Feast your eyes on the exclusive new cover art for Empire of Shadows: The 1898 Edition, coming soon to Kickstarter! This luxuriously nerdy 19th-century inspired special edition of the hit historial fantasy adventure
features:
new original cover in gold and black foil on a green mercerized cotton binding
Victorian-style black and white frontspiece illustration by @atalienart
deckled edges
sewn binding with green and gold colored endbands
new historically-inspired layout
optional gold foiled slipcase It’s everything you need to feel like you just pulled this treasure off the shelves of a cluttered back alley vintage bookstore, except for the sneezing.
William Dunbar, the younger son of a Scottish nobleman, craves wealth, and marriage seems to be his simplest way to achieve it. His pursuit eventually leads him to Mercy Grundy, an old maid in the eyes of mid-1740s society who fears lifelong spinsterhood. Her father has offered a substantial dowry to the man who will take her hand in marriage. For William, marriage to Mercy would be a match made in heaven. But for Mercy, who has succumbed to William’s charms, would marrying him necessitate her taking one false step?
“One False Step is a historical novel prompted by an article I read about Mary Blandy – ‘the fair parricide’ who was hanged outside Oxford Castle for poisoning her father on the 6th of April 1752. I felt that Mary’s story would form the basis for a novel comprising a reimagining of the events leading to her execution – especially given the much-overlooked role played by William Henry Cranstoun, who duped Mary into poisoning her father.”
Now more than halfway through his eighth decade, Clive Woolliscroft is retired and lives in Cheshire with his wife, Sue, and Cocker Spaniel, Bonnie.
Before retiring, he served as an Army Officer in Germany, worked as an International Money Market Trader in London, was a Management Consultant in Prague and Riga and practised as a Solicitor in London, Hertfordshire and Staffordshire.
Ever since Clive was commissioned to write a book to demystify the derivative financial products that emerged in the 1980s, his ambition was to write a novel. That ambition was achieved more than thirty-five years later when Less Dreadful With Every Step was published in May 2023.
One False Step is Clive’s second novel.
My thoughts: inspired by true events, this is a very clever tale of twisted love and a ruthless obsession with money.
William Dunbar is a soldier and a younger son, he’s not set to inherit and his stipend doesn’t stretch far, so he plans to marry wealth. He’s a monster, he marries one woman in Scotland, then heads off to England to find another, richer, mark. In the form of Mercy Grundy, who at almost thirty is headed for a life as an old maid, according to society.
Mercy falls head over heels for the soldier, and vows to do anything she can to marry him. Even after her father learns about his previous (and contested) marriage, and forbids it. Mercy isn’t particularly educated (as women weren’t) and is incredibly naive. William talks her into putting a “love philtre” into her father’s food and drink. Things then take a far darker turn.
William’s single-minded pursuit of money, his obsession with living the high life, brings about his downfall and destroys lives.
The writing is gripping and brings the period vividly to life, the story ramps up the horror of what William has caused to happen and what Mercy has become entangled in, to its shocking conclusion. An excellent example of historical crime fiction.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
The secrets of Rayna Laurence’s past threaten to unravel the life she’s created for herself in West London in 1957.
A young West Indian girl with a talent for singing, Rayna takes a job as a barmaid in a local pub, and it’s there that she meets the charismatic leader of a West Indian jazz band, Eddie Keane. But when her affections become the subject of a tug-of-war between Terry Collins, the pub owner, and Eddie, Rayna chooses Terry, but the love triangle is far from over.
As her fame and fortune as a performer grow, Rayna finds her past catching up with her.
Will the secrets of her former life in the West Indies destroy the life she’s built for herself?
An emotional story of love, music, and hidden truths in post Windrush London.
Fran Clark writes Women’s Fiction, both contemporary and historical. Her first novel was published by Indigo Dreams in 2014. In the same year she achieved a Distinction in her Creative Writing MA from Brunel University. In 2016 she was shortlisted for the SI Leeds Literary Prize. In February 2024, her Island Secrets Book Series will be published, starting with Holding Paradise Book 1.
Originally from London, Fran moved to the English countryside with her musician husband. A musician herself, Fran teaches vocals and leads a local choir. She has two sons.
Fran also writes under the pseudonym, Rosa Temple, writing contemporary fiction and published by HQ Digital and Simon & Schuster UK
My thoughts: I am always interested in why people would pack up their lives and move to the sad, soggy archipelago that is the UK, confronting racism, the crap weather, the grinding poverty and the terrible jobs immigrants often take, which no one else wants to do.
