I never intended to write a sequel to French Relations, but then I got so many letters from readers saying that Tash had ended up with the wrong man, I started to see their point.  And any excuse to get back to writing about horses was fine by me… I’ve always retreated to write, in those days shutting up my little London flat and beating a path to my parents’ cottage in West Berkshire where all the research I needed was on my doorstep, helped enormously by a brief stint working in a saddlery a few years earlier. Event riders are enormous fun – bright, brave and very sexy – and remain amongst my favourite subjects.

Trivial fact: Before writing the book, I spent a fabulous afternoon nosing around Mark Todd’s yard, who at the time was based with the Lloyd Webbers on Watership Down. If that sounds horribly name-droppy, I should point out that both sporting and musical knights were overseas at the time, and I spent all afternoon discussing splint remedies, rolling bandages and helping wheel muck barrows about, which is my idea of perfect research.