Saturday, March 14, 2009

Saturday Suggestions: Valerie Anand

This week I would like to suggest British author Valerie Anand. Many years ago I started reading her Bridges Over Time series. This series, along with a few others, got me hooked on Historical Fiction. It is a saga that follows an English family through the years, as their fortunes rise and fall, beginning when they are poor serfs in the middle ages. There are six volumes:

The Proud Villeins
The Ruthless Yeomen
Women of Ashdon
The Faithful Lovers
The Cherished Wives
The Dowerless Sisters

Really, lovely books. There are also seven other stand alone historical novels that were published before the Bridges Over Time series:

Gildenford
The Norman Pretender
The Disputed Crown
To a Native Shore
King of the Wood
Crown of Roses
West of Sunset

She is still writing, her latest historical novels are set in Exmoor, Somerset, in the west of England. The House of Lanyon and The House of Allerbrook are both available new. The rest may be out of print, but there should be used copies available (that's how I got most of mine).



Valerie Anand also writes an excellent historical mystery series, under the name Fiona Buckley, set at the court of Queen Elizabeth I. This series features the Queen's lady-in-waiting, and sometime spy, Ursula Blanchard. The first book, To Shield the Queen, plunges Ursula into the biggest scandal of the Queen's reign, when Robert Dudley's wife, Amy, fell down the stairs to her death.

To Shield the Queen
The Doublet Affair
Queen's Ransom
To Ruin a Queen
Queen of Ambition
A Pawn for a Queen
The Fugitive Queen
The Siren Queen

6 comments:

Lenore Appelhans said...

Poor serfs in the middle ages?! I'm so hooked! (Does the plague figure into at all perhaps?)

Anonymous said...

I am excited to read your site! It provides excellent insight into historical fiction. I am an author of HF; my new novel is entitled The Fuhrer Virus. It is a WWII spy/conspiracy/thriller for adolescent/adult readers and can be found at www.eloquentbooks.com/TheFuhrerVirus.html, www.amazon.com, and www.barnesandnoble.com.

Thanks!

Paul Schultz

Nancy said...

I sent you and e-mail, I'm sorry that I didn't get do it sooner. Actually I didn't get the e-mail that you sent for some reason. But thank you so much for picking my name. I look forward to reading about Parisan Crimes!
(If you don't get my e-mail let me know.) Thanks again!

Zibilee said...

Ooh! These sound really good! I think I'm going to order the first in each series. Thanks for posting this!

Michele said...

I am just loving your suggestions!

Marg said...

I really enjoyed the Fiona Buckley series, and I am kind of hoping that we may one day see another book under that name, but I haven't yet read any Anand at all!


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About Me

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New Hampshire, United States
Bibliophile, Anglophile, Traveller... I have been an avid reader all of my life, since I took the Dr. Seuss Dictionary away from my Mom when I was less than a year old because I wanted to read it myself. In college, where I earned my degree in English Literature, I was often asked "What are you going to do with it?" Now I finally have the answer to that question!!! Being employed as a Flight Attendant for twenty years has given me a lot of life experience and, better still, a lot of time to read. I love to travel for fun, too.