Yarde Reviews & Book Promotion

Rachel Fallon

I'm Rachel Fallon. I'm 32 years old and work full time in an office arranging engineer schedules, but after work is when all the fun begins! I write, I read, I bookstagram. I absolutely love fantasy romance and will just eat up any books of it I find. I started my bookstagram because I wanted to keep track of my thoughts on the books I've read, and started doing reviews. It started to take off so I've expanded out to include special edition book and bookish merch spotlights as well a book box unboxings. I love romantasy so much in fact, that I couldn't help coming up with stories in my head all the time. I used other's fictional characters for a long time as my outlet. I received so much support and great feedback, and people encouraging me to write my own novel. I don't think I would have had the guts to chase this dream without them. I sat down and decided y'know what? I want to write a damn book. Let's do this.

Very quickly, the story and characters began coming to me. It's evolved along the way of course, but much of my base brainstorming remains true to the story now. The characters and the world were just so vivid to me right away, and I knew this had to be my focus. I do have other series ideas waiting in the wings for later, but all my love and attention is going into The Star Queen Chronicles right now. Especially book 1, Of Darkness and Ruination. I can't wait to share this with you all!

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Wednesday, 3 April 2024

Don’t miss out on this amazing offer. For a limited time, you can get Tim Walker’s fabulous short stories on #Kindle for only 0.99.

Don’t miss out on this amazing offer. For a limited time, you can get Tim Walker’s fabulous short stories on #Kindle for only 0.99

A word from Mary Anne:

Tim Walker’s books are a favourite of mine, these brilliant short stories are perfect for a quick coffee break.

Scroll down to find out more!

London Tales
By Tim Walker

Publication Date: 7th November 2023

Publisher: Independently Published

Page Length: 203 Pages

Genre: Short Stories

London Tales is a collection of eleven short stories that offer dramatic pinpricks in the rich tapestry of London’s timeline, a city with two thousand years of history. They are glimpses of imagined lives at key moments, starting with a prologue in verse from the point of view of a native Briton tribeswoman absorbing the shock of Roman invasion. The first story is a tense historical adventure set in Roman Londinium in 60 CE from the perspective of terrified legionaries and townsfolk facing the vengeful Iceni queen, Boudica, whose army burnt the fledgling city to the ground.

Further historical dramas take place in 1381 during the Peasant’s Revolt, the Great Fire of London, in 1666 and the last ice fair on the frozen Thames in 1814. These are followed by a romance set during the Blitz in 1941, then the swinging Sixties and wide-flared seventies are remembered in the life story of fictional policeman, Brian Smith. Moving on, an East End family get a fright from copycat killings that are a throwback to the 1888 Jack the Ripper murders.

There’s a series of contemporary stories that reference recent events, including the London terrorist bombings of 2005, a literary pub crawl and a daring prison break, building to the imagined death throes of London in a chilling, dystopian vision. These stories are loosely inspired by the author’s personal experiences and reflections on his time living and working in London in the 1980’s and 90’s. Adaptability, resilience, conformity and resolve are recurring themes.

London Tales evokes the city’s rich history and showcases the qualities that were needed by Londoners at various times to survive and prosper – from the base and brutal, devious and inspired, to the refined and civilized.

Thames Valley Tales

By Tim Walker

Publication Date: 23rd December 2016

Publisher: Independently Published

Page Length: 155 Pages

Genre: Short Stories

This collection of twelve contemporary short stories have been infused with references to the rich history and legends associated with the river Thames in England. Tim Walker’s stories were written during periods of convalescence over the past seven years and reflect his interests and experiences of living and working in towns along the course of England’s longest river wholly within the country. An author’s note near the end of the book explains the context and background to each story.

Some of these stories are updated versions (many with new endings) from the first edition of Thames Valley Tales, published in 2015. They are mixed with new stories to make up this collection selected for their suitability for the new audiobook.

