Adele Astaire served up smiles and love both on and off the stage—with and without her also famous brother Fred Astaire— along with a determined young dancer with rags-to-riches dreams.
A spirited rising stage star…
Adele Astaire was a glittering, glamorous star, dancing with her brother, Fred, endearing herself to audiences from New York to London. But although she is toasted by royalty and beloved by countless fans, Adele Astaire has dreams of a loving husband and a houseful of children. And when she meets Lord Charles Cavendish, her wishes may just come true—but at what cost?
A determined young dancer …
Ever since Violet Wood could walk she’s wanted to dance on the London stage. Befriended by Adele, filled with ambition, she is more than willing to make the sacrifices it will take to becomes a star herself, and her rags-to-riches hopes are within reach. But the road to fame is never easy.
Two women with unquenchable spirit …
From the fast-paced world of roaring 20s New York to the horrors and sacrifice of wartime London, Adele’s and Violet’s lives intertwine, and each must ask themselves is fame worth the price you must pay?
STARRING ADELE ASTAIRE by Eliza Knight is an engaging historical fiction/biographical historical women’s fiction novel featuring dual narratives alternating between one half of the famous brother sister dancing duo of Fred and Adele Astaire and an up-and-coming London West End dancer with dreams of stardom. This story is a wonderful mix of historical fact and fiction that brings these two women and their era to life.
Adele Astaire was the older sister of Fred Astaire and his first partner in dance, vaudeville, and theater productions. Adele was full of life and always laughing and endearing herself to audiences. While she loves the success and fame they have achieved, she also yearns for the life of a wife and mother.
Violet Wood is from the poor West End of London and has forever been told her washerwoman mother that she should quit trying to rise above her station, but Violet continues to practice dance on her own as she works as a cocktail waitress in the theaters. On an audition, she is befriended by Adele Astaire and proves she has the drive and ambition to become a star.
This is an emotional story of two strong women, one historical and one fictional who work, sacrifice, and strive for what they want. The timeline of this story is from the “Roaring Twenties” through WWII in both the UK and New York. There were several times in this story I was completely heartbroken for Adele and yet she was able to pick herself back up and start again. The triumphs and tragedies of both women’s stories intertwined to depict the ups and downs of their choices, but also the lack of choices due to the times. It is evident there was in-depth research done on Adele’s life and the use of Violet as a counterpoint the author was able to bring the decades depicted to life.
I highly recommend this captivating biographical historical fiction novel!
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About the Author
Eliza Knight is an award winning, USA Today and international bestselling author. Her love of history began as a young girl when she traipsed the halls of Versailles and ran through the fields in Southern France. She can still remember standing before the great golden palace, and imagining what life must have been like. Growing up in the Washington, D.C. area, her weekends were filled with visits to museums, and historical reenactments. Escape into history for courageous heroines, irresistible heroes and daring escapades. Join Eliza (sometimes as E.) on riveting historical journeys that cross landscapes around the world. She is a member of the Historical Novel Society and Novelists, Inc., the creator of the popular historical blog, History Undressed, a co-host on the History, Books and Wine podcast and a co-host for the true crime podcast, Crime Feast.
While not reading, writing or researching for her latest book, she tries to keep up with her three not-so-little children. In her spare time (if there is such a thing…) she likes daydreaming, wine-tasting, traveling, hiking, staring at the stars, watching movies, shopping and visiting with family and friends. She lives atop a small mountain with her own knight in shining armor, three princesses, two very naughty Newfies, and a turtle named Fish.
Today I am sharing my Feature Post and Book Review for THE VERY DEAD OF WINTER: A Sinner’s Cross Novel by Miles Watson on the Coffee and Thorn Book Tour.
Below you will find a book description, my book review, an about the author section and the author’s social media links. Enjoy!