In Rayna’s case, it’s desperation. The job she had back in Dominica wasn’t one she could return to – so to England, and a nursing course she came. My mum was a nurse for over 40 years and worked with lots of women just like Rayna, young, intelligent and resourceful, hardworking and a long way from home.
But Rayna gives up the nursing, ends up in a factory, then when that closes, panicking, she asks a new friend for help. Taking a job as a barmaid in West London isn’t her dream, but she hopes it will keep a roof over her head.
Her talent as a singer leads her on stage, first just in the Pelican, but from there, on world tours, but jazz draws her back to the corner of London she considers home. And into a conflict of the heart, the pub landlord who loves her, the jazz musician who offers her the world. It also brings her face to face with her past, with what she ran from.
It’s an engaging, intelligent book, there’s a lot of heart and Rayna is a wonderful protagonist – big hearted, gentle and talented. She’s not perfect and she makes mistakes but she admits to them, and makes changes to mend them. I really enjoyed this one and rooted for it’s characters all the way through.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
Detective duo Mrs Jameson and Marjorie Swallow are called to investigate when a renowned garden designer suspects that someone is sabotaging her priceless Himalayan Sapphire Lilies, ahead of the 1923 Chelsea Flower Show. But soon it’s not just the flowers that are dying. Rival gardeners, intrepid plant hunters and even King George V himself are caught up in a poisonous bouquet with its roots deep in the mountains of Tibet. The third in the Marjorie Swallow 1920s murder mystery series requires all her wit, charm and pluck to solve.
Anna Sayburn Lane is the author of page-turning murder mysteries set in jazz age London, and of award-winning short stories and contemporary thrillers. Her debut novel, Unlawful Things, was shortlisted for the Virago New Crime Writing award, and her first historical mystery, Blackmail In Bloomsbury, has been described as ‘like slipping on a pair of elegant evening gloves and slipping back to the golden age of detective fiction’. Before turning to fiction, Anna worked as a journalist for local newspapers and medical journals – useful for thinking up novel ways of bumping off fictional characters. She lives in the UK, sharing her time between London and a small seaside town.
My thoughts: I really enjoy this series, I love Marjorie and Mrs Jameson and this particular investigation is very fiendish. After an act of sabotage, which they’ve been called into investigate, a gardener is killed, which is puzzling, and then another body drops at the famous Chelsea Flower Show – in front of the king! That just won’t do.
Is it because of the mysterious flowers due to be exhibited – rare Himalayan Sapphire Lilies or is there something even murkier in their acquisition that’s behind the deaths? There’s lots of shady figures in the flower world it seems, and Mrs Jameson and Marjorie must solve all of this – by Royal request, as murder in front of the monarch is a big problem.
Witty and clever, there’s little time for socialising and lunch in fancy restaurants this time round, and Marjorie is increasingly becoming the quicker detective as she hones her skills of observation and interrogation. Delightful.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
1798: A magical, dark adventure. Fourteen-year-old Pâtca, initiated in the occult arts, comes to Bucharest, to her uncle, Cuviosu Zăval, to retrieve the Book of Perilous Dishes. The recipes in this magical book can bring about damaging sincerity, forgetfulness, the gift of prediction, or hysterical laughter. She finds her uncle murdered and the book missing. All that Zăval has left her is a strange map she must decipher. Travelling from Romania to France and on to Germany to do so, Patca’s family’s true past and powers are revealed, as is her connection to the famous and sublime chef, Silica.
DOINA RUŞTI, important contemporary Romanian novelist, is unanimously appreciated for epic force, for originality and erudition of her novels. She received all major Romanian awards, including the Romanian Academy Prize, and was translated into many languages (even in Chinese).
She wrote ten novels, including: Fantoma din moară (The Phantom in the Mill, 2008), Lizoanca (2009), Zogru (2006).
The novels Manuscrisul fanariot (The Phanariot Manuscript, 2015), Mâța Vinerii (The Book of Perilous Dishes, 2017) and “Homeric” (2019) can be a Phanariotic Trilogy (18th century). The most recent novel: Paturi oculte (Occult beds), 2020.
Good international reviews in: La Stampa, Stato Quotidiano, Il Venerdì di Repubblica. Il Libero, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Magyar Nemzet, La Opinion, Turia. Il Mercurio etc.
