I have loosely based the main character of Bright Light – Daisy Briscoe – on British-American actress Dorothy Mackaill.

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Born in 1903 in Kingston-upon-Hull, England, it is said that Dorothy Mackaill ran away to London to pursue a career as a stage actress. She then worked in Paris before migrating to New York at the age of 17, and performing in Ziegfeld's Midnight Frolics on Broadway.

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Some of the scenes in Bright Light (posing in front of a journalist having stepped off the boat from Europe and auditioning for the role of an orphaned blind girl) are recounted by Dorothy Mackaill during interviews with journalists in 1920s New York.

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Other events in Bright Light are purely fictional, and tie in with the wider fictional family saga told through my soon to be released novels - The Poole Trilogy.

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I hope you enjoy reading about Daisy Briscoe, and her inspiration Dorothy Moore.