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Book Description
On the eve of what will be known as The Battle of the Bulge, the survivors of Sinner’s Cross are scattered all over Europe. Halleck, the tough Texan who drives men like cattle, finds himself surrounded in the snow-blanketed forests of the Eifel Mountains riding herd on greenhorn soldiers; Breese, the phony hero with a chip on his shoulder the size of Rushmore, embarks on a bloody mission of redemption behind enemy lines; Cramm, the one-eyed, one-armed German staff officer, tries to balance duty against his lust for vengeance against those who crippled him. Three men separated by war will once again converge…in The Very Dead of Winter.
THE VERY DEAD OF WINTER: A Sinner’s Cross Novel by Miles Watson is a historical fiction book I was very excited to be able to read for this blog tour. This is the second Sinner’s Cross book and while it is a continuation of the three main soldier protagonists lives from the first book, Sinner’s Cross, this book is easily read as a standalone. I recommend them both highly!
In this book, three survivors of the Battle of the Hurtgen Forest are converging in the Ardennes Forest in the dead of winter for what will be known as the Battle of the Bulge. Sgt. Halleck is battle-hardened and once again finds himself leading men into battle with the enemy behind every tree, Lt. Breeze gets sent back to the front and finds himself battling the Nazis looking for redemption, and Cramm, a German staff officer, who will fight to the death but no longer believes in Hitler and his fanatics.
The writer’s depiction of this horrific battle and the three diverse paths the main characters are on felt so realistic. Even knowing the outcome of this historical battle, I kept turning the pages because I was so invested after following these characters in two books. The moral questions about war and loss of life are ever present, but unlike the feeling of senseless loss of life in the first book and this was the largest and bloodiest battle during WWII, this battle was a turning point in the war for the Allies and the beginning of the end for Nazi Germany.
I highly recommend this historical fiction novel and I believe both books in the Sinner’s Cross series are exceptional!
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About the Author
Miles Watson is one of the most successful independent writers of his generation. He holds undergraduate degrees in Criminal Justice and History and a Masters of Fine Arts in Writing Popular Fiction, and served in law enforcement for nearly ten years before moving to Los Angeles, where he has worked on over 200 episodes of television and half a dozen feature films. But his first and last passion is writing. His various works have won the following:
CAGE LIFE – Shelf Unbound Best Indie Book Runner Up (2016): Zealot Script Magazine “Book of the Year” (2017); Best Indie Book Award – Mystery & Suspense (2018)
KNUCKLE DOWN – Writer’s Digest S.P.B.A. Honorable Mention (2019); Best Indie Book Award – Suspense (2019)
DEVILS YOU KNOW – Eric Hoffer Award for Excellence in Independent Publishing Finalist (2019)
THE NUMBERS GAME – Pinnacle Book Achievement Award – Novella – (2019)
NOSFERATU – Pinnacle Book Achievement Award – Novella – (2020)
SINNER’S CROSS – Best Indie Book Award – Historical Fiction – (2019); Book Excellence Award – Action (2020); Literary Titan Book Award – Gold Medal (2020); Independent Author Network Book of the Year Awards – Finalist (2020); Readers Favorite Five Stars (2021)
THE VERY DEAD OF WINTER – Literary Titan Book Award – Gold Medal (2022); Pinnacle Book Achievement Award (2022); Book Excellence Award Finalist (2023)
Today I am sharing a Feature Post and Book Review for THE PARIS AGENT by Kelly Rimmer on this HTP Books Summer 2023 Blog Tour.
Below you will find an about the book section, my mini book review, an excerpt from the book, an about the author section, and the author’s social media links. Enjoy!
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About the Book
For fans of fast-paced historical thrillers like Our Woman in Moscow and The Rose Code, Rimmer’s brilliant new novel follows three female SOE operatives as their lives intersect in occupied France, and the double agent who controls their fate.
Twenty-five years after the end of the war, an aging Marcel Augustin is reflecting on his life during those perilous, exhilarating years as a British SOE operative in occupied France—in particular the agent who saved his life during a mission gone wrong, whose real name he never knew, nor whether she survived the war. Piqued by her father’s memories, Marcel’s daughter Charlotte begins a search for answers that resurrects the unrest and uncertainty from that period of his life. What follows is the story of Eloise, Josie and Virginia, three otherwise ordinary, average women whose lives intersect in 1943 when they’re called up by the SOE for deployment in France. Taking enormous risks to support the allied troops with very little information or resources, the three women have no idea they’re at the mercy of a double agent within their ranks who’s causing chaos within the French circuits, whose efforts will affect the outcome of their lives.
