Tag: historical fiction

Edinburgh, January 1732: It’s Lady Grange’s funeral. Her death is a shock: still young, she’d shown no signs of ill health.

But Rachel is, in fact, alive. She’s been brutally kidnapped by the man who has falsified her death – her husband of 25 years, a pillar of society with whom she has raised a family.

Her punishment, perhaps, for railing against his infidelity – or for uncovering evidence of his treasonable plottings against the government.

Whether to conceal his Jacobite leanings, or simply to `replace’ a wife with a long-time mistress, Lord Grange banishes Rachel to the remote Hebridean Monach Isles, until she’s removed again to distant St Kilda, far into the Atlantic – to an isolated life of primitive conditions, with no shared language – somewhere she can never be found.

This is the incredible and gripping story of a woman who has until now been remembered mostly by her husband’s unflattering account. Sue Lawrence reconstructs a remarkable tale of how the real Lady Grange may have coped with such a dramatic fate, with courage and grace.

Goodreads Amazon

As well as writing popular historical thrillers, including Down to the Sea, Sue Lawrence is a leading cookery writer. After winning BBC’s MasterChef in 1991, she became a regular contributor to the Sunday Times, Scotland on Sunday and other leading magazines. Raised in Dundee, she now lives in Edinburgh. She has won two Guild of Food Writers Awards.

My thoughts:

This was a really fascinating read. Having read books like The Scandalous Lady W and Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, I knew 18th Century women were treated appalling in their unhappy marriages as they had no rights and not even custody of their own children.

But to have your wife kidnapped, not once, not twice, but three times (the third isn’t covered in the book but is mentioned in the author’s afterword) is a new extreme.

Rachel, Lady Grange, may not have always been easy to live with; her fierce temper and fondness for claret saw to that, but she didn’t deserve the punishment her husband and his Jacobite pal Lord Lovet dreamed up for her.

Fleshing out the limited details available about Lady Grange’s life, Sue Lawrence has created a fascinating, enjoyable and eminently readable piece of historical fiction.

The drinks are flowing. The music’s playing. But the party can’t last.

London, 1950. With the Blitz over and London still rebuilding after the war, jazz musician Lawrie Matthews has answered England’s call for help. Arriving from Jamaica aboard the Empire Windrush, he’s taken a tiny room in south London lodgings, and has fallen in love with the girl next door.

Touring Soho’s music halls by night, pacing the streets as a postman by day, Lawrie has poured his heart into his new home — and it’s alive with possibility. Until one morning, while crossing a misty common, he makes a terrible discovery.

As the local community rallies, fingers of blame are pointed at those who had recently been welcomed with open arms. And before long, London’s newest arrivals become the prime suspects in a tragedy which threatens to tear the city apart. Immersive, poignant, and utterly compelling, Louise Hare’s debut examines the complexities of love and belonging, and teaches us that even in the face of anger and fear, there is always hope.

My thoughts:

With the Windrush generation in the news again, for all the wrong reasons, this is a timely novel about those first arrivals and their new lives in London.

They face racism, both institutional and individual, a struggle to find somewhere to live, work, love.

Lawrie is an empathetic protagonist, you really feel for him as he’s scapegoated and railroaded by a biased copper and a suspicious community.

But it’s Evie’s story that really made me sad, the daughter of a mixed race couple, raised by a single parent, surrounded by white faces and ignorance her whole life.

This is at its heart a love story, not just that of Lawrie and Evie, but of mothers and daughters, of friends, community and music.

Moving and well written, I think Louise Hare is definitely going to be one to watch, this debut novel is powerful and much like Pandora’s box, there’s hope under all the darkness.

Opening with the shooting of Lady Virginia ‘Ginie’ Courtauld in her tranquil garden in 1950s Rhodesia, The Dragon Lady tells Ginie’s extraordinary story, so called for the exotic tattoo snaking up her leg. From the glamorous Italian Riviera before the Great War to the Art Deco glory of Eltham Palace in the thirties, and from the secluded Scottish Highlands to segregated Rhodesia in the fifties, the narrative spans enormous cultural and social change. Lady Virginia Courtauld was a boundary-breaking, colourful and unconventional person who rejected the submissive role women were expected to play.
Ostracised by society for being a foreign divorcée at the time of Edward VIII and Mrs Simpson, Ginie and her second husband ,Stephen Courtauld, leave the confines of post-war Britain to forge a new life in Rhodesia, only to find that being progressive liberals during segregation proves mortally dangerous. Many people had reason to dislike Ginie, but who had reason enough to pull the trigger?
Deeply evocative of time and place, The Dragon Lady subtly blends fact and fiction to paint the portrait of an extraordinary woman in an era of great social and cultural change.

