Mary Chamberlain’s vivid social and oral history of an isolated village in the Cambridgeshire Fens was the first book ever published by Virago. Told through the voices and lives of women, whose memories span over one hundred years, it provides a unique portrait of a working-class, rural community where intermarriage was common, most inhabitants lived […]
Latest releases from HWA members
1217: The Battles that Saved England by Catherine Hanley
In 1215 King John had agreed to the terms of Magna Carta, but then reneged on his word, plunging the kingdom into war. Rebellious barons offered the throne to the French prince, Louis, and set off a chain of events that almost changed the course of English history. Louis arrived in May 1216, was proclaimed […]
The Queen and the Countess by Anne O’Brien
England in the 1450s, and Queen Margaret knows she must protect the crown, and her son Prince Edward’s claim to it, at all costs. It is up to her to fight for their inheritance, with her husband King Henry VI becoming increasingly frail. And as the Wars of the Roses rage on, Margaret’s enemies lurk […]
Death in the Aviary by Victoria Dowd
New Year’s Eve, 1928. In the grand residence of Ravenswick Abbey, isolated in the wilds of Dartmoor, nine members of the household step into an ornate lift. The power fails. The lift stops. In the darkness, a single shot is fired. When the light returns, Charles Ravenswick — the heir to the Ravenswick fortune — […]
The Ladies’ Lounge by Graham Brack
When Captain Josef Slonský is sent to investigate reports of an unpleasant smell in an apartment building, he already knows what he’s going to find. The man has been dead for some time with a brutal wound to the head. With no signs of forced entry, it seems likely he knew his attacker. But this […]
The Stolen Crown by Tracy Borman
In March, 1603, Queen Elizabeth I, the last Tudor monarch, lies dying at Richmond Palace. The queen’s ministers cluster round her bedside, urging her to name her successor — something she has stubbornly resisted throughout her reign. Almost with her last breath she whispers that James VI of Scotland should succeed her. Or so we’ve […]
Appointment in Paris by Jane Thynne
It’s April 1940, and Britain is in turmoil. Chamberlain’s government is faltering, and a German invasion may be only weeks away. A body, wearing the uniform of a Luftwaffe captain, is found in the grounds of Trent Park, a stately home and now a prison to house high level German POWs. Trent Park’s true purpose, […]
City of Destruction by Vaseem Khan
Bombay, 1951, and a political rally ends in tragedy when India’s first female police detective, Persis Wadia, kills a lone gunman as he attempts to assassinate the divisive new defence minister, a man calling for war with India’s new post-Independence neighbours. With the Malabar House team tasked to hunt down the assassin’s co-conspirators — aided […]