Who better than a novelist who’s also a historian and the latest biographer of Charles I to review Mary & George, the TV drama based on the life of George, Duke of Buckingham, favourite of James VI and I? We asked Mark Turnbull to watch the series. Many of us ask why the Stuarts are […]
The Other Gwyn Girl by Nicola Cornick
1671 in London: the Civil War is over and Charles II, the ‘Merry Monarch’, is revelling in the throne of his murdered father and all the privileges and power that comes with it. Sharing the spoils is his favourite companion, the celebrated beauty, actress Nell Gwyn. Beloved of the English people, Nell has come a […]
Fiction and the English Civil Wars
Jemahl Evans, author of the Blandford Candy series of novels about a man known as the last Roundhead, surveys 300 years of fiction about the English Civil Wars. The popularity of the English Civil Wars and the wider 17th century as a period for historical fiction novelists has ebbed and flowed over the last 300 […]
Horse and Pistol by Griff Hosker
An only child of Anglo-French descent, young James Bretherton has known a life of privilege; well-educated and mild mannered, his path is filled with promise. But when James suddenly finds himself orphaned and penniless, his future looks decidedly bleak. It is only when Fate intervenes in the guise of two English mercenaries, that James is […]
The Shadows of London by Andrew Taylor
London 1671, and the damage caused by the Great Fire still overshadows the capital. The disfigured body of a man is unearthed in the ruins of the old almshouse, forcing architect Cat Hakesby to stop restoration work. It is clear he has been murdered, and Whitehall secretary James Marwood is ordered to investigate. When the […]
Baby Face, Charles II’s French mistress
Andrew Taylor profiles Louise de Keroualle, the Breton ‘baby faced’ girl who became one of Charles II’s most long-lasting mistresses, Nell Gwynn’s worst enemy — and a French spy. She appears in his latest book, The Shadows of London. Who is often described as the Merry Monarch? The answer of course is Charles II, who […]
The Secrets of Crestwell Hall by Alexandra Walsh
1605: Bess Throckmorton is well used to cunning plots and intrigues. With her husband Sir Walter Raleigh imprisoned in the Tower of London, and she and her family in a constant battle to outwit Robert Cecil, the most powerful man in the country, who is determined to ruin her, Bess decides to retreat to her […]
Bess Throckmorton and the Gunpowder Plotters’ wives
Bess Throckmorton, Walter Raleigh’s wife, was a formidable character who survived disgrace under Elizabeth I and her husband’s execution under James VI and I. Intrigued by her, Alexandra Walsh found that Bess’s connections to the wives of most of the Gunpowder Plotters would give Bess a central role in her novel, The Secrets of Cresswell […]