Rotherweird

1558: Twelve children, gifted far beyond their years, are banished by their Tudor queen to the town of Rotherweird. Some say they are the golden generation; some say the devil's spawn. But everyone knows they are something to be revered - and feared.

Four and a half centuries on, cast adrift from the rest of England by Elizabeth I and still bound by its ancient laws, Rotherweird's independence is subject to one disturbing condition: nobody, but nobody, studies the town or its history.

Then an Outsider arrives, a man of unparallelled wealth and power, enough to buy the whole of Rotherweird - deeply buried secrets and all . . .

Welcome to Rotherweird.

Andrew Caldecott is a Queen's Counsel barrister specializing in media law; he has represented a variety of clients, from the BBC and the Guardian to supermodel Naomi Campbell. An occasional playwright, he turned his hand to fiction when, informed by his love of history, which he studied at New College, Oxford.