The Finish - what's it all about

The Finish is my new novel featuring Kitty Ives, an 18th century prostitute, who plies her trade in Covent Garden. When a man is found dead in her bed she fears she may swing from the gallows. So begins Kitty's quest to uncover the identity of the murderer. 

We are in Covent Garden in 1769. It seethes with all manner of life. It smells. It is dirty and beautiful at one and the same time. It is home to the whores and harridans, aristocrats and artisans, actors and a drunks alike.

Bread and Cheese

Seems innocent enough, save that he is paying her for more than just bread and cheese! By John Collet, 1777

Covent Garden

Here we have Covent Garden around the time of our story about Kitty Ives, an 18th century prostitute. The Little Piazza is the covered walkway and buildings at bottom right. The house in question is the one on the corner of the Little Piazza and Russell Street, to the middle of the right hand side of the square.

Playing footsie

The Finish is an episodic story set in the 18th century - insofar as I am sent it out to beta readers in sections, as I wrote it. This means something happens in each episode, which builds to the overall story. It's been exciting to write like this.

Picture by James Gillroy

Casanova

Casanova blows up a condom while prostitutes look on. Condoms have been around for centuries. They were usually made from animal intestines and called (in the 18th century) cundums. They weren't so much to avoid pregnancy as to guard against disease

Connoisseurs

As many as one in five young women in London were prostitutes in the 18th century. This picture is called Connoisseurs by Thomas Rowlandson

The scene of the Crime

Covent Garden. 












The Finish is my new novel set in 18th century Covent Garden. It tells the story of Kitty Ives, a prostitute, who is forced to solve a murder when she wakes to find a dead man in her bed. If she should fail she will swing from the gallows. 

This is is almost the exact view Kitty has from the brothel where she lives on the corner of the Little Piazza and Russell Street