The river Thames rises in a meadow in Gloucestershire, near Lechlade, and flows for 215 miles through nine counties, past Oxford, Reading, Henley, Marlow, Maidenhead, Windsor, Staines, Walton, Hampton Court and Kingston to London, before spilling into the North Sea. The settlements along the course of the river have witnessed many events that have shaped the country’s history and have given rise to myths and legends that dwell outside the bounds of verifiable history.

Tim’s Thames Valley Tales conjure up ghosts of the English Civil War, showcase an unlikely friendship between a pop star and an arms dealer, reveal a murder at Henley Regatta, expose a Runnymede rebellion, welcome the very modern merry Women of Windsor, find Dick Turpin’s treasure in Maidenhead Thicket, reveal a daring Colnbrook caper and cower from a tiger in Oxford.

Also included are three bonus stories from the first edition that are not included in the audiobook. So, get comfortable and enjoy your journey down this mature, meandering river.

Don’t miss out on grabbing both copies HERE before the Kindle Countdown deal ends on 5th April.

London Tales and Thames Valley Tales are also available as audiobooks from Amazon Audible and Apple iTunes, narrated by actor-author Richard James.

Tim Walker

Tim Walker is an independent author based in the UK.

In November 2023 Tim published his second book of short stories, London Tales. This is a collection of eleven stories that echo London's past, reflect the present and imagine its future. London Tales is a companion volume to Thames Valley Tales, re-published as a second edition in March 2023. Also in March, Tim released his first audiobook of Thames Valley Tales, narrated and produced by actor Richard James. These stories cut across a range of genres - historical fiction, crime thriller, contemporary drama and comedy. The rationalisation of Tim's Thames stories into these two volumes marks a personally satisfying conclusion to what had been a dragging conundrum. Now it all makes sense.

His most recent novel is a thrilling dual timeline, Guardians at the Wall, published in June 2021. Inspired by a visit to Hadrian's Wall in 2020, it tells the story of a team of archaeologists who uncover artefacts that connect them to the life of a Roman centurion who had guarded the wall in second century Roman Britannia. The story of centurion Gaius Atticianus of the VI Legion is told in alternating chapters, shadowing the efforts of student archaeologist, Noah Jessop, to piece together an account of Gaius's life and struggles for his thesis. How close will Noah's assumptions be to Gaius's real fate?

Tim published three books in 2020 - Perverse (April); Arthur Rex Brittonum (June) and Charly in Space (September).

Arthur, Rex Brittonum, a re-imagining of the King Arthur story, is book five in his historical series, A Light in the Dark Ages, and follows on from 2019's Arthur Dux Bellorum. Book one in the series is Abandoned (second edition 2018), followed by Ambrosius: Last of the Romans (2017); and book three is Uther's Destiny (2018). Series book covers are designed by Canadian graphic artist, Cathy Walker. The series connects the end of Roman Britain to elements of the Arthurian legend, presenting an imagined history (inspired by early historical sources) of Britain in the early Medieval period, once called the Dark Ages.

Tim lives near Windsor - close to the River Thames - the inspiration for his first book of short stories, Thames Valley Tales (2015, revised second edition, 2023). In September 2017 he published a second book of short stories, Postcards from London (unpublished in August 2023 to make way for London Tales). These stories draw on the local history and current affairs of towns and cities along the course of the Thames where the author has lived and worked. A new collection of poems and short fiction, Perverse, was published in April 2020.

His first novel was a political thriller, Devil Gate Dawn, that received pre-publication exposure on the Kindle Scout programme in March/April 2016. It found a wide readership due to its unnerving predictions of a post-Brexit Britain beset by political turmoil under King Charles III's rule and buckling under attacks from terrorist groups and includes a chapter that anticipated life in Trump America, written a year before his election.

In early 2017 he published his first children's book, co-authored with his daughter, Cathy - The Adventures of Charly Holmes. Another adventure story was published in 2018 - Charly & The Superheroes, followed by Charly in Space (2020).

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Flora must make her own way if she is ever to find where she truly belongs.

