What draws you to a historical fiction book cover?
Each month I will be choosing my ‘Pam’s Pick’. Hopefully, you will be intrigued enough to look beyond the covers I feature and find your next favourite author. If a cover interests you just click on the link to learn more about the book.
My July winner is:
Thoreau’s Wound by Danny Kuhn
***
This is such a beautiful image – moody and very Celtic. Congratulations to Danny!
***
Young Finbar Laverty, displaced by Ireland’s Tithe Wars and family treachery, attempts a new start by moving with his volatile wife Maggie, a follower of the Old Religion, from the Cork countryside to bustling Dublin. He is recruited by his friend Dr. James Wilde to help disinter the body of Dean Jonathan Swift during the renovation of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, but commits an act of vengeance and is forced to flee Ireland.
Seeking fortune in London, Finbar’s inadvertent participation in a Royal conspiracy involving a young court reporter puts him on the run again, this time to America.
The Lavertys begin to think they have found peace in New Hampshire, but suspicion surrounding a female body revealed by the melting ice on Bodge’s Pond and the anti-Irish Catholic frenzy ignited by the Know-Nothings sends Finbar to Concord, Massachusetts. His new bosses’ son, Henry David Thoreau, introduces him to new ideas, Abolitionist activism, and the most influential circle of literary figures in America’s history.
While Finbar’s adopted country is about to be torn apart by civil war, his family is also threatened when the consequences of old sins return to haunt him.
To find out more, please click here
***
Here are some other wonderful covers to tempt you!
London, 1786. Lord Henri-Antoine has returned from the Grand Tour to a life of privilege and excess. A vast inheritance allows him every indulgence, free from responsibility. Yet, Henri-Antoine maintains a well-ordered existence, going to great lengths to conceal an affliction few understand and many fear.
Miss Lisa Crisp is a penniless orphan who relies on the charity of relatives to keep her from the poorhouse. Intelligent and unflappable, Lisa will not allow poverty to define her. She leads a useful life working among the sick poor.
Under startling circumstances, Henri-Antoine and Lisa meet. There is instant attraction. When they find themselves attending the same wedding in the country, Henri-Antoine offers Lisa a scandalous proposition, one she should refuse but yearns to accept. Following her heart could ruin them both.
A standalone romantic adventure set against the backdrop of Treat, ancestral home of the dukes of Roxton. SATYR’S SON will delight fans of the series with cameos by many beloved characters, while new readers will discover the myriad pleasures and glittering aristocratic world of the Roxton family through the fresh eyes of newcomer Lisa Crisp. SATYR’S SON is a Cinderella story with a heartwarming Happily Ever After.
To find out more, please click here
***
Bill, a farm boy brought up in a village on the Duke of Buccleuch’s Northamptonshire estate, is plucking up his courage to ask his sweetheart, Florrie, to marry him. Florrie has given up her dream of being a dancer to bring up her siblings and protect them from their violent, sexually abusive widowed father. For her, marriage to Bill is love, escape, and protection: a dream to be clung to.
When war breaks out in August 1914, Bill and Florrie’s dreams are dashed – Bill is sent with the Royal Buckinghamshire Hussars, a yeomanry cavalry regiment, to fight in Gallipoli, Egypt, and Palestine taking with him a horse, Copper, volunteered for service by the 7th duke’s young daughter, Lady Alice. Bill makes promises before he leaves: to marry Florrie if he survives and to bring his beloved warhorse, Copper, home safe to Lady Alice.
While Bill fights Turks and Germans in appalling conditions, Florrie fights her own war with rationing, poverty, the loss of her menfolk, and her father’s drunken temper. As the war proceeds, fearful and with her resilience faltering, her feelings of self-worth plummet, and she turns to her dandelion clocks for reassurance. ‘He lives? He lives not? He loves me? He loves me not?’
When Bill returns to England six months after the armistice in 1918, both he and Florrie have been changed by their personal journeys. Has their love survived five years apart and the tragedies they’ve endured? Can Bill keep his promises to Florrie and Lady Alice?
To find out more, please click here
And the not so small print: the judge’s decision is final (that would be me!) and is highly subjective.
Please note this is a cover competition only and does not constitute a review of any of the books featured. It’s up to you to explore. Happy Reading!
***
Reblogged this on Rebecca Bryn and commented:
Wow – The Dandelion Clock is a runner up? fab! Thank you.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Thank you so much. Thrilled to be a runner up.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Congratulations to the winner, and to the runners-up. They are all lovely, unique, book covers.
LikeLiked by 1 person
PS Have sent to Twitter, Google and Pinterest. Will Tweet and share further.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Reblogged this on An English Writer in Germany and commented:
Some marvellous-sounding books here and beautiful covers of course!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Super, thanks so much xx
LikeLike
Wow, Pam, what a great line-up you’ve got here this month. I really appreciate you doing this as it not only gives a lot of pride to these authors and their cover artists, but it sets a nice standard for other authors and just shares some “eye candy” for those of us who appreciate a good book cover. Thank you!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Very vibrant and all evoking such different moods! Congratulations to the winner, and to the RUPs.
LikeLiked by 1 person