Antonia Hodgson: The Devil in the Marshalsea

Styles, John, The Dress of the People

Vickery, Amanda, Behind Closed Doors: At Home in Georgian England

Worsley, Lucy, Courtiers: The Secret History of Kensington Palace

Firstly I would like to thank both Jo Unwin and Clare Conville for their brilliant encouragement and help. Big thanks to Carrie Plitt and to everyone at Conville & Walsh – especially Jake Smith-Bosanquet, Henna Silvennoinen and Alexandra McNicoll.

Joint firstly (this is allowed, I’ve decided) – thanks to my publisher Nick Sayers for his tireless support and brilliant editorial guidance. Also to Laura Macdougall, Alasdair Oliver, Kerry Hood, Ellen Wood and the whole team at Hodder for everything.

My US publisher Andrea Schulze provided thoughtful and perceptive notes that really made a difference – I am very grateful both to her and her team at Houghton Mifflin.

Thanks to the staff at the British Library – especially for not looking at me in a funny way when I ordered up a multi-volume collection of eighteenth-century erotica. It was for research. It was for research. It was for research. (What I tell you three times is true.)

Thanks to Richard Beswick for being a thoroughly bene cove. To David Shelley for his support and good humour. To Luigi Bonomi for his very useful and thoughtful advice. To Ant, Vic and the Kirstys for their fine company and kindness. To Jo Dickinson, Harrie Evans, Lance Fitzgerald, John O’Connell and Andrew Wille for friendship and wise counsel. Very special thanks to Rowena and Ian for all this and their incredible hospitality. And a low bow with a flourish to my parents and my sisters Kay, Michelle and Debbie.

I’m grateful to everyone at Little, Brown for their encouragement – especially Ursula Mackenzie, Cath Burke, Hannah Boursnell, Sean Garrehy, Clare Smith and Adam Strange.

Finally, thanks and eternal gratitude to my very dear friend Ursula Doyle for her loyalty, generosity and regular trips to the tavern.

Antonia Hodgson was born and grew up in Derby.

She studied English at the University of Leeds.

THE DEVIL IN THE MARSHALSEA is her debut novel.