About the Author
In the Covilhã’s Secret Journal series, M. H. Broderick draws on a private archive of over 2,000 antiquarian books and maps to reconstruct the real-world clandestine missions and high-stakes diplomacy of Portugal’s most forgotten royal envoy.
Unearthing the Secret Journal
The inspiration for the series—and the first novel, Terra Barbaria—struck in a dusty Viennese antiquarian bookshop: I stumbled across a rare 1947 chronicle of Portuguese seafarers and discovered an incredible, untold odyssey.
I saw that Pêro da Covilhã played a pivotal role in the escalating 15th-century conflict between East and West, Islam and Christianity. He successfully scouted the route to India a full decade before the celebrated Vasco da Gama ever set sail. Yet, because of a strict policy of secrecy at the Portuguese court, his achievements were buried as a mere footnote in our history books. I was compelled to set the record straight.
Archives, Research, and the Horn of Africa
Today, my writing is fueled by a private library centered on the history and culture of Portugal and Abyssinia. This archive allows me to build an immersive, historically accurate geopolitical backdrop—with the tension and narrative drive of a world on the edge of empire.
To ensure the world feels real, my wife and I have traveled extensively through Portugal and embarked on a study tour of Ethiopia—formerly Abyssinia—to get a first-hand understanding of the cultures Pêro encountered in the Highlands of the Horn of Africa.
From Technical Writer
to Historical Detective
I started off as an American Army brat born in Germany. After being schooled in Spain and California, I studied applied linguistics at the University of Mainz. Eventually, I wound up as a technical writer, editor, and information developer for major international corporations.
That background is exactly why I treat historical fiction with rigorous professionalism. Over the last ten years, I’ve mapped out the seven-book Covilhã’s Secret Journal series—adhering strictly to the historical timeline. Making good use of my languages and linguistic studies, I combine the authentic phrasing of the era with today’s English—actively avoiding anachronisms—to keep Covilhã’s world authentic, but accessible.
I’ve also compiled a private dossier of nearly 300 historical and fictional characters, and a glossary of 1,300 foreign and obsolete terms, excerpts of which I’ll include from book to book and online.
The Scriptorium
Today, I live a quiet life near Heidelberg with my dearly loved German wife and a strict succession of fierce German cats.
In fact, my wife fittingly insisted that I include a fictional Maghrebi cat—Felfel—in Terra Barbaria. I took the hint. There will be at least one feline accomplice in every novel.
All three of us enjoy perusing the old tomes, looking at the costume plates, and poring over the roteiros, the rutters of the Portuguese discoveries.
From Barstow
to Barbaria
I learned to type in junior high in Barstow, California.
I was the only guy in a class full of girls, pounding away on a machine that our cats could use as a staircase today. It took a few decades, a slight upgrade in hardware, and a whole lot of research, but those early, hard-won typing skills eventually hammered out the first draft of Terra Barbaria.
Look closely at the page in this early-1900s Remington Standard No. 10. It was the first model where you could actually see the words as they were typed—which means you can see them, too…
Meet my Co-Author
Kitzekatze, my fierce feline co-author, always keeps an eye out for comma gremlins and anachronism rats trying to sneak into our novels.
Securing the Scriptorium
One of the Kitze’s self-appointed tasks is to stand watch over the Scriptorium, keeping out fault-finding rodents—and checking on her porcelain double.
All these responsibilities inspired us to create Negreta, ironically “Little Black One” in Catalan, for the second book in the series, Terra Occidens. Negreta is a 15th-century maritime gat de bord, “a ship’s cat”—no vessel left port without one.
Surveying the Grounds
Scouting the terrain surrounding our library of dusty tomes is another of the Kitze’s daily duties.
Want to read the rest of that first chapter on the typewriter? Join Mike and the Kitze in the Covilhã Intelligence Network to get the complete first chapter of Terra Barbaria for free, along with exclusive access to the archives.