material together to write that book myself. It took me another two years to complete it in my spare time. I found an agent. He found me a publisher. And next week The Day Parliament Burned Down finally hits the shelves of a bookshop or Kindle near you. There’s something in there for everyone – history, art, architecture, Charles Dickens, JMW Turner, political scandal and corruption, Parliamentary reform, the slums of Westminster, floating fire engines, terrorism, child labour, vast quantities of beer, the London Irish, and a dog called Chance. I hope everyone enjoys reading the story as much as I did writing it.

The Day Parliament Burned Down ISBN 9780199646708 is published on 9 August, and will be available on Amazon (including Kindle) and at all good bookshops. Signed copies can be purchased from the Houses of Parliament Shop price £15.99 (RRP £18.99).

 

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Filed Under: Getting an Agent, Publicising the Book, Publishing the Book, Writing and Researching

About Caroline Shenton

Dr Caroline Shenton is an archivist and historian. She was formerly Director of the Parliamentary Archives in London, and before that was a senior archivist at the National Archives. Her book The Day Parliament Burned Down won the Political Book of the Year Award in 2013 and Mary Beard called it 'microhistory at its absolute best' while Dan Jones considered it 'glorious'. Its acclaimed sequel, Mr Barryís War, about the rebuilding of the Palace of Westminster, was a Book of the Year in 2016 for The Daily Telegraph and BBC History Magazine and was described by Lucy Worsley as 'a real jewel, finely wrought and beautiful'. During 2017 Caroline was Political Writer in Residence at Gladstone's Library.

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About Caroline

Dr Caroline Shenton is an archivist and historian. Her book The Day Parliament Burned Down won the Political Book of the Year Award in 2013. Read More…

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