I’ve always dreamed of visiting Australia, but that was not to be. The outback is rough and Ayers Rock is dry and high desert like. But not in my vision!

Book Title:  A Splendid Defiance

Series:  Roundheads & Cavaliers

Author:  Stella Riley

Publication Date: 6^th December 2012

Publisher:  Stella Riley

Page Length:  371 pages

Genre:  Historical Fiction / Historical Romance

Special Tour Price: Ebook £1.95 / US $1.95 (and equivalent) for the duration of the tour!

Twitter Handle: @RileyStella @cathiedunn

Instagram Handle:  @stellarileybooks @thecoffeepotbookclub

Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #HistoricalRomance #EnglishCivilWar #BlogTour #TheCoffeePotBookClub

Tour Schedule Page: https://thecoffeepotbookclub.blogspot.com/2024/03/blog-tour-a-splendid-defiance-by-stella-riley.html

Book Title and Author Name:

A Splendid Defiance

Stella Riley

Audiobook performed by Alex Wyndham

Blurb:

For two years England has been in the grip of Civil War.  In Banbury, Oxfordshire, the Cavaliers hold the Castle, the Roundheads want it back and the town is full of zealous Puritans.

Consequently, the gulf between Captain Justin Ambrose and Abigail Radford, the sister of a fanatically religious shopkeeper, ought to be unbridgeable.

The key to both the fate of the Castle and that of Justin and Abigail lies in defiance.  But will it be enough?

A Splendid Defiance is a dramatic and enchanting story of forbidden love, set against the turmoil and anguish of the English Civil War.

Excerpt 9

Visist From A Prince

Justin spent the afternoon in the Globe Room at the Reindeer Inn. It was a pleasant room but, as far as Justin was concerned, it might as well have been a coal cellar.  He sat broodingly in a corner and found a sardonic enjoyment in the wary glances accorded him by the other customers.

He did not, however, get drunk and this was fortunate because, at just past five o’clock, the door was flung wide to admit the King’s nephew.  Silence engulfed the room.

Rupert strode across to push Justin unceremoniously back into his seat with a curt, ‘Are you sober?’ 

‘Yes, sir.  I can’t afford to be anything else.’

With a derisive grunt, the Prince threw himself inelegantly into a chair and waved the pot-boy aside.

‘Then it’s not a completely ill-wind that keeps our pay in arrears.  And at least you have boots.  Two of my fellows were actually sharing a pair at one point.  The whole army is living off the country and discipline is going to the dogs.’  He scowled at this thought for a moment and then looked back at Justin.  ‘They told you I was coming?’

‘Yes.  In order that we might ‘nurture our vices together’ was, I think the exact expression.’  Justin paused and then, with a brief, contemptuous gesture, ‘They think so, at any rate.  Or is it that they’ve finally recognised you?’

‘Who cares?’ Rupert’s indifferent gaze skimmed the room and sent at least three stalwarts edging towards the door.  ‘If I took to the bottle every time filth was thrown at me, I’d never be less than half-cut.’

‘No, sir.  Point taken.’

‘I hope so.’  The dark eyes examined him shrewdly. ‘Do you want me to take you out of here?’

The blood rose under Justin’s skin and he said flatly, ‘There’s nothing I’d like better.  But I’d be no use to you, sir.  I can’t hold a sword yet, or even stay in the saddle more than a few hours.  And I know the pace you set.’

‘Needs must,’ shrugged Rupert.  ‘But when the Parliament fields their new army, I’ll need all my best captains – so get yourself fit.’ 

‘Yes, sir.’ Justin stared into his ale-cup.  ‘What will you do now that Shrewsbury has fallen?’

‘Use Ludlow.’ Rupert scowled again.  He’d depended on his brother Maurice to hold Shrewsbury and its loss was a sore point.  He said tersely, ‘I’ve some news for you.  Your father died at the end of last month.’

A muscle moved in Justin’s jaw.  Then his eyes hardened and he said, ‘I see.  Thank you for telling me.’

‘Well, no one else is in a position to, are they?’ observed the Prince trenchantly.  ‘What will you do?’

