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So right now I am at the tail end of Written in My Own Hearts Blood by Diana Gabaldon. I read all 7 of the books in the series (well listened anyway) and I cant wait for Run Tell the Bees Im Gone which will conclude the stories. There are a few novellas in there but they are relatively short and I dont like to waste my Audible credits on short books, I would read those. I also rather enjoy the Tudor and company books by Phillipa Gregory and I listened to and read all of them from Lady of the Rivers up to the Bolelyn Inheritance but stopped before Taming of the Queen because i didnt care for the characters in that one, they werent historical characters as all the others had been.
I am so slowly making my way through The Last Kingdom books by Bernard Cornwell but i tend to linger and wander away and back again in historical books written by men because they focus heavily on warfare and such and I prefer to learn about what everyone else was doing behind the scenes.
ANYWAY, I am looking for a book that takes place somewhere between 1500 and 1800 in Scotland. I would like to read about the Jacobites more extensively but In an entertaining way and also Mary Tudor, Queen of Scotland. And recommendations? Also any books from prior to Henry VI of England?
Outlander is mostly set in the mid 1700s Scotland - it's a romance, but involves Jacobites. Margaret George wrote a novel about Mary Queen of Scots called Mary Queen of Scotland and The Isles.
There's lots of books written about royalty before Henry VI. What are you looking for?
--Susanna Kearsley has many novels set in 18th century Scotland, primarily focusing on the Jacobite rebellion. (Most of them contain a time shift element). I'd start with "The Winter Sea". I believe all of them are available on Audible, although I cannot attest to the narration.
--"Mary, Queen of Scotland and the Isles: A Novel" by Margaret George
--There are many romance books set in Scotland in the same time period that focus more on the love relationship than on the history; Julie Garwood is among the best authors in that genre. If that is what you are looking for, let me know and I can recommend more.
England:
--Ken Follet, "The Pillars of the Earth" trilogy. I know these are written by a man, but I know many women who love these books.
--Sharon Kay Penman, She has several different series, some set in Wales, some set in England. You might look at "When Christ and His Saints Slept, which is the first in the Plantagenets series and is about Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. She is a fantastic writer.
--Anya Seton, "Katherine", about John of Gaunt (the Duke of Lancaster) and Katherine Swynford. This is amazing on audio.
--Elizabeth Chadwick also has several different series including one about Eleanor of Aquitaine (again)...she also has one that goes back to the 1100s called "Lords of the White Castle."
--This is a bit later than the time period you are asking for, but Stella Riley has written a series surrounding the War of the Roses; she recently released the first one, "The Black Madonna", on Audible (good thing, because you would have a hard time finding a print copy). The narrator, Alex Wyndham, has quickly become my favorite narrator. All of Stella Riley's books are wonderful but some are more historical with romance thrown in, while some are romances with history thrown in. I would say "The Black Madonna" is a balance of both.
Sharon Kay Penman, She has several different series, some set in Wales, some set in England. You might look at "When Christ and His Saints Slept, which is the first in the Plantagenets series and is about Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. She is a fantastic writer.
This.
I especially loved the Wales trilogy, successively following these protagonists:
Llewelyn the Great
Simon de Montfort
Llewelyn ap Gruffydd
The 13th century in England and Wales comes alive...
Thank you so much! Ive always enjoyed history and Henry Tudor (8th) was sort of my jumping off point for history and Ive worked my way back through Henry 7th, Richard III, Edward, Henry 6, and the story of the Plantagenet's and Tudors rises and falls. I would like to go further back that way and also forward from the Henry 8th Mary, Elizabeth and the scottish bloodlines. You guys have given me some good places to start. Reading multiple books from the same time period helps clear up some of the details of events as everyone changes a little bit of history to suit the story.
So right now I am at the tail end of Written in My Own Hearts Blood by Diana Gabaldon. I read all 7 of the books in the series (well listened anyway) and I cant wait for Run Tell the Bees Im Gone which will conclude the stories. There are a few novellas in there but they are relatively short and I dont like to waste my Audible credits on short books, I would read those. I also rather enjoy the Tudor and company books by Phillipa Gregory and I listened to and read all of them from Lady of the Rivers up to the Bolelyn Inheritance but stopped before Taming of the Queen because i didnt care for the characters in that one, they werent historical characters as all the others had been.
I am so slowly making my way through The Last Kingdom books by Bernard Cornwell but i tend to linger and wander away and back again in historical books written by men because they focus heavily on warfare and such and I prefer to learn about what everyone else was doing behind the scenes.
ANYWAY, I am looking for a book that takes place somewhere between 1500 and 1800 in Scotland. I would like to read about the Jacobites more extensively but In an entertaining way and also Mary Tudor, Queen of Scotland. And recommendations? Also any books from prior to Henry VI of England?
Oh yes, and this will keep you busy for a long, long time.
ETA: Just realized that someone else recommended this.
Read Sharon Kay Penman's books. She is truer to history than Phillipa Gregory, but her books are also longer and more involved.
She has one stand-alone book about the Wars of the Roses, called The Sunne in Splendour. It is excellent.
The majority of her books take place in the 12th and 13th centuries and involved the Plantagents. They were not written in chronological order, but you can read them that way. I first read Here Be Dragons, about the marriage of King John's illegitimate daughter to the then Prince of Gwynned/Wales during a period of truce between the two countries. It was a true love match, but the truce didn't last long, and Joanna was caught between her father and her brother. It is the first of a trilogy (Falls the Shadow and The Reckoning) follow.
However, Penman then went back in time and wrote the stories of what happens before that, beginning with When Christ and His Saints Slept, about the wars between Matilda and Stephen. Then Time and Chance, absolutely fascinating about Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine, and then on to The Devil's Brood, about their children, who included Richard Lionheart and John, and then Lionheart, finishing with A King's Ransom, about Richard's capture on his way home from the Crusades.
When I first began to read her novels in the 1980s and read her notes on her research in the Afterword, I thought she was this brilliant Brit or Welshwoman. Turns out that like me, she is from New Jersey, a former lawyer turned novelist.
I have read all of her books except for a few mystery novels that are set in the medieval time period.
I enjoy historical fiction and enjoy murder mysteries as well
Right now I am starting a new series for me by Bernard Knight—
The Crowner John series
Set during time of Richard the Lionheart
About the creation of the King’s Crowner—the origin of the CORONER—
John de Wolf is former soldier who has fought in many campaigns, loyalist to Richard when John tried to take over the country—-was awarded this Crowner post in Exeter/Devon for his loyalty to Richard
His brother in law is the sheriff so they are at odds—just as he is with his wife
He also has a mistress who runs the best tavern in town
Has a defrocked priest as his clerk and his former squire as his assistant
Historically accurate for the most part (but some social norms are changed to facilitate the plots) and the mysteries —have read just 2 so far—are of varying complexity
Have read couple of other series w/this same premise or close to it
Crowner John seems more dynamic as character, more like Falstaff vs Sherlock Holmes....
There are quite a few in the series and they are kind of expensive on Kindle/Amazon
So right now reading on an open access site
Don’t know how to use my library’s e-book system to see if they are there...
I haven't read him in a while, but I read a number of Edward Rutherford's books and enjoyed them all. His main focus is the history itself and he builds a story around it so the plots aren't as compelling as books like The Nightgale or All the Light we Cannot See. He's more interested is using fiction to illustrate history. But that's part of what I like about his approach.
Reading new series about the Hittite empire—not something that gets much attention
First two books are real pot-boilers w/miraculous escapes for the villein and almost a movie-serial plot with cliffhangers
Not the greatest but our son died a month ago and I read just to pass the time since we are in quarantine now...
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