A stellar line-up of authors will be appearing at the Chorleywood Bookshop’s first ever history festival over the course of three Wednesday evenings to talk about both historical fact and fiction.

All ages will be able to enjoy the talks, based on family sagas, love letters, romances, poetry, lively intellectual debate, and real-life stories of remarkable people.

The festival kicks off with Mandy Kirby, editor of Love Letters of the Great War, a book which brings together some of the most romantic correspondence ever written. From the private papers of Winston Churchill to the tender notes of an unknown Tommy in the trenches, these letters offer an intimate glimpse into the hearts of men and women separated by the conflict.

Mandy will be talking about some of the wrenching accounts of fear, jealousy, love and betrayal she has come across.

Also on the first evening, Juliet West will be talking about her book, Before the Fall, a compelling tale of a love affair set in the East End during World War One, based on an unforgettable real-life story.

Fans of Downton Abbey won’t want to miss TV historian Kate Williams the following week.

Kate has written her first novel, The Storms of War, a family saga which involves a complex plot based in the summer of 1914 along the lines of everyone’s favourite period drama.

Kate regularly appears on radio and television as an expert on historical, royal and constitutional matters on the BBC and Radio 4, and is the author of five acclaimed non-fiction historical titles.

She will be appearing alongside Adele Parks, Sunday Times writer and author of a number of best-selling novels.

Spare Brides is her first historical novel and tells the story of four female friends who are all very different in terms of class, relationship status and beauty, but the same in that their lives have all been dramatically altered by the First World War.

The third and final evening of the festival features three authors who have all researched elements of the war through the eyes of very different people.

James Long has written The Balloonist, a mesmerising novel of an almost forgotten service of World War One – a balloon observer hanging under a gas bag filled with explosive hydrogen, one of the most dangerous jobs on the Western Front.

Max Egremont’s book Some Desperate Glory examines the war through the lives of the poets who fought at the Front, while Duncan Barrett focuses on the Post Office heroes who fought in World War One in Men of Letters.

The Post Office was the world’s biggest employer when the war broke out and many employees found themselves on the Front Line, and their own letters are worked into this fascinating book.

  • The Chorleywood Bookshop History Festival takes place at Chorleywood Memorial Hall, Common Road, Chorleywood, on Wednesday, September 17, 24 and Wednesday, October 1 at 7.30pm. Details: 01923 283566, chorleywoodbookshop.co.uk