Harry Thompson, This Thing Of Darkness

This is one of the best historical novels I have ever read - if you can call it a novel, as the book is so well-researched it is almost a biography of the two main characters. I was so inspired by the book that I went out and found an actual biography of FitzRoy - very interesting too but not as compelling as Thompson's telling of it. Be warned however this story is at times heartbreakingly sad, as was the discovery that its author had died, tragically young, a mere two days before I had completed reading his first novel. This book had a huge impact on me and I can highly recommend it.