As Charlotte’s search for answers continues, new suspicions are raised about the identity of the double agent, with unsettling clues pointing to her father, and more mysteries are unearthed from the last days of the war about the eventual fates of Eloise, Josie and Virginia.
THE PARIS AGENT by Kelly Rimmer is a moving historical fiction novel written with dual intertwining timelines; one set during WWII in France following two female SOE operatives and the other set in 1970 England with a survivor trying to uncover the mystery surrounding their betrayals and deaths. This is a story that pulled me in emotionally and made it impossible to stop reading. Make sure you have the tissues handy for the ending.
This story is extensively researched and believable. The author makes you feel the emotional suspense and distress of the SOE operatives while they are in France. That these young women volunteered and were sent into occupied territory during WWII with only months of training and no guarantee they would return alive demonstrates their strength, bravery, and belief in freedom. The second story line follows a father and daughter duo looking for answers twenty-five years after WWII to fill in questions the father still has after a brain injury while with the SOE in France, but many of the documents are still classified. The two storylines come together is an emotional climax that is gut-wrenching and uncomfortable.
I highly recommend this historical fiction novel featuring strong women caught up in the horrors of war and the long-lasting emotional ripples that flow through their families.
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Excerpt
Prologue
ELOISE
Germany
October, 1944
Perhaps at first glance, we might have looked like ordinary passengers: four women in civilian clothes, sitting in pairs facing one another, the private carriage of the passenger train illuminated by the golden light of a cloudless late-summer sunrise. Only upon closer inspection would a passerby have seen the handcuffs that secured us, our wrists resting at our sides, between us not because we meant to hide them but because we were exhausted, and they were too heavy to rest on our bony thighs. Only at a second glance would they have noticed the emaciated frames or the clothes that didn’t quite fit, or the scars and healing wounds each of us bore after months of torture and imprisonment.
I was handcuffed to a petite woman I knew first as Chloe, although in recent weeks, we had finally shared our real names with one another. It was entirely possible that she was the best friend I’d ever known—not that there was much competition for that title, given friendship had never come easy to me. Two British women, Mary and Wendy, sat opposite us. They had trained together, as Chloe and I had trained together, and like us, they had been “lucky enough” to recently find themselves imprisoned together too. Mary and Wendy appeared just as shell-shocked as Chloe and I were by the events of that morning.
As our captors had reminded us often since our arrests, we were plainclothes assassins and as such, not even entitled to the basic protections of the Geneva Convention. So why on earth had we been allowed the luxury of a shower that morning, and why had we been given clean civilian clothes to wear after months in the filthy outfits we’d been wearing since our capture? Why were they transporting us by passenger train, and in a luxurious private carriage, no less? This wasn’t my first time transferring between prisons since my capture. I knew from bitter personal experience that the usual travel arrangement was, at best, the crowded, stuffy back end of a covered truck or at worst, a putrid, overcrowded boxcar.
But this carriage was modern and spacious, comfortable and relaxed. The leather seats were soft beneath me and the air was clean and light in a way I’d forgotten air should be after months confined to filthy cells.
“This could be a good sign,” I whispered suddenly. Chloe eyed me warily, but my optimism was picking up steam now, and I turned to face her as I thought aloud. “I bet Baker Street has negotiated better conditions for us! Maybe this transfer is a step toward our release. Maybe that’s why…” I nodded toward our only companions in the carriage, seated on the other side of the aisle. “Maybe that’s why she’s here. Could it be that she’s been told to keep us safe and comfortable?”
