Jul 14, 2026 · 34 min · 12 segments
EBD wrote an adventure for boys - and Kit told me (after editing the episode) that it sounds far more brutal than any of the boys' stories he read as a kid. Time for a bit of international espionage…
EBD is usually thought of as a writer for girls because she was writing in an age when gendered expectations were much greater than they are now.
But she also, in the Chudleigh Hold series, wrote a couple of adventure books which are about, and therefore aimed at, boys.
And it has to be said, they are thrilling tales which came entirely from her imagination.
There are many unknowns in EBD's life, but I am pretty certain that she herself was never held hostage in the Andes or shipwrecked in the Indian Ocean.
She taught girls, mixed with female teachers, lodged with women, and holidayed with women.
Men were not wholly absent from her life, but they did not figure greatly in it.
She was of the generation which lost many men to the First War, and her brother Henzell died when they were both teenagers.
I wonder if perhaps she had her brother in mind when she created the character of Hawk Chudleigh, whose escapade in the Antipodes we're looking at today.
Come with me on the adventure of international espionage, which is EBD's book Top Secret.
EBD is usually thought of as a writer for girls because she was writing in an age when gendered expectations were much greater than they are now.
But she also, in the Chudleigh Hold series, wrote a couple of adventure books which are about, and therefore aimed at, boys.
And it has to be said, they are thrilling tales which came entirely from her imagination.
There are many unknowns in EBD's life, but I am pretty certain that she herself was never held hostage in the Andes or shipwrecked in the Indian Ocean.
She taught girls, mixed with female teachers, lodged with women, and holidayed with women.
Men were not wholly absent from her life, but they did not figure greatly in it.
She was of the generation which lost many men to the First War, and her brother Henzell died when they were both teenagers.
I wonder if perhaps she had her brother in mind when she created the character of Hawk Chudleigh, whose escapade in the Antipodes we're looking at today.
Come with me on the adventure of international espionage, which is EBD's book Top Secret.
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