Anya Seton & Other "Faction" novelists

[Daisy Loo]

Just thought I'd share about this amazing book I'm reading, called "The Winthrop Woman", set in the 1600's, and it is based on factual events regarding the Winthrops...it's by Anya Seton..

Most of the book is about the journey of how the Winthrops ended up in Boston, but the first part is about the time in England, under King Charles...it's fantastic reading, and gives great atmosphere of those times...and it's a delight to know that the people actually existed.

Anya Seton is a fanastic author, as she is renowned for doing years of research (4 years for this book!)

I'm definitely going to look for some more of her books, I just hope they are still in print, as the one I'm reading was printed in 1958

[aghadowey]

Anya Seton's family connections was mentioned on this old thread:
www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,242570.0.html
Think at least some of her books might have been reprinted fairly recently as I noticed some new ones in my local library a year or so ago.

[Daisy Loo]

Thanks Aghadowey...very interesting!  I'm only a third of the way through this book, but it's keeping my attention!  She's fantastic, manages to include so much detail of history, yet it isn't dry...  She says she owns some of the Winthrop papers, and I wonder if she was connected to them at all...more than likely!  But can you imagine owning papers that old?

[aghadowey]

As far as I can remember Anya Seton was not connected to Winthrop family but she lived for many years in Greenwich, Connecticut in the area described in that book. At least one of her other books also took place in Greenwich (Smoldering Fires).

www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/s/anya-seton

[Su]

Other books by Anya Seton are
My Theodosia
Dragonwyck
The Mistletoe and the Sword
Green Darkness and
best of all in my view
Katherine which is about Katherine Swynford (nee Roet)who became mistress to John of Gaunt then his wife.  Through her children by John O Gaunt (legitimised upon their marriage) she became ancestress to the Tudor Kings of England and the Stuarts of Scotland.
She lived much of her life in Lincolnshire and her tomb and that of her daughter Joan Beaufort are in Lincoln Cathedral.
Anya Seton's version of Katherine is a romantic novel.
Katherine and John of Gaunt is one of the greatest love stories of mediaeval England.  Once read, never forgotten.
I have lost count of the times I have read it myself.

[united]

and
best of all in my view
Katherine which is about Katherine Swynford (nee Roet)Once read, never forgotten.
I have lost count of the times I have read it myself.

I could not agree more - I cannot remember how many years ago I read that book - or how many times I have read it again since ....!!
Note to self - must dig it out and read it again ....!!!  Maybe it is time to renew my very dog-eared paperback version; I think it must still be in print, because it was for sale in the Lincoln Cathedral shop when I went a few years ago!

[Su]

Hello united
I refuse to lend my copy to anyone in case I don't get it back 
In case you might be interested, at the moment I am reading Katherine Swynford by Alison Weir.  The review by the Daily Telegraph says..Gripping..immaculately researched.

I couldn't agree more. 
Well worth reading if you love history as I do.
I live in Lincoln too.

kind regards
Su

[united]

Thanks for that Su - I will look out for that one!!

[Daisy Loo]

Thanks Su & United....

I have finished the Winthrop Woman, and it was just brilliant, so I am going to look out for the others.

I'll have a look at the other suggestion too Su, and if there are any other historical "novelists" you might recommend, I'd be grateful...it's so wonderful to get a kind of insight into our past isn't it?


Cheers,

Daisy Loo