Iris Gower
The meticulously researched books of popular novelist, Iris Gower (b1939), have won her a worldwide readership. She still lives and writes in Mumbles where she was born.
Her historical romances all take as their setting the city of Swansea and the Gower Peninsula (from which she adopted her 'nom de plume') both providing her with a source of seemingly inexhaustible inspiration.
Iris Gower’s novels, the majority of which feature complex and spirited female leading characters, range widely and deal with subjects such as the copper-mining industry in Copper Kingdom (1984) and the Swansea potteries in the Firebird series.
The Rowan Tree (2003), set in 1831, tells of the cattle drovers who used to drive their animals from West Wales to London's Smithfield Market on foot.