A strange smile crossed the chiselled features.

‘The same as I’ve done these last ten years, Your Highness.  Absolutely nothing.  I won’t even get drunk.’

Buy Link:

Universal Buy Link:  https://books2read.com/u/bPzVNd

Author Bio:

Winner of four gold medals for historical romance and sixteen Book Readers’ Appreciation Medallions, Stella Riley lives in the beautiful medieval town of Sandwich in Kent.

She is fascinated by the English Civil Wars and has written six books set in that period. These, like the 7 book Rockliffe series, the Brandon Brothers trilogy and, most recently The Shadow Earl, are all available in audio, performed by Alex Wyndham.

Stella enjoys travel, reading, theatre, Baroque music and playing the harpsichord.  She also has a fondness for men with long hair – hence her 17th and 18th century heroes.

Author Links:

Website: https://stellarileybooks.co.uk

Twitter: https://twitter.com/RileyStella

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stellariley.books

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stellarileybooks/

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.co.uk/riley9631/stella-riley-books/

Book Bub:  https://www.bookbub.com/authors/stella-riley

Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Stella-Riley/e/B0034PB7UU/

Goodreads:  https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40487661-a-splendid-defiance

Book Title: The Falconer’s Apprentice

Series: n/a

Author: Malve von Hassell

Publication Date: January 30, 2024 (second edition)

Publisher: Malve von Hassell

Pages: 214

Genre: Historical Fiction

Twitter Handles: @MvonHassell @cathiedunn

Instagram Handles: @mvonhassell @thecoffeepotbookclub

Hashtags: #HistoricalFiction #HolyRomanEmpire #FrederickII #CasteldelMonte #falconry #MedievalMedicine #BlogTour #TheCoffeePotBookClub

Tour Schedule Page: https://thecoffeepotbookclub.blogspot.com/2024/03/blog-tour-the-falconers-apprentice-by-malve-von-hassell.html

Book Title and Author Name:

The Falconer’s Apprentice

by Malve von Hassell

Blurb:

THE FALCONER’S APPRENTICE is a story of adventure and intrigue set in the intense social and political unrest of the Holy Roman Empire in the thirteenth century.

“That bird should be destroyed!”

Andreas stared at Ethelbert in shock. Blood from an angry-looking gash on the young lord’s cheek dripped onto his embroidered tunic. Andreas clutched the handles of the basket containing the young peregrine. Perhaps this was a dream—

Andreas, an apprentice falconer at Castle Kragenberg, cannot bear the thought of killing the young female falcon and smuggles her out of the castle. Soon he realizes that his own time there has come to an end, and he stows away, with the bird, in the cart of an itinerant trader, Richard of Brugge.

So begins a series of adventures that lead him from an obscure castle in northern Germany to the farthest reaches of Frederick von Hohenstaufen’s Holy Roman Empire, following a path dictated by the wily trader’s mysterious mission. Andreas continues to improve his falconry skills, but he also learns to pay attention to what is happening around him as he travels through areas fraught with political unrest.

Eventually, Richard confides in Andreas, and they conspire to free Enzio, the eldest of the emperor’s illegitimate sons, from imprisonment in Bologna.

Buy Links:

This title is available to read on #KindleUnlimited.

Universal Buy Link: https://books2read.com/u/31BMjD   

Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-falconers-apprentice-malve-von-hassell/1121105739?ean=9781737101185/  

Author Bio:

Malve von Hassell is a freelance writer, researcher, and translator. She holds a Ph.D. in anthropology from the New School for Social Research. Working as an independent scholar, she published The Struggle for Eden: Community Gardens in New York City (Bergin & Garvey 2002) and Homesteading in New York City 1978-1993: The Divided Heart of Loisaida (Bergin & Garvey 1996). She has also edited her grandfather Ulrich von Hassell’s memoirs written in prison in 1944, Der Kreis schließt sich – Aufzeichnungen aus der Haft 1944 (Propylaen Verlag 1994).

She has taught at Queens College, Baruch College, Pace University, and Suffolk County Community College, while continuing her work as a translator and writer.

