Eighteen-year-old Constance is not interested in marriage or in being a “young lady.” But for a young woman coming of age in the early 1800s, that’s just about all that’s available to her. When her parents arrange her a marriage with a man more than twice her age, she’s powerless to resist. Stance couldn’t possibly find her newfound husband less appealing, but what can she do? Here’s what: Four months into the marriage, she can slip out of their bed in the middle of the night, and she can put on his clothes. She can look in the mirror and like what she sees. She can sneak out of the house before dawn and visit the baker’s scrawny son, who has just been drafted into the army, and offer to take his place. Vive l’Empereur! Hot on Stance’s tail all the while is her younger brother Pieter, determined to bring Stance back home to Ghent where she belongs. (The battlefield is no place for a young lady, after all.) Ironhead, or, Once A Young Lady is the riotous and powerful story of a fierce renegade, and the silly men who try to bring her down.
Denmark, AD 870. Yrsa knows her place in the village of Mimir’s Stool. Though she was born with a crooked foot, she’s never let anyone underestimate her; after all, she’s the daughter of Toke the helmsman and granddaughter of the fearsome warrior Gudrun the Torch (who, according to legend, stood before the walls of Paris, splattered in the blood of Frankish warriors). And no one else in the village shares her ability to see what the Norns, the three weavers who live under the roots of Yggdrasil, the world tree, and craft people’s fates, have in store for them. One day the men return from a raid with a high-ranking hostage, Sister Job, and although the two girls couldn’t be more different, they look out for each other. And when one of the villagers viciously assaults Sister Job and she and Yrsa mortally wound him in self-defense, they’re forced to take to the sea to escape the wrath of the warriors of Mimir’s Stool, and worse, the wrath of the gods. Can either of them escape their fate? Do they even want to? From the acclaimed author of Ironhead, or, Once a Young Lady, comes Daughter of Doom, a dark historical adventure about fate, faith, and free will set on the rollicking seas in the age of Vikings.
On January 27, 1962, a concert at the Maly Theatre in Leningrad is interrupted by a gunshot and an ex-state prisoner is arrested. At the police station, the mysterious gunman recalls the early summer of 1941… When the German army begins its invasion of Soviet Russia, four children are evacuated to the countryside: Maxim, the son of a senior Communist Party official; Pyotr, the son of writers; Anka, the daughter of a concert violinist; and Grigory, the son of a pilot that was executed for insubordination. The farm where they are staying is attacked and the train that is supposed to take them to safety is blown to bits by German planes. The four children must fight through enemy lines to get back to their families in Leningrad. But all that awaits them is the beginning of one of the most prolonged and destructive sieges in history. Two and half desperate years that will push their friendship -and their lives -to the limit.
Eighteen-year-old Constance is not interested in marriage or in being a “young lady.” But for a young woman coming of age in the early 1800s, that’s just about all that’s available to her. When her parents arrange her a marriage with a man more than twice her age, she’s powerless to resist. Stance couldn’t possibly find her newfound husband less appealing, but what can she do? Here’s what: Four months into the marriage, she can slip out of their bed in the middle of the night, and she can put on his clothes. She can look in the mirror and like what she sees. She can sneak out of the house before dawn and visit the baker’s scrawny son, who has just been drafted into the army, and offer to take his place. Vive l’Empereur! Hot on Stance’s tail all the while is her younger brother Pieter, determined to bring Stance back home to Ghent where she belongs. (The battlefield is no place for a young lady, after all.) Ironhead, or, Once A Young Lady is the riotous and powerful story of a fierce renegade, and the silly men who try to bring her down.
Denmark, AD 870. Yrsa knows her place in the village of Mimir’s Stool. Though she was born with a crooked foot, she’s never let anyone underestimate her; after all, she’s the daughter of Toke the helmsman and granddaughter of the fearsome warrior Gudrun the Torch (who, according to legend, stood before the walls of Paris, splattered in the blood of Frankish warriors). And no one else in the village shares her ability to see what the Norns, the three weavers who live under the roots of Yggdrasil, the world tree, and craft people’s fates, have in store for them. One day the men return from a raid with a high-ranking hostage, Sister Job, and although the two girls couldn’t be more different, they look out for each other. And when one of the villagers viciously assaults Sister Job and she and Yrsa mortally wound him in self-defense, they’re forced to take to the sea to escape the wrath of the warriors of Mimir’s Stool, and worse, the wrath of the gods. Can either of them escape their fate? Do they even want to? From the acclaimed author of Ironhead, or, Once a Young Lady, comes Daughter of Doom, a dark historical adventure about fate, faith, and free will set on the rollicking seas in the age of Vikings.
On January 27, 1962, a concert at the Maly Theatre in Leningrad is interrupted by a gunshot and an ex-state prisoner is arrested. At the police station, the mysterious gunman recalls the early summer of 1941… When the German army begins its invasion of Soviet Russia, four children are evacuated to the countryside: Maxim, the son of a senior Communist Party official; Pyotr, the son of writers; Anka, the daughter of a concert violinist; and Grigory, the son of a pilot that was executed for insubordination. The farm where they are staying is attacked and the train that is supposed to take them to safety is blown to bits by German planes. The four children must fight through enemy lines to get back to their families in Leningrad. But all that awaits them is the beginning of one of the most prolonged and destructive sieges in history. Two and half desperate years that will push their friendship -and their lives -to the limit.