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#HistFicThursdays - Strait Lace by Rosemary Hayward - Guest Post

For this week's #HistFicThursdays blog, I'm delighted to be welcoming  Rosemary Hayward  to the blog with a guest post about her new release  Strait Lace ,   as part of her  Coffee Pot Book Club  tour. Read on to discover the history surrounding this fabulous book. But first, let's meet the book... Blurb It is 1905. Edwardian England. Harriet Loxley, the daughter of a vicar and niece to a prominent Nottingham lace manufacturer, spends her days playing cricket with her brother, scouring the countryside for botanical specimens, and never missing an opportunity to argue the case for political power for women. Given the chance to visit the House of Commons, Harriet witnesses the failure of a historic bill for women’s voting rights. She also meets the formidable Pankhurst women. When Harriet gets the chance to study biology at Bedford College, London, she finds her opportunity to be at the heart of the fight. From marching in the street, to speaking to hostile c...

#HistFicThursdays - Christmas Snippets

Christmas is coming, it's only four days away! For someone who loves Christmas so much, the festival and celebration of Christmas does not feature in as many of my books as I would have expected. All the same, I've drawn together a couple of snippets concerning Christmas from various stories I've written, and I present them to you now as my #HistFicThursdays offering (you can also find a couple from Beneath Black Clouds and White here, as well as last year's offerings here).


Philip was almost grateful of the laborious journey, as it numbed his body to the pains which lay ahead. Instead, he concentrated all his thoughts on the imminent arrival of Advent. It had always been his favourite season of the church’s year. The coming of peace. And he was ready for peace.

~ from The Year We Lived



The presents were distributed by Hamish and Roger and all those present had a gift matched perfectly to their recipient. The day continued with games and carols, for which Catherine accompanied them on the piano, drawing smiles from Hamish and Imogen who shared a joke with her husband. Henry stood in the doorway at the back and smiled across at the gathered family who sang with great enthusiasm if not always great pitch. Toby walked over to him and his father smiled down.

“I have tried, with all my new family,” Toby began,“to find anyone who has a bad word to say about you. But no one has anything but the greatest respect for you. Do you know how hard it is to be the son of such a man?”

“If they have no bad word to say, Toby, it is only that they do not know me.”

“Do not say that, Father. I realised today, you see, that I should stop being so selfish. I was thinking only of you in relation to me. I am so proud of you, Father, and if I can do even half of what you have done for other people I shall be amongst the best of men.” 

~ from To Reason Why


Merry Christmas, Readers!

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