Doina Rusti lives in Bucharest, and is a professor and screenwriter.
My thoughts: After her grandmother is dragged away to be executed, our 14 year old protagonist heads to Bucharest to find her uncle. Unfortunately he has been murdered and she gets involved in the various intrigues of society.
The titular book, one Pâtca wrote several years before, has fallen into the hands of a cook who is now making those perilous dishes for the local ruler, and they’re having some strange effects.
As she attempts to get the book back from the cook, solve her uncle’s murder, and stay ahead of the city – who are looking for a witch called Cat O’ Friday, another name for Pâtca.
I really enjoyed this book, Pâtca is an intriguing character, trying to figure all of these different things out, she’s only a teenager but seems wise beyond her years and quite dangerous.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
A governess bound by her own strict rules, a movie-star tormented by grief, a forbidden love story you won’t forget.
Hollywood, 1937 Hester Carlye has no wish to look after the pampered offspring of the rich anymore, in spite of being a highly sought-after governess. But with her elderly father frail, and the roof of their rundown cottage falling in, she has no choice but to accept a dazzling new placement. Movie star Aidan Neil is box office gold, but after the tragic death of his wife Dinah Doyle, he needs Hester’s help to raise their young daughter Erin. Aidan and Dinah were once the perfect Hollywood couple, but stars don’t shine forever…
At Aidan’s glittering Hollywood mansion, Hester finds a family struggling with their grief. Hester knows she can help little Erin, but Aidan’s torment is palpable. Brooding and reclusive, he is far from the picture-perfect hero Hester’s seen in films. There’s an edge to him that makes Hester wonder if he’s hiding a dark secret of his own….
Was the marriage between Aidan and Dinah as perfect as it appeared to be? Was Dinah’s death really a tragic accident? When it finally comes, the truth is more shocking than Hester could ever have imagined. And she knows that if revealed, it will destroy the family she has grown to love and ruin Aidan’s Hollywood dream forever…
Alex Weston is a debut historical fiction writer whose novels are inspired by forbidden love in 1930s Hollywood. She lives in East Yorkshire and her first book for Boldwood, The Hollywood Governess, will be published in June 2024.
My thoughts: Hester Carlyle is a professional governess, hired by wealthy families to care for and educate their children, but she’s had enough, after a terrible accident and a broken engagement, she’s retreated to her family home in Yorkshire to rest and recuperate.
However the roof is falling in, her father’s sick and her youngest sister’s school fees need paying. So she agrees to take another job, for a Hollywood star, a recent widower with a seven year old daughter. Going to work in a bereaved family isn’t easy, but she’s resourceful and good at her job, she’s also kind and compassionate, and it isn’t only Erin who needs her.
As she gets to know her employer, she discovers there are secrets in the past that need to be let into the light in order for everyone to heal and be able to move on with their lives. Hester may play a bigger role in things than she could ever imagine.
This is a lovely, tender read with beautifully written characters and heart.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
Next in the #1 Sunday Times bestselling series, New York Times bestselling author Kate Mosse returns with The Ghost Ship, a sweeping historical epic of adventure on the high seas.
The Barbary Coast, 1621. A mysterious vessel floats silently on the water. It is known only as the Ghost Ship. For months it has hunted pirates to liberate those enslaved by corsairs, manned by a courageous crew of mariners from Italy and France, Holland and the Canary Islands.
But the bravest men on board are not who they seem. And the stakes could not be higher. If arrested, they will be hanged for their crimes. Can they survive the journey and escape their fate?
A sweeping and epic love story, ranging from France in 1610 to Amsterdam and the Canary Islands in the 1620s, The Ghost Ship is a thrilling novel of adventure and buccaneering, love and revenge, stolen fortunes and hidden secrets on the high seas.
KATE MOSSE, CBE, is a multiple New York Times and #1 internationally bestselling author with sales of more than eight million copies in thirty-eight languages. Her previous novels include Labyrinth, Sepulchre, The Winter Ghosts, Citadel, The Taxidermist’s Daughter, and The Burning Chambers. Kate is the founder director of the Women’s Prize for Fiction, a visiting professor at the University of Chichester, and in June 2013, was awarded an Officer of the Order of the British Empire for services to literature. She divides her time between Chichester in the United Kingdom and Carcassonne in France.
My thoughts: this is the third installment of The Joubert Family Chronicles, but I think it could be read as a standalone too. Louise’s story is inspired by the real life female pirates like Anne Bonny and Mary Read, women who took on male roles, who did things they weren’t expected to.
