A fine romance
Howick author, Helena Davis, has just released her latest book, Married by Proxy, a love story set in 1919.
It centres on English rose, Fenella Barrington, who is struggling with life alone, having lost her loved ones in the Great War.
Everything changes, however, when she receives a marriage proposal from a complete stranger and has to decide whether or not to remain in Britain or set sail for a remote farm in South Africa.
We caught up with Davis to chat about Married by Proxy.
What inspired you to write Married by Proxy?
My husband’s parents were married by proxy – they were strangers, they didn’t know each other – she an English rose, and he a tough South African farmer.
He posted her a wedding ring and she came out from England by ship. This has always intrigued me, and triggered an idea for a story. Tell us more about the book. Married by Proxy is set in South Africa, post World War I where the character, Thomas Greenwood, a confirmed bachelor, who fought long and hard in the South West Africa campaign against the Germans, finds his fortune in the diamond-rich area of the Namibian desert.
He buys a beautiful farm in Cedarville, but his boreholes dry up in a severe drought.
His eccentric neighbour is selling his farm next to the Umzimvubu River, but he won’t sell it to an unmarried man, believing a man isn’t stable unless he is married!
Thomas is forced to advertise for a wife in an English magazine. He marries, a woman, Fenella Barrington, by proxy. The trouble starts when she arrives and his major-domo, Giles, tells her the real reason why he married her… When do you find time to write since you run a florist business?
I’m a bit of a lone-geek, and spend time with my books after hours, although a writer’s mind is always active even during busy daily activities – I’m always thinking and conjuring up ideas as I go along. And I happily ‘suffer’ from insomnia, so I have plenty of night hours to write.
Will you take a break after this novel – or will there be a fifth one?
I can’t stop writing - I love it! I get quite grumpy if I haven’t got a book on the go. I’ve already started writing the next one, I know the beginning, and I know the end and I know the basic plot, but I’m working on the middle bits!
• Helena Davis’s books are available at
Nuts About Books in Mare Street and at Flowers From Howick in Somme Street, Howick. For more information go to www.helenadavisauthor. com or email candlelightromances@gmail.com