Malve has published two children’s picture books, Tooth Fairy (Amazon KDP 2012/2020), and Turtle Crossing (Amazon KDP 2023), and her translation and annotation of a German children’s classic by Tamara Ramsay, Rennefarre: Dott’s Wonderful Travels and Adventures (Two Harbors Press, 2012).

The Falconer’s Apprentice (2015/KDP 2024) was her first historical fiction novel for young adults. She has published Alina: A Song for the Telling (BHC Press, 2020), set in Jerusalem in the time of the crusades, and The Amber Crane (Odyssey Books, 2021), set in Germany in 1645 and 1945, as well as a biographical work about a woman coming of age in Nazi Germany, Tapestry of My Mother’s Life: Stories, Fragments, and Silences (Next Chapter Publishing, 2021), also available in German, Bildteppich Eines Lebens: Erzählungen Meiner Mutter, Fragmente Und Schweigen (Next Chapter Publishing, 2022), and is working on a historical fiction trilogy featuring Adela of Blois.

Author Links:

Website: https://www.malvevonhassell.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/MvonHassell

Facebook author page: https://www.facebook.com/malvevonhassellauthor/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/malve-von-hassell-02b61517/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mvonhassell/

Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/malvevonhassell.bsky.social

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/471746.Malve_von_Hassell

Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/malve-von-hassell

Amazon author link: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Malve-von-Hassell/author/B0CTGLDQ7P/

Is there a Lost City of Atlantis? Yes? No? Did you first meet your spouse or significant other in Atlantis? I would love to read your thoughts on this lost city.

Thought I’d try it…

Book Link

From Amazon:

Welcome to Dravenridge, a bustling small town nestled in the shadows of the Adirondack Mountains in Upstate New York. Dr. Kyle Weber has moved there to escape his past and heal his ailing marriage. But there is darkness in Dravenridge fueled by the desires and needs of its benefactor, Aurora Draven, a powerful immortal whose taste for blood is insatiable. Kyle learns of this hunger through a terrifying ritual that makes him a lifelong member of her Town Council. Neither knows of the savage serial killer who preys upon the town’s residents until it is too late. The Dravenridge Covenant is a fast-paced thrill-fest filled with memorable characters. It is guaranteed to keep you turning pages far into the night.

My Review:

Mary Schmidt

5.0 out of 5 stars WowserReviewed in the United States on April 18, 2024

Verified Purchase

Harrington has written a book full of thrills and danger mixed with love and vampires, add to that more money than anyone on Earth, plus a few well placed narrative about the towns benefactor, an inch or so of reality and full on gallons of vampirism, and that barely sums up this novel. Don’t take it wrong, please. A lot of good happens and deep love, but with deep love comes equal pain. It is visceral and intense.

Book Title: THE VIOLA FACTOR

Series: n/a

Author: Sheridan Brown

Publication Date: February 14^th, 2024

Publisher: BookBaby

Pages: 231

Genre: Historical Fiction

Book Trailer YouTube: https://youtu.be/yrtEyjFaC5A

Twitter Handle: @cathiedunn

Instagram Handles: @theviolafactor @thecoffeepotbookclub

Hashtags: #ViolaKnappRuffner #HistoricalFiction #BiographicalHistoricalFiction #BlogTour #TheCoffeePotBookClub

Tour Schedule Page: https://thecoffeepotbookclub.blogspot.com/2024/03/blog-tour-the-viola-factor-by-sheridan-brown.html

Book Title and Author Name:

The Viola Factor

by Sheridan Brown

Blurb:

“The Viola Factor” takes place at a time when the country faced division and growth after the American Civil War. Viola Knapp Ruffner (1812-1903) struggled with what was just and fair, becoming a little-known confidant for a young black scholar from Virginia. But Viola was much more than a teacher; she was a mother, wife, game-changer, and friend. With her mother’s dying wish, a young woman alone, she left her New England roots. This is a story of trauma and love in the South while battling for justice and the rightful education of the enslaved and once enslaved. African American leader Booker T. Washington (1856-1915) called her his friend and model for life.

