Выборка по метке: "Исторические приключения". Страница 91

Marguerite, eldest daughter of the Count of Provence, had married a king of France - and now her sister Eleanor is determined to make just as grand a match. Good fortune and wily cunning bring her Henry of England. A good and generous husband but a weak king, he rules a nation that still remembers his cruel and foolish father, King John. As Henry showers gifts on his new bride his extravagance forces him to levy ever greater taxation on the land, and the spectre of revolt soon looms against him. For Simon de Montfort, the adventurer who will give England its first true parliament, the house of destiny is at hand.

Richard the Second is losing his hold on the crown and Henry of Bolingbroke, previously exiled by the king, returns to England to claim it. Richard is deposed and dies mysteriously, murdered some say on the orders of Bolingbroke, now King Henry the Fourth. But Henry finds the crown harder to hold onto than it was to win. He is beset by enemies, hampered by disease, and concerned about the rebellious behaviour of his son. Dominating the court and with his eye on the crown is Harry of Monmouth, whose reckless conduct in low-­class taverns with his crony Sir John Oldcastle causes scandal.­When the king dies, Harry became King Henry the Fifth, and the change is dramatic for both him and Oldcastle. The licentious youth becomes a great king, and Oldcastle, the rake, turns into a religious reformer. Oldcastle dies a martyr and Harry becomes the conquering hero of Agincourt. The Star of Lancaster is in the ascendant. Harry has brought France to her knees and married her princess. It seems that the long war was at an end. But a greater enemy than the French awaits Harry...

Scotland has been torn apart by civil war and the young and passionate Catholic Mary Queen of Scots is in the hands of her enemies. Under duress, Mary abdicates in favour of her son, James VI, and fleeing to England she boldly seeks refuge from her cousin, Queen Elizabeth I. But Elizabeth has never trusted the ambitious Mary, and consequently has her imprisoned.

So begins a treacherous battle between two of history's most powerful and ruthless women. Without once meeting her cousin, Mary is held captive for nineteen years, whilst Elizabeth rules in the shadow of countless Catholic plots against her life...

When Caroline of Ansbach arrives in England, King George is old and sour, his mistress ugly and his wife imprisoned at his own hand for over twenty years. She has grown up watching her mother Eleanor's loveless and dangerous marriage, and is determined to avoid a similar situation. So she marries the Prince of Wales, George Augustus, and they are popular among the people, leading the King to resent them. In what will become typical Hanoverian style, father and son loathe each other and exist in a state of constant competition for power. She quickly realizes that her husband is unintelligent and sees that she will be able to control him to some extent. Despite plenty of obstacles, including her father-­in-­law's control of her children, she refuses to lose sight of her aims.

With Spain now united, Ferdinand looked to his daughters to further his ambitions. All too often, Isabella found herself torn between his brilliant plans and her love for her children. During the last years of Isabella's reign it seemed there was a curse on the royal house which struck at the children of the sovereigns. Tragedy followed tragedy - the Infanta Isabella, a broken-­hearted widow; Juana, driven to madness by her husband's philandering; and the sorrow of parting with young Catalina, destined to become Katharine of Aragon, wife to Henry VIII and Queen of England ...

At just six days old, Mary Stuart became Queen of Scots. At just six years old she was betrothed to the Dauphin Francois, the future King of France.­Reluctantly leaving Scotland, Mary is raised in the decadent French court in preparation to become the Queen of France. But her reign with Francois is short-­lived. Widowed at just eighteen years old, Mary is once again forced to leave her home to return to Scotland. Now a Catholic queen of a Protestant country, Mary must rule with caution and choose her next husband prudently...

7th in Georgian Saga. Although the young widow Maria Fitzherbert is a commoner and a Catholic, her dashing suitor is none other than the Prince of Wales, whose unquestioned royal duty it is to marry a Protestant princess. In an age well accustomed to royal mistresses, Maria is as virtuous as she is beautiful. Rather than succumb, she flees to France... only to be irresistibly drawn back to England and into the arms of her Prince and a passionate relationship that may well cost the Prince his throne.

Edward the Second's first act on coming to the throne is to recall Piers Gaveston from exile, and the new king's devotion to the shrewd and avaricious young man soon becomes a scandal. It is assumed that when Edward marries one of the most beautiful princesses in Europe his inclinations will change, but nothing can make him swerve from his attachment to Gaveston, who is clearly making the most of royal favour.

The new Queen Isabella, accustomed to adulation, is bitterly humilated; and she is not a woman to forget or forgive. With the country in turmoil the king is making enemies throughout the land, and he fails to see that the most deadly of these is his queen.

As Henry VIII's only child, the future seemed golden for Princess Mary. She was the daughter of Henry's first queen, Katharine of Aragon, and was heir presumptive to the throne of England. Red-haired like her father, she was also intelligent and deeply religious like her staunchly Catholic mother. But her father's ill-fated love for Anne Boleyn would shatter Mary's life forever. The father who had once adored her was now intent on having a male heir at all costs. He divorced her mother and, at the age of twelve, Mary was banished from her father’s presence, stripped of her royal title, and replaced by his other children--first Elizabeth, then Edward. Worst of all, she never saw her beloved mother again; Katharine was exiled too, and died soon after. Lonely and miserable, Mary turned for comfort to the religion that had sustained her mother.

In a stroke of fate, however, Henry's much-longed-for son died in his teens, leaving Mary the legitimate heir to the throne. It was, she felt, a sign from God--proof that England should return to the Catholic Church. Swayed by fanatical advisors and her own religious fervor, Mary made horrific examples of those who failed to embrace the Church, earning her the immortal nickname "Bloody Mary." She was married only once, to her Spanish cousin Philip II--a loveless and childless marriage that brought her to the edge of madness.

Married to Ferdinand after continual fears and disappointments, Isabella triumphed over every dangers, convinced of her true destiny. With the might of Portugal humbled, the Court of the Sovereigns saw the rise of Torquemada, the establishment of the dreaded Inquisition, and th ecoming of Columbus, who left the woman he loved to make a dream reality. Ambitious and unfaithful, Ferdinand longed to lead his troops against the Moorish strongholds. Isabella knew a united Spain and a glorious future could be theirs, but they must only share it together