3.5 stars Ash Winters is a bipolar depressive who once wrote a very clinically acclaimed novel, but now makes a living writing mystery genre fiction, when he´s well enough to do anything at all, that is. He feels like a constant disappointment to his friends and family and cannot remember the last time he felt happy or even content. He´s dragged along to a stag party in Brighton against his better judgement and ends up going home with Darian, an Essex model with a spray […]
Finally a Philippa Gregory book I actually enjoyed
Young Jewish girl Hannah Verde flees the Inquisition in Spain with her father after her mother is burned for heresy. They travel through Europe to England, calling themselves “Green” and making a new life for themselves as loyal Christians. Hannah´s father has a printing press and soon his skilled work comes to the attention of scholars like John Dee. While John Dee is visiting their print shop with his patron, Lord Robert Dudley, Hannah has one of her visions, seeing an angel over their shoulder. […]
Being a Russian Countess seems to help when rebuilding one´s life during the 20th Century
3.5 stars Zoya Ossupov, a young noblewoman, second cousin to the Tsar himself, lives a sheltered life of luxury in St. Petersburg. When the revolution breaks out, Zoya´s grandmother, who has seen which way the wind was blowing, bundles up the many garments they´ve sown jewellery into and Zoya and they flee the country through Finland. Having lost her father, mother and elder brother in only a few days and worrying about the safety of her cousins the Romanovs, who were placed in house arrest […]
A historical romance with kissing and scheming guardians
Sixteen year old Helena de Stansion, Comtesse D’Lisle, is spending Christmas Eve wandering around the gardens of the convent where her sister is recuperating from illness when a man suddenly drops down into the convent garden pretty much on top of her. Assuming the man is fleeing from something clandestine, she lies to the nuns and the guards when the approach her to ask if she’s seen someone on the grounds. As a thank you for protecting him, the handsome stranger gives her a kiss. […]