Showing results by author "Norah Lofts" in All Categories

"At the age of seven I was a skilful pickpocket. I could sew neatly, write a tolerable hand, make a curtsey and a correct introduction, dance a little and play simple tunes on the harpsichord.” This was the London life of Felicity Hatton in 1740 – until chance sent her back to the House, first as a pauper, later to become its mistress – a strange eccentric mistress whose choice of husband was as unorthodox as her manner of living.

The House at Old Vine is the second in a trilogy of novels by Norah Lofts about the inhabitants of a Suffolk house from the late 14th century to the middle of the 20th.

Covering the turbulent years of 1496 to 1680, it follows six generations of the descendants of Martin Reed, who founded the "House" dynasty through his act of rebellion in The Town House, through persecution, war, and revolution, from the era of Christopher Columbus to the Restoration of Charles II.

“All eyes and hair” a courtier had said disparagingly of her – and certainly the younger daughter of Tom Boleyn lacked the bounteous charms of most ladies of Court. Black-haired, black eyes, she had a wild-sprite quality that was to prove more effective, more dangerous than conventional feminine appeal. The King first noticed her when she was sixteen – and with imperial greed he smashed her youthful love-affair with Harry Percy and began the process of royal seduction.

For the Spender family, the ancient, beautifully kept house had seemed a godsend, an incredible bargain, almost a gift from its owner - a kindly man who merely wanted someone to protect the family homestead, to make Gad’s come alive again. And it did. Soon a strong-willed, sensible woman would be overtaken by irrational feelings she could not control, all because of the unspeakable secret kept by the women who had lived at Gad’s Hall more than a century ago.…

"It was in the first week of October in the year 1391 that I first came face to face with the man who owned me… the man whose lightest word was to us, his villeins, weightier than the King’s law or the edicts of our Holy Father…” So began the story of Martin Reed - a serf whose resentment of the automatic rule of his feudal lord finally flared into open defiance.

The house was built in the Old Queen's time: built for an Elizabethan pirate who was knighted for the plunder he brought home. It survived many eras, many reigns: it saw the passing of Cromwell and the Civil War. It became rich with an Indian Nabob and poor with a 20th century innkeeper. It saw wars, and lovers, and death. Children were born there, both heirs and bastards. It had ghosts and legends and a history that grew stranger with every generation.

She was the daughter of a preacher and a gypsy. A strange and elusive child with powers of prophecy, she grew into an even stranger woman. From those around her she inspired love and admiration or furious hatred. Nothing in between. And somehow Jassy could transform even those who loved her into her enemies. Barney Hatton, the dispossessed heir of Mortiboys, loved her but not enough. Lindy, a girl who worked there, loved her too much.

The Wars of the Roses were over, but for Henry Tallboys the battle for survival went on. Scratchign a livign from the meagre soil of Knight’s Acre was no easy task, but that wasn’t Henry’s only worry – there was also Joann’s future to settle. Even at the age of eleven Joanna seemed destined to fetch a handsome price in the marriage market; yet a mysterious bond seemed to unite her with Henry, a bond more close than either of them could have known.

When William the Conqueror wished to reward his armourer, he made him a grant of land - land worked by freemen and already belonging to a Saxon lord. But the men of the Conquest had no time for the niceties of land tenure and legal possession. Rolf, the armourer, hacked his way through the Saxon defiance and savagely claimed his royal bequest.

Thus the future of Caroline Matilda, youngest sister of George III, was settled – marriage to the nearly insane Prince of Denmark. Prompted by a sense of foreboding, she begged that one of her sisters should be sent in her place. But Caroline was the healthiest, the strongest of the English princesses, and as well as being exiled, princesses were meant to be brood mares…Exiled in a strange country, isolated by her inability to speak the language, Caroline forms a close bond with the King’s doctor, Johann Struensee.

Eleanor…young, high-spirited, supremely intelligent, heiress to the vast Duchy of Aquitaine – at a time when a woman’s value was measured in terms of wealth. Her vivid leadership inspired and dazzled those about her. And yet, born to rule, she was continually repressed and threatened by the men who overshadowed her life. This is the story of a brilliant, medieval figure – of a princess who led her own knights to the Crusades, who was bride to two kings and mother of Richard the Lionheart.

When Daisy Holt was dismissed from her post as a nursemaid she set off cheerfully into the jungle of mid-Victorian London. When Kitty Hammond, proprietress of the “select establishment” off Leicester Square discovered her she was quick to realise that Daisy has a rare talent and would make a successful entertainer. And there it was that she met the impoverished artist John Skelton. To him Daisy represented the perfect model – the one to inspire his work.

In the autumn of 1817, the arrival of the Ipswich coach and its occupants – a strange, ill-assorted company – changed the lives of those who lived at the Fleece Inn forever…. Will Oakley, landlord and host, with his two daughters, beautiful Myrtle, and the repellent Harriet, waited to receive his guests. Along with the usual farmers, merchants and the “quality”, there were others who fitted into none of these categories.

Sir Godfrey Tallboys had come home from the Crusades. Home to Knight’s Acre. But the years had brought many changes – and not only to his estate. His wife Sybilla, exhausted with struggling to keep poverty at bay, had grown old before her time. And with Sir Godfrey’s return, there was further change. With him was the Moorish slave girl who had saved his life in Spain.

His name was Colin Lowrie. A tall, red-haired Scot; a man at 16, whose pride was the ancient clan pride of the Lowries. And when the clans were broken - massacred in a brutal revenge at Culloden Field - Colin Lowrie was forced to take flight on a journey half-way round the world.

No one at Gad’s Hall could admit what they knew about the room in the attic. The locked room that held the Thorley family’s most shameful secret. The terrifying room that had once been the living tomb of a beautiful young woman possessed by the darkest evil. Years had passed but the relentless diabolic force abided – waiting until it could once again possess an innocent and inflict its horror upon the living. It was a force countless centuries old. It was simply a matter of time before it would strike again.

When, at the Pollards Harvest Supper of 1817, Araminta Glover was seduced by Jan Honeywood, the outcome seemed inevitable. Araminta, like so many servant girls, would marry her poor suitor and prepare to raise a large family on nine shillings a week. But 17-year-old Araminta was determined enough to rebel against the pattern of impoverished rural life, and, putting marriage and Jan firmly behind her, she accepted the post of dairymaid in the house of the strange Mrs Stancy.

Forced to flee Revolutionary France after the brutal guillotining of her beloved father, Isabella de Savigny arrives at Nethergate, the Suffolk house of her cousin, hoping for sympathy and succour. Instead, as a poor relation, she is forced to live the life of a servant and suffer the casual cruelty of lady’s maid Martha Pratt. When she is seduced and abandoned by the son of the house, Isabella is forced to marry Martha’s brother, and her struggle to survive truly begins. However, her misery is lessened when her daughter is born....

When young John Vincent died, the outward respectability of the Cornwall household was undermined. Strangers pried, asked too many questions and pointed accusing fingers at Charlotte - herself eager to escape from the oppressive atmosphere of her father's home.

Isabella of Spain was a great woman, a great Queen. Crown of Aloes is presented as a personal chronicle. Within the framework of known fact and detail drawn from hitherto unexploited contemporary Spanish sources, a novelist’s imagination and understanding have provided motives, thoughts, and private conversations, helping to build up the fascinating character Isabella must have been. Her fortunes were varied indeed: she knew acute poverty, faced anxiety and danger with high courage, gave much, suffered much, lived to the full.