The Viola Factor is in many ways a journey of life done in baby steps, tentatively stumbling, until a galloping stride is achieved. Viola Knapp wears different shoes on different days. Heavy, mud-trekking boots to allow for aggressive steps, and daintier shoes for more rhythmic and assertive ones. She was a diligent daughter, an outspoken protector, and a progressive teacher.

Like many women in her situation, alone at seventeen, Viola must realize her own principles to fulfill her future goals. With every stride, Viola Knapp Ruffner marches around surprises, over potholes, and dodges folly after folly on her journey to be fulfilled. After ambling in one direction, plodding along in another, and wandering to find herself, a sudden halt pushes her forward until a factor of fate places her in the path of a newly freed slave with a desire to read and penchant to lead. After years of post-traumatic stress and mental uncoupling, she finds herself a woman who followed her mother’s dying wish to fight for what is fair and just.

Buy Link:

Universal Buy Link: https://books2read.com/u/b5YERw

Author Bio:

Sheridan Brown holds advanced degrees in school leadership and is a certified teacher, principal, and educational leader. The arts have always been a central force in her life, since performing in piano recitals, school band, plays, and singing in choirs her whole life.

Ms. Brown was born in Tennessee and raised in small towns of southwest Virginia. She practiced her profession in Virginia, Massachusetts, and Florida. Upon retirement, she began volunteering, painting, writing, researching, and traveling with her husband, attorney John Crawford. She has one son, Tony Hume. She is GiGi to Aiden and Lucy. She has returned to the Blue Ridge to live and explore.

Author Links:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ViolaFactor/
YouTube: https://youtu.be/yrtEyjFaC5A

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/sheridan-l-brown-17422a5

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theviolafactor/

Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0B3HMSRBM

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/20766921.Sheridan_Brown

Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sheridanreels22

Threads: https://www.threads.net/@sbrown1919

Book Title: Yellow Bird’s Song

Series: n/a

Author: Heather Miller

Publication Date: March 19^th, 2024

Publisher: Historium Press

Pages: 370

Genre: Historical Fiction, Native American Studies, Western, Biography

Twitter Handles: @HMHFR @cathiedunn

Instagram Handle: @thecoffeepotbookclub

Hashtags: #AmericanHistory #NativeAmericanHistory #TrailOfTears #BlogTour #TheCoffeePotBookClub

Tour Schedule Page: https://thecoffeepotbookclub.blogspot.com/2024/03/blog-tour-yellow-birds-song-by-heather-miller.html

Book Title and Author Name:

Yellow Bird’s Song

by Heather Miller

Blurb:

Rollin Ridge, a mercurial figure in this tribal tale, makes a fateful decision in 1850, leaving his family behind to escape the gallows after avenging his father and grandfather’s brutal assassinations. With sin and grief packed in his saddlebags, he and his brothers head west in pursuit of California gold, embarking on a journey marked by hardship and revelation. Through letters sent home, Rollin uncovers the unrelenting legacy of his father’s sins, an emotional odyssey that delves deep into his Cherokee history.

The narrative’s frame transports readers to the years 1827-1835, where Rollin’s parents, Cherokee John Ridge and his white wife, Sarah, stumble upon a web of illicit slave running, horse theft, and whiskey dealings across Cherokee territory. Driven by a desire to end these inhumane crimes and defy the powerful pressures of Georgia and President Andrew Jackson, John Ridge takes a bold step by running for the position of Principal Chief, challenging the incumbent, Chief John Ross. The Ridges face a heart-wrenching decision: to stand against discrimination, resist the forces of land greed, and remain on their people’s ancestral land, or to sign a treaty that would uproot an entire nation, along with their family.

Heather Miller, Author

Yellow Bird’s Song, Excerpt 3

John Rollin Ridge, West Dessert, Utah, 1851

Instead of other travelers along this desert route, we’d found wagon carcasses, adding ours to the lot. Whether human corpses decayed inside, I couldn’t say. I didn’t stop to find out, ridding myself of guilt for not burying the dead. My body couldn’t have done it properly with so little water, not without following directly behind them.

