Deborah Devonshire is a natural writer with a knack for the telling phrase and for hitting the nail on the head. She tells the story of her upbringing, lovingly and wittily describing her parents (so memorably fictionalised by her sister Nancy); she talks candidly about her brother and sisters, and their politics (while not being at all political herself), finally setting the record straight.Throughout the book she writes brilliantly about the country and her deep attachment to it ...

Grace is a kitchenmaid but, unlike her mother, Polly, she doesn't enjoy life inside the house; she'd much rather be working in the stables with the horses. Cricket teas and shooting-party luncheons will soon become a distant memory, however. It's 1914 and war is about to turn the country upside down. Soon all the young male servants are leaving to fight in France, while trainloads of wounded soldiers arrive at the Hall to convalesce. Grace can see at firsthand the terrible effects of war, ...

Since its purchase in 1604 by Thomas Sackville, 1st Earl of Dorset, the house at Knole, Kent, has been inhabited by thirteen generations of a single aristocratic family, the Sackvilles. Here, drawing on a wealth of unpublished letters, archives and images, the current incumbent of the seat, Robert Sackville-West, paints a vivid and intimate portrait of the vast, labyrinthine house and the close relationships his colourful ancestors formed with it.Inheritance is the story o...

Polly Perkins can hardly believe her luck when she is taken on as under-housemaid at Swallowcliffe Hall. At first it's all she can do to keep up, with endless fires to be laid and beds to be made, never mind when guests arrive from London for a country house party. Will she ever feel at home in this grand old house, full of whispers and ghosts from the past? But friendship and comfort are found in unexpected places and Polly slowly becomes used to her new life - until the discovery of a tr...

It's 1939 and Isobel is visiting her grandmother, Polly, the housekeeper at crumbling Swallowcliffe Hall. Izzie's meant to be resting after a serious illness but with talk of war on everyone's lips, life is anything but peaceful, even deep in the English countryside. Izzie meets Andreas, a Jewish boy who has fled Nazi Germany on the Kindertransporte: the evacuation of thousands of Jewish children to safety in Britain. He's left his family behind and now they're in terrible danger. If war b...

A New York Times–bestselling biographer "evokes the luminous spirit of Kick Kennedy" in this account of the beloved socialite and sister of JFK ( Vanity Fair).Kathleen "Kick" Kennedy was the incandescent life-force of the fabled Kennedy family, her father's acknowledged "favorite of all the children" and her brother Jack's "psychological twin." She was the Kennedy of Kennedys, sure of her privilege, magnetically charming and somehow not quite like ...

A life of love and glamour as a 19th Century British Duchess: the perfect read for fans of BRIDGERTON and DOWNTON ABBEY'Wonderfully evocative [...] now reissued in an elegant new edition' ― Country LifeConsuelo Vanderbilt was young, beautiful and the heir to a vast family fortune. She was also deeply in love with an American suitor when her mother chose instead for her to fulfil her social ambitions and marry an English Duke. Leavi...

The life of Princess May of Teck is one of the great Cinderella stories in history. From a family of impoverished nobility, she was chosen by Queen Victoria as the bride for her eldest grandson, the scandalous Duke of Clarence, heir to the throne, who died mysteriously before their marriage. Despite this setback, she became queen, mother of two kings, grandmother of the current queen, and a lasting symbol of the majesty of the British throne. Her pivotal role in the abdication of her eldes...

Justin Vovks In Destinys Hands is the heartbreaking story of five children of Austrias iconic empress, Maria Theresa, who watched as their royal worlds were ripped apart by tragedy and epic misfortunes. These are the stories of Joseph, whose disastrous reign forced Austria to the brink of civil war; Amalia, the brazen and scandalous duchess who married a boy-prince and died exiled and forgotten; Leopold, Maria Theresas unassuming second son, who was the envy of Europe until his tu...

The family trees contained within this ebook are best viewed on a tablet.A fabulously wealthy New York beauty marries a cold-hearted British aristocrat at the behest of her Machiavellian mother – then leaves him to become a prominent Suffragette.Consuelo Vanderbilt was one of the greatest heiresses of the late 19th-century, a glittering prize for suitors on both sides of the Atlantic. When she married, a crowd of over 2,000 onlookers gathered, and newspapers frenziedly repo...

A source of inspiration for the film Viceroy's HousePamela Mountbatten was born at the end of the 1920s into one of Britain's grandest families. The daughter of Lord Louis Mountbatten and his glamorous wife Edwina Ashley, she was brought up by nannies and governesses as she was often parted from her parents as they dutifully carried out their public roles. A solitary child, she learned to occupy her days lost in a book, riding or playing with the family's animals (...

This is a fascinating portrait of royal life at Sandringham, from the early life of Albert Edward to the modern day. Drawing on letters, diaries and contemporary reports, it is a rich exploration of the private lives of Britain's royal family. From family life at the estate to the first visit of Queen Victoria, the glittering parties of the early twentieth century and all the way up to the death of King George V, the reigns of his sons and the Sandringham of today, it will...