The Lucky Penny
By Dilly Court

Publication Date: 1st February 2024

Publisher: HarperCollins

Page Length: 400 Pages

Genre: Historial Fiction / Romance

Clinging tightly to the penny in her palm, Flora’s fortune was about to change…

Flora is forever grateful for the day the Stewart family rescued her from her life of poverty on London’s streets. Adopted as one of their own, she shed her rags and was finally given a place to call home.

When a twist of fate calls her back to the cobbles, Flora’s new life is torn apart.

Flora must make her own way if she is ever to find where she truly belongs…

From the No.1 Sunday Times bestselling author of The Rockwood Chronicles comes an emotional and captivating fireside read about finding home in the most unlikely places.

Pick up your copy of

The Lucky Penny

Dilly Court

Dilly Court grew up in North East London and began her career in commercial television, writing scripts for commercials. She is married with two grown up children, and now lives in Dorset on the beautiful Jurassic Coast with her husband and large, yellow Labrador.

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Goodreads

Make me a better writer: Using the Research Arsenal to Construct a Vivid Setting

Using the Research Arsenal to Construct a Vivid Setting

When writing about the past, it can be difficult to construct a believable and accurate setting. Not only do you have to worry about how differently places would have looked in the past, but you also need to keep in mind what technology has been invented and what objects are commonly (and uncommonly) available. And unlike your peers who may write sci-fi and fantasy and can get away with a bit of make-believe, you’re tasked with recreating the world of the past in a way that can be examined and fact-checked.

Of course, your story is about much more than its setting and physical objects, but getting these details right draws your readers in deeper and creates a more vivid and believable world. For stories taking place during the American Civil War or in the mid-19th century more generally, the Research Arsenal has a wealth of information that can help you construct a vivid setting that will feel grounded and believable to your readers.

Using Quartermaster and Ordnance Specifications for Object Descriptions

When it comes to military gear and weapons, Quartermaster’s and Ordnance Specifications have an unbelievable amount of information about every type of gear the military would bring into the field. Just by browsing through these records, you can get a much fuller picture of the types of things soldiers had with them as well as descriptions of the color and size of each item. To better understand how these records can be used in constructing your setting, let’s break them down into several different types.

Weapons and Ordnance

Weapons and Ordnance covers everything from small arms like pistols to huge pieces of artillery. It also includes the many types of ammunition used by each weapon, as well as the tools and gear it took to maintain weapons and keep them in good condition. Looking up a weapon on the Research Arsenal also links you to historical period photos of it so you can see it as well as read descriptions.

Beyond the weapons themselves, you can also use ordnance specifications to learn about how weapons and ammunition were stored. This entry for ammunition stored in chests tells you the amount of ammunition, its total weight and the location in an ammunition chest that it should be kept. Regardless of whether you include this level of detail in your book, knowing it for yourself can trigger your imagination and give you a greater sense of how things were organized.

Books and Record Keeping

While naturally the greatest focus of the Civil War is on battles and weapons, it required immense logistics and record keeping to be able to effectively provision and order so many men at once. Each regiment was responsible for keeping track of the orders they gave and received as well as official letters they sent and received.

There are a great deal of quartermaster’s specifications dealing with these books, the ink and pens used to write in them, and even the glue that holds them together. The now infamous “red tape” used on documents also gets a mention.

One of the most surprising entries in this section is a description for making “cheese paste” which could be used for gluing parchment together. The description is included in full below.

Cheese Paste is made of fresh white cheese and quicklime. Pound the cheese in a mortar with boiling water : let it stand, and decant it : repeat this operation three or four times. Pound together 3 parts of this cheese thus prepared and 1 part of quicklime, moistening it with pure water till the paste ropes like honey. Prepare only a little at a time. It is used in pasting parchment and parchment-paper.

These different kinds of paste should be used cold. A supply for not more than 2 or 3 days should be made at one time ; but it may be preserved longer by adding alum in the proportion of 1/10th of the weight of flour. The depredations of rats may be prevented by dissolving a like proportion of colocynth in the water with which the paste is made.

