Welcome to M.K. Tod – Mary actually – author of historical fiction
and blogger at A Writer of History.
About M.K.Tod
I’ve been a fan of historical fiction since my teenage years when I stumbled on a novel my mother was reading featuring a sword-wielding Scot and a woman with red hair. Losing myself in long-ago worlds is the best entertainment. In 2004, my husband’s career took us to Hong Kong where, with no job and few prospects, I began to research and write about my grandparents’ lives during two world wars. A few years later, that interest turned into a full-time occupation writing historical fiction.
In a previous life, I worked at an executive level in management consulting. My husband and I have two adult children and live in Toronto, Canada. For a light-hearted look at my background you can read more at Will the Real M.K. Tod Please Stand Up.
For more about my non-writing life, check out the photos below.
M.K.Tod Family Travel
M.K.Tod at twelve...
M.K.Tod at three...
M.K.Tod at four...
who wouldn’t pick up this handsome guy?
a few years ago with our precious grandsons
my lovely mother in 2009; still going at 95
pretending to be movie stars at the Toronto Film Festival
who says you can’t have four people on a bicycle?
a husband who cooks is a treasure
serious chef outfit!
biking can be hard work!
why do they make golfing so difficult?
visiting Estonia notebook in hand
the Dordogne has big hills to climb
you have to match your shoes and your T-shirt
visited the great wall with our daughter in 2005
plenty of steep hills to hike in Hong Kong
the Taj Mahal - one of the wonders of the world
celebrating a special wedding anniversary
the northern tip of New Zealand, one of my favourite countries
rafting down the Nahanni river in Canada’s north, just before the plane crash
in the exotic city of Bangkok
taking notes for Unravelled near Vimy Ridge
Read more about Mary...
I’m a Canadian. As a child I lived in Toronto, Montreal, and Ottawa, our country’s capital city. I studied Mathematics at the undergraduate level and Computer Science at the graduate level. Those subjects may have been useful for my business career, but of no use at all to me as an author!
When I’m not writing you’ll find me enjoying my husband’s company, hanging out with friends and family, biking, hiking, golfing, entertaining, and travelling. While living in Hong Kong for three years, my husband Ian and I had the great gift of visiting countries like New Zealand, Thailand, India, Vietnam and others. We’ve also made trips on our own ticket to places like Ireland, France, Spain, Scotland, Italy, and our own country of Canada.
About the Novels
The Admiral’s Wife was inspired by the experience of living in Hong Kong for three years. It’s a dual-timeline novel featuring two women living more than a century apart who are connected by forbidden love and financial scandal. Author Janie Chang calls it ‘irresistible and absorbing’.
Paris In Ruins is set in Paris 1870 during the tumult of siege and rebellion. It’s the story of two women raised for a life of parties and servants who are brought together to fight for the people and city they love.
I have three earlier novels. Time and Regret, published by Lake Union Publishing, is a “decades-spanning journey of wartime loss, family secrets, and ultimately, redemption.” Available in paperback, ebook and Audiobook formats from Amazon (US, Canada, UK and other countries) and from Barnes & Noble and IndieBound.
My first novel Unravelled is set during WWI and WWII. It earned a Historical Novel Society Indie Editor’s Choice award. A second and connected novel, Lies Told in Silence, was endorsed by noted historical fiction author Sharon Kay Penman as ‘dramatically depicts the horror and heartbreak of war, while also celebrating the resilience of the human spirit’.
More information on my Novels page.
“Tod is not only a good historian, but also an accomplished writer, capturing here the febrile atmosphere of a Paris about to be under siege, the vise tightening, the sense of security eroding.”
- Kirkus Reviews -