Spotlight: Fearless Hearts Forbidden Love (Hearts of Sparta Trilogy #1) by Anthea Laurelton
Spartan warrior, Diokles, has waited years for the opportunity to right a failure that torments his heart and integrity. Sent to hunt down a threat to Sparta, this campaign may be his final chance to restore his honour and uncover the traitor whose actions blighted his life. Success is at his fingertips, but when duty forces him to take an unwilling accomplice, his plans are challenged in ways he never foresaw.
Archaeolibrarian
1 hour ago
Snippet: The Valet's Witness by Rohn Hein
In the summer of 1776, as the Declaration of Independence takes shape within the charged chambers of the Second Continental Congress, two lives unfold in quiet, irrevocable collision-one etched into the official record, the other deliberately erased from it.
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1 day ago
Spotlight: Via Malorum by G.G. MacLeod
In the shadowed streets of ancient Rome, 37 CE, power is a blade that cuts both ways. Agrippina, a towering enigma of ambition, slips from Caligula’s gilded cage with her newborn son, Domitius, her mind a labyrinth of cold calculation. At her side prowls Messalina, a siren in scarlet, her seductive cunning as deadly as her blade. Together, they navigate a city teeming with decadence and deceit, pursued by whispers of treachery and the emperor’s wrath.
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5 days ago
Guest Post: Soldiers of Christ (The Northern Crusader Chronicles #2) by Jon Byrne
1205. Richard Fitz Simon has fled England after his title was usurped, joining the Livonian Order of Swordbrothers – a German brotherhood of warrior-monks fighting to bring the word of God to the pagan frontier. After slaying the Lithuanian champion at the Battle of Rodenpois, Richard is celebrated by the Order and their Semigallian allies.
Archaeolibrarian
Jul 10
Review & Goodreads #Giveaway: Fables & Lies by Elisabeth Storrs
WWII Berlin. Freyja Bremer, a patriotic museum assistant, marries Kaspar Voigt, an ambitious SS scholar, to protect her father. Yet she is unaware her husband is instrumental in Himmler’s twisted quest for Aryan supremacy.
Merissa
Jul 3
Excerpt: Queen of Shadows by Anna Belfrage
Castile in the 1330s is a place of constant turmoil. King Alfonso must contend with the incursions from the Muslim Marinids eager to reclaim Al-Andalus while struggling with repeated rebellions against his firm rule.
Archaeolibrarian
Jun 24
Excerpt: The Lost Voices by Paul Rushworth-Brown
The Lost Voices is a work of historical fiction centered on those whose stories were never formally recorded—not because they lacked meaning, but because their lives unfolded beyond the reach of power, authorship, and recognition. In a world governed by rigid social structures and unyielding expectations, the novel follows a cast of individuals navigating the quiet, often invisible tensions of obligation, fear, and endurance.
Archaeolibrarian
Jun 22
Spotlight: COURAGE: Tales of History, Mystery and Hope by Helen Hollick & Friends
The lion has long been a symbol of courage, loyalty, and hope. A creature of power and, in some traditions, of the divine. We imagine it unflinching, unafraid. Yet the truest bravery is not found in the open, but within, where the lion lies hidden, waiting to be called upon. In moments of uncertainty or grief. Courage is not the absence of fear, but the decision to face it. It is the moment when we would rather flee, but instead, find a strength we did not know we possessed.
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Jun 17
Guest Post: Enheduanna's Song from the Sands by Ellen Rachlin
When Enheduanna is named High Priestess of Ur, her connection to the gods makes her a target. Lugalanne’s coup strips her of robes, power, and home, casting her into the perilous underworld. There, amid forests of shadows and treacherous trials, she discovers that divine favor alone won’t save her—only cunning, courage, and a willingness to embrace the ruthlessness of her enemies can restore her.
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Jun 15
Excerpt: The Queen's Sister by Carol McGrath
At nineteen, Elizabeth Seymour is already a mother, has been recently widowed, and seen her Queen, Anne Boleyn, lose her life. Against the wishes of her father, she heads North, away from Wulf Hall and the court in London to Yorkshire, determined to establish a new beginning as a landowner and business woman. As her family in Wiltshire curry favour with King Henry, aided by Thomas Cromwell, Elizabeth makes Kexby Manor her home, finding loyalty among her people there.
