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ABOUT
Dr Madeleine Pelling is a cultural historian and broadcaster. Her debut, Writing on the Wall: Graffiti and the Rebellion in Eighteenth-Century Britain (Profile, 2024), was named a Book of the Year by The Sunday Times, BBC History, and History Today. Her second, Hoax: Truth and Lies in the Age of Enlightenment (Profile, 2026), explores the eighteenth century’s obsession with fraud and performative truth.
Maddy holds a PhD from the University of York, and is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. She is a regular presenter and expert contributor for television, having worked with Channel 4, Sky Arts, Warner Bros, BBC and others.
Her engaging and narrative broadcast style, including as co-host of History Hit's popular After Dark podcast, has earned her critical recognition, including nominations as 'Best New Presenter' and 'Listener's Choice' at the UK ARIA Awards, and a win as 'Rookie of the Year' at the True Crime Awards.
BOOKS
'Pelling is an expert storyteller, teasingly unravelling her tales, holding the reader as spellbound as those who fell for these hoaxes centuries earlier. A scintillating pleasure of a book'
Hallie Rubenhold, author of THE FIVE
Here lies Fanny Lynes, whose whispers from beyond the grave set London alight with scandal.
Here swings Mary Bateman, who lived a life of lies - and died a prophetess and murderer.
Here stands Mary Willcocks. Or is it Anne Burgess? Or Princess Caraboo, from the distant island of Javasu?
A ghost. A witch. A princess. This is a story of those who lie. And of those who choose to believe them.
The discoveries of the Enlightenment unsettled as much as they excited. New truths challenged longstanding beliefs. Rationalism jarred with superstition. Which voices would be heard in this ferocious battle for certainty?
From the chaos, three women and their hoaxes rose as symbols of terror and fascination. But were the lies surrounding Fanny Lynes, Mary Bateman and Mary Willcocks entirely of their own making? Why were the public transfixed?
Questioning culpability and complicity, Pelling's engrossing history of this great age of the hoax reveals a veiled world of moral panic, tall tales and true crime, and holds a mirror to our own turbulent relationship with truth.
'Ingenious' The Spectator
'Fascinating' The Times
Sunday Times, BBC History Magazine and History Today book of the year 2024
What if walls could talk? They can - if you know where to look.
An aristocrat carves obscenities into a tavern window with his diamond ring. A shopkeeper's daughter sketches customers with a piece of coal. A desperate highwayman, condemned to death, scratches his initials into his prison cell door. Writing on the Wall goes in search of the hidden voices of Britain's most rebellious and transformative era - a time when anyone in possession of a sharp point and ready surface could find their voice and immortalise their message. Through the marks made by ordinary people, scratched into walls, doors, windows and more, Madeleine Pelling brings the lost stories of the past to life in all their unguarded glory.
PODCASTS
Maddy is host, along with Dr Anthony Delaney, of History Hit's award-winning After Dark, a podcast that takes listeners to the shadier corners of the past to shine a light on folklore, superstition and true crime. The show has received multiple award nominations and wins, and has hosted expert guests including Dr Tracy Borman OBE, Professor Ronald Hutton and actress and presenter Siobhán McSweeney.
Maddy is also available as an expert contributor to other podcasts, and has worked with partners including BBC History Extra, Churches Conservation Trust and BBC and Times Radio.
TELEVISION
Maddy is a confident and passionate presenter, having fronted documentaries including The Brontës: Death at the Parsonage (History Hit, 2025), Versailles: Science and Splendour (History Hit x Science Museum, 2025), Burke and Hare and The King's Curse (History Hit, 2024). She also appears regularly as an expert contributor, with recent credits including Mayhem! Secret Lives of the Georgian Kings (Sky, 2025),Titanic in Colour (Channel 4, 2024) Royal Autopsy (Sky, 2024), Queens That Changed The World (Channel 4, 2023) and Who Do You Think You Are? Australia (Warner Bros, 2023).
Contact
Literary enquiries, press and television
Charlotte Merritt at Andrew Nurnberg Associates