Tag Archives: King Edward IV

#BookReview ‘Kingdom Come’ by Toby Clements #historicalfiction #WarsoftheRoses

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The impression of peace and security is transient in 1470. Kingdom Come by Toby Clements is the fourth book in the Kingmaker historical series set during the Wars of the Roses. And such a book it is I didn’t want to put it down. I have developed a fondness for Thomas and Katherine Everingham. Toby ClementsThe story continues on immediately from the end of the third book, Divided Souls, as King Edward IV is drawn north to deal with rebellion. The Earl of Warwick has switched sides and now backs the old king Henry VI whose wife Margaret of Anjou seeks to enthrone their son Edward of Westminster. King Edward is deposed and forced to flee to Bruges with his loyal retinue including Thomas’s patron, Lord William Hastings. Thomas and Katherine go too with their two children, Rufus and new baby Alice. As they face more impossible decisions, tragedy, poverty and vicious battles, the couple long simply to go home.
Kingdom Come is a page-turning story set in 1470-1471 when the wars see the three York brothers separated and reunited, where the York and Lancaster armies march to and fro across the country to meet in battle again and again, buffeting Thomas and Katherine to and fro entangled in events over which they have no control.
At the heart of this series are three secrets shielded by Thomas and Katherine. One a ledger, hidden for ten years, contains an inconvenient truth that could bring about their own deaths and make the already violent Wars of the Roses explode as kin turns on kin. The proof is ‘bundled tightly in its waxed linen and leather bindings, heavy as any chain, shackling them, inescapably, to the great weight of their pasts.’ The second secret, shrouded in mystery throughout, is seen with a wisp of a hint here and there but is so fleeting it is forgotten in the stories of Thomas and Katherine moving north and south, east and west, in pursuit of safety and the truth. Always, they return home to Marton Hall in Lincolnshire. The third secret, re-emerges in Kingdom Come to drive them from their home into destitution, refugees overseas, then back into battle at Barnet and then Tewkesbury.
Heartily recommended. This is a fine series. I’m crossing my fingers that there will be another Kingmaker installment to take us to the fall of Yorkist rule and the dawn of the Tudors.

Read my reviews of the other books in this series:-
WINTER PILGRIMS #1KINGMAKER
BROKEN FAITH #2KINGMAKER
DIVIDED SOULS #3KINGMAKER

And also by Toby Clements:-
A GOOD DELIVERANCE

If you like this, try:-
‘The Players’ by Minette Walters
‘The Key in the Lock’ by Beth Underdown
‘Plague Land’ by SD Sykes #1OSWALDDELACY

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview KINGDOM COME by Toby Clements https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-90E via @SandraDanby 

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Robert Thorogood

#BookReview ‘Divided Souls’ by Toby Clements #historicalfiction #WarsoftheRoses

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England 1469. For five years, Thomas and Katherine Everingham have lived in peace until the divisions of the Wars of the Roses envelop them again. Divided Souls by Toby Clements is third in the Kingmaker series set during this deadly and complex time of on-off war between the houses of York and Lancaster. Toby ClementsAt the heart of Divided Souls is the rebellion by the Duke of Warwick against King Edward IV. Thomas and Katherine, now with a five-year-old son Rufus, never look for trouble. But when Thomas is asked by his former commander Lord William Hastings to travel to Yorkshire to monitor enemy troop movements, the Everinghams cannot refuse. And then Hastings admits his real reason for sending them north from their Lincolnshire home. He wants them to find a ledger, find it before Warwick’s supporters do. The value of the ledger is unexplained but Thomas and Katherine already know because it is buried beneath their hearth, hidden because of the deadly information it contains. And they are the only people who know where it is.
So the three Everinghams, with faithful retainers one-armed John Stump, Jack and his pregnant wife Nettie, set out for York. Old friends and familiar foes are encountered once again in Yorkshire and on a new battlefield. Old fears and nightmares that return are deepened as Thomas and Katherine, with Rufus to protect, feel vulnerable in a way they never have before. Their five years of domestic peace at Marton Hall seem a fleeting moment as the couple are separated again, Thomas must fight and Katherine faces battlefield surgery. And all the time they know that the enemy and other agents working for Hastings are searching for the ledger. Terrified of being caught, they discuss the consequences of burning it, burying it or simply giving it to Hastings.
Clements negotiates his way through a complex and confusing time in history, placing his fictional characters into an imagined setting within the facts known of the times. The result is quick-reading tale that races from one difficult decision to another as Thomas and Katherine journey into the unknown, no sooner escaping from one danger before facing another. Loved ones must be left behind, home must be abandoned and once safe familiar places are now dangerous. As King Edward’s loyal lords rebel, it isn’t only Thomas and Katherine who don’t know who to trust.
Excellent.
This is the third in the series. Please start reading with Winter Pilgrims in order to enjoy Kingmaker at its best and to fully appreciate the long-standing loyalties, fear and hatred that runs throughout Clements’ telling of two innocent people caught up in the Wars of the Roses.

Read my reviews of the other books in this series:-
WINTER PILGRIMS #1KINGMAKER
BROKEN FAITH #2KINGMAKER
KINGDOM COME #4KINGMAKER

And also by Toby Clements:-
A GOOD DELIVERANCE

If you like this, try:-
‘Cecily’ by Annie Garthwaite
‘The Other Gwyn Girl’ by Nicola Cornick
‘The Lady of the Rivers’ by Philippa Gregory

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview DIVIDED SOULS by Toby Clements https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8Ts via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Stephen Spotswood