From childhood travels abroad to standing awestruck before Tutankhamun’s golden mask at the Met, Katherine Kirkpatrick has long carried a fascination with history and Egypt’s mysteries. Shaped by both wonder and loss, she turned to writing early in life, a path that led to her new historical novel To Chase the Glowing Hours, fifteen years in the making.
Welcome, Katherine!
What:
My new historical fiction novel, To Chase the Glowing Hours (Regal House Publishing, September 2025), features the real-life residents of Highclere Castle, the English manor made famous in the Downton Abbey series. Lady Eve, the 21-year-old daughter of the Earl of Carnarvon, travels to Egypt with her father. There, her father’s hired archaeologist, Howard Carter, has discovered steps leading down into the ground. He believes he’s found the lost tomb of King Tutankhamun. Amidst the excitement of her adventure, Eve finds herself enamored with the brilliant yet temperamental archaeologist. Set against the alluring and glamorous backdrops of England and Egypt in 1922-1923, the novel explores themes of love, grief, loss, privilege, and self-discovery.
To Chase the Glowing Hours was in the works for fifteen years, so it’s great to see it finally come out!
Why:
There is a place in the world for dreamy, empathetic individuals who are willing to work hard toward their artistic pursuits.
I grew up in Stony Brook, Long Island, New York, in a household of readers. My mother, Audrey Kirkpatrick, had a favorite professor at Cornell, Vladimir Nabokov, whose classes inspired her lifelong love of literature. My two siblings and I became writers and publishing professionals. Our family’s enthusiasm for history, art, archaeology, and ancient Egypt also comes from our mother. My father, Dale Kirkpatrick, was an entrepreneur whose business ventures included a travel agency. Lucky me, I traveled abroad from the age of five. Experiences of exotic places settled into my consciousness, as did a visit to the Tutankhamun touring exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 1977. I stood mesmerized in front of Tutankhamun’s golden death mask, an experience that has stayed with me for decades.
Those are some of the idyllic aspects of my upbringing. I was also a very lonely child and painfully sensitive. The youngest by eight and a half years, I yearned for my sister and brother when they went off to boarding school. When I was nine and ten, two of my grandparents and another in our family circle all died. I developed an intense inner life.
In the fourth grade, I decided I wanted to be a writer, and an enormous amount of family support backed that desire. That I wasn’t raised to think practically was both a blessing and a curse. I’m low on marketable skills. However, there is a place in the world for dreamy, empathetic individuals who are willing to work hard toward their artistic pursuits.
Katherine at Highclere Castle
How:
I recommend that all authors learn how to make book trailers.
Actress and dancer Ginger Rogers once said, “I did everything Fred Astaire did, only backwards and in high heels.” An editor once told me that writing historical fiction was a similar process to dancing. It’s hard, but you need to make it look easy. The challenge for most historical fiction writers is to ease up on the historical details, to keep the story smooth and flowing.
I love traveling to the settings of my books. To research To Chase the Glowing Hours, I toured Highclere Castle twice. My late mother-in-law was British, so I was already visiting England every two or three years for family reasons and could make side trips. Journeying to Egypt was a far bolder adventure to undertake. For that, I needed to leave my husband and young children at home. I was prepared to go alone. Fortunately, my sister, brother-in-law, and niece accompanied me.
You can see some of my Highclere Castle and Egypt photos in my YouTube videos. Video making is a new hobby of mine. I recommend that all authors learn how to make book trailers. Videos help to generate excitement for our books, and they are easy to create with software programs like Canva. Make a little movie about your book and see how much fun you’ll have.
“An archaeological romance full of Roaring Twenties glamor and grit, made all the more fascinating for being based in truth. Kirkpatrick brings the discovery of King Tutankhamun’s tomb to life through the sharp and wondering eyes of the youthful ingenue Lady Evelyn Herbert, in a tribute to treasure.”
—Elizabeth Wein, author of the New York Times and international bestseller Code Name Verity
Bio
When not flying over the Valley of the Kings in a hot air balloon or exploring the secret cabinets of Highclere Castle, Katherine Kirkpatrick can be found at her computer in Seattle, Washington. Before marriage and full-time caretaking of younger and older family members, Katherine worked in New York City in the book publishing industry. Katherine enjoys hiking and nature, Sumi ink painting, and playing the harp.
Thank you for visiting! Linda K. Sienkiewicz is a wrangler of words and big messy feelings. Her second novel, Love and Other Incurable Ailments, is coming October 27, 2026, from Regal House Publishing: When love letters from a despondent stranger land in her lap, an anxiety-ridden overthinker becomes convinced she’s the cure, and sets off to save him, and herself, blissfully armed with nothing but magical thinking. Connect with Linda on social media via LinkTree. Check out Linda’s Books. Sign up for her newsletter and never miss an event, announcement or giveaway!