Chloe and I had had little to do with the secretary at Karlsruhe Prison, but I had seen her in the hallway outside of our cell many times, always scurrying after the terrifyingly hostile warden. It made little sense for a secretary to accompany us on a transfer, but there she was, dressed in her typical tweed suit, her blond hair constrained in a thick bun at the back of her skull. The secretary sat facing against the direction of travel, opposite the two armed guards who earlier had marched me and Chloe onto the covered truck at the prison, then from the covered truck onto the platform to join the train. The men had not introduced themselves, but like all agents with the British Special Operations Executive, I’d spent weeks memorizing German uniforms and insignias. I knew at a glance that these were low-ranking Sicherheitsdienst officers—members of the SD. The Nazi intelligence agency.
The secretary spoke to the guards, her voice low but her tone playful. She held a suitcase on her lap, and she winked as she tapped it. The men both brightened, surprised smiles transforming their stern expressions, then she theatrically popped the suitcase lid to reveal a shockingly generous bounty of thick slices of sausages and chunks of cheese, a large loaf of sliced rye bread and…was that butter? The scent of the food flooded the carriage as the secretary and the guards used the suitcase as a table for their breakfast.
It was far too much food for three people but I knew they’d never share it with us. My stomach rumbled violently, but after months surviving on scant prison rations, I was desperate enough that I felt lucky to be in the mere presence of such a feast.
“I heard the announcement as we came onto the carriage— this train goes to Strasbourg, doesn’t it? Do you have any idea what’s waiting for us there? This is all a bit…” Wendy paused, gnawing her lip anxiously. “None of it makes sense. Why are they treating us so well?”
“This is the Strasbourg train,” Chloe confirmed cautiously. There was a subtle undertone to those words—something hesitant, concerned. I frowned, watching her closely, but just then the secretary leaned toward the aisle. She spoke to us in rapid German and pointed to the suitcase in her lap.
Had we done something wrong? More German words but it may as well have been Latin to me, because I spoke only French and English. Just then, the secretary huffed impatiently and pushed the suitcase onto the empty seat beside her as she stood. She held a plate toward me, and when I stared at it blankly, she waved impatiently toward Chloe and spoke again in German.
“What…”
“She wants you to take it,” Chloe translated for me, and I took the plate with my one free hand, bewildered. Chloe passed it to Wendy, and so on, until we all held plates in our hands. The secretary then passed us fat slices of sausage and cheese and several slices of bread each. Soon, our plates were filled with the food, each of us holding a meal likely more plentiful than we’d experienced since our arrival in France.
“She’s toying with us,” Mary whispered urgently. “She’ll take it back. She won’t let us eat it so don’t get your hopes up.”
I nodded subtly—I’d assumed the same. And so, I tried to ignore the treasure sitting right beneath my nose. I tried not to notice how garlicky and rich that sausage smelled, how creamy the cheese looked, or how the butter was so thick on the bread that it might also have been cheese. I told myself the increasing pangs in my stomach were just part of the torture and the smartest thing I could do was to ignore them altogether, but the longer I held the plate, the harder it was to refocus my mind on anything but the pain in my stomach and the feast in my hands that would bring instant and lasting relief.
When all the remaining food had been divided between us prisoners, the secretary waved impatiently toward the plates on our laps, then motioned toward her mouth.
“Eat!” she said, in impatient but heavily accented English.
Chloe and I exchanged shocked glances. Conditions in Karlsruhe Prison were not the worst we’d seen since our respective captures, but even so, we’d been hungry for so long. The starvation was worse for Chloe than me. She had a particularly sensitive constitution and ate a narrow range of foods in order to avoid gastric distress. Since our reunion at the prison, we’d developed a system of sharing our rations so she could avoid the foods which made her ill but even so, she remained so thin I had sometimes worried I’d wake up one morning to find she’d died in her sleep.
“What can you eat?” I asked her urgently.
She looked at our plates then blurted, “Sausage. I’ll eat the sausage.”
For the next ten minutes we prisoners fell into silence except for the occasional, muffled moan of pleasure and relief as we devoured the food. I was trying to find the perfect compromise between shoving it all into my mouth as fast as I could in case the secretary changed her mind and savoring every bite with the respect a meal like that commanded. By the time my plate was empty and my surroundings came back to me, the guards and the secretary were having a lovely time, laughing amongst themselves and chatting as if they didn’t have a care in the world.
