The Burning Chambers (The Joubert Family Chronicles)

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First-rate cloak and dagger excitement – who knew the religious wars between Catholics and Huguenots in sixteenth-century France could be so riveting to modern audiences? Kate Mosse captures the details of life in the Languedoc region of France, famed for its beauty, but hiding many secrets, in this masterful novel - Margaret George, New York Times bestselling author of The Confessions of Young Nero Another meticulously researched and stunningly written novel by a much-loved and highly accomplished author. I adored it! - Santa Montefiore, bestselling author of An Italian Girl in Brooklyn The Ghost Ship is utterly absorbing. I couldn’t put it down and fell in love with her two main characters, and felt bereft when it ended - Louise Minchin, BBC journalist, host of the Her Spirit podcast and author of Fearless Gripping, thrilling, a spectacular work of scholarly reimagining, The Ghost Ship is a beautiful book about two women, about love, courage, suffering, and a world in which everything was on a knife edge. A stunning novel, a whole world recreated - Kate Williams, historian and author of Rival Queens This powerful story of love, secrets and deceit is pacy, rich and stylish – and as compelling as they come. One to stay up late for - Isabel Ashdown, author of Lake Child

Religious fanaticism, political intrigue and the heart-wrenching tale of a lost child add to a highly readable historical adventure, with women firmly centre stage - Mail on Sunday People don’t want to read a book about the refugee crisis, but they can fall in love with characters and feel their hearts broken when they have to flee their homes and have nowhere to live But the bravest among them are not who they seem. The stakes could not be higher. If arrested, they will be hanged for their crimes. Can they survive the journey and escape their fate? Also part of their household is Granny Rosie, Mosse’s mother-in-law, who will turn 93 this year and who, as we speak, is sipping the lunchtime gin and tonic Mosse has prepared for her. The writer and her husband are Rosie’s carers, and it is that experience, along with having cared for her own, much-loved parents, that formed the basis of Mosse’s memoir An Extra Pair of Hands, with its evocative subtitle, A Story of Caring and Everyday Acts of Love. A gorgeously written, utterly absorbing epic and, despite being set in the sixteenth century, has some very pertinent messages for our time about the evils of religious persecution and the transcendent power of love and family. In case it’s not clear enough yet, I absolutely LOVED it - Lucy Foley, bestselling author of The Hunting Party and The Paris Apartment, on The City of TearsMosse’s narrative lyricism, beautifully drawn female characters and deft journey from the past to the present day are a cut above - Scotland on Sunday on The Burning Chambers A vibrant sequel to 2018’s Burning Chambers . . . The fascinating historical detail fuels the drama and keeps the plot zipping along - Publishers Weekly Fifty Shades of Feminism (essay – edited by Lisa Appignanesi, Rachel Holmes & Susie Orbach, Virago, 2013)

Piracy. Romance. Revenge. Across the seas of the seventeenth century, two seafarers are forced to fight for their love and their lives. The sequel to The City of Tears, The Ghost Ship is the third novel in The Joubert Family Chronicles from bestselling author Kate Mosse.Sweeping from Paris and Chartres to the City of Tears itself – the great refugee city of Amsterdam – this is a story of one family’s fight to stay together and survive against the devastating tides of history . . .

May 1572: for ten violent years the Wars of Religion have raged across France. Neighbours have become enemies, countless lives have been lost, and the country has been torn apart over matters of religion, citizenship and sovereignty. But now a precarious peace is in the balance and a royal wedding has been negotiated. It is a marriage that could see France reunited at last. Mosse shows a deft command of character and narrative in this second volume of a planned sequence - Sunday Times But the ship’s crew hides a secret, and the stakes could not be higher. The bravest among them are not who they seem: if arrested, they will hang for their alleged crimes. Can they survive their journey and escape their fate?She is particularly interested in those moments when societies and countries have stood at crossroads. “All of my books are set at a turning point in history,” she explains, on cusps at which “if things had gone the other way, the whole of what happened would have been different. So in City of Tears, obviously, it’s the St Bartholomew’s Day massacre. It looked like there would be peace. And because of that, there wasn’t, and it went on for another generation. In The Burning Chambers, the first one, it’s if the Duke of Guise had not opened fire on people praying in Vassy on the first of March 1562, the wars of religion would not have happened like that.” Toulouse: As the religious divide deepens in the Midi, and old friends become enemies, Minou and Piet both find themselves trapped in Toulouse, facing new dangers as sectarian tensions ignite across the city, the battle lines are drawn in blood and the conspiracy darkens further. Meanwhile, as a long-hidden document threatens to resurface, the mistress of Puivert is obsessed with uncovering its secret and strengthening her power.... An invitation has arrived for Minou Joubert and her family to attend this historic wedding in Paris in August. But what Minou does not know is that the Joubert family’s oldest enemy, Vidal, will also be there. Nor that, within days of the marriage, on the eve of the Feast Day of St Bartholomew, her family will be scattered to the four winds and one of her beloved children will have disappeared without trace . . . Piracy. Romance. Revenge. Across the seas of the seventeenth century, two seafarers are forced to fight for their lives. The sequel to The City of Tears, The Ghost Ship is the third novel in the Joubert Family Chronicles from bestselling author Kate Mosse.