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Hopeful Hearts at the Wartime Hotel by Maisie Thomas #Review #PublicationDay

  I am delighted feature another in the WW2 saga by Maisie Thomas. Hopeful Hearts at the Wartime Hotel  is published today by Boldwood Books .  Manchester, 1942. When Kitty Dunbar was forced to confront her husband’s debts and close the family hotel, she transformed Dunbar’s into a storage business for bombed-out families. But with her daughter to support, and relishing her new independence, Kitty is keen to come up with more ways to use the once prestigious hotel. Sharing her home are former chambermaid Lily , and kind-hearted welfare worker Beatrice , both haunted by past loss. Together, the three women create a new kind of family in the heart of the Manchester Blitz: one built on respect and resilience. When Kitty suggests hosting wedding receptions in the old dining room, her friends are happy and willing to lend a hand – and help to serve ‘Dunbar’s Wartime Wedding Punch’! But when Lily meets a handsome doctor, and Beatrice comes face to face with an old ...

A Widow's Vow by Rachel Brimble #Review

 

Today's historical fiction takes us to Victorian England and Bath. Published by Aria on September 10th, A Widow's Vow is the first in a new saga series by Rachel Brimble. 


From grieving widow...

1851. After her merchant husband saved her from a life of prostitution, Louisa Hill was briefly happy as a housewife in Bristol. But then a constable arrives at her door. Her husband has been found hanged in a Bath hotel room, a note and a key to a property in Bath the only things she has left of him. And now the debt collectors will come calling.

To a new life as a madam.

Forced to leave everything she knows behind, Louisa finds more painful betrayals waiting for her in the house in Bath. Left with no means of income, Louisa knows she has nothing to turn to but her old way of life. But this time, she'll do it on her own terms – by turning her home into a brothel for upper class gentleman. And she's determined to spare the girls she saves from the street the horrors she endured in the past.

Enlisting the help of Jacob Jackson, a quiet but feared boxer, to watch over the house, Louisa is about to embark on a life she never envisaged. Can she find the courage to forge this new path?

A Widow's Vow is the first in a gripping and gritty new Victorian saga series from Rachel Brimble. You won't be able to put it down.

My Thoughts

Plunged into Victorian Bath, you get to see a section of society which is not often featured. An underclass of prostitutes and shady characters co-exist alongside the prosperous middle classes and at times, on the surface, are indistinguishable from the respectable citizens. This is the first in a trilogy and you are introduced to three women who are all surviving despite everything. A Widow's Vow centres on Louisa and Jacob who both have huge trust issues, following difficult childhoods. 

    Because of her past life, Louisa is determined to retain her independence and to set up a brothel which she will run in the interests of its staff. The three women, Louisa, Nancy and Octavia form a tight household, a surrogate family even and I am sure that future books will shed more light on their backgrounds. This is an enjoyable historical novel which has a strong sense of time and place and which poses some interesting questions about the place of women in society, their right to establish their own lives as individuals, rather than as goods 'owned'  by men. 

In short:  Sharply drawn characters and a great sense of the period.

About the Author


Rachel lives with her husband and their two daughters in a small town near Bath, England. She is the author of over 20 published novels including the Pennington’s department store series (Aria Fiction) and the Templeton Cove Stories (Harlequin).

Her next project is a Victorian trilogy set in a Bath brothel which she recently signed with Aria Fiction. The series will feature three heroines determined to change their lives and those of other women. The first book. A Widow’s Vow is due for release in September and available for Amazon preorder now.

Rachel is a member of the Romantic Novelists Association and has thousands of social media followers all over the world.

To sign up for her newsletter (a guaranteed giveaway every month!), click  here.

You can follow Rachel here:|   Website  |  Blog   |  Twitter     |  Instagram  

Book links:  Amazon UK   |  Amazon US

 
Aria links: Website  |  Twitter   |  Fiction   |  Instagram 
  

Thanks to Rachel Brimble and Aria for a copy of the book and a place on the tour.


                                      Be sure to check out the rest of the tour!
 

 

 

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