My
latest offering, Victoria & Violet, is book 1 in my brand-new Royal
Maids series and I am excited, but also nervous, now it has been released into
the world. Why? Well, as much as I love this book and how proud I am of writing
it, Victoria & Violet is the first novel in which I have included
real people and real events alongside the fictional.
To do this has been an
ambition of mine ever since my first book was published in 2007 so having
achieved it feels like a very big deal. Although Queen Victoria, Lord Melbourne,
the Duchess of Kent, Lehzen and other well-known people feature in the book,
the story really revolves around the lives and burgeoning romance of fictional
housemaid Violet Parker and fictional assistant to Lord Melbourne, James
Greene.
These two characters
were a joy to create, and their electricity was immediate which made a usually
hard job all the easier! Their paths have crossed a few times before the book
opens, but the interest is firmly in James’s court (so to speak!), rather than
Violet’s who has far more important and life-changing things on her mind than
romance…such as escaping the clutches of her overbearing mother and forging a
life of her own. Of course, it is not as though Violet would ever consider
James a possible suitor considering his superior status. Yet, he really is most
persistent!
All too soon, James and
Violet are repeatedly thrown together as their roles become ever more important
to Victoria and Lord Melbourne. Amid a court that travels from the gardens of
Windsor Castle to the corridors of Buckingham Palace to the wedding of the
Queen herself, Victoria & Violet takes you on an adventure of drama,
intrigue and romance that I hope has you quickly turning the pages!
Happy reading,
Rachel x
Here's the blurb &
preorder link – I hope I’ve tempted you!
It
should be a dream come true to serve the Queen of England…
When Violet Parker is told she will be Queen
Victoria’s personal housemaid, she cannot believe her good fortune. She finally
has the chance to escape her overbearing mother, a servant to the Duchess of
Kent.
Violet hopes to explore who she is and what the
world has to offer without her mother’s schemes overshadowing her every thought
and action.
Then she meets James Greene, assistant to the
queen’s chief political adviser, Lord Melbourne. From entirely different
backgrounds and social class, Violet and James should have neither need nor
desire to speak to one another, yet through their service, their paths cross
and their lives merge—as do their feelings.
Only Victoria’s court is not always the place
for romance, but rather secrets, scandals, and conspiracies…
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