Historical Women

The gripping multimillion-copy best seller charting the rags to riches story of Emma Harte. In 1905 a young kitchen maid leaves Fairley Hall. Emma Harte is 16, single and pregnant. By 1968 she is one of the richest women in the world, ruler of a business empire stretching from Yorkshire to the glittering cities of America and the rugged vastness of Australia. But what is the price she has paid? A Woman of Substance is as impossible to pause as it is to forget.

‘Women can be heroes, too’. When twenty-year-old nursing student, Frances “Frankie” McGrath, hears these unexpected words, it is a revelation. Raised on California’s idyllic Coronado Island and sheltered by her conservative parents, she has always prided herself on doing the right thing, being a good girl. But in 1965 the world is changing, and she suddenly imagines a different path for her life. When her brother ships out to serve in Vietnam, she impulsively joins the Army Nurses Corps and follows his path.

Minerva Hepplewhite has learned the hard way how to take care of herself. When an intruder breaks into her home, she doesn't swoon or simper. Instead she wallops the rogue over the head and ties him up - only to realize he is Chase Radnor, the man who nearly got her convicted of her late husband's murder. Now, he's insisting that Minerva has inherited a fortune from his uncle, a wealthy duke. Only one thing could surprise her more: her sudden attraction to this exasperating man.... 

This riveting narrative explores the lives of six remarkable female pharaohs, from Hatshepsut to Cleopatra - women who ruled with real power - and shines a piercing light on our own perceptions of women in power today. Female rulers are a rare phenomenon - but thousands of years ago in ancient Egypt, women reigned supreme. But throughout human history, women in positions of power were more often used as political pawns in a male-dominated society. What was so special about ancient Egypt that provided women this kind of access to the highest political office?

Philippa Gregory's first story in the best-selling Wideacre trilogy. A compelling tale of passion and intrigue set in the 18th century. From the author of The Other Boleyn Girl and The Virgin's Lover. Wideacre Hall, set in the heart of the English countryside, is the ancestral home that Beatrice Lacey loves. But as a woman of the 18th century, she has no right of inheritance. Corrupted by a world that mistreats women, she sets out to corrupt others.

The year is 1920: Flying in the face of convention, legendary American adventuress Beryl Helliwell never fails to surprise and shock. The last thing her adoring public would expect is that she craves some peace and quiet. The humdrum hamlet of Walmsley Parva in the English countryside seems just the ticket. And, honestly, until America comes to its senses and repeals Prohibition, Beryl has no intention of returning stateside and subjecting herself to bathtub gin.

The daughter and granddaughter of prominent Manhattan lawyers, Meredith McKenzie is destined for the best of everything: top schools, elite social circles, the perfect marriage. Spending her childhood in Germany as her father prosecutes Nazi war criminals at the Nuremberg trials, Meredith soaks up the conflict between good and evil as it plays out in real time. When her family returns to the United States, she begins blazing her own trail, swimming against the tides, spurred on by her freethinking liberal grandfather, determined to become a lawyer despite her traditional, conservative father's objections.

Harry went off to fight for the Crown unaware his delightful interlude with his childhood friend had permanent consequences. Now, he's back in England, catapulted into the title by his brother's untimely death. He sorely misses his former life of unfettered adventure, so when he has reason to explore Little Puddledon, he jumps at the chance. But what he finds there is something - and someone - he never knew he'd lost, and a once-forbidden love whose time has come, if only he can persuade Pen he's home to stay....   

When amateur sleuth Augusta Peel receives a mysterious letter about a missing young woman, she can’t resist helping with the search. But the case takes a turn when an art student is found dead in a Bloomsbury square. Could the murder have something to do with Augusta’s investigation? The more questions she asks, the fewer answers she receives. Someone’s hiding something.

Frances Wynn, the American-born Countess of Harleigh, enjoys more freedom as a widow than she did as a wife. After an obligatory year spent mourning her philandering husband, Reggie, she puts aside her drab black gowns, leaving the countryside and her money-grubbing in-laws behind. With her young daughter in tow, Frances rents a home in Belgravia and prepares to welcome her sister, Lily, arriving from New York - for her first London season. But no sooner has Frances begun her new life than the ghosts of her old one make an unwelcome appearance....