For a long while, we prisoners traveled in silence, holding our plates on our laps at first, then after Wendy set the precedent, lifting them to our mouths to lick them clean. Still, the guards chatted and laughed and if I judged their tones correctly, even flirted with the secretary? It gradually dawned on me that they were paying us very little attention.
“How far is Strasbourg? Does anyone know?” I asked. Wendy and Mary shook their heads as they shrugged, but Chloe informed me it was hundreds of miles. Her shoulders had slumped again despite the gift of the food, and I nudged her gently and offered a soft smile. “We have a long journey ahead. Good. That means we have time for a pleasant chat while our bellies are full.”
By unspoken agreement, we didn’t discuss our work with the Special Operations Executive (SOE). It was obvious to me that each of the other women had been badly beaten at some point—Wendy was missing a front tooth, Mary held her left hand at an odd angle as if a fractured wrist had healed badly, and Chloe… God, even if she hadn’t explained to me already, I’d have known just looking at her that Chloe had been to hell and back. It seemed safe to assume we had all been interrogated literally almost to death at some point, but there was still too much at stake to risk giving away anything the Germans had not gleaned from us already. So instead of talking about our work or our peculiar circumstances on that train, we talked as though we weren’t wearing handcuffs. As though we weren’t on our way to, at the very best, some slightly less horrific form of imprisonment.
We acted as though we were two sets of friends on a casual jaunt through the countryside. We talked about interesting features outside our window—the lush green trees in the tall forests, the cultivated patches of farmland, the charming facades of cottages and apartments on the streets outside. Mary cooed over a group of adorable children walking to school, and Wendy talked about little shops we passed in the picturesque villages. Chloe shared longing descriptions of the foods she missed the most—fresh fruit and crisp vegetables, eggs cooked all manner of ways, herbs and spices and salt. I lamented my various aches and pains and soon everyone joined in and we talked as if we were elderly people reflecting on the cruelty of aging, not four twenty-somethings who had been viciously, repeatedly beaten by hateful men.
I felt the warmth of the sunshine on my face through the window of the carriage and closed my eyes, reveling in the simple pleasures of fresh air and warm skin and the company of the best friend I’d ever known. I even let myself think about the secretary and that picnic, and feel the relief that I was, for the first time in months, in the company of a stranger who had shown kindness toward me. I’d almost forgotten that was something people did for one another.
I’d never been an especially cheerful sort of woman and I’d never been an optimist, but those past months had forced me to stare long and hard at the worst aspects of the human condition and I’d come to accept a certain hopelessness even when it came to my own future. But on that train, bathed in early morning sunlight and basking in a full stomach and pleasant company, my spirits lifted until they soared toward something like hope.
For the first time in months, I even let myself dream that I’d survive to embrace my son Hughie again. Maybe, even after all I’d seen and done, the world could still be good. Maybe, even after everything, I could find reason to have faith.
Kelly Rimmer is the worldwide, New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author of The German Wife, The Warsaw Orphan, and The Things We Cannot Say. She lives in rural Australia with her husband, two children and fantastically naughty dogs, Sully and Basil. Her novels have been translated into more than twenty languages.
The Lebensborn project; a Nazi breeding program to create a so-called master race. Through thorough research and with deep empathy, this chilling historical novel goes inside one of the Lebensborn Society maternity homes that existed in several countries during World War II, where thousands of “racially fit” babies were bred and taken from their mothers to be raised as part of the new Germany.
At the Heim Hochland maternity home in Bavaria, three women’s lives coverage as they find themselves there under very different circumstances. Gundi is a pregnant university student from Berlin. An Aryan beauty, she’s secretly a member of a resistance group. Hilde, only eighteen, is a true believer in the cause and is thrilled to carry a Nazi official’s child. And Irma, a 44-year-old nurse, is desperate to build a new life for herself after personal devastation. Despite their opposing beliefs, all three have everything to lose as they begin to realize they are trapped within Hitler’s terrifying scheme to build a Nazi-Aryan nation.
