Lament for a Lost Lover by Philippa Carr
Various editions, circa 1977
Daughters of England Series, book 5
My previous reviews from this series

I edited this synopsis myself to avoid spoilers:

Against the background of an England torn by civil war, religious persecution, and political treachery in the turbulent era of Cromwell and the Stuart Restoration, Philippa Carr has set the passionate story of Arabella Tolworthy, whose loves and destiny are inextricably linked to the plight of her nation.

The dethroned Charles I had met the executioner's ax with regal calm, and as Oliver Cromwell tightened his Puritan grip on English church and state, thousands of royalists fled their confiscated lands. Among them was young Arabella, her family seeking safe harbor in France where they hoped to serve the exiled royal heir, Charles II. Separated from her parents, confronted by the unaccustomed hardships of political banishment, she finds solace in the company or the ravishing and charismatic actress, Harriet Main.

Little does Arabella suspect the threat Harriet will pose to her future happiness.
Nor does she envision what lies ahead when dashing Edwin Eversleigh, Cavalier and heir to a titular fortune, makes her his bride after a whirlwind courtship. For in the deceptive peace following Parliament's Restoration of the Crown,  Arabella returns to England bearing a new scion of the Eversleigh estate.
With its skillful narrative, Lament for a Lost Lover is a worthy and engrossing successor to the previous novels of the Daughters of England saga.

This is the fifth Carr book I've read, which is a series written under a pseudonym of Jean Plaidy/Eleanor Hibbert. My fellow Carr reader and I had a mini read along as we could not wait to get to the next book in the Daughters of England series after finishing book 4, Saraband for Two Sisters. The story picks up with the next generation, and Arabella does not disappoint. What was a pivotal character in this one, the witchy one again - was Harriet. Once Harriet comes along, poor Arabella doesn't know which way was up. She had a fascination for the dramatic Harriet and Arabella lets herself be led around like a marionette. It was wicked fun to watch and while the Gothic tones were minimal in this one, there was still a sinister something out there that was a dun dun dunnnn waiting to happen.

I really enjoy these novels in spite of the formulaic plots centered around marriage, birth and death. The characters are the spice of the story, and there are many times the reader could be screaming at the character to open your eyes! I loved how the historical details were a little more in depth with this novel as the focus was always on whether Charles could have his English Crown back.The London Fire and the plague also make their appearance, and how it affects Arabella is part of the novel.

The next novel looks completely totally delish and I cannot wait to read book six, The Love Child. I need to make sure my life is not too crazy because I want to be able to enjoy that one, too! Come visit our Goodreads group for more read alongs on Jean Plaidy's works.

Saraband for Two Sisters by Philippa Carr
Published 1976
The Miracle at St. Bruno's -read my review
The Lion Triumphant - read my review
The Witch From the Sea- read, but never reviewed here.

Synopsis:

Angelet and Bersaba. They were identical twins, but their alikeness stopped at their physical appearance. Angelet was gentle and mild in her innocence. While Bersaba was dark and devious in her overwhelming sensuality. They had never been apart--until Bersaba became ill. Angelet was immediately packed off to London. There she met and married Richard Tolworthy and went to live at the handsome, brooding manor house at Far Flamstead. Bersaba had always thought she would be the first to wed. Recovered, she went to visit the newlyweds with more jealousy than joy in her heart. Nothing could have prepared her for the secrets she discovered there. Secrets of a carefully hidden past that could unleash dangerous passions and forever separate her from the sister she had always loved...

This is the fourth novel I have read of the Daughters of England series created by Philippa Carr who is also known as Jean Plaidy and Victoria Holt. The series is a historical gothic romance saga that follows the same family tree from one generation to the next, set against intriguing backdrops of historical importance. While Plaidy's work can be incessantly dry and monotonous as she details historical events with her royal character portrayals, the Carr pen name allowed her to freely carve out fanciful reimaginings with some pretty far-fetched plots which makes it so much fun to read.

The previous novel The Witch from The Sea brought us the story of a woman being washed ashore and the drama that was caused by her arrival. In Saraband for Two Sisters that woman's daughter arrives back at Trystan Priory and creates turmoil within the lives of twins Angelet and Bersaba. This novel is told in alternating first person accounts by these sisters, who are twins only in appearance. Their characters are developed before our eyes as Bersaba is the impetuous passionate one, and Angelet is the sweeter kinder of the two. The reign of King Charles is at question in England and the two key men in the novel are at opposite ends of the political beliefs of the time: Royalist and Puritan. Of course, the twins wind up with one of each.

Wild events occur from smallpox and secrets of a mysterious castle, poisons and falling in love with the wrong men. It was fast paced and seemed better to stomach than the previous novel; with some of the previous Carr novels the males were portrayed as overbearing brutes and this one only seems to have the recurring character of the grumpy maniacal Grandfather Casvellyn as the mean man. The others were pretty darned good to a fault. This time...I know it can't last forever.

These are the type of novels that you can't go too much into the detail without giving away a spoiler, so I will end it here with the remarks that I enjoy the Daughters of England series for the dramatic license it exhibits even while still setting a historical tone, and the characters are so easy to root for. The gothic suspense with romance thrown in is always a treat and whenever I finish a Carr novel I always want to binge read and move on to the next one. These novels would have made a fantastic TV series with awesome instrumentals playing in the background.

Since I own all the titles, just for kicks I looked up the next book: Lament for A Lost Lover and it will bring us more turbulent political drama of Cromwell and will follow the daughter of Bersaba as they are forced away from their home to take exile with the rightful king.

