Book III of the House Trilogy ( The Town House, The House At Old Vine). "At the age of seven I was a skilful pickpocket. I could sew neatly, write a tolerable hand, make a curtsey and a correct introduction, dance a little and play simple tunes on the harpsichord." Thus was the London life of Felicity Hatton in 1740 - until chance sent her back to the house, first as a pauper, later to become it's mistress - a strange eccentric mistress, whose choice of husband was as unorthodox as her manner of living. https://cosmiccauldronbooks.com.au/p/town-house-norah-lofts/ https://cosmiccauldronbooks.com.au/p/the-house-at-old-vine-norah-lofts/
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The post-Revolution years saw a state of flux with the balance of power shifting back to the bourgeoisie. Napoleon's rise to power was meteoric and he is a successful young general when this book opens. Hortense Beauharnais finds life very different when he mother becomes Bonaparte's wife and she lives her life on the chessboard of the French court amid jealousy and greed. She is married off the Napoleon's brother but is in love with Charles de Flahaut, a gallant young officer. History, brought to life. -
Philip Ollenshaw was the eldest son of Sir John Ollenshaw and heir to the Manor of Marshalsea. There his advantages ended, for Philip was a cripple - shy, sensitive, nervous - and he aroused only contempt and hatred in his libertine father. But he had courage and vision; he saw and understood the hardships of the local villagers and the limitations of Puritan bigotry. Life in England was not easy after the Restoration of Charles II for those who wished to steer a moderate course; and when he fell in love with Linda Seabrook, he renounced his inheritance and joined a band of colonists bound for America, committing himself to a life of hardship and endeavour, to carve out a future from the wilderness - surviving Indian raids and the harshness of Puritan rule - and his strength was the abiding force of the community... -
When at the Pollard's Harvest Supper of 1817, Araminta Glover , a servant girl, is seduced by Jan Honeywood the outcome seems inevitable. Like many servant girls, she will marry her poor suitor and raise a large family on 9 shillings a week. But she's determined to rebel against an impoverished rural life. Putting marriage and Jan firmly behind her, she accepts a post as dairy maid in the home of the strange Mrs Stancy - a thrifty, terrifying and vicious woman who is not what she appears to be. -
Marion Draper was a rebel with just cause against the stifling conventions of her day. In the repressive times of the Victorian middle class, wives and daughters were expected to live as respectful, Papa-fearing cabbages. The Draper family - mother, father and two daughters - were no exception. With practically no education, discouraged from independent effort and rigidly separated from 'undesirable' social contacts, Marion had much to rebel against. The squashing of her natural personality led to inevitable consequences - an illicit friendship with a young man which quickly developed into a passionate love affair. Eventually her lover is revealed in his true worthless light and breaking free of him, she gets a glimpse of real freedom and emancipation - but is it an illusion? -
The village of Swything is a picture book place of green lanes, comfortable farm houses and a Saxon church. But the Bacons are anything but charming - slovenly, dirty and poor, with too many unattractive children - except Emmie. She was different. She knew there must be something better than her slatternly mother, who disliked all her children, but hated Emmie most because she was different. When Emmie was twelve, the miracle happened - a chance to learn about a very different world through her schoolteacher, Miss Stanton. There had to be something better than Ted Gibson, her mother's lecherous star-boarder, who was tired of her mother's favors and wanted to sample the daughters and Saul Fincham, the miserly farmer who overworked and underpaid her. There must be something better... -
The Ipswich coach which arrived at the Fleece Inn in the autumn of 1817 carried a strange, ill-assorted company, who were destined to change forever the lives of those who lived at the Fleece. Will Oakley, landlord and host, with his two daughters, one very beautiful and one astonishingly ugly, waited to receive the guests - the farmers, the merchants, the 'quality' - and those who fitted into none of these categories...such as the handsome foreigner with the scarred face - or the fat man who appeared to be gloating over some malicious secret of his own... Don't be put off by the 'bodice-ripper' style cover; Norah Lofts wrote a brilliant, historically well-researched story every time. -
When young Walter Raleigh first presented himself before Elizabeth I, he dreamt of carving out an empire in the New World to lay at her feet. But Elizabeth is equally determined to keep this handsome, witty young man at her side. Through years of frustration, violent quarrels, reconciliation, and the challenges and rewards of exploration, Raleigh desperately tries to hold on to his dream. Also appearing in this tale are some of the greatest personalities of the age: Shakespeare, Marlowe, Sir Phillip Sydney and Sir Francis Drake, making a detailed portrait of the Elizabethan era in all its colorful, contentious glory. -
Nethergate: Norah Lofts
$9.00The old Suffolk country house of Nethergate provided a welcome refuge for young Isabella de Savigny, fleeing from the terror of revolutionary France. But she was treated with subtle cruelty by Lady Rosaleen Franklin and despised by Martha Pratt, the lady's maid, when she allowed herself to be seduced and abandoned by the son of the house. Utterly at Lady Rosaleen's mercy, Isabella was forced into a loveless marriage with Martha's brother George, a heartless one-armed soldier just back from the wars - until her daughter Annabelle was born, Isabella wanted nothing more than to die. But from that moment her love for her daughter gave her new strength and determination. For her daughter's sake she would snatch a living from a hostile world - and she would survive.