Goodreads asked Lucinda Riley:

Where did you get the idea for your most recent book?

Lucinda Riley In January 2013, I was searching for my next story but wanted to find an overarching angle to add another element to my past/present writing, something that would challenge and excite me – and my readers. I had always watched the stars – especially the Seven Sisters in the belt of Orion, and on that frosty night in North Norfolk , I looked up to the heavens, and, thinking also of our own seven children, came up with the idea for a seven book series based allegorically on the legends of the Seven Sisters constellation.

For the first book, Maia’s Story, I was in Brazil promoting ‘Hothouse Flower' (The Orchid House) and, having fallen in love with the country and its people, realised I had never read a book based there. I went up Corcovado Mountain to see ‘Christ the Redeemer’, stood in front of him and marvelled at the statue. I wondered what stories lay behind its construction almost a century ago. I began to investigate and heard about the mystery of whose hands were actually used as the model…

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