After coming into her inheritance Louise buys a merchant ship, and during a voyage from Amsterdam to the Canary Islands her experiences and the stories of the crew make her want to make a difference. She’s also drawn to a young man, Gilles, who she’s taken under her wing. But like Louise, Gilles is not exactly what he seems.
They become pirates of a sort, stealing not treasure but saving lives – hunting down slave ships and freeing the captives, encouraging them to take over the ships they’re held on.
It’s both an adventure and a romance, Louise and Gilles are both incredibly brave and resourceful, even when things seem incredibly bleak and hopeless, they have courage and faith in one another.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
An atmospheric gothic mystery that beautifully brings the ancient Cornish countryside to life, Armstrong introduces heroine Ruby Vaughn in her Minotaur Books & Mystery Writers of America First Crime Novel Award-winning debut, The Curse of Penryth Hall.
After the Great War, American heiress Ruby Vaughn made a life for herself running a rare bookstore alongside her octogenarian employer and house mate in Exeter. She’s always avoided dwelling on the past, even before the war, but it always has a way of finding her. When Ruby is forced to deliver a box of books to a folk healer living deep in the Cornish countryside, she is brought back to the one place she swore she’d never return. A more sensible soul would have delivered the package and left without rehashing old wounds. But no one has ever accused Ruby of being sensible. Thus begins her visit to Penryth Hall.
A foreboding fortress, Penryth Hall is home to Ruby’s once dearest friend, Tamsyn, and her husband, Sir Edward Chenowyth. It’s an unsettling place, and after a more unsettling evening, Ruby is eager to depart. But her plans change when Penryth’s bells ring for the first time in thirty years. Edward is dead; he met a gruesome end in the orchard, and with his death brings whispers of a returned curse. It also brings Ruan Kivell, the person whose books brought her to Cornwall, the one the locals call a Pellar, the man they believe can break the curse. Ruby doesn’t believe in curses—or Pellars—but this is Cornwall and to these villagers the curse is anything but lore, and they believe it will soon claim its next victim: Tamsyn.
To protect her friend, Ruby must work alongside the Pellar to find out what really happened in the orchard that night.
JESS ARMSTRONG is the USA Today best selling author of the Ruby Vaughn Mysteries. Her debut novel, The Curse of Penryth Hall, won the Minotaur Books/Mystery Writers of America First Crime Novel Competition. She has a masters degree in American History but prefers writing about imaginary people to the real thing. Jess lives in New Orleans with her historian husband, two sons, yellow cat, speckled dog, and the world’s most pampered school-fair goldfish. And when she’s not working on her next project, she’s probably thinking about cheese, baking, on social media or some combination of the above.
My thoughts: Cornwall is a place steeped in magic and mystery – long thought the land of Arthur and his knights, there’s many stories about piskies and spells in England’s southernmost county.
Ruby Vaughn is tasked to deliver a chest of books, despite not wanting to go anywhere near the home of her former close friend Tamsyn Chenowyth. But of course she visits Tamsyn and something terrible happens – Edward Chenowyth is murdered.
The Pellar, a sort of wise man, is called to inspect the body – as well as the constable, as there’s a curse on the family, or so they and the village believe. Ruby, being a modern scientific minded woman, doesn’t believe in curses or magic, she believes a human hand is behind all of it, and she will prove it. Even as she and Ruan Kivell (the Pellar) are drawn together.
The atmosphere does start to get to Ruby, but she’s determined to help Tamsyn, who is terrified her young son will be next. The answers lie in secrets from the past, things kept hidden, in grief and rumour.
I was gripped by this clever, sinister and compelling story, I really liked Ruby, her bookseller employer/surrogate father, the pompous house cat who keeps turning up everywhere, the housekeeper who over feeds everyone, they’re a delightful crew and there’s a hint at the end that there will be more to come….
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
Lady Hannah Simmons is a quintessential wallflower, unassuming, dowdy yet ignored by most. But underneath her plain exterior, Hannah is hiding a thrilling secret!
Unbeknownst to the rest of the ton, she is Queen Victoria’s leading femme fatale, slipping unnoticed through the streets of London and listening to scandalous whispers from lords and ladies. But with daggers in her stockings and pistols in her pockets, Hannah’s mission is to apprehend a deadly killer.
