Pamela Shields’ latest book is about Hertfordshire’s many connections with royalty. Within these pages you find murder, mayhem, intrigue, scandal, love, hate, war and sometimes, even peace. She comes to her subject not as an academic historian but as a journalist with a passion for history and a populist eye for anecdotes and local myths and legends which surround some of the most famous of names.
Quirky, insightful, entertaining, sometimes irreverent it is also, of course, full of fascinating facts such as: in 1361 the Prince of Wales spent his honeymoon in Berkhamsted and that his new Duchess of Cornwall was an older woman with a past; how Henry VIII’s children (all future monarchs) were brought up; where James I was when he received news of the Gunpowder Plot and where George VI, father of the present Queen, fell madly in love with Lady Elizabeth Bowes Lyon. We read about Edward II and his lover Piers Gaveston; how Henry Bolingbroke had his cousin Richard II murdered and why he buried him in Kings Langley. We discover that The Three Lions on English football shirts are far from English and the famous Tudor dynasty was started by a Welsh servant. Pamela takes a modern approach to the shenanigans of kings and queens throughout history. Some were brave, some greedy, some cruel, others gentle, all are fascinating.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Pamela Shields trained as a magazine journalist at the London College of Printing and has been a freelance writer ever since. She has a passion for local history, and her previous book was Essential Islington.
local history, and her previous book was Essential Islington. Pamela has lived in Hertfordshire since 1997, and writes regularly for the magazines Hertfordshire Life and Hertfordshire Countryside. She also tutors for the WEA on Hertfordshire subjects.
125 x 165 mm | paperback | 160 pages | 55 b&w illustrations
COVER PRICE £14.99
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