Archaeolibrarian
Jun 11
Excerpt: Escape of the Grand Duchess by Susan Appleyard
Escape of the Grand Duchess by Susan Appleyard is a gripping historical novel that shatters the notion that royalty is synonymous with privilege and ease. At its heart is the youngest sister of Tsar Nicholas II, Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna—a Romanov who defied a doomed destiny and survived.
Archaeolibrarian
May 21
Review & Excerpt: Beyond the Dark Oceans by Alison Huntingford
In 1906, the Huntingford family leaves England behind, crossing dark oceans in search of hope and opportunity in a new land. Canada promises a fresh start but for the eldest son, Georgy, it also brings hardship, responsibility, and a future shaped by forces far beyond his control.
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May 21
Showcase: Firevein: The Awakening (Firevein Saga #1) by Hanna Park
I went to Røros for a wedding—not to fall for a man who looked at me like he had already mourned me once.
From the moment Rurik touches me, something beneath my skin ignites. Every kiss feels inevitable. Every glance pulls at something I can’t remember—but can’t ignore. He says I’ve lived before. That I’ve died before. That he has loved me through it all.
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May 13
Review: Lady of Lincoln (The Nicola de la Haye Series #1) by Rachel Elwiss Joyce
12th-century England. Nicola de la Haye wants to do her duty. But though she’s taught a female cannot lead alone, the young noblewoman bristles at the marriage her father has arranged to secure her inheritance. And when an unexpected death leaves her unguided, the impetuous girl shuns the king’s blessing and weds a handsome-but-landless knight.
Merissa
May 8
Spotlight: That Catskill Summer (Lived-In Love #1) by Bart A. Charlow
Author Aaron Ben-Ami’s steamy novel, based on a failed youthful love affair in the "Summer of Love" Borscht Belt, is a sensation. Love was easy to come by in the resort culture of the early sexual revolution, but not so easy to keep. Now, as his story is being made into a movie starring Isobel “Izzy” Sandler, the past and present are about to collide.
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May 7
Review: Rescued by the Rakish Lord by Sarah Mallory
When Lord Deveril Blackbourne meets Selina Wynter, he is intrigued. For she has all the accomplishments of a lady, but the fiery temper and spirit of a tavern maid! Then she is abducted by a dastardly suitor, and Deveril—for all his roguish reputation—can't stand idly by…
Debbie
May 6
Spotlight: Infidel: The Daughters of Aragon (Six Tudor Queens) by Nicola Harris
Born in the glittering courts of Castile and Aragon and forged in the shadow of war, Catalina de Aragón grows up surrounded by queens, rebels, and ghosts. She is her mother’s last daughter, the final jewel of a dynasty built on conquest and faith, and the one child Isabella of Castile cannot bear to lose.
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Apr 28
Excerpt: The Enemy's Wife (Survivors of War) by Deborah Swift
1941. When Zofia’s beloved husband Haru is conscripted into the Imperial Japanese Army, she is left to navigate Japanese-occupied Shanghai alone.
Far from home and surrounded by a country at war, Zofia finds unexpected comfort in a bond with Hilly, a spirited young refugee escaping Nazi-occupied Austria.
Archaeolibrarian
Apr 24
Excerpt: Lucie Dumas by Katherine Mezzacappa
London, 1871: Lucie Dumas of Lyon has accepted a stipend from her former lover and his wife, on condition that she never returns to France; she will never see her young son again. As the money proves inadequate, Lucie turns to prostitution to live, joining the ranks of countless girls from continental Europe who'd come to London in the hope of work in domestic service.
Archaeolibrarian
Apr 23
Spotlight: Another Soul Saved: A Story of the Holocaust by John Anthony Miller
Monika Graf, the wife of a wealthy Austrian military commander, steals two Jewish girls from the Nazis—a crime often punishable by death. With soldiers in rapid pursuit, a homeless Jew named Janik, a mysterious man who lurks in the shadows, helps her escape.
Archaeolibrarian
Apr 21