Glue is dissolved in its own weight of boiling water. A glue-pot with a water-bath should be used, to avoid burning the glue. Remove the pot from the fire as soon as the glue is entirely dissolved.

Camp and Garrison Equipage

The term “camp and garrison equipage” refers to the bulk of miscellaneous items that soldiers needed to live and serve out in the field. It covers everything from pots and pans, to musical instruments, to flags and tents. For gathering an impression of what camp life was like, these items are an amazing resource.

As with all quartermaster’s specifications in the Research Arsenal, looking up the description also links you to images of the item, so you always have access to both written and visual descriptions. In the image below, you can see soldiers cooking on a stove.

Clothing

If there’s one item you can’t escape writing about, even if only slightly, it would have to be clothing. Clothing in the military is especially unique, because it can tell you about a soldier's rank, area of service, and even sometimes the regiment in which they were serving. Knowing details like what the colors of rank chevrons indicate—infantry, cavalry or artillery (light blue, yellow, and red respectively)—can have a huge impact in crafting descriptions that demonstrate to your reader that you’ve done your research and offer a way to transmit a good deal of information about your characters more subtly and indirectly.

The photograph below is of an unidentified African-American sergeant in the Union cavalry. Note that the picture was hand-colored to show the golden yellow stripes and chevrons on his coat indicating his service in the cavalry.

Using Photographs to Create Descriptions

Beyond the written descriptions of Quartermaster’s and Ordnance Specifications, photographs offer an easy way to see everything from clothing, to camps, to battlefields, and see what day-to-day life really looked like. Crucially, they also offer glimpses of civilian life which is missing from other military records.

The Research Arsenal has thousands of photographs available to browse, all of them tagged and keyword searchable by all of the objects in them. Whether you’re searching for specific locations or just trying to get a general idea of camp life and battlefields, you can learn an extraordinary amount by browsing through the photo collection.

Using Letters to Create Descriptions

Finally, letters can be an amazing resource to turn to for descriptions of both camp and civilian life as well as descriptions of battles. As with searching photos, the best way to find letters related to what you’re looking for is to use the keyword search for a specific item, or else browse for letters written from the area that’s of interest to you.

Many soldiers wrote quite detailed descriptions of their camp and daily lives so that their friends and family could have an accurate understanding of what they were up to. On the civilian side, friends and family also wrote long letters to soldiers keeping them apprised of all of the major happenings in their hometowns, whether that be weddings, funerals, or other big events, as well as plenty of gossip about all the people they knew.

Conclusion

Building a convincing, period-accurate setting can take a lot of work, but the results are well worth it. A convincing setting not only does more to draw in your readers but it also allows you to solve story problems in an authentic and interesting way that wouldn’t occur to people who never bothered to do much more than surface-level research. The better you understand the times in which your characters lived, the easier it will be for you to unlock new story ideas. Finally, your authentic storytelling and understanding of the times will make your books instantly stand out to readers interested in the time period and they’ll be sure to pass along a good word about it to their fellow history lovers.

Click HERE to check out the database.

This database really is a game changer and we have secured a special 15% discount on The Research Arsenals annual membership.

Just type in YARDE at the checkout.

Tuesday, 2 April 2024

The American Daughters is a novel of hope and triumph that reminds us what is possible when a community bands together to fight for their freedom.

The American Daughters
By Maurice Carlos Ruffin

Publication Date: 5th September 2024

Publisher: One World Random House

Page Length: 304 Pages

Genre: Historical Fiction

Ady, a curious, sharp-witted girl, and her fierce mother, Sanite, are inseparable. Enslaved to a businessman in the French Quarter of New Orleans, the pair spend their days dreaming of a loving future and reminiscing about their family's rebellious and storied history. When mother and daughter are separated, Ady is left hopeless and directionless until she stumbles into the Mockingbird Inn and meets Lenore, a free Black woman with whom she becomes fast friends. Lenore invites Ady to join a clandestine society of spies called the Daughters. With the courage instilled in her by Sanite-and with help from these strong women-Ady learns how to put herself first. So begins her journey toward liberation and imagining a new future.

