New Release Wall of Stone by Heather Robinson and Meet the Author

One of the spots I loved to visit the most in Scotland. Not as breathtaking as other places, but oh, so much history.

Wall of Stone by Heather Robinson released last week in the Historical Fiction genre.

In AD121 the Twentieth Legion of Rome stands at the northern frontier of Britannia. Forgotten, neglected and dour in spirit, they must still do their duty for an Empire whose meaning is becoming lost to them.

As the lives of the local Teviot family intertwine with the legion, relationships of love and bitter anguish unfurl. Will the invading army push north? Will the disputing native tribes unite in an uprising? Can Marcus be with Jolinda?

When peace is fragile, friendships count for everything…

Buy Links:

Universal Link: mybook.to/WallofStone

Author Bio:

Heather Robinson is a novelist and short story award winner from Wiltshire, UK. Her academic background includes a Bachelor of Science degree with most of her working life spent as an Administration Manager locally. She is also a qualified and experienced radio presenter, hosting a weekly show for Warminster Community Radio. Proud parents of two boys, Heather and her husband Graham share a passion for live music, hiking and motorcycling.

It was the fascination of Hadrian’s Wall during a family holiday to the area that first drew me to this time period. The Limus Britannicus as it was known to the Romans. A frontier. The extreme limit of settled land beyond which lies wilderness, the edge of the Roman Known World, here, in the country where I live. Put like that, how could my interest not be piqued?
Looking out across the Whin Sill from Housesteads Fort, in the peace and beauty of modern Northumberland, I could feel the whispers of history. And I’m using the correct word there, as I didn’t hear anything, but I felt the presence of those long gone. The legionaries, the locals, I needed to research further.

The more I learned, the more interested I became. The Wall was an audacious piece of engineering. It wasn’t the first limus to be built in the Roman Empire but, boy, was it special in Britain where building with stone was not the norm. A grand concept and a huge practical undertaking with a consistency of planning, a thoroughness of execution and a technical grasp of landscape control. It was a mighty display of Roman dominance, the building of which reflects the organisation and discipline that the legions are renowned for in their fighting. It was an incredible barrier, seven to ten feet thick, fifteen to twenty feet high, running the breadth of the country covering eighty roman miles, traversing three major rivers and marking territory in a magnificent show of arrogance.
My fascination with the time period doesn’t cease with the engineering feats either. The political reasons as to why the Wall was built intrigue me too. Up until Hadrian’s rule the Empire had been expanding. It would appear that Hadrian made the tactical decision to mark the limit of his Empire, to control passage through to the south, to conquer through diplomacy. Yet, not long after construction commenced, historians and archaeologists have determined that plans were changed and what appears to have started out as a defensive barrier, seems to have changed to a more offensive barricade with the addition of more forts along the Wall. To add further to the conumdrum, a defensive ditch – the Vallum – was created on the southern side of the barrier as if trouble was occurring from the so-called Romanized south! What was going on?
With all these facts bubbling around in my head, it led to me wondering what effect the arrival of the Legions to the area must have had on those people already living there. We know they traded, we know there was interaction other than warfare. Hearts must have collided! Well, that was enough to complete my intrigue. This was the era for me to write in.