Leaves from the Fig Tree

Raised by eccentric grandparents at Annesgrove, an Irish stately home, Diana Duff grew up surrounded by family ghosts, banshees and buried treasure. At 18, Diana entered the glamorous world of 1950s Kenya, becoming a stand-in for Grace Kelly before embarking on a career as a nurse. After marrying a young officer in the Colonial Service, Diana spent her nights shivering and alone, gun in hand, as the Mau Mau rebellion threatened to engulf her. Moving to Tanganyika, Diana went on to found the first inter-racial nursery school in East Africa before a transfer saw the family shifting to South Africa in the 1960s at the height of apartheid.