A cautionary tale for modern times told in stunning detail, Cradles of the Reich uncovers a little-known Nazi atrocity but also carries an uplifting reminder of the power of women to set aside differences and work together in solidarity in the face of oppression.
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Elise’s Thoughts
Cradles of the Reich by Jennifer Coburn explores the Lebensborn project, a Nazi breeding program to create a so-called master race. This historical novel goes inside the Lebensborn Society, where thousands of “racially fit” babies were bred and taken from their mothers to be raised as part of Nazi Germany.
At the Heim Hochland maternity home in Bavaria, three women’s lives intersect as they find themselves there under very different circumstances. The Heim Hochland Estate is a country house in Bavaria. The German’s use it as a maternity home during the Second World War as part of the Lebensborn Society. Here pregnant Aryan women stay in luxury, they receive the best medical care, and their babies are adopted by high-ranking German officer’s families.
In 1939 Gundi Schiller was unmarried and pregnant, a university student from Berlin. As a member of the Edelweiss Pirates, a resistance group, she met and fell in love with Leo Solomon, a Jewish man, who was now missing. Because she is considered an “Aryan beauty,” she is told that she needs to enter the Lebensborn program at Heim Hochland. Gundi needs to find a way to hide the identity of her child’s father and protect her baby who will be killed.
Hilde Kramer is a high school student who eagerly supported Hitler’s policies. Hilde, only eighteen, is a true believer and is thrilled to carry a Nazi official’s child. She believed in the cause, where maternity homes had children bred for a superior race for the German future.
Irma Binz, a 44-year-old nurse, is desperate to build a new life for herself after personal devastation. She will be the one encouraging the unwed mothers to stay healthy, so they deliver these perfect children. Irma just wants to do her job and stay out of trouble, looking the other way. But her closeness with the women in the home has her conflicted about her loyalty to Germany, especially when it comes to the danger faced by Gundi and her baby.
Jennifer Coburn has an incredible knack for being able to entertain while at the same time educate her readers on this important piece of horrific history. Her characters come alive and are very relatable.
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Author Interview
Elise Cooper: How did you get the idea for the story?
Jennifer Coburn: It was from a television show, “The Man in the High Castle.” It imagines the Nazis winning the war and takes place in 1962. In one of the episodes a German woman said she was bred through the Lebensborn Society. I thought this was a fictional episode, but I googled it. I found a black and white photograph of this row of nurses standing in a military-like formation holding babies. It was then I realized it was real.
EC: What exactly is the Lebensborn Society?
JC: It was a top-secret breeding program that operated for ten years. The nurses were brain washed at best and complicit. Women were like incubators. The Nazis had a goal of 2 million racially pure babies for the Reich. Only 20,000 babies were produced but 200,000 babies were stolen from occupied countries. After the war the women who participated and the children born were shunned. Only 20% of these babies knew about their roots.
EC: How did the 20% find out they were products of the program?
JC: When their mothers passed away the children found a silver mug given by Himmler. The mug had the child’s name engraved on the front and his name engraved on the back.
EC: You have three different women who were associated with the Society in some manner?
JC: Yes. They were meant to represent the three different choices that gentile German women had in 1939. There is the resistor, bystander, and the Hitler true believer. Those that worked there could have been aware of the plan to create a “Master Race.” I would never give up my child for good of country.
EC: How would you describe Gundi?
JC: She is a twenty-year-old university student. She is everything the Nazis consider perfect: blonde, blue-eyed, and tall. But she is secretly a member of the resistance and carrying the child of a Jewish man. She is the resistor, the moral conscious of the story, and the heroine of the story.
EC: What about Nurse Irma?
JC: She is a typical bystander who wants to keep her head down. She does not do much questioning of the Nazis and goes whichever way the wind blows until the end. She changes the most over time. She starts out one thing and ends up the opposite.