In this second installment of Carola Dunn's cozy mystery series set in 1923 England, plucky Daisy Dalrymple embarks on another assignment for Town and Country magazine and discovers that daffodil bulbs aren't all that's buried in a country estate's flower bed.

Turned out of her ancestral home by her vicious half-brother, the orphaned daughter of an English duke and a French noblewoman makes her way to Paris and takes in abused French streetwalkers, transforming them into sought-after courtesans in the city's most exclusive bordello, Le Boudoir. It is only the beginning of her return to the upper reaches of society and ultimate justice.

He is the last duke standing...the sole remaining bachelor of the three self-proclaimed Decadent Dukes. Yet, Davina MacCallum's reasons for searching out the handsome Duke of Brentworth have nothing to do with marriage. Scottish lands were unfairly confiscated from her family by the Crown and given to his. A reasonable man with vast holdings can surely part with one trivial estate, especially when Davina intends to put it to good use. Brentworth, however, is as difficult to persuade as he is to resist.

They meet in a clash of swords, drenched in the moonlight of Britain's rugged eastern coast: Captain Jack, his handsome features etched in silver and shadow, his powerful physique compelling "Kit" Cranmer to surrender. He is her dream lover come vividly alive, and his command of the smuggling gang is absolute. His all-knowing gaze penetrates her disguise as the male leader of a rival gang with frightening ease, and his "punishment" with kisses leaves her maidenly modesty in tatters.

The third volume in the best-selling Wideacre trilogy. Set in the 18th century, they launched the career of Philippa Gregory, the best-selling author of The Other Boleyn Girl and Three Sisters, Three Queens. Meridon, a desolate Romany girl, is determined to escape the hard poverty of her childhood. Riding bareback in a travelling show while her sister, Dandy, risks her life on the trapeze, Meridon dedicates herself to freeing them both from danger and want.

The Wideacre estate is bankrupt, the villagers are living in poverty and Wideacre Hall is a smoke-blackened ruin. But in the Dower House, two children are being raised in protected innocence. Equal claimants to the inheritance of Wideacre, rivals for the love of the village, they are tied by a secret childhood betrothal but forbidden to marry. Only one can be the favoured child.

December 1918: There is much to celebrate for 19-year-old Phoebe Renshaw and her three siblings at their beloved family estate of Foxwood Hall. The war is finally over; eldest daughter Julia’s engagement to the Marquis of Allerton appears imminent; and all have gathered to enjoy peace on earth, good will toward men. But the peace is shattered on Boxing Day, when the Marquis goes missing and macabre evidence of foul play turns up in gift boxes given to lady’s maid Eva Huntford and a handful of others. 

When Lord Wrexford discovers the body of a gifted inventor in a dark London alley, he promptly alerts the watchman and lets the authorities handle the matter. But Wrexford soon finds himself drawn into the murder investigation when the inventor's widow begs for his assistance, claiming the crime was not a random robbery. It seems her husband's designs for a revolutionary steam-powered engine went missing the night of his death. The plans could be worth a fortune and very dangerous in the wrong hands.

London’s bright young things are partying, Soho’s nightlife is buzzing, and Augusta Peel is hiding in her basement. She has a reason to hide there: it’s home to her Bloomsbury workshop where she repairs old, neglected books. After a busy time during the war, all Augusta wants is peace and quiet. But events take a turn when Augusta agrees to chaperone nineteen-year-old Harriet Jones on a date. Failing to get her home on time, she ends up in a riotous nightclub. She can’t imagine the evening getting much worse when the police raid it. But then the murder happens.

At one time, Corrie ten Boom would have laughed at the idea that she had a story to tell. For the first 50 years of her life, nothing out of the ordinary ever happened to her. She was a spinster watchmaker living contentedly with her sister and their elderly father in the tiny house over their shop in Haarlem. Their uneventful days, as regulated as their own watches, revolved around their abiding love for one another. But with the Nazi invasion and occupation of Holland, everything changed....