Literary Lunch: Best-selling novelist determined not to give away the plot of latest book

The 77-year-old author told a packed Yorkshire Post Literary Lunch audience she would stick to talking about the prologue to her latest novel, Playing the Game, which would hopefully provoke interest without spoiling the story.

Set in the glamorous and secretive depths of the art world, the book begins with consultant and private dealer Annette Remington, who has just sold a long-lost Rembrandt for 20m.

"That actually happened in London in December 2009," said Mrs Bradford. "This book has secrets, lies, treachery – and all this exists in the art world."

The prologue ends with a hint at Annette's dark and secret past – but the author remained tight lipped about what happens next.

Gervase Phinn, a self-confessed "oldie with attitude", had guests shaking with laughter as he related anecdotes from his time as a teacher and school inspector.

Out of the Woods but not Over the Hill looks back at more than 60 years of family life, his career and time as a writer and public speaker.

"My dad used to tell me poems, and I thought all mums chased their children around the kitchen pretending to be a witch," he explained.

"I was very lucky with my parents, but all children deserve the best that life can give them.."

The final speaker was Frances Brody whose latest novel, A Medal for Murder, is set in Harrogate in August 1922, who revealed how her story hit a potential problem when she was told there'd been a flood in Harrogate at that time.

But after poring over newspaper records, she found the flood was actually a burst water main.