Sarah Dunant’s energetic and engaging talk left the audience in no doubt as to her energy and enthusiasm for her subject matter.

On our rollercoaster ride through Renaissance Venice and Rome, she took us through the arts, religion, history, family and sex.

In her book, Blood and Beauty, she tracks the rise and rise of the Borgia family in late 15th and early 16th century Italy.

They became her subject matter because, wherever she looked in the Renaissance, there they were, so the ubiquity, in a sense, brought the family to her.

Of the painting and buildings that we so admire, she reminded us that none of them would have existed without the corruption-based funds that paid for them.

She told us how her own love of historical fiction had evolved in an attempt to get away from the television and her parents, who were watching it. Reading history at Cambridge, however, had beaten the colour and romance out of history for her. She finds that, if you ask a different question of history, you get a different answer.

At a pivotal point in her life, she was in Florence with her daughters when she asked: “Why was it that this city was the hub?”

She wanted to share her knowledge with them but all she could think to say and show them was men’s work. That was why she chose to write about women.

By the end of Sarah’s talk, we have a vivid picture of Renaissance women’s lot, of the beauty of life in a Convent compared to that outside of it for many women. We are left in no doubt as to the author’s enthusiasm for her subject, her fondness and understanding of her characters and I cannot wait to read the next instalment.

Kay Kiggell