On 28 January 1547, the sickly and obese King Henry VIII died at Whitehall.Just hours before his passing, his last will and testament had been read, stamped and sealed. The will confirmed the line of succession as Edward, Mary and Elizabeth; and, following them, the Grey and Suffolk families. It also listed bequests to the king's most trusted councillors and servants.Henry's will is one of the most intriguing and contested documents in British history. Historians have disagr...

Step into the tumultuous age of Stuart England with Peter Ackroyd's enlightening Civil War. Beginning with James I, the first Scottish king of England, it tracks an era of massive upheaval, ending with the dramatic flight of his grandson, James II, into exile.Civil War transports you to the heart of the 17th-century Britain, where you meet figures like James I with his shrewd perspectives on diverse matters, and Charles I, whose inept rule ignited...

The complete story of how the German Enigma codes were broken. Perfect for fans of THE IMITATION GAME, the new film on Alan Turing's Enigma code, starring Benedict Cumberbatch.Breaking the German Enigma codes was not only about brilliant mathematicians and professors at Bletchley Park. There is another aspect of the story which it is only now possible to tell. It takes in the exploits of spies, naval officers and ordinary British seamen who risked, and in some case...

Bletchley Park has played a vital role in British history. This Victorian country house in the Buckinghamshire countryside was was where one of the war’s most famous – and crucial – achievements was made: the cracking of Germany’ s 'Enigma' code in which its most important military communications were couched.It was home to some of Britain’s most brilliant mathematical brains, such as Alan Turing, and the scene of immense advances in technology – indeed, the birth of modern computi...

Henry VIII has proclaimed himself Supreme Head of the Church and the country is waking up to savage new laws, rigged trials and the greatest network of informers ever seen. Under the order of Thomas Cromwell, a team of commissioners is sent through the country to investigate the monasteries. There can only be one outcome: the monasteries are to be dissolved. But on the Sussex coast, at the monastery of Scarnsea, events have spiralled out of control. Cromwell's Commissioner Robin Singleton,...

The first book in the No. 1 Sunday Times bestselling series set at the time of Queen Elizabeth I In Elizabeth’s England, true faith can mean bloody murder…Oxford, 1583. A place of learning. And murderous schemes.The country is rife with plots to assassinate Queen Elizabeth and return the realm to the Catholic faith. Giordano Bruno is recruited by the queen’s spymaster and sent undercover to expose a treacherous conspiracy in Oxford...

England’s Forgotten Queens‘The gripping tale of Elizabeth of Lancaster, sibling of Henry IV. Packed with love, loss and intrigue’ – Sunday Express S MagazineOne betrayal is all it takes to change history1382. Daughter of John of Gaunt, sister to the future King Henry IV, Elizabeth of Lancaster has learned the shrewd tricks of the court from England’s most powerful men.In a time of political turmoil, allegiance to family is ...

**SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE**'It was a beautiful, breezy, yellow-and-green afternoon...'This is the way Abby Whitshank always begins the story of how she and Red fell in love that summer's day in 1959. The whole family on the porch, half-listening as their mother tells the same tale they have heard so many times before.From that porch we spool back through the generations, witnessing the events, secrets and unguarded...

THE RUNAWAY GLOBAL BESTSELLER'Gripping, enthralling - a top-notch thriller and a compulsive read.' SJ Watson, bestselling author of BEFORE I GO TO SLEEPRachel catches the same commuter train every morning. She knows it will wait at the same signal each time, overlooking a row of back gardens. She's even started to feel like she knows the people who live in one of the houses. 'Jess and Jason', she calls them. Their life - as...

Includes a new foreword by the authorThe story of the death, in sinister circumstances, of the boy-king Edward V and his younger brother Richard, Duke of York, is one of the most fascinating murder mysteries in English history. It is a tale with profound moral and social consequences, rich in drama, intrigue, treason, scandal and violence.In this gripping book Alison Weir re-examines all the evidence - including that against the Princes' uncle, Richard III, whose body was r...

Elizabeth I acceded to the throne in 1558, restoring the Protestant faith to England. At the heart of the new queen's court lay Elizabeth's bedchamber, closely guarded by the favoured women who helped her dress, looked after her jewels and shared her bed.Elizabeth's private life was of public, political concern. Her bedfellows were witnesses to the face and body beneath the make-up and elaborate clothes, as well as to rumoured illicit dalliances with such figures as Robert Dudley. ...

Elizabeth Woodville is a historical character whose life no novelist would ever have dared invent. She has been portrayed as an enchantress, as an unprincipled advancer of her family's fortunes and a plucky but pitiful queen in Shakespeare's histories. She has been alternatively championed and vilified by her contemporaries and five centuries of historians, dramatists and novelists, but what was she really like?In this revealing account of Elizabeth's life...