Author: Gill Paul
Published: 4th June 2015
Publisher: Avon Books
Today I am part of the blog Tour for No Place For A Lady by Gill Paul, whose cover I revealed a little while ago. Today I have a wonderful extract of the beginning of the book to share with you. Enjoy!
EXTRACT
Prologue
25th October 1854
Mrs Lucy Harvington stands shivering on a
hilltop near the coast of Crimea, watching armies massed for battle below,
waiting to find out if her husband will die today. Charlie is somewhere in the
group to the far left: she has overheard Lord Raglan pointing out the Light
Brigade when giving an order and she peers in the direction he indicated to see
indistinct figures on horseback, cold sunlight glinting on the steel of their
bayonets. All around she can see lines of men standing poised, waiting for the
order to rush forward and try to kill each other – men who are sons, nephews,
husbands and fathers, even grandfathers. She can hear the impatient whinny of
horses and the squawk of a bird high above. It sounds like a warning.
Suddenly it seems incomprehensible that she
should find herself in such a situation. In less than a year her entire fortune
has turned on its head: she’s gone from being a young lady of just seventeen
years who lived at home with her father and older sister, to being the wife of
an army captain who has followed her husband to war in a remote, inhospitable
land. She still can’t quite believe the change in her circumstances. In London
she has a wide circle of friends and used to attend balls and soirées wearing fashionable
new gowns and the latest hairstyles. Now she has been wearing the same gown for
almost a week without the opportunity to wash, her cloak is smeared in mud and
her hair hangs in matted coils. She spends most of her time alone while Charlie
is out in the field.
She is cold, her clothes are damp – they
never seem to dry completely – and she is very, very scared. But her fate has
been sealed since that first unforgettable meeting with Charlie Harvington, the
beginning of a chain of circumstances that had led her to this godforsaken
hillside.
It was a dull November day in 1853, when
London was thick with sooty fog and the stench of the Thames. Lucy had called
upon the Pendleburys, old friends of her parents, in the hope of seeing their
son Henry, whom she knew was home on leave from the army. They’d enjoyed a
brief flirtation during his last leave and she was curious to see where it
might lead. Unfortunately Henry was absent and she had to make conversation
with his mother and father, a rather staid couple. Once they had run through
the usual topics – the weather, plans for the festive season, health of
respective family members – Lucy offered to play the pianoforte and sing for
them, simply to pass the time until she could decently make her excuses and
leave.
About The Author
Gill Paul is a writer of meticulously researched historical fiction. Her five novels include Women and Children First (set on the Titanic and published in 2012 for the centenary of the sinking) and The Affair (set in Rome in the early 1960s, and published in May 2013, on the 50th anniversary of the release of the Burton-Taylor Cleopatra movie). Gill has written several non-fiction books, including Royal Love Stories and World War I Love Stories.
‘A wonderfully imagined peek into the fabulous excesses of the Burton-Taylor relationship, from booze-fuelled spats to their intoxicating chemistry.’ Hello! Magazine review of The Affair
"It's a galloping good story, and the author has clearly done her research and has a good grasp of the period." Natasha McEnroe, Director, Florence Nightingale Museum
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