Award-winning author Eva St John brings Norwich’s hidden history to life in her new fantasy detective book Flint in the Bones
Norwich has stood for over a thousand years, its Norman castle, medieval lanes, Georgian townhouses and modern buildings all integrated to form the city of today. It’s this very quality, a city where every century is visible at once, that sparked the idea behind Flint in the Bones. The first book in award-winning author Eva St John’s Norwich Map Runners series, Flint in the Bones was recently announced as the winner of the Book Brunch Selfies Award for Best Novel – 2026. It’s now stocked in East Anglian bookshops through Norfolk wholesaler Bittern Books.
“In Norwich you can walk down any street and you will see a multitude of time frames within a five minute walk, you see layers of British history,” says Eva. “I wanted to take it one stage further, what would it be like if all the people were here as well as their buildings? And so Flint in the Bones was born.”
In her novel Eva has put together a magical cataclysm that fuses centuries of Norwich maps together, pulling people forward through time so that Tudor farmers, Victorian housemaids and Georgian matrons all wake up in the present day, disoriented and afraid. Only buildings old enough to appear on enough historical maps survive. The rest, including modern developments, are wiped away. Norwich itself is saved by its ancient city walls, while the surrounding Norfolk countryside becomes a wasteland.
Real Norwich locations anchor the fantasy: the Guildhall, Elm Hill, the Castle, the old city walls, Bank Plain, the Great Hospital and the Cathedral. Real historical figures appear too, including Julian of Norwich. Add in a vicious serial killer, a rookie detective, a cast of characters from different eras, magic and the ability to ‘map run’ (navigate between various historical times) and you have a gripping storyline.
For Eva, the choice to set the books in Norwich was obvious. “I know and love Norwich, so it was easy for me to write a story based here… I can feel Norwich in my bones.”
To get physical copies of Flint in the Bones into local bookshops Eva turned to Steve Haines at Bittern Books, a specialist distributor of books and maps covering Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex. “Steve has been so helpful and generous,” says St John. “I sent him a copy of my book and he loved it, which blew me away… the level of support I get from him is unparalleled in the book business.”
Books one and two of the Norwich Map Runners series are available now through Bittern Books, with book three, currently funding via Kickstarter, set to join the list in November.
Bittern Books specialises in East Anglian books and maps, both as a wholesale business, distributing to retail outlets throughout East Anglia, and also selling direct through our website.
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Images: Andy Blundred- used with permission