Private Investigator to the Prime Minister, damaged, yet devastatingly handsome ex-war hero Duke Robert Killian always puts duty first. However, when he finds himself competing with the intriguing Lady Hannah on the same daring task, his blood boils with frustration – and desire! Is it possible to seduce this vexing woman whose not afraid to put herself in danger and achieve the upper hand?
Hannah enjoys Killian’s attempts to distract and tempt her, but she has never faced an adversary she couldn’t overthrow. And Killian has never met a challenge he couldn’t conquer…until now. The gauntlet has been thrown. Can they finish their jobs and resist the temptation?
Keep your friends close…and your enemies even closer!
Darcy McGuire is an award-winning New Zealand-born writer now living in the Pacific Northwest. She will write a five-part Victorian romance series for Boldwood, focused on a group of ‘Deadly Damsels’.
My thoughts: I really liked Hannah, she’s a pretty kickass Victorian heroine, with her sensible boots hidden under her skirts, along with several knives and at least one gun.
Duke Killian, former Lieutenant General, turned Government agent, is on the same case as Hannah – that of a murdered maid, who was buried alive. But he’s distracted by Hannah, and then some.
It goes from a bit flirty to very spicy as they agree to trade secrets for “favours” and start falling for one another. But they don’t forget the case, and getting justice for Sarah Bright. But there’s more to the case than one death – and hopefully there’s more stories to come with Hannah and Killian.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
The Fascination is now available in paperback, so to celebrate this excellent Gothic slice of historical fiction I am re-sharing my review from the hardback tour.
Victorian England. A world of rural fairgrounds and glamorous London theatres. A world of dark secrets and deadly obsessions… Twin sisters Keziah and Tilly Lovell are identical in every way, except that Tilly hasn’t grown a single inch since she was five. Coerced into promoting their father’s quack elixir as they tour the country fairgrounds, at the age of fifteen the girls are sold to a mysterious Italian known as ‘ Captain’ . Theo is an orphan, raised by his grandfather, Lord Seabrook, a man who has a dark interest in anatomical freaks and other curiosities … particularly the human kind. Resenting his grandson for his mother’ s death in childbirth, when Seabrook remarries and a new heir is produced, Theo is forced to leave home without a penny to his name. Theo finds employment in Dr Summerwell’ s Museum of Anatomy in London, and here he meets Captain and his theatrical ‘ family’ of performers, freaks and outcasts. But it is Theo’ s fascination with Tilly and Keziah that will lead all of them into a web of deceits, exposing the darkest secrets and threatening everything they know… Exploring universal themes of love and loss, the power of redemption and what it means to be unique, The Fascination is an evocative, glittering and bewitching gothic novel that brings alive Victorian London – and darkness and deception that lies beneath…
Essie Fox was born and raised in rural Herefordshire, which inspires much of her writing.
After studying English Literature at Sheffield University, she moved to London where she worked for the Telegraph Sunday Magazine, then the book publishers George Allen & Unwin – before becoming self-employed in the world of art and design.
Always an avid reader, Essie now spends her time writing historical gothic novels. Her debut, The Somnambulist, was shortlisted for the National Book Awards, and featured on Channel 4’s TV Book Club.
My thoughts: this is a dark and beautiful book about three young people facing adversity and danger, finding their family and happiness despite the odds. Keziah and Tilly are twins, but Tilly stopped growing as a child and their father sells them to a stranger – known as Captain.
Their paths cross with Theo, mistreated and abandoned by his miserable and cruel grandfather, dreaming of becoming a doctor.
It is only a few years later when the three meet again that their lives become entangled as Tilly is kidnapped. Together with the twins’ friends they set out to rescue her and discover the truth about Theo’s family and find a home, and a family of their own.
It’s beautiful as well as sinister, amongst the collections of Theo’s grandfather and then that of the doctor. There’s a lovely little twist right at the very end too. And romance blooms for some of the characters, the wicked are punished, people are reunited and wrongs are undone. It’s a bit Shakespearean as it ends with a wedding, as many of his comedies do, which is fitting for Tilly, playing a fairy queen on stage.
The author’s day job as a historian of the Victorian era means this is a well researched and intelligent story, beautifully brought to life, the characters mix with real life figures, and could themselves almost be real, they certainly feel it. Keziah steps out of the page in her chapters, with all the hopes and dreams of a young woman, even amid her reality. Theo too feels very alive, his struggles and desires to make a difference at odds with the rotten world of his grandfather. Magical and moving.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
ramblingmads 