You usually see him on the telly or hear his urbane tones on the radio. His voice has that calm, reassuring bedside manner that reaches the parts other broadcasting doctors cannot reach.

And now Britain’s favourite on-screen GP, Dr Hilary Jones, has found his writing voice, launching his epic historical series in the midst of a pandemic.

He’ll be at BridLit in conversation with Sally Laverack on Thursday 11 November at the Bull Ballroom at 10am.

They’ll be talking about Frontline, a sweeping sumptuous World War I medical drama set during the Spanish Flu pandemic, when only the strongest survived.

The pandemic killed an estimated 50 million people, with the mortality rate higher in the 20-40s age range and those below five and over 65.

Frontline is the first book in a series charting the rise of a prominent British medical family in the twentieth century. From wars to a pandemic, the discovery of penicillin to the birth of the NHS, successive generations of the Burnett family are at the vanguard of life-saving developments in medicine.

Dr Hilary’s debut novel focuses on aristocrat’s daughter Grace, a nurse, and Will, a young soldier, who meet in a field hospital in France. Rumours of Armistice abound but hopes of peace are threatened by the deadly virus.

You can hear more about the novel in this clip on the ITV website when Dr Hilary talks to This Morning presenters Philip Schofield and Holly Willoughby.

At BridLit, Dr Hilary will be discussing the challenges posed by writing romantic fiction and plotting the course of a family saga across the 20th century. Are there parallels with Covid 19, which has affected global well-being?

For more information and to book tickets go to the page on the website via this link.