WHEN you try and re-imagine one of the country's most popular novels, you're inevitably setting yourself up for some flack.

And that's exactly what author Jo Baker got when she released her bestselling book, Longbourn, which looks at Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice from the servants point of view.

"I really just did it for my own entertainment," she tells me. "I love Jane Austen but always thought her books never really spoke to me. My family are very much from a working class background, so back then I was never going to be wearing a pretty dress like the Bennet's, I was more likely to be scrubbing the floor.

"I started getting a bit of flack before it even came out. People were quite angry about, I assume they thought I was being disrespectful. I suppose as a fan myself I would have thought the same thing."

But when the book came out it was a huge success making the Sunday Times bestsellers list and now it's being made into a film.

"I just kept getting these calls from my agent," she adds, "and I just kept on giggling every time she told some more good news."

Educated at Oxford and Queen’s University, Belfast, Jo has returned back to her home town of Lancaster where she lives with her husband, the playwright and screenwriter Daragh Carville and their two children.

Her latest book is inspired by another literary hero of her's, the playwright Samuel Beckett and his incredible little known story of his time spent in Paris during the Second World War.

A Country Road, A Tree, is also a re-imagining, this time of Beckett’s involvement with the Resistance during the war.

"In terms of his writing," Jo says, "there is quite a gap from his early stuff to his later writings and such a sea change in between he got me to thinking what had happened to him during that time.

"He was Irish and he could have easily sat the war out but he made a conscious decision to go back to Paris and for me that appeared to be such a courageous decision."

In the end Jo has ended up with a cross between an adventure story, packed with spies, danger and passion, and an examination of what makes an enigmatic literary figure like Beckett tick.

"It was fun to write," she chuckles. "I loved all the adventure stuff and there was quite a bit of fun research as well going to Paris to visit all the places where Beckett hung out."

Jo Baker will be talking and signing copies of her new book at Wivenhoe Bookshop in the High Street, next Wednesday, June 15, from 2pm.

For more information call the shop on 01206 824050 or go on-line at www.wivenhoebooks.com