Friday Fiction: Philippa Gregory

--by Hanje Richards
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Philippa Gregory was born in Kenya. When she was two years old, her family moved to England. She was a "rebel" at school, but eventually decided to go to university and was educated at the University of Sussex. She worked in BBC radio for two years before attending the University of Edinburgh, where she earned her doctorate in 18th-century literature. She has taught at the University of Durham, University of Teesside, and the Open University, and was made a Fellow of Kingston University in 1994.
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Her academic background has given her a knowledge of and enthusiasm for many periods of history but particularly for the Tudor period and the 16th century. Her research in 18th-century literature led her to write the bestselling Lacey trilogy Wideacre, which is a gripping story about the love of land and incest, The Favored Child and Meridon.

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Philippa Gregory now lives on a 100-acre farm in the North York Moors national park, near Stokesley, with her husband, children and stepchildren (six in all). Her interests include riding, walking, skiing, and gardening..

Constant Princess - Katherine of Aragon. Known to history as the Queen who was pushed off her throne by Anne Boleyn, here is a Katherine the world has forgotten: the enchanting princess that all England loved. First married to Henry VIII's older brother, Arthur, Katherine's passion turns their arranged marriage into a love match; but when Arthur dies, the merciless English court and her ambitious parents -- the crusading King and Queen of Spain -- have to find a new role for the widow. Ultimately, it is Katherine herself who takes control of her own life by telling the most audacious lie in English history, leading her to the very pinnacle of power in England.

Set in the rich beauty of Moorish Spain and the glamor of the Tudor court, The Constant Princess presents a woman whose constancy helps her endure betrayal, poverty and despair, until the inevitable moment when she steps into the role she has prepared for all her life: Henry VIII's Queen, Regent, and commander of the English army in their greatest victory against Scotland. .

Favored Child - The Wideacre estate is bankrupt. The villagers are living in poverty and Wideacre Hall is a smoke-blackened ruin. But, in the Dower House, two children are being raised in protected innocence. Equal claimants to the estate, rivals for the love of the village, they are tied by a secret childhood betrothal but forbidden to marry. Only one can be the favored child. Only one can inherit the magical understanding between the land and the Lacey family that can make the Sussex village grow green again. Only one can be Beatrice Lacey's true heir. .

Little House - A contemporary psychological. It was easy for Elizabeth. She married the man she loved, bore him two children, and made a home for him which was the envy of their friends. It was harder for Ruth. She married Elizabeth's son and then found that, somehow, she could never quite measure up! Isolation, deceit and betrayal fill the gaps between the two individual women and between their different worlds. In this complex thriller, Philippa Gregory deploys all her insight into what women want and what women fear, as Ruth confronts the shifting borders of her own sanity. Laying bare the comfortable conventions of rural England, this spine-tingling novel pulses with suspense until the whiplash double-twist of the denouement.
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Meridon - Meridon knows she does not belong in the dirty, vagabond life of a gypsy bareback rider. The half-remembered vision of another life burns in her heart, even as her beloved sister, Dandy, risks everything for their future. Alone, Meridon follows the urgings of her dream, riding in the moonlight past the rusted gates, up the winding drive to a house -- clutching the golden clasp of the necklace that was her birthright -- home at last to Wideacre. The lost heir of one of England's great estates would take her place as its mistress...

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Queen's Fool - It is winter, 1553. Pursued by the Inquisition, Hannah Green, a fourteen-year-old Jewish girl, is forced to flee Spain with her father. But Hannah is no ordinary refugee. Her gift of "Sight," the ability to foresee the future, is priceless in the troubled times of the Tudor court. Hannah is adopted by the glamorous Robert Dudley, the charismatic son of King Edward's protector, who brings her to court as a "holy fool" for Queen Mary and, ultimately, Queen Elizabeth. Hired as a fool but working as a spy; promised in wedlock but in love with her master; endangered by the laws against heresy, treason, and witchcraft, Hannah must choose between the safe life of a commoner and the dangerous intrigues of the royal family that are inextricably bound up in her own yearnings and desires.

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Wideacre - Beatrice Lacey, as strong-minded as she is beautiful, refuses to conform to the social customs of her time. Destined to lose her family name and beloved Wideacre estate once she is wed, Beatrice will use any means necessary to protect her ancestral heritage. Seduction, betrayal, even murder -- Beatrice's passion is without apology or conscience. "She is a Lacey of Wideacre," her father warns, "and whatever she does, however she behaves, will always be fitting." Yet even as Beatrice's scheming seems about to yield her dream, she is haunted by the one living person who knows the extent of her plans... and her capacity for evil.