Sarah, Duchess of York I DARED to DREAM

As she embarks on a new career as a novelist, aged 61, Sarah, Duchess of York talks candidly about the traumas and triumphs of her tumultuous life.

- JULIET RIEDEN

Fifteen years ago, while researching her ancestry, Sarah Ferguson stumbled upon a distant relative she just had to get to know. Her name was Margaret – Sarah’s middle name– she had flaming red hair and a refreshingly feisty disposition. As she delved more into the archives, the Duchess of York felt an uncanny affinity with this woman – actually her great-great-aunt, daughter of the very aristocratic Duke and Duchess of Buccleuch who mingled with the court of Queen Victoria, and was evidently quite a live wire.

But the records proved scant and could only tell her so much, which is where Sarah’s fertile imagination and passion for storytelling kicked in. Her Heart for a Compass is the result, the Duchess’s first attempt at novel writing which is being published out of the Mills & Boon stable. It’s a sweeping saga about family rifts, female empowerment, finding a new life away from the stuffiness of the court in the brave new world of America’s Gilded Age and the power of love. Sound familiar?

“People will spot some of the parallels between me and my heroine, my great-great-aunt Lady Margaret Montagu Douglas Scott. She’s a redhead, she’s strong-willed and stands up for what she believes in, she makes a career in writing. I think inevitably all writers draw on their own experiences: I certainly did,” explains Sarah, who has been penning best-selling children’s books for more than 30 years but is a rookie novelist. “I’m so proud of this book and the fact that I have become a first-time novelist at the age of 61, and the fact that I’m feeling more authentically and confidently myself than ever is reflected in the end of Margaret’s story. But ultimately