HISTORY · BIOGRAPHY
Tracy Borman
It's a funny thing about mothers and fathers.
— from Matilda
Most acclaimed
Matilda
But my father, my beloved and most wretched father ... would he never overcome the fierce passion that now held pitiless dominion over him? With its shocking themes of father-daughter incest, Mary Shelley's publisher--her father, known for his own subversive books--not only refused to publish Mathilda, he refused to return her only copy of the manuscript, and the work was never published in her lifetime. His suppression of this passionate novella is perhaps understandable--unlike her first book, Frankenstein, written a year earlier, Mathilda uses fantasy to study a far more personal reality. It tells the story of a young woman whose mother died in her childbirth--just as Shelly's own mother died after hers--and whose relationship with her bereaved father becomes sexually charged as he conflates her with his lost wife, while she becomes involved with a handsome poet. Yet despite characters clearly based on herself, her father, and her husband, the narrator's emotional and relentlessly self-examining voice lifts the story beyond autobiographical resonance into something more transcendent: a driven tale of a brave woman's search for love, atonement, and redemption.
Elizabeth's women
"Elizabeth I was born into a world of women. As a child, she was served by a predominantly female household of servants and governesses, with occasional visits from her mother, Anne Bolyen, and the wives who later took her place. As Queen, Elizabeth was constantly attended by ladies of the bedchamber and maids of honour who clothed her, bathed her and watched her while she ate. Among her family, it was her female relations who had the greatest influence: from her sister Mary, who distrusted and later imprisoned her, to her cousin, Mary, Queen of Scots, who posed a constant and dangerous threat to her crown for almost thirty years. Despite the importance of women in Elizabeth's life, most historians and biographers have focused on her relationships with men. She has been portrayed as a woman who loved to flirt with the many ambitious young men who frequented her court. Yet it is the women in her life who provide the most fascinating insight into the character of this remarkable monarch."--Global Books in Print.
The king's witch
In March of 1603, as she helps to nurse the dying Queen Elizabeth of England, Frances Gorges dreams of her parents' country estate, where she learned to use flowers and herbs to become a much-loved healer. When King James of Scotland succeeds to the throne Frances is only too happy to stay at home. His court may be shockingly decadent, but his intolerant Puritanism see witchcraft in many of the old customs -- punishable by death. Yet when her ambitious uncle forces Frnces to return to the royal palace, having bought he a position as a lady in the bedchamber of the young Pincess Elizabeth, she becomes a ready target for the twisted scheming of the Privy Seal, Lord Cecil. As a dark campaign to destroy both King and Parliament gathers pace, culminating in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, Frances is surrounded by danger, finding happiness only with the King's precocious young daughter and with Tom Wintour, the one courtier she feels she can trust. But Wintour has a secret that, when revealed, places Frances in conflict with her royal charge and in fear for her own family.