The American Daughters is a novel of hope and triumph that reminds us what is possible when a community bands together to fight for their freedom.

Pre-order your copy of

The American Daughters

Maurice Carlos Ruffin

Maurice Carlos Ruffin is the author of the forthcoming historical novel, The American Daughters, which will be published in 2024 by One World Random House. He is the recipient of the 2023 Louisiana Writer Award and the Black Rock Senegal Residency. He also wrote The Ones Who Don’t Say They Love You, which was published by One World Random House in August 2021. It is the 2023 One Book One New Orleans selection. The book was a New York Times Editor’s Choice, a finalist for the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence and longlisted for the Story Prize. The book was also selected to represent Louisiana at the 2023 National Book Festival. His first book, We Cast a Shadow, was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award, the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, and the PEN America Open Book Prize. It was longlisted for the 2021 DUBLIN Literary Award, the Center for Fiction Prize, and the Aspen Words Literary Prize. The novel was also a New York Times Editor’s Choice. Ruffin is the winner of several literary prizes, including the Iowa Review Award in fiction and the William Faulkner–William Wisdom Creative Writing Competition Award for Novel-in-Progress. His work has appeared in the New York Times, the LA Times, the Oxford American, Garden & Gun, Kenyon Review, and Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America. A New Orleans native, Ruffin is a professor of Creative Writing at Louisiana State University, and the 2020-2021 John and Renee Grisham Writer-in-Residence at the University of Mississippi. Ruffin was the 2022 Grand Marshal of the Mardi Gras Krewe of House Floats and recipient of the 2022 Louisiana Board of Regents ATLAS grant. Ruffin has taught at numerous residencies and conferences including Bread Loaf, Sewanee, Maine Media, Randolph College MFA, and Longleaf. Ruffin was a co-curator of the Read My World Literary Festival (Amsterdam) in 2017 and a contributor in 2022. Ruffin is part of the Artist Network of Narrative 4, an organization dedicated to aiding the educational opportunities of young people.

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Can you catch a killer? Or are you already in the web?

The Spider
By Lars Kepler

Publication Date: 15th February 2024

Publisher: Zaffre

Page Length: 496 Pages

Genre: Psychological Thrillers

CAN YOU CATCH A KILLER?

OR ARE YOU ALREADY IN THE WEB?

Three years ago, Detective Saga Bauer received an ominous postcard describing a gun and nine white bullets - one of which was intended for her partner, Detective Joona Linna. The sender alleged that Saga was the only person who could save him. But as time passed, the threat faded.

Until now.

A sack with a decomposing body has been found hanging from a tree in the forest. A milky white bullet casing turns up at the scene. When the body count begins to rise, the police realise that the killer is sending riddles, offering them the chance to stop the murders before they happen.

But the police always seem to arrive a moment too late. As they begin to close in, the case becomes more and more tangled. Someone is spinning a fiendishly intricate web, pulling Joona ever closer to a trap he may not be able to escape.

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The Spider

Lars Kepler

Lars Kepler is a No.1 bestselling international sensation, whose Joona Linna thrillers have sold more than 12 million copies in 40 languages. The first book in the series, The Hypnotist, was selected for the Richard and Judy Book Club and the most recent, Stalker, went straight to No.1 in Sweden, Norway, Holland and Slovakia.

Lars Kepler is the pseudonym for writing duo Alexander Ahndoril and Alexandra Coelho Ahndoril. They live with their family in Sweden.

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Monday, 1 April 2024

Book Review - The Rise of Synne (Destiny's Embrace Book 1) by LP O'Bryan

The Rise of Synne
(Destiny's Embrace Book 1)
By LP O'Bryan

Publication Date: 17th March 2024
Publisher: Independently Published
Page Length: 446 Pages
Genre: Historical Fiction

1066: While England reels, a young woman reaches for her destiny.

In the chaotic aftermath of the Battle of Hastings, Synne, an orphan healer, chooses a dangerous path. She has royal blood in her veins, but can she survive long enough to even rescue her sisters?

