‘Entrancing, compelling, and beautifully written…This is the historical novel as literary fiction – and damned good literary fiction at that.’ Alison WeirJeanne, a young French exile orphaned by the wars of religion on the continent, is brought to London as a young girl disguised as a boy. Growing up, the disguise has not been shed and she finds a living as a clerk, ending up in the household of R…
For the first time, Jane beheld King Henry VIII of England.He was broad chested and strong voiced, jewelled and befurred, a powerfully dominant presence… Lady-in-waiting Jane Sweetwater’s resistance to the legendary attractions of Henry VIII may have saved her pretty neck, but her reward is a forced and unhappy marriage to a much older man.Jane’s only consolation is that she still lives upon her b…