This was an absolutely cracking read set during the period of the English Civil War. It had robbery, treachery, danger and romance and had me turning the pages at speed to find out what was going to happen next.

The story starts in 1648 with Lady Katherine Ferrers en route to her arranged marriage to Thomas Fanshawe when she is held up by a highwayman, thankfully he doesn’t take the lucky silvered heart that hangs around her neck. I could feel Katherine’s fear and could almost smell the rotten breath of her assailant through the brilliantly crafted words. When fleeing from the robbery scene, Katherine leaves her wedding dress lying in the mud. This means that she has to get married in a borrowed red gown, a colour that Rachel, her maid and friend, worries is unlucky.

Katherine soon finds herself trapped in a loveless marriage to a man she hardly knows; she has been married for her fortune which is quickly plundered in support of the king. During this time of uncertainty in England’s history, Cromwell’s men can arrive at any moment demanding payment for Parliament and Katherine finds her coffers running low. She rolls her sleeves up and helps with the house while her husband is away in London, frequently dreaming of Markyate Cell, her ancestral home. It is during a clandestine visit to Markyate Cell that she encounters a bloodied stranger, the highwayman Rafe Chaplin. Katherine joins forces with Rafe to obtain funds in order to keep her household running and ultimately becomes known as the infamous highwaywoman, The Wicked Lady.

I adore historical novels such as this; there are just enough facts based on real people and events to make you forget it is a work of fiction. Katherine, Rafe and Rachel’s stories kept me on the edge of my seat at times and there were a few twists along the way to the tragic ending. I loved the way that the story began with Katherine desperate to keep her precious necklace during the robbery and ending with the reappearance of the necklace in the epilogue set 26 years later in 1674. Living close to the Northumbrian coast myself, I was also delighted at the mention of Craster in Northumberland and like to think that Katherine eventually found her way there or somewhere similar.

An absolute masterpiece, I was hooked from the first page and couldn't put it down! Without hesitation I have added Katherine’s debut novel, The Crimson Ribbon, to my must read list.

I received this book from the publisher via Bookbridgr in exchange for an honest review.
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1648, Katherine Ferrers is forced into a loveless marriage. Fate has other plans and when Katherine meets and falls for Rafe her life changes. Katherine becomes The Wicked Lady who rides out on the highway robbing travellers.

I was really looking forward to this book but have been left feeling disappointed. I thought it was going to be more about Katherine as The Wicked Lady than it was.

The first two hundred pages are about Katherine and her loveless marriage against the backdrop of the civil war and Oliver Cromwell. Then when she meets Rafe and becomes a highway robber. I would have liked more of the story to have been about Katherine and her life on the road and not a lot of this happens in the book either.

The author claims that there is very little about Katherine recorded down and her becoming a highway robber is a bit of a legend. This book is a work of fiction based on the legends.

The story is ok without expectations. I wanted more swashbuckling and highwaymen. This book did for me fail to deliver. The legend of Katherine is interesting and she comes across as a fascinating person but this yarn of a book does not do her legend justice. ( )

I had high hopes for this novel based on the true story of a 17th-century noblewoman who was lured into a brief career as a highwayman, but it didn't quite live up to expectations. While beautifully written in sensuous, descriptive prose, the characterisation doesn't have the grit and density that I'd been hoping for given the potentially meaty subject. The emphasis is very much on the heroine's romantic entanglements and on the desire she stirs in others, and so it ended up being rather less of the exciting swashbuckler that I'd hoped for and closer to your standard kind of historical romance. Nevertheless, if you enjoy romance then you should keep an eye open for this: it offers a vivid picture of the ravaged aftermath of the Civil War, and its heroine must in reality have been a most extraordinary woman.

For my full review please see my blog:
http://theidlewoman.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/the-silvered-heart-katherine-clements... ( )