Wintercombe (Wintercombe Series Book 1)

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One of my favorite historical novels, now sadly out of print. In 17th-century England, Silence St. Barbe, a young Puritan woman married to a much older nobleman, finds her difficult circumstances as stepmother to a brood of hostile stepchildren made immeasurably more difficult when civil war breaks out, her husband rides away to battle, and a troop of Cavalier soldiers promptly occupy the house. Tortured by a cold, Puritan father, Silence has learned to conceal her passionate nature inside a prison like shell of passivity. Her eventual marriage does not offer her the escape that she longs for and she craves some semblance of autonomy. Over the next few years 'The Epic', as it became known, grew and grew. Belle drew up a huge family tree and a plan of the house very like Rushbrooke. I really enjoyed this. Pamela Belle is one of my favorite authors in general, but hands down my favorite author of historical fiction. It's really a shame her books are out of print, and also that it seems they get marketed so often as romance novels. While there is a love story involved, they are definitely a lot more than romance novels. Her portrayal of the these fictional families that struggle through real-life historical events seems so true to the time period and so detailed that it makes me feel I'm looking through a portal into actual events.

Wintercombe Series Book 2) eBook : Belle Herald of Joy (Wintercombe Series Book 2) eBook : Belle

Thanks for reviewing this book. It is one of my favourite books of all time. It deserves to be re-discovered by readers who have been clamoring for a long-slow burn, more accurate history, amazing writing. Now, however, he has returned to Somerset to claim Wintercombe as his inheritance — but his arrival is greeted with trepidation and foreboding. Bitter quarrels break out on his first night home and soon, the old fires of family passions and religious contention are raging.

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Pamela Belle is married and a teacher of a class of six-year-olds, she wrote in longhand and, while publishers made encouraging noises, no one was prepared to risk publishing a large book by an unknown author. Eventually the agent Vivienne Schuster was wonderfully enthusiastic about it and found a publisher. Silence St. Barbe is the Puritan wife of a man twice her age who has never loved her. He treats her with condescension, much like a child who needs his firm guidance. Her three stepchildren and three children love her to varying degrees but also take her for granted. She is the calm mistress of a household of servants who still see her as a London outsider and the daughter-in-law of a mean tempered, controlling old biddy who makes the lives of her family a misery – good Lord, Dame Ursula is enough to frighten a whole regimen of demon hellraisers into quivering jelly. Silence is also a woman of hidden passions and needs which no one has ever thought to inquire about much less fulfill. This is one of my all-time favorite books, and I look forward to one day seeing the house in Wiltshire that inspired this novel about the English Civil War. Set in 1644, during the English Civil War, Wintercombe is no longer just the St. Barbe family home and estate. Occupied by enemy soldiers, Lady St. Barbe (Silence) must keep the household together and protect her people and land from the callous Cavaliers while her husband is fighting for his King, but she is still considered an outsider, someone not born and bred in Somerset, and the staff don't fully trust her. It will take everything she has to keep her children safe, and in the meantime she herself is blossoming, as if until now she had lived only in a dim light.

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The only son of the late Nathaniel St Barbe, he has spent the last several years in exile in Holland, living a dissolute and debauched life far from his well-respected family in England. Well written, detailed historial romance set in the days of the English Civil War. I enjoyed Belle's deft handling of day-to-day activities of life during each season of the year in which the plot unfolds.The people of Bath were frightened, and furious. The soldiers were from Bristol, and could well have brought the plague with them, to infect their clean, sweet, and pleasant city, and they did not see why they should risk such a disaster when the Royal cause seemed well and truly lost. When it became apparent that many of the reinforcements were the hated and despised Welsh, their rage was redoubled. Crowds surrounded the governor's house in West Street, throwing rotten eggs and filth and stones, and shouting "No Welsh!" A lovely warm tapestry of a book, weaving together suspense and drama with a bittersweet love story and a richly detailed account of life in an English Manor House during the Civil War. Pamela Belle’s best book so far” — Rosemary Sutcliff Yes, this is the book of yours I read a while ago and which sent me on a pre-digital search mission for your (at that point) out of print hardcover books. Since I never did complete that quest, I’m glad to see them being reissued for me and, hopefully soon more, people to discover. However, a surprisingly friendship is established between Silence and Captain Hellier who helps in any way to help her to summon this period of the English Civil War. Jayne on REVIEW: Midnight is the Darkest Hour by Ashley Winstead @Jennie: So Ruth was "Eve" tempting the lascivious snake wit...

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England's Civil War has reached Wintercombe Manor. Silence St. Barbe, raised by a remorselessly strict father, has escaped her troublesome childhood home through a marriage of convenience. Her (much older) husband has left to fight on the side of Parliament against King Charles. Silence is only twenty-eight years old, but she has been left with the responsibility of the manor estate along with several servants and her five children to care for and protect in her husband's absence. However Wintercombe is soon to be occupied by Royalist forces (and an attractive Royalist captain who more than once, will come to Silence's rescue, or to her children's). When her house is taken by the soldiers, with the leadership of Lieutenant Ridgeley, she and her five children starts to suffer with the soldier's brutality and harassment. This is one of my favorite novels of all time. I love Silence, Lady St. Barbe. I love the description of beautiful Wintercombe, a fictional place based on an actual house. I love the details about the domestic arrangements of the estate, about how a lady was supposed to behave, about life during the English Civil War. As the ugliness of war continues, Silence must learn to shed the submissive nature that life has forced her to assume and draw upon the inner strength that she has always possessed.

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This is the story of Silence St. Barbe, who has been left in charge of Wintercombe, near Bath in Somerset, while her husband and eldest son are fighting for Parliament. Meanwhile Louise, who has escaped scandal in France to come to England in search of a husband, knows she should stay away from her attractive, fascinating cousin, but she finds herself unable to resist his allure. As Jayne commented, I’m currently writing a modern novel (with 17th century interludes) as a blog, issued in instalments, and I also have three unpublished novels, one set in 18th century London, one in Elizabethan England, and the other at the time of Alfred the Great, which I hope will see the light of day sometime, even if I have to do it myself! The story is excellent. It is everything I enjoy in historical fiction. A party of Cavaliers descend upon Puritan Wintercombe and turn it into their winter headquarters. Silence, Lady St. Barbe, works to keep her family in their home and the servants unmolested, with varying success. She is constantly scorned and humiliated, but she can't give up or give in. Meanwhile she develops a friendship and a behind the scenes supporter with one of the Cavalier officers. Meanwhile her obnoxious stepdaughter creates problems on top of problems.