Westmorland, 1970. Dark and imposing in a bleak landscape, Foulstone Manor stands abandoned on the edges of the Lake District. Reclusive Joan Goss inherited Foulstone, but her fragmented memories of her childhood there still disturb her and she keeps her distance in a cottage on the outskirts of the land. Joan was brought up by […]
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 […]
The London Bookshop Affair by Louise Fein
London, 1962: The world is teetering on the brink of nuclear war but life must go on. Celia Duchesne longs for a career, but with no means or qualifications, passes her time working at a dusty bookshop. The day a handsome American enters the shop, she thinks she might have found her way out of […]
The Austrian Bride by Helen Parusel
Austria, 1938 After years of hardship, Ella is full of hope for a better future for Austrians, and when Hitler marches into Linz, she can’t help but become swept up in the euphoria of her boyfriend, Max. But she soon realises her mistake. When she witnesses a woman being shot in the street and a […]
Clash of Kings by MJ Porter
It’s AD937. After the slaughter field of Brunanburh, a defeated Olaf Gothfrithson of the Dublin Norse and Constantin of the Scots narrowly escaped with their lives. In their kingdoms, failure has left them demoralised and weak. Olaf licks his wounds in Dublin, whilst Constantin and the Welsh kingdoms who defied King Athelstan, are once more […]
Sherlock Holmes and the Duelling Dukes by Linda Stratmann
In 1877, Sherlock Holmes and his good friend Mr Stamford have taken a break from their studies at Barts Medical College in London to join a gentlemen’s sporting week at a large country manor house. But on arrival, they find the guests consumed by old rivalries, with new hatreds and sinister plots festering among them. […]
Conquest by Griff Hosker
King William has the crown of Edward the Confessor, but he has many enemies both at home and abroad. He has to subdue a land that does not want a Norman yoke upon its shoulders. When Richard fitz Malet is given the manor north of York he finds that it is a poisoned chalice and […]
Historia interview: 2023 HWA Gold Crown shortlist: Rebecca Stott
Rebecca Stott’s novel Dark Earth was shortlisted for the HWA Gold Crown Award in 2023. The judges described it as “spellbinding… Filled with folklore and myth and evocative world-building, an immersive and endlessly vivid novel.” It follows two sisters’ fight for survival in post-Roman ruined London: a place filled with violence and superstition. Congratulations on […]