Amazon

Born in London, Louisa Treger began her career as a classical violinist. She studied at the Royal College of Music and the Guildhall School of Music, and worked as a freelance orchestral player and teacher.
Louisa subsequently turned to literature, gaining a First Class degree and a PhD in English at University College London, where she focused on early twentieth century women’s writing.
Married with three children, she lives in London.

Website Facebook Twitter

My thoughts:

This was such a fascinating read, mainly covering the Courtaulds’ time in Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, and their contributions to the cultural and political life of the country; a period I know basically nothing about.

Ginie Courtauld is a very interesting person to read about, and this fictionalised account of her life, from daughter of an Italian merchant and his Romanian wife, to member of an old Huguenot family in the upper echelons of British society was riveting.

She entertained Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson, and the future Queen Mother, at their home in the restored Eltham Palace, before moving to Africa after WWII.

Life in La Rochelle, their Rhodesian estate, wasn’t easy and they alienated their white neighbours by being liberal and egalitarian, treating their black employees better than most, building schools and decent housing; even paying them well! How dare they treat people with respect!

It’s hard to understand that mindset from a vantage point in 2020, where we know that colonialism was a bad thing, and where we can see how ahead of their time the Courtaulds were.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

It is 1761. Prussia is at war with Russia and Austria. As the Russian army occupies East Prussia, King Frederick the Great and his men fight hard to win back their homeland.
In Ludwigshain, a Junker estate in East Prussia, Countess Marion von Adler celebrates an exceptional harvest. But this is soon requisitioned by Russian troops. When Marion tries to stop them, a Russian Captain strikes her. His Lieutenant, Ian Fermor, defends Marion’s honour, but is stabbed for his insubordination. Abandoned by the Russians, Fermor becomes a divisive figure on the estate.
Close to death, Fermor dreams of the Adler, a numinous eagle entity, whose territory extends across the lands of Northern Europe and which is mysteriously connected to the Enlightenment. What happens next will change the course of human history…

Goodreads Amazon

Justin Newland writes history with a supernatural bent. His novels are The Genes of Isis, an epic fantasy set under Ancient Egyptian skies, and The Old Dragon’s Head, a historical fantasy played out in the shadows of the Great Wall of China. He lives with his partner in Somerset, England.

My thoughts:

This was an interesting read, following Fermor’s mysterious quest, and the adventures of several other characters, against a backdrop of war in the 18th Century.

It reminded me of Russian novels with its large cast and various incidents along the way.

Well written and with a strong narrative voice, this book encourages you to ask questions about the nature of things.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour but all opinions remain my own.

Retain your loyalty, preserve your rights.”
Such was the motto of Lady Anne Clifford, the woman who defied King James I and risked everything by opposing her family, friends, and the law in a battle to reclaim her inheritance. Anne’s father, the Earl of Cumberland, died in 1605 and bequeathed his great northern estates not to his sole surviving child but to his brother, believing that a prophecy by his great-grandfather would eventually come true and return the estates to Anne. Only fifteen years old at the time, she and her mother vowed to contest the will, and Anne spent the next three decades battling for what she believed was rightfully hers.
Lady Anne Clifford steadfastly (and treasonably) refused to accept the king’s decision, whatever the consequences, but was defeated and left with the prophecy as her only hope. Widowed at the age of thirty-four, she survived an anxious period alone with her two young daughters before surprising everyone with an ill-judged second marriage that gave her access to the highest in the land. But the Civil War destroyed that power and confined the fifty-two-year-old Anne to a grand palace in London for six years. Would she ever attain “ye landes of mine inheritance”? The Will to Succeed, the first novel to tell the story of Lady Anne Clifford, chronicles her brave attempt to take back what she was owed and gives readers a glimpse into some of the issues that women faced in the seventeenth century.

My Thoughts:

I love a bit of historical fiction revisiting women whose lives might otherwise have been buried and forgotten.

Lady Anne Clifford is one of those women.

The lives of noble women tend to be known about a bit more because their births, marriages, children, deaths would all be recorded, especially if they’re close to the throne. But in Lady Anne’s case it is also because of the extraordinary battle for her inheritance.

Drawing on Lady Anne’s own detailed diary, Raafat has recreated the court of James I & VI, replete with gossip and scandal, a place Anne came to know through both her marriages.

This is vividly drawn, well written and Lady Anne comes across an empathetic and resourceful as she fights the court for her inheritance.

I really enjoyed this book, with its attention to detail at the turbulent 17th Century.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour but all opinions remain my own.