You what?

Like many WordPress bloggers, I find myself occasionally disconcerted by some of the search data that’s made available to help keep track of who is visiting this site and why. In part because it can be a bit of a stretch to work out how some of the wackier queries actually drive people to my work, but mainly because it’s quite an eye-opener to see the sort of off-the-wall searches that are going on out there.

I can only hope the people searching hopefully for the following nuggets of information weren’t too disappointed with what they actually found here. I would imagine, however, that they were. Especially the guy (and you just know it’s a guy) with a thing for electric chairs.

• how to get superhuman strength naturally

• erotic executions by electric chair

• extremely crucified female slaves

A word of explanation

I write books.

But when I’m not writing, I read a lot, and when I read it’s almost always history. The history that I like best is the stuff that no-one else is interested in – I’ll never knuckle down to Henry VIII if I can curl up with a strange old book about a forgotten island in the Pacific or social banditry in Brazil. So I tend to stumble across stories that I love, but that are too small, too odd or just too fragmentary to tell my publishers about.

They know much better than I do what is marketable, and inevitably what sells isn’t always what I find fascinating. So I created A Blast From The Past to write about these small, strange stories. Because they’re eye-opening, and because they offer insights of their own into the world we live in. Because I think they ought to be better known. And because, secretly, I think you’ll like them too.