Derbyshire novelist publishes fourth book in series on Second World War women

In bookshops from Thursday, June 8, Bridget’s War is set around an internment camp on the Isle of Man, a place that holds extra significance for the writer Shirley Mann, from Wirksworth.

The first book in the series, Lily’s War, drew on her parents’ wartime experiences – her mother as a WAAF in Bomber Command and her father in the Eighth Army. They later retired to the Isle of Man, and both are buried there.

Shirley said: “This has been a very special book for me because of my parents’ connection with the Island. It’s as if my writing journey has come full circle.”

Like all of Shirley’s works, the story is backed up by extensive research and oral history interviews with the now-dwindling generation who experienced the war as young women.

She said: “I’m a journalist so I’m paranoid about getting something wrong and my research is a vital part of the process. I do know the Isle of Man, it is the most amazing place full of folklore, but if I get one thing wrong, they’ll tell me.”

In 1940, the Home Office opened Rushen Internment Camp on the island to contain British residents considered as a potential threat to the war effort.

It housed only women and children, and unlike their adult male counterparts, they were billeted with local families rather than held in requisitioned boarding houses.

An instruction from Winston Churchill to ‘Collar the lot,’ meant German Jews were forced to rub shoulders with German Nazis, as well as prostitutes, conscientious objectors and fascists.

Shirley, who previously worked at the BBC, said: “It’s a part of war history not many people know about, and once I heard about it, I couldn’t resist. I knew there had to be a story there and talking to the relatives of a policewoman who worked there gave me the impetus I needed to start writing.”

Set in 1942, the plot of the new book follows a police officer who is sent from London back to the island where she grew up to ‘babysit a pile of women’ as she puts it.

Behind the barbed wire she discovers a cauldron of resentment and fear before a seemingly simple arrest unearths a plot that brings the terror of war across the Irish Sea.

Early reviews of Bridget’s War have begun to reward Shirley’s efforts, describing the book as a ‘gritty’ drama, ‘gripping’ and ‘brilliantly written’.

Published in paperback by Zaffre, the novel will be available from online and high street retailers for around £8.99. Readers can get their hands on a signed copy at a launch event at Scarthin Books in Cromford on Sunday, June 11, 2-4pm.

The other books in the series are Hannah’s War, based on Land Army girls, and Bobby’s War, which was inspired by ATA pilot Mary Ellis and won the 2021 Romantic Novelists’ Association Romantic Saga Novel of the Year award.

To learn more about Shirley’s work, go to shirleymannauthor.home.blog.