Soon she becomes entangled with Magnus, the disturbingly arrogant son of the fallen King Harold. He offers her a dangerous mission.

Driven by a fiery determination to rescue her sisters from slavers, Synne agrees and becomes a spy in the enemy's camp. Her inherited seer's gift lies untapped, a powerful force waiting to be unleashed.

Captured by the man destined to be King of England, William the Conqueror, Synne finds herself before the assembled nobility at William's coronation feast, branded a traitor.

In a world where alliances are shifting sands, Synne must fight for her life. But why does her accuser want her dead, and what has her involvement with Magnus got to do with it?

Dive into a rich saga where history and destiny collide.

Was this the end of the beginning? Against all odds, William, Duke of Normandy, emerged as the winner in a battle where Harold Godwinson and his Anglo-Saxon army were favoured to win. Now, Harold was dead, his body mutilated, and those who survived the fray were fleeing towards the relatively safety of London where they could regroup and decide the next course of action.

Among their number was Synne and her brother Stefan. After the murder of their mother, the capture of their sisters, and the banishment from the only home they knew, Synne, and Stefan, travel across the country. Synne is a gifted healer, and healers are always in demand. Synne holds onto the hope that someone, somewhere, has information about the location of their sisters, Tate and Gytha. It was why they had joined Harold and his army in the first place. Unfortunately, Harold’s death meant that the possibility of finding her sisters was dwindling with each passing minute. But Synne was not one to give up easily.

Despite Stefan’s urging, Synne chooses to stay and see if any of the nobility has survived before the Normans catch up to them. This decision would change the course of her life forever.

LP O’Bryan’s The Rise of Synne is a gripping account of war, betrayal, and the unbreakable bond of kinship. O’Bryan’s novel, based on real events and includes many historical figures, is poised to captivate readers with its brilliance, authenticity, and historical precision.

O’Bryan possesses an instinctive comprehension of history’s captivating allure. The Battle of Hastings irrevocably changed the course of England’s future and signalled the near end of Anglo-Saxon rule. Still, the victory at Hastings was not the singular event that established William as king. After the battle, he had to solidify his position and form alliances with English nobility, while neutralizing any potential challenges to his aspirations. O’Bryan’s story begins where the battle ends, and what an extraordinary story it is! The attention to the smallest historical detail demonstrates the hours of research that have gone into writing this book. Such dedication is to be praised for this novel screams authenticity and makes this book all the more appealing.

The narrative features a highly appealing ensemble of characters. Told in the first person, the reader experiences the events of this story through the eyes of Synne. Synne treads a fine line between the spiritual world and the religious one. The prophecy stated that she would follow in her mother’s footsteps as a seer. However, due to her mother’s identity, she has experienced profound and inexplicable heartbreak, which makes her cautious of men of the cloth especially at the start. She has to hold her ground again and again and convince them she is a good Christian woman and not a threat. Initially, there is suspicion in her relationship with the monk, Ulf, but it transitions into trust as the story unfolds, unlike her encounters with a certain Norman clergyman!

Synne, despite her healing background, becomes embroiled in a tragic power struggle. This struggle involves not just the Anglo-Saxons and the Normans, but also the Anglo-Saxon nobility who are torn between national interests and personal gain. Who should they stand with, the Norman outsider or the hastily approved Witan appointed Edgar Ætheling? The illustration of the Earls of Mercia and Northumbria was stunning, highlighting their deceitful nature in their interactions with the House of Godwinson. In the same way, Harold’s other children, Edmund and Magnus, grapple with diverse personal beliefs in which direction to take, but they maintain a united front as a family, at least publicly. The portrayal of these historical figures greatly enhanced the story’s credibility and made it an absolutely captivating read.