EC: Was Hilde naïve or stupid?
JC: She is pathetic and cruel. She is unloved, neglected, and a second-class citizen. She is brain-washed, delusional, and went along with the crowd. She wanted to be the best “Hitler girl.” She enjoyed the power that came with her contacts. She is only eighteen and a little bit naïve and narcissistic. She became a vessel literally. She is based on a real person. In an interview the real Hilde said that her time in the Lebensborn Society was the best time of her life. She noted she was well fed, well cared for, with a lot of leisure time. The real Hilde Trutz told of her sexual experience with an SS officer, had a child, and handed it over for adoption, without thinking twice about it. Till the day she died she thought she had done a great think for her country.
EC: What was true in the story?
JC: If the baby was imperfect, that included, a Jewish baby, they were given a lethal injection. They also monitored the skin tone of those women chosen. Regarding Kristallnacht, the 1938 Pogroms, this was considered the official start of the Holocaust. This was widespread. The baby naming ceremony is also true, where the sword tip is laid on the baby’s stomach, like knighthood.
EC: Your next book?
JC: It is titled The Girls of the Glimmer Factory, set in the Theresienstadt Ghetto, located in Northern Czechoslovakia. It was a propaganda camp, set up for films, tours, to show the world the Jews were treated well under Nazi rule. Hilde is back. She is a filmmaker on the crew for the Nazis who made a movie about Theresienstadt that was filled with false information. She reunites with an old friend Hannah Kaufman, a Jewish prisoner there. Irma is involved with a baby smuggling program. It will be out in early 2025.
THANK YOU!!
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BIO: Elise Cooper has written book reviews and interviewed best-selling authors since 2009. Her reviews have covered several different genres, including thrillers, mysteries, women’s fiction, romance and cozy mysteries. An avid reader, she engages authors to discuss their works, and to focus on the descriptions of their characters and the plot. While not writing reviews, Elise loves to watch baseball and visit the ocean in Southern California, with her dog and husband.
Today I am sharing my Feature Post and Book Review for THE SCOTS OF DALRIADA by Rowena Kinread on this Coffee and Thorn Book Tour.
Below you will find a book description, my book review, an about the author section and the author’s social media links. Enjoy!
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Book Description
THREE BROTHERS Fergus, Loarn and Angus, Princes of the Dalriada, are forced into exile by their scheming half-brother and the druidess Birga One-tooth.
THREE FATES Fergus conceals himself as a stable lad on Aran and falls helplessly in love with a Scottish princess, already promised to someone else. Loarn crosses swords against the Picts. Angus designs longboats.
TOGETHER A MIGHTY POWER Always on the run the brothers must attempt to outride their adversaries by gaining power themselves. Together they achieve more than they could possibly dream of.
Fergus Mór (The Great) is widely recognised as the first King of Scotland, giving Scotland its name and its language. Rulers of Scotland and England from Kenneth mac Alpín until the present time claim descent from Fergus Mór. Full of unexpected twists and turns, this is a tale of heart-breaking love amidst treachery, deceit and murder.
THE SCOTS OF DALRIADA by Rowena Kinread is a historical fiction set in the fifth century telling the tale of three brothers with focus on Fergus, who will go on to become the founder of Scotland. This is an epic family saga delivered in an easy-to-read historical fiction novel.
While this story covers many years, the author makes it flow through the many players and intrigues with intertwined historical facts that do not bog down the pace. The author’s research is evident with the descriptive characters and living conditions all brought to life. The writing style is very different from other historical fiction books I have read. It is a cross between reading a short, to the point history book, but with the added imagined historical fiction embellishment of relationships intertwined.
This historical fiction story is loaded with adventure, jealousy, greed, and warfare, but it also has moments of romance, family, and brotherhood. It is an entertaining and enlightening story of a period I had previously known nothing about.
