Upcoming Historical Fiction Releases

Hello dear readers! I hope you all got to peruse my interview with Kayla Posney at the Pittsburgh Historical Fictional Examiner. A big thank you to her for thinking of me and for maintaining such a great site.

I mentioned yesterday that I had a big announcement. Well it was sort of the release of my interview (you can't tell that I'm proud, can you?) but I'm also announcing that I am taking requests for reviews, as well as author interviews. What does this entail? Send me an e-mail, pitch me your book, and if I like the sound of it I will read it and post a review. More information can be found up top on the tab labeled "Need A Review?" If I really like your book, I will most likely feature you in an author interview as well (if you're willing).

So that's all the news that's fit for print.

Oh wait, I have yet more books to add to my upcoming releases to be read list...

The Fortune Hunter - Daisy Goodwin

I have to wait until July or at least until this one pops up on Netgalley. I hope it will as I really, really enjoyed The American Heiress which was based loosely on the marriage of Consuelo Vanderbilt to the Duke of Marlborough in the late 19th century. The Fortune Hunter is set in 1875 and features Si
si, the Empress of Austria. Beautiful, athletic and intelligent, she has everything - except happiness.

Bored with the stultifying etiquette of the Hapsburg Court and her dutiful but unexciting husband, Franz Joseph, Sisi comes to England to hunt. She comes looking for excitement and she finds it in the dashing form of Captain Bay Middleton, the only man in Europe who can outride her. Ten years younger than her and engaged to the rich and devoted Charlotte, Bay has everything to lose by falling for a woman who can never be his. But Bay and the Empress are as reckless as each other, and their mutual attraction is a force that cannot be denied.


A Triple Knot - Emma Campion

Another one that isn't due out until July. I read Campion's The King's Mistress which detailed the story of the much maligned Alice Perrars, mistress to King Edward III. Set in the same time period, this new novel features Joan of Kent, the woman who become the first Princess of Wales. Joan is a renowned beauty and niece of King Edward III, and seems blessed with a life of royal privilege until her father is executed for treason and she becomes a ward of the king, living amongst those who deem her the daughter of a traitor. Joan begins to understand the brutal constraints and dangers inherent in being of royal blood. There is one at court who loves her, but his love proves the greatest threat of all.

As an impetuous teenager, she escapes into a clandestine marriage in a bid for freedom, then must hide it for nearly a decade, as her guardians marry her off to another man. After her first husband's death, Joan—now a mother of four—enters into another scandalous relationship, this time with the heir to the British throne, Prince Edward, hero of Crécy and Poitiers, who has loved her all along. But his devotion comes at a terrible price. Haunted by nightmares of her father's execution and the ruthlessness of her royal kin, Joan must reconcile her passion for the crown prince with the potentially tragic costs of a royal life.

I'm really looking forward to this one. I read Karen Harper's The First Princess of Wales and enjoyed it immensely.

Cavendon Hall - Barbara Taylor Bradford

Jumping forward several centuries, this newest novel by the author of A Woman Substance borrows a page from Downton Abbey by uncovering the goings-on upstairs and belowstairs in a great English manor. I've never read Bradford before so I'm interested to see if I enjoy it.

Cavendon Hall is home to two families, the aristocratic Inghams and the Swanns who serve them. Charles Ingham, the sixth Earl of Mowbray, lives there with his wife Felicity and their six children. Walter Swann, the premier male of the Swann family, is valet to the earl. His wife Alice, a clever seamstress who is in charge of the countess's wardrobe, also makes clothes for the four daughters. For centuries, these two families have lived side-by-side, beneath the backdrop of the imposing Yorkshire manor. Lady Daphne, the most beautiful of the Earl’s daughters, is about to be presented at court when a devastating event changes her life and threatens the Ingham name. With World War I looming, both families will find themselves tested in ways they never thought possible. Loyalties will be challenged and betrayals will be set into motion. In this time of uncertainty, one thing is sure: these two families will never be the same again.

I certainly love a book with a good scandal, so I'm eagerly awaiting the release of this one, which comes in April (just in time for my birthday!)

Happy reading!