As the afternoon waned, we dismounted and walked beside our thirsty animals. In the desert, a man’s horse becomes too weak to carry him. So, he travels on foot, closer to the dust, breathing and clogging his mind with villainous grains. Packs double their weight with worry, heavier with one last blanket of self-preservation. Yet, parched though he may be, his mind sings songs, like uprooted choruses from a withered elder, telling his trials to impatient warriors who already know the legend’s end.

Expanses of grass shrunk into patches, peeking through worn spots in the desert, like leg hair peeking through worn and holey farmhand pants. We found the pooled water brackish, the color of tea from iodine, salt mixing with sparse rainwater. It wasn’t potable for man or beast. With each disappointment from the lack of soluble water, our progress trickled, nearly stopping entirely.

The sway of horses and pack mules found their rhythm, sluggish though it was. Heat rippled across the sand to just repel back to us from wide mountain berths. Thorny bushes turned pale, a shade lighter than the sand at our feet, desperate for water deep in their roots. Snakes could not reach it and fled, finding no shade.

We pressed forward into the sun, past the mountains near Salt Lake. Each pull at the rim of our hats remained where it was stretched. Bandanas covered our mouths, eyes asquint, leaving each of us absent identity.

Aeneas coughed, attempting to break his silence, rallying saliva enough to articulate some question or another. One which I’d likely have no answer to. He said, “How are we gonna feed the horses, Rollin?”

I was right.

Wacooli answered behind me. “Anee, we’ll have to search for grass on foot and bring it to ‘em.” 

From my brother’s response to Wacooli’s lack of enthusiasm, I knew Aeneas stewed in his thoughts. His concern for our animals was more about him than the beasts.

Aeneas said, “You know what I’m hungry for? Grandma’s fried bread, Mama’s glazed chicken, Honey’s pole beans boiled with fatback, and strawberry pie.”

“Damn it, Aeneas! Doesn’t do us any good thinking about it.” I took the fatal risk of putting my thoughts to voice while lingering in Aeneas’ conjured savory tastes. I bit my tongue and swallowed twice. “Aeneas, do you remember Papa asking Mama to take all the seeds out of his strawberries?”

“Nope. Too little. You can hold Papa in your thoughts better than me, Rollin. You’ve got more stock.”

When I didn’t answer right away, he asked, “What did Papa say?”

“Said they got stuck in his teeth, and she needed to remove them.”

“Did she throw something at him?” Aeneas smiled briefly and tried a laugh, but his throat was too dry to form the sound.

“No. She kissed him, as I remember it.”

The memory was as sweet as the fruit. Our lives were so predictable then, freedom through synchronicity. Running Waters will always be home, not the cabin in the West at Honey Creek, or Mama’s dogtrot in Fayetteville, but our home, Running Waters, in Cherokee Nation East, settled among valley lands in the foothills of the Appalachians.

My parent’s extensive farm stretched into the valley on a high hill, crowned with a fine grove of oak and hickory, with a large clear spring at its foot. The orchard was on the left, wheat and cornfields to the right, pastures of cows, goats on one side near the house, and sheep grazing on the other.³ Behind the house, the running spring gave our home its name. After Grandfather’s New Echota Treaty in 1835, we, too, would run over rock, slip on moss, and fall downhill with only brief plains to pool.

The ground whitened under our horse hooves, salted sand gathering in random odd-shaped lines. Only God could articulate their rhyme and reason. Boot tracks marked our path northwest. Each saunter brought another thought: some forward, most backward. Where we’d been, what we’d lost. My thoughts rambled without any respite.

Buy Link:

Universal Buy Link: https://books2read.com/u/49a2w8

Author Bio:

As a veteran English teacher and college professor, Heather has spent nearly thirty years teaching her students the author’s craft. Now, with empty nest time on her hands, she’s writing herself, transcribing lost voices in American’s history.

Author Links:

Website: https://www.heathermillerauthor.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/HMHFR

Facebook: https://facebook.com/HMillerAuthor

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@heathermillerauthor

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/jhjewmiller/yellow-bird/

Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B094DLCL8K

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/21805281.Heather_Miller

Thank you.