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About the Author
Rowena Kinread grew up in Ripon, Yorkshire with her large family and a horde of pets. Keen on travelling, her first job was with Lufthansa in German
She began writing in the nineties. Her special area of interest is history. After researching her ancestry and finding family roots in Ireland with the Dalriada clan, particularly this era. Her debut fiction novel titled “The Missionary” is a historical novel about the dramatic life of St. Patrick. It was published by Pegasus Publishers on Apr.29th, 2021 and has been highly appraised by The Scotsman, The Yorkshire Post and the Irish Times.
Her second novel “The Scots of Dalriada” centres around Fergus Mór, the founder father of Scotland and takes place in 5th century Ireland and Scotland. It is due to be published by Pegasus Publishers on Jan.26th, 2023.
The author lives with her husband in Bodman-Ludwigshafen, Lake Constance, Germany. They have three children and six grandchildren.
This sweeping novel of historical fiction is inspired by the true rags-to-riches story of Arabella Huntington—a woman whose great beauty was surpassed only by her exceptional business acumen, grit, and artistic eye, and who defied the constraints of her era to become the wealthiest self-made woman in America.
1867, Richmond, Virginia: Though she wears the same low-cut purple gown that is the uniform of all the girls who work at Worsham’s gambling parlor, Arabella stands apart. It’s not merely her statuesque beauty and practiced charm. Even at seventeen, Arabella possesses an unyielding grit, and a resolve to escape her background of struggle and poverty.
Collis Huntington, railroad baron and self-made multimillionaire, is drawn to Arabella from their first meeting. Collis is married and thirty years her senior, yet they are well-matched in temperament, and flirtation rapidly escalates into an affair. With Collis’s help, Arabella eventually moves to New York, posing as a genteel, well-to-do Southern widow. Using Collis’s seed money and her own shrewd investing instincts, she begins to amass a fortune.
Their relationship is an open secret, and no one is surprised when Collis marries Arabella after his wife’s death. But “The Four Hundred”—the elite circle that includes the Astors and Vanderbilts—have their rules. Arabella must earn her place in Society—not just through her vast wealth, but with taste, style, and impeccable behavior. There are some who suspect the scandalous truth, and will blackmail her for it. And then there is another threat—an unexpected, impossible romance that will test her ambition, her loyalties, and her heart . . .
An American Beauty brings to vivid life the glitter and drama of a captivating chapter in history—and a remarkable woman who lived by her own rules.
AN AMERICAN BEAUTY by Shana Abe is a riveting biographical historical fiction novel about the most interesting woman of the gilded age that I knew nothing about. Arabella Huntington uses her beauty, determination, and brains to overcome her impoverished beginnings and will ignore the rules of elite New York society and rise to become the wealthiest self-made woman in America.
This story begins in 1867 Richmond, Virginia when Arabella Duval Yarrington is only in her teens. Her mother runs a boarding house and is barely able to feed her children in the war devastated Richmond. Arabella is the beauty of the family, and her mother takes her to get work in a gambling parlor and brothel. Arabella is beautiful and talented and knows her family depends on her. Collis Huntington is a railroad baron who attends the establishment Arabella works at and is smitten with Arabella even though he is married. This man will change her and her family’s lives even as Arabella learns and grows into her ambitions, business acumen, and large fortune over her lifetime.
This is such a rich story with many individual plot threads woven together over the lifetime of Arabella Huntington that made me feel she could walk right off the page. Arabella and her mother had to be tough and make difficult choices that not everyone would agree with, but they survived and thrived. I kept thinking of the Reba McEntire song “Fancy” as I was reading that part of Arabella’s life. All the characters are fully drawn throughout the book and believable. Even though this is a work of historical fiction many of the major plot points of the story can be verified as well as painting and jewelry collections still available for viewing left by Arabella. This story tells the tale of an amazing woman who triumphed even though she was very much ahead of her time.
I highly recommend this captivating biographical historical novel.
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About the Author
Shana Abé is the award-winning, New York Times, USA Today, Publishers Weekly, and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of seventeen books, including the acclaimed Drákon Series and the Sweetest Dark Series.
She has a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the University of Southern California, and currently resides in the mountains of Colorado with her very patient husband and a lot of pets.