Although the looming threat of William, Duke of Normandy, persists throughout the book, readers only meet him near the end of the novel. The combination of his arrogance, ambition, and battle prowess propelled him to his current status. He is no man’s fool and knows when to withdraw and when to advance. Although when he withdraws the local population pays a heavy price. Similar to historical events, William seizes control of the treasury in Winchester, giving him an advantage over Harold’s followers who are regrouping in London. The novel expertly showcases this advantage, revealing that even supposed allies can be bought if the price is right.

In my opinion, this book struck the perfect balance between history and fiction. The Rise of Synne by LP O'Bryan, is so captivating that once you begin reading it, you won’t want to stop. There’s no such thing as too much when historical fiction is written like this. This story is brilliant from beginning to end and will leave a lasting impression on you. Without question, this is a book that requires your undivided attention until the final full stop. Discovering that this novel is part of a series was a delightful surprise, and I am eagerly anticipating reading the other books in what is sure to be a memorable saga.

Pick up your copy of
The Rise of Synne
HERE!

LP O'Bryan

I spent over 2 years researching this series, including a week at Christ Church College, Oxford, to ensure I understood as much as I can about the period described in these novels. That was a time of real change, like what we are living through today. I live to write and I appreciate all feedback and reviews. They will help as I expand the series beyond what you see here.

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She took on titans, battled generals, and changed the world as we know it…

Becoming Madam Secretary
By Stephanie Dray

Publication Date: 4th March 2024

Publication: Berkley

Page Length: 524 Pages

Genre: Historical Biographical Fiction

She took on titans, battled generals, and changed the world as we know it…

New York Times bestselling author Stephanie Dray returns with a captivating and dramatic new novel about an American heroine Frances Perkins.

Raised on tales of her revolutionary ancestors, Frances Perkins arrives in New York City at the turn of the century, armed with her trusty parasol and an unyielding determination to make a difference.

When she’s not working with children in the crowded tenements in Hell’s Kitchen, Frances throws herself into the social scene in Greenwich Village, befriending an eclectic group of politicians, artists, and activists, including the millionaire socialite Mary Harriman Rumsey, the flirtatious budding author Sinclair Lewis, and the brilliant but troubled reformer Paul Wilson, with whom she falls deeply in love.

But when Frances meets a young lawyer named Franklin Delano Roosevelt at a tea dance, sparks fly in all the wrong directions. She thinks he’s a rich, arrogant dilettante who gets by on a handsome face and a famous name. He thinks she’s a priggish bluestocking and insufferable do-gooder. Neither knows it yet, but over the next twenty years, they will form a historic partnership that will carry them both to the White House.

Frances is destined to rise in a political world dominated by men, facing down the Great Depression as FDR’s most trusted lieutenant—even as she struggles to balance the demands of a public career with marriage and motherhood. And when vicious political attacks mount and personal tragedies threaten to derail her ambitions, she must decide what she’s willing to do—and what she’s willing to sacrifice—to save a nation.

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Becoming Madam Secretary

Stephanie Dray

STEPHANIE DRAY is a New York Times, Wall Street Journal & USA Today bestselling author of historical women’s fiction. Her award-winning work has been translated into many languages and tops lists for the most anticipated reads of the year. Now she lives in Maryland with her husband, cats, and history books.

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Can Æthelflæd fulfil her father’s dream of uniting England?

King Alfred's Daughter

By David Stokes

Publication Date: 28th March 2023

Publisher: Book Guild Publishing Ltd

Page Length: 300 Pages

Genre: Historical Fiction

King Alfred is dead and the achievements that made him great are in jeopardy. Rebels challenge the succession of his son Edward to the Wessex throne, and his old ally in Mercia is sick. The Vikings in the Danelaw sense the time has come to complete their conquest of England.

It falls on Alfred’s firstborn, his daughter, Æthelflæd, to unite the Anglo-Saxons. Reluctantly, she takes up the challenge. But can a woman rebuild ruined towns and lead men into battle against hardened Viking warriors? And can Æthelflæd fulfil her father’s dream of uniting England?

Based on contemporary sources and archaeological evidence, King Alfred’s Daughter is rich in drama, family conflict and historical achievement.

Pick up your copy of

King Alfred's Daughter