The Lion Triumphant by Philippa Carr
various publishers, circa 1974

Catharine Kingsman The Lion Triumphant follows The Miracle at St Bruno's with Catharine, the daughter of Damask, growing up in the new Elizabethan age -- one of the most eventful in English history because of the struggle for power between two mighty rivals had begun. Catharine, smarting from the bitter blow which deprived her of her lover, meets the lusty sea Captain Jake Pennlyon, who makes it clear that he allows nothing to come between him and his desires. Catharine is the chief of these and the battle between two stong-willed and tempestuous people is fought out in the shadow of the growing rivalry between Spain and England. Catharine delights in outwitting the man who would subdue her and before he can have his way a mysterious abduction takes place. A captive on a Spanish galleon, Catharine experiences the terrors of the sea and makes the aquaintance of the mysterious and dignified Don Felipe. In the Hacienda she discovers the reason for her capture and what is demanded of her, which bears out the fact that Jake Pennlyon is a man whose life is inextricably interwoven with her own.

His symbol is the Lion and there is no escape from him and his determination to overcome her resistance. He is as sure of his power to subdue her as he is of England's to rule the seas. With her Spanish son Roberto and her English daughter Linnet, Catharine is torn between love and loyalty in a story of lusty adventure on land and sea, when those who lived in the turbulent sixteenth century were caught up in the trmendous events of their times. The fight for survival is Catharine's and Jake's, Roberto's and Linnet's -- as well as England's. From Plymouth, the ships set forth, for the issue will be decided at sea. Here is the most significant engagement of all times when the little ships of England drove off the mighty Spanish galleons of Spain and the Invincible Armada was defeated, leaving the Lion Triumphant.

The second book in the Daughters of England series by Philippa Carr (another pseudonym of Jean Plaidy fame) picks up with the next generation of the family from The Miracle at St. Bruno's. Damask's daughter Catharine is the heroine of the novel which takes on a very gothic feel. Even though some of the situations Cat would get herself in made me want to strangle her, I was enthralled by the story. This was supposed to be a read -along but I blew through it due to the wildness of some of the story arcs.

Catharine did have a tendency to get on my nerves - she was definitely a curious one - poking her nose in where she shouldn't. She had some really intriguing relationships going on which I am not going to spoil within the review here, but it was definitely a lot of fun and lived up to my expectations with a Carr novel.

I loved it so much that I had to know what was going to next in the third book, The Witch From The Sea, so the read - along participant and I decided to jump into that one next soon after. There are times when you just need to sink yourself into some crazy entertaining historical that just may be a bit off-kilter from reality, and the Philippa Carr series does the trick.

The Miracle at St. Bruno's (Daughters of England #1) by Philippa Carr
Gothic Historical Romance of the 70's
Book from my personal collection
Burton Book Review Rating: 3.5 Stars

"I was born in the September of 1523, nine months after the monks had discovered the child in the crib on that Christmas morning. My birth was, my father used to say, another miracle: He was not young at the time being forty years of age . . . My mother, whose great pleasure was tending her gardens, called me Damask, after the rose which Dr. Linacre, the King's physician, had brought into England that year."

Thus begins the story narrated by Damask Farland, daughter of a well-to-do lawyer whose considerable lands adjoin those of St. Bruno's Abbey. It is a story of a life inextricably enmeshed with that of Bruno, the mysterious child found on the abbey altar that Christmas morning and raised by the monks to become a man at once handsome and saintly, but also brooding and ominous, tortured by the secret of his origin which looms ever more menacingly over the huge abbey he comes to dominate.

This is also the story of an engaging family, the Farlands. Of a father wise enough to understand "the happier our King is, the happier I as a true subject must be," a wife twenty years his junior, and a daughter whose intelligence is constantly to war with the strange hold Bruno has upon her destiny. What happens to the Farlands against the background of what is happening to King Henry and his court during this robust period provides a novel in which suspense and the highlights of history are wonderfully balanced.

I was fortunate to be able to participate in the read along for this first book of the gothic series that prolific author Eleanor Hibbert/Jean Plaidy wrote under her pen-name of Philippa Carr. It is the story of a family in England struggling to stay out of trouble during the tyrannical reign of Henry VIII and eventually his daughter Queen Mary.

The main characters are three .. "we three as one": Damask, the daughter of the household, Kate, her distant cousin, and Bruno, the miracle child that was brought up next door to Damask in the Abbey. Religious turmoil permeates the land, as persecution reaches its wicked tentacles out to the innocents, and Damask and Kate attempt to live their lives after tragedies occur.

Damask is introduced to us as a young girl, and by the end of the story we pretty much see what would be the end of her life as well. She was a narrator that could easily get on your nerves though, she is supposed to be so uber smart, yet it seems she doesn't see the reality in front of her face and that got tedious after awhile. The other characters were all well done with bad guys and good guys; the plus was that in the background  we also had Henry VIII and his wives.  The writing had small lulls - as we knew that the proverbial shoe was going to drop and we kept waiting for it. Full of tension and the gothic style of melodramatics, this was a fun read that definitely has me intrigued enough to at least see what happens with the next generation in book two. I had been suspecting what was to be the "climatic moment" when it hit by page 357, but it was still awesome.


I haven't read a series in a very long time that features a particular family through a long period of time, though the Morland series comes to mind (Cynthia Harrod Eagles). These two series have completely different tones, as I would not hesitate to recommend this first book of the Daughters of England to the Young Adult reader who is intrigued by the tumultuous reign of the Tudors and their effects on the families of England.

This novel was part of my 2013 To-Be-Read-Pile Reading Challenge hosted by Roof Beam Reader

The next novel I'm reading for the challenge will be another by the same author (different pen-name) The Bastard King by Plaidy.

I read along with the Goodreads Plaidy group for The Miracle at St. Bruno's and we had great discussions there about the book, but here are some of the status updates from the book as I was reading (you may have to be my friend there in order to see since I'm pasting):