Anne O’Brien
WHEN Shakespeare wrote of Macbeth’s ‘vaulting ambition,’ he
could well have been describing the medieval Despenser family… a Yorkist clan
steeped to their necks in treason and betrayal.
At the heart of their scheming to steal back the throne from
the Lancastrian King Henry IV was Constance, Lady Despenser, a granddaughter of
Plantagenet King Edward III, and wife of the self-seeking Thomas Despenser,
Earl of Gloucester, a man who hailed from a family already tainted by scandals
of treason and corruption.
The Despensers’ treachery, their battle to survive, their
perilous politicking, and the daring woman willingly caught up in their power
struggle, spring to vivid life from the pages of history in a dazzling new
novel from the queen of medieval fiction, Anne O’Brien.
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| RICH DRAMA: Anne O’Brien |
Using her impressive imaginative powers and vast historical
research, O’Brien has given a voice and a leading role to some of history’s most
fascinating but forgotten women, placing their struggles at the centre of riveting
stories filled with political intrigue, romance and tragedy.
But in the cold and calculating Constance of York, O’Brien
has given the spotlight to one of her most charismatic medieval stars yet… a complex,
compelling woman far ahead of her time, a woman prepared to risk losing life,
limb and her love for the only man who had ever won her heart, and all in
pursuit of her family’s ambitions.
It’s a thrilling story, based on fact, filled with the kind
of rich drama that should really only belong in pure fiction, and made
viscerally authentic by the hand of a writer who knows how to make history a
living, breathing, vibrant canvas.
In 1399, Constance, Lady Despenser, is more than a mere
observer in the devious intrigues of her magnificently dysfunctional family, the
House of York, which has prospered under the reign of Richard II and formed
‘the bedrock on which the king’s power rested.’
Surrounded by power-hungry men, including her aggressively egotistical
husband Thomas Despenser, and ruthless brothers, Edward, heir to the Duke of
York, and Richard of Conisborough, Constance freely admits that her family is
driven by a ‘naked desire to match our influence to our royal blood.’
But on a visit to Ireland, Richard’s throne is snatched by
his Lancastrian cousin, Henry Bolingbroke, who is quickly crowned Henry IV… and
now the Despenser family’s power seems ‘to hang as insecurely as a bees’ nest
in a wind-tossed sapling.’
Unconvinced that the imprisoned Richard’s crown is lost
forever, Constance and her cunning family decide to keep a foot in the camp of
both royal houses, but restless as ever, Constance is soon placing herself at
the heart of two treasonous and deadly plots against King Henry IV.
Although carrying out these conspiracies will place them all
in jeopardy, Constance is not deterred, even when the cost of her ambition
threatens to overwhelm her. Because, for the first time in her life, Constance
has fallen in love… with the charming Edmund Holland, a man from a family as
ambitious as her own.
It’s a love that brings her a previously unknown brand of
happiness, one ‘with the purity of new honey dripping from a spoon,’ but even
though her eyes might appear to be closed to the machinations of Henry’s court,
ambition is still ‘too deeply ingrained in all of us, to be wilfully cast
aside.’
Will Constance be tempted to hatch another daring and
perilous Yorkist plot, even if it endangers her new-found contentment?
O’Brien is in her element in this gripping historical
portrait, playing her own addictive Game of Thrones with the life of the
intriguing Constance Despenser, a woman as much sinned against as sinning. Vilified
by history but now recognised as a feisty, forthright woman fighting her corner
in a man’s world, Constance was a remarkable if ruthless woman.
Unafraid to play a leading role in several treasonous plots
against the Lancastrian usurper Henry, Constance’s veneer of cold pragmatism is
finally pierced by her love for Edmund Holland in a warm and sexually potent
relationship which smooths her sharp edges and exposes a vulnerability she has carefully
hidden since her arranged marriage to Thomas at the age of just four.
Constance’s transforming affair with the handsome and
beguiling Edmund is one of the most moving and captivating drivers of a story
firmly rooted in the power struggles between the Houses of Lancaster and York,
which were just the precursor to the bitter Wars of the Roses which would tear
England apart.
O’Brien’s entertaining novel charts a course through
rebellion, insurrection and the notorious Epiphany Rising as Constance, her
husband and double-dealing brother Edward try desperately to assassinate the
cousin who stole the Yorkist crown.
Brimming with plots, politics, passion and perfidy, this is
historical fiction at its best as O’Brien allows the determined, fearless and flawed
Constance of York to finally step out of the shadows and into the light. And as the author tells us in her final note, ‘How could I
possibly resist writing about her, bringing her to life? Constance is not an
easy heroine, but she makes for a formidable protagonist.’
(HQ, hardback, £14.99)
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