Profile: Jude Lyon

About This Author

In 1988 I moved to rural Turkey where I lived with my husband and 4 children for 15 years. There we endured electricity and water cuts, earthquakes, hell, high water, no sliced bread. oh yes...and home school. It also spawned the sort of insanity that drives people to write. We eventually moved to Istanbul, and then Ankara where I started to write anything and everything. Most of my work was involved in writing plays/pantomimes/ school assemblies/general entertainment for the local communities and international charities…free of course. Writing for such diverse audiences was not without its challenges; the hardest being to re-write Macbeth so it could be understood by non-mother -tonguers, and also to make it "funny." My biggest achievement to date, was getting the Italian Ambassador on stage to dance to YMCA. Apparently, it had been a long held ambition of his to do so. Oh well,it takes all sorts… When we returned to the UK, I started to write with a friend, mostly on ideas for comedy series for both children and adults. I continued writing plays for schools.Then came 5 years in Australia... During my time in the ex-colony:)I decided I wanted a change of direction, and cast around my home county,Shropshire, for inspiration I can honestly say that from the moment I decided on my subject that all has gone smoothly, and there have been many coincidences that have led me to believe that this book should be written. The Pitchord Chronicles is a trilogy partly based on the visit of Princess Victoria of Kent to Pitchford Hall in 1832. Pitchford Hall is a 16th century manor house, in our little village, Pitchford. It was sold in 1992, along with countless antiques that were auctioned at Sothebys. It is now privately owned,but is, to all intents and purposes, derelict. The Tree with the House in it sits abandoned, probably for the first time in 300 years, but is, at least, cared for as it is grade one listed. John Yates from The National Heritage once said. "Pitchford is a sleeping beauty of Shropshire and one day it'll wake up again" I agree, and hope that this my book will be the Prince to wake it up, or should I say, Princess?