Identity, agency, belonging, and transformation…these are the themes which drive me to write. I love historical fiction and historical fantasy because for female characters, the past was rife with oppression, which creates an even greater barrier to self-actualization and personal alchemy. There are still barriers for females in our present world, but setting a story in the past can more clearly call out those barriers and the ways females bust through them. We finally live in a world where historians and storytellers are unearthing the untold tales of the past. No longer are the narratives in the sole control of the victors and oppressors.
When Alys’ older brother Hob leaves England—and her—to follow Robin of Locksley to Jerusalem for a Holy War, she expects Robin to do all he can to bring her brother home safely. Robin returns alone and causes havoc in Nottinghamshire, threatening everything Alys holds dear. Her family has lost their home. Alys blames Robin for everything.
The Sheriff of Nottingham promises Alys that, with Prince John’s favor, he has the power to bring Hob home and restore their family to their village farm. All Alys has to do is infiltrate Robin’s band of merry thieves to help bring the outlaws to justice. Alys is confident she’ll have Hob back within a year…until she discovers everything she thought she knew about the outlaws was wrong.
Set against the backdrop of the French Revolution and a stifling patriarchal environment, Adelaide Labille-Guiard will do anything to live as an artist and as her own woman. This is one of the most exquisite books I’ve ever read, especially about a female striving to claim her agency in a past setting. Dunlap’s writing is beautiful and emotive, and Adelaide’s arc is satisfying with that rare treat of being both surprising and inevitable. I was fortunate enough to beta-read this book, and it quickly became one of my favorites. I bought my copy the moment it was published.
Based on a true story, this is the tale of Adelaide Labille-Guiard's fight to take her rightful place in the competitive art world of eighteenth-century Paris.
With a beautiful rival who's better connected and better trained than she is, Adelaide faces an uphill battle. Her love affair with her young instructor in oil painting gives rise to suspicions that he touches up her work, and her decision to make much-needed money by executing erotic pastels threatens to create as many problems as it solves. Meanwhile, her rival goes from strength to strength, becoming Marie Antoinette's official portraitist and gaining entrance…
This is an epic read but well worth it for Aliena’s character arc alone. While she begins the story in the upper echelons of society, the ambitions of others soon send her world crashing down around her. Aliena must find her own agency in order to survive and thrive in a world dominated by men. Be patient with yourself as you read; this is a long book with a lot of characters. I was in my teens the first time I tried to read it and didn’t make it through but as an adult, I found a deep appreciation for this story.
The "extraordinary . . . monumental masterpiece" (Booklist) that changed the course of Ken Follett's already phenomenal career-and begins where its prequel, The Evening and the Morning, ended.
"Follett risks all and comes out a clear winner," extolled Publishers Weekly on the release of The Pillars of the Earth. A departure for the bestselling thriller writer, the historical epic stunned readers and critics alike with its ambitious scope and gripping humanity. Today, it stands as a testament to Follett's unassailable command of the written word and to his universal appeal.
While this is a story broadly about all the Shakespeares, Anne Shakespeare is a focal point. She’s a unique woman with an understanding of nature and an almost supernatural way about her. Her courage to live her life as she sees fit is by turns subtly and boldly expressed through O’Farrell’s masterful prose. I’ve always enjoyed stories about Shakespeare and his family, and this one was so beautifully written that I might even re-read it.
WINNER OF THE 2020 WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION - THE NO. 1 BESTSELLER 2021 'Richly sensuous... something special' The Sunday Times 'A thing of shimmering wonder' David Mitchell
TWO EXTRAORDINARY PEOPLE. A LOVE THAT DRAWS THEM TOGETHER. A LOSS THAT THREATENS TO TEAR THEM APART.
On a summer's day in 1596, a young girl in Stratford-upon-Avon takes to her bed with a sudden fever. Her twin brother, Hamnet, searches everywhere for help. Why is nobody at home?
Their mother, Agnes, is over a mile away, in the garden where she grows medicinal herbs. Their father is working in London.
A family friend recommended this book at a party and then I saw it in a bookstore window and had to have it. I love retellings, and Miller’s retelling of Circe, the sorceress of Homer’s Odyssey, is smart, heart-wrenching, and wonderfully executed. Circe’s voice is what captivated me most, but the story is likewise engaging. Miller builds a vibrant world retelling a character who has long been vilified and perhaps misunderstood. Readers who enjoy female characters striving to achieve agency will cheer for Circe throughout.
In the house of Helios, god of the sun and mightiest of the Titans, a daughter is born. Circe is a strange child - not powerful and terrible, like her father, nor gorgeous and mercenary like her mother. Scorned and rejected, Circe grows up in the shadows, at home in neither the world of gods or mortals. But Circe has a dark power of her own: witchcraft. When her gift threatens…
This is my favorite book of Donnelly’s, perhaps because I had the distinct pleasure of meeting her upon its release. This book was an inspiration to me as a writer. Not only is Isabelle considered “ugly,” but her spirit is so downtrodden at the beginning of the story because others don’t believe in her abilities. She must find her own agency and her own belief in her abilities to do great things and realize that real beauty shines from within.
'In an ancient city by the sea, three sisters - a maiden, a mother, and a crone - are drawing maps by candlelight. Sombre, with piercing grey eyes, they are the three Fates, and every map is a human life . . .'
Stepsister takes up where Cinderella's tale ends. We meet Isabelle, the younger of Cinderella's two stepsisters. Ella is considered beautiful; stepsister Isabelle is not. Isabelle is fearless, brave, and strong-willed. She fences better than any boy, and takes her stallion over jumps that grown men fear to attempt. It doesn't matter, though; these qualities are not valued…
The Road from Belhaven is set in 1880s Scotland. Growing up in the care of her grandparents on Belhaven Farm, Lizzie Craig discovers as a small girl that she can see the future. But she soon realises that she must keep her gift a secret. While she can sometimes glimpse the future, she can never change it.
Nor can Lizzie change the feelings that come when a young man named Louis, visiting Belhaven for the harvest, begins to court her. Why have the adults around her never told her that the touch of a hand can change everything? When she follows Louis to Glasgow, she begins to learn the limits of his devotion and the complexities of her own affections.
From the New York Times best-selling author of The Flight of Gemma Hardy, a novel about a young woman whose gift of second sight complicates her coming of age in late-nineteenth-century Scotland
Growing up in the care of her grandparents on Belhaven Farm, Lizzie Craig discovers as a small child that she can see into the future. But her gift is selective—she doesn’t, for instance, see that she has an older sister who will come to join the family. As her “pictures” foretell various incidents and accidents, she begins to realize a painful truth: she may glimpse the future, but…
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