Yes I remember that. I think there was maybe a TV series as well but not certain.

I read a few of his when I worked at James Thins - Player of Games, and Consider Phlebas for sure but the others I can't remember definitely, and only Player has left much impression 3 decades later. Banks himself seems to have been a lovely guy - we swapped emails once and he was charming.

2/ anotehr of the Reid girls and she is described as having peach coloured hair down below, that that was a tell about a connection to Joleta, but then that was later contradicted from what I recall. Probably a peach-red herring!

Simon was "intermittently fertile" I think was the phrase Dorothy used. All to do with him wearing armour too often for his jousting practice allegedly! 😉 Sometime I'll need to dig through the discussions we had on Dunnetworks 20-odd years ago. Many had assumed that when Nick finds Henry with /2

2/ That's all from memory and it's a while since I studied it properly so I may be misremembering the details, but that was the gist of it. Corrections welcome from anybody that studied it more recently.

That was certainly an early theory but seems to have been discarded later. Dorothy apparently said "Close the book on Bonne" at a gathering. The theory was that Simon got one of his conquests (Muriella?) pregnant and Conn Malloch married her and they left Scotland. Malloch later became Mallett. /2

It's ages since I delved into that in detail so I may be a bit hazy. IIRC it was decided that it wasn't via Henry (which had been suspected ), but may have been through Simon. So very distant and not direct from Nicholas, but a slight link. Unlike most Scottish houses being closely related! 😉

What an intriguing question. Sadly I have no idea, and short of there being something in Alastair's archived papers (which might be unlikely if there was an MI6 connection) I can't imagine how else we could find out. Would be lovely if there is a way of finding out.

Looks like he might be related to Joleta! 😉

Sounds like you're getting the idea! 😉 There are a couple of family trees created by readers but they aren't 100% reliable. One of them includes stuff that was in Dorothy's archives as early possible plans and experiments and were later discarded.

4/ society matters. Naturally there is some crossover of background information about Dorothy but the sites serve different purposes and co-exist happily.

3/ I was on the original DDS council for many years and was chairman for a time, and fully support them. Contrary to one article that appeared on the web there is no rivalry whatsoever - I built and maintain the first ever Dunnett website with Dorothy's help, while the society website focuses on /4

2/ users addresses on any particular topic. There are plans for Bluesky to have a communities feature but how exactly it'll work isn't yet clear. The DDS is well worth joining for the excellent quarterly magazine and if you want to attend events in person or via some new online events. /3

2/ you've finished the series you can follow the feed and individuals for further discussion. We do tend to discuss Lymond more than Niccolo - have you read Lymond? - but probably best to make sure nothing spoils your read.

Most readers that know of us follow me and/or the DDS, but the feed gives folk a better chance of finding us. In the same way things like Booksky or Historical Fiction+ are basically just a feed.

Yes, and the all-round cooking experience to give it a damn good try. I bet you've never burnt toffee!