Showing titles in Historical

The follow-up to the best-selling Heresy sees the return of Giordano Bruno, religious exile and renegade monk…Autumn, 1583. As an astrological phenomenon heralds the dawn of a new age and Mary Stuart’s supporters scheme to usurp Elizabeth, a young maid is murdered, occult symbols carved into her flesh. Giordano Bruno is called on to use his cunning to infiltrate the plotters and find evidence against them. In fear for his life, Bruno discovers that the young woman’s murder could point to an even more sinister truth…

It is AD 55. As trouble brews on the eastern fringes of the Roman Empire, Tribune Cato and Centurion Macro must prepare for war.... The wily Parthian Empire has invaded Armenia, a frontier territory claimed by Rome, ousting King Rhadamistus. The king is ambitious and ruthless, but he is vital to Rome's strategic interests. General Corbulo must restore him to power while also readying the troops for war with the powerful Parthian Empire. Corbulo orders new arrivals Cato and Macro, and their elite cohort of Praetorian Guards, to carry out the task.

Spring, 1543. King Henry VIII is wooing Lady Catherine Parr, whom he wants for his sixth wife. But this time the object of his affections is resisting. Archbishop Cranmer and the embattled Protestant faction at court are watching keenly, for Lady Catherine is known to have reformist sympathies.

Scotland, 1924: When Lady Poppy Proudfoot travels to the Highlands for a midsummer party, the last thing she and her fellow guests expect is for a body to wash up beside the loch. Despite protests that it could have been an accident, Poppy is convinced it’s murder and decides to dust off her law degree and hunt for clues. But when the police arrive, the grumpy Inspector MacKenzie dismisses her evidence, insisting a crime scene is no place for a Lady. The nerve!

In 1919, Kathryn Wombacher finds a lonely-hearts ad placed by one Walter Andrew: "Would be pleased to correspond with a refined young lady or widow. Object, matrimony.” Kathryn and Walter fall in love and marry within weeks. What Kathryn doesn’t know...is that her new husband is really James “Bluebeard” Watson, a notorious West Coast serial killer who catfished and married 22 women, murdering 10.

It is 1548, and seven-year-old Mary Queen of Scots, betrothed to her cousin the Dauphin, heir to the French throne, has been dispatched to France. But far from home and vulnerable, surrounded by the double-dealing and debauchery of a dangerous and unpredictable court, she suffers a series of 'accidents'. Her mother, Scotland's Queen Dowager, orders Francis Crawford of Lymond to protect Mary, believing that at the very heart of Henri II's glittering, decadent court is an assassin hired to kill the infant monarch. Lymond must secretly hunt down this individual before he himself is exposed.

South Africa, 1899 - the smouldering hostility between the Boers of the Transvaal and Orange Free State and the British colonies of the Cape and Natal is about to burst into flame. War is coming and no one can prevent it. Colonel Penrod Ballantyne, hero of Abu Klea and Omdurman, is sent to Mafeking to recruit and train men for the fighting ahead. Amber, his wife, the successful novelist, accompanies him - eager to see more of the country her husband is about to risk his life for.

It was 1970 in a defeated Rhode Island fishing town. Vietnam and Nixon dominated the national news. Both the near and distant future looked bleak. But they were five inseparable high school friends with something incredible in common: an unwavering resolve to look after each other no matter what hell life threw at them. And they were on a mission. The plan was simple: Go off the grid before they turned 18 to avoid the draft. They’d sell some grass, stack some cash, then head west and start a commune. What could possibly go wrong?

James Whitby, sentenced to death for the murder of prominent lawyer and former Quit India activist Fareed Mazumdar, is less than two weeks from a date with the gallows. In a last-ditch attempt to save his son, Whitby's father, arch-colonialist, Charles Whitby, forces a new investigation into the killing. The investigation leads Inspector Persis Wadia of the Bombay Police to the old colonial capital of Calcutta, where, with the help of Scotland Yard criminalist Archie Blackfinch, she uncovers a possible link to a second case.

Assyria, in the reign of Ashurbanipal. For Aurya and her daydreaming brother, Sharo, every day is a struggle for survival, as they dodge the beatings of their drunken father and scrabble for scraps of food. One violent evening, everything changes. Soon, they are on the barge of King Ashurbanipal, bound for the beautiful, near-mythical city of Nineveh.

