by Kate Mosse 'In her last seconds of consciousness, [she] grieved to think this was how the story would end. In a forgotten corner of a graveyard on the other side of the world. This is the day of my death.' Readers who have followed Kate Mosse's story of the Joubert Family and the Huguenot-Catholic …
Category: Historical Fiction
The Color Purple
by Alice Walker 'Dear God, I am fourteen years old. I am I have always been a good girl. Maybe you can give me a sign letting me know what is happening to me.' So begins Alice Walker's brilliant, prize-winning epistolary novel, The Color Purple. It introduces Celie, a poor, black, badly-educated and ugly (in …
Dawnlands
by Philippa Gregory '[Rowan] nodded and disappeared before his eyes. It was as if she had melted into air. One moment he held her warm hand and saw her confident smile under the shadow of her hat, and the next there were just shadows, not even the outline of her shadow, not even the whisper …
The Long Song
by Andrea Levy A Review 'And what a squealing, tempestuous, fuss-making child she was. The quivering pink tongue and toothless gums in July's shrieking mouth were more familiar to her mama than he baby's arms and feet.' The British Slave Trade Act of 1807 did not abolish slavery. The aspirations of many in the Colonies, …
Cloud Cuckoo Land
by Anthony Doerr Like All The Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr's 2014/2015 Pulitzer winner, Cloud Cuckoo Land comes as a big surprise. It is a book within a book, as compelling as it is original, and tells the story in three timelines - well, four really (which I will explain shortly). Beginning and ending …
Girl Meets Boy (13th Century Style)
The Tiger and the Cauldron To coincide with the release today of the new paperback, here are two final teasers from the story! ' Dawn came too quickly for Hassan. He had hardly slept but his body felt warm and alive. Doquz lay close to him beneath the double blanket, her wounded arm still wrapped …
Challenging an Empire
The Tiger and the Cauldron New Edition " Doquz had seen death and violence before but never had it filled her with such horror. Though Jahan had relaxed his hold, she was for a moment unable to move. Then something snapped inside her brain. Instead of fear and disgust, she was filled with terrible rage. …
Adventure, Love and Legend (2)
Another little plug today for my paperback novel, The Gammadion. 'The envoy shivered. It was only a month till the solstice and, though no snow had fallen, the sharp mountain wind chilled his bones. It was true he had known colder winters, but the circumstances of this journey were exceptional. Fear played a part in …
Adventure, Love and Legend
I hope readers will allow me today to give a boost to my most recently published historical novel. Entitled The Gammadion, it is a completely new and revised edition of an earlier book from 2002, and is a prequel to The Tiger and the Cauldron which I serialised here recently. The cover of the book …
Sisters at the Edge of the World
by Ailish Sinclair A Review 'Atunement. Living flesh, pulsing with the beat of life, touching stone that is also living and beating in another way. There is life within. And there is wisdom. And there is a throb of energy, gathered over time. And love. Yes, love.' The Roman historian Tacitus wrote of a great …