When investigative journalist Hana Sinclair uncovers a cryptic reference to an ancient botanical manuscript left to by her late grandfather, she unravels a thread tied to Hildegard von Bingen, a 12th-century abbess, healer, and mystic. Her findings reveal that Hildegard’s work holds more than historical value—it may conceal the key to curing some of humanity’s most devastating diseases. But someone is determined to ensure her secrets stay buried.

Cleo’s holiday with her family to the seaside resort town of Brighton is everything she hoped it would be…until she receives a blackmail note. The blackmailer demands Cleo help her or a story revealing Cleo’s investigating will appear in the newspaper. With her uncle warning her to keep her detecting activities private, Cleo agrees to meet the blackmailer when they return to London. But when the woman is seen getting on the train but not off, Cleo grows concerned.

After Culloden, Iain MacGillivray was left for dead on Drumossie Moor. Wounded, his face brutally slashed, he survived only by pretending to be dead as the Redcoats patrolled the corpses of his Jacobite comrades. Six years later, with the clan chiefs routed and the Highlands subsumed into the British state, Iain lives a quiet life, working as a bookseller in Inverness. One day, after helping several of his regular customers, he notices a stranger lurking in the upper gallery of his shop, poring over his collection. But the man refuses to say what he's searching for.

In the wake of a humbling incident aboard a canal boat in the Cotswolds, young Captain Horatio Hornblower arrives in London to take command of the Atropos, a 22-gun sloop barely large enough to require a captain. Her first assignment under Hornblower's command is as flagship for the funeral procession of Lord Nelson.

Set in the turbulent times of 12th century England where civil war, famine, religious strife, and battles over royal succession tore lives and families apart, The Pillars of the Earth tells the story of the building of a magnificent cathedral. Against this richly imagined backdrop, filled with intrigue and treachery, Ken Follett draws the reader irresistibly into a wonderful epic of family drama, violent conflict, and unswerving ambition.

There will never be another Western writer like Louis L’Amour. A legendary author and indisputably the greatest storyteller in his genre of all time, L’Amour captivated millions of readers and has sold well over three hundred million copies of his works, which includes nearly ninety novels and countless short stories. Mistakes Can Kill You highlights an essential selection featuring nine of L’Amour’s earlier short stories, sometimes written under the pen name Jim Mayo, that exemplify the rugged morality of the best Western writing.

To live among wolves, first you must become one… An unmissable new spy thriller from best-selling master of the genre, Alex Gerlis. War is coming to Europe. British spymaster Barnaby Allen begins recruiting a network of agents in Germany. With diplomatic relations quickly unravelling, this pack of spies soon comes into their own: the horse-loving German at home in Berlin's underground; the young American sports journalist; the mysterious Luftwaffe officer; the Japanese diplomat and the most unlikely one of all... the SS officer's wife.

Elliot Rosenzweig, a respected civic leader and philanthropist, is attending a fundraiser when he is suddenly accosted and accused of being a former Nazi SS officer named Otto Piatek, the Butcher of Zamosc. Although the charges are denounced as preposterous, his accuser is convinced he is right and engages attorney Catherine Lockhart to bring Rosenzweig to justice.

1539. Anne of Cleves wins the dangerous prize of becoming Henry VIII’s fourth wife. From the start, Anne’s royal blood, education and fierce intelligence count for nothing as the king pursues young Katherine Howard. Katherine is a pawn in the political manoeuvres of her ambitious family; unprepared for the dangers that await, she steps into their trap. At her side is kinswoman Jane Boleyn, who has served - and betrayed - one queen already: her sister-in-law Anne, who died on Henry’s scaffold. Will Jane betray a second queen to the headsman?

Egypt is under attack. The ancient city of Luxor is under attack. Pharaoh Tamose lies mortally wounded. All seems lost. Taita prepares for the enemy's final, fatal push. The ex-slave, now general of Tamose's armies, is never more ingenious than when all hope is dashed. And this is Egypt's most desperate hour. With the timely arrival of an old ally, Taita's army repels the enemy invaders; for now, at least. But upon his return to Luxor, Taita is seized and branded a traitor. Tamose is dead and a poisonous new era has begun. The new Pharaoh has risen.