An important part of the action concerns a gay male romantic triangle, so the female narrator character is doubly distanced. With the marriage of their talents, Anne and Frankie enter this extravagant, savage hunting ground, seeking a little happiness for themselves. This novel begins and ends with yellow, the colour of deceit, treason and witchcraft during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

Jago also develops a portrayal of the “material culture” of the time, with the masquerades and daily use of masks and connotations of cosmetics; the development of the silk industry; the dress fashions and their symbolic power; the various London areas in various degrees of development (with the construction of new and enormous Northampton House in Charing Cross) or decomposition (such as the northern area to St Paul’s when it was still a medieval church); the growth in the circulation of the “broad sheets”, etc. Based on a true story of seventeenth-century scandal, Jago’s evocative first novel is redolent of the intrigue and machinations of James I’s court, as two very different women attempt to find favour and make their way through a political viper’s nest. Jager creates a warm and sympathetic Anne Turner for our age, rescuing her from the crude and cruel historical documents of her time.a net for small fishes is the antithesis of my typical preferences as centres on a true story of imagined relationship between two women in the court of king james. Enter Anne, a mother of five, wife of an elderly physician, she had some status but only based on her husband's profession. Based on a true scandal that rocked the court of James 1st, this book sees you dive into the pitch-black waters of the cut-throat Jacobean Court where even the King is a stranger to his own subjects.

But for all the imaginative license Lucy Jago takes in the book, she hasn't aimed to ignore history, just enhance it. A big thank-you to Lucy Jago, Bloomsbury Publishing, and NetGalley for arc in exchange for my honest review. I would have liked more on the ins and outs of court life, but it was fascinating to get a bit of insight into the bizarre nature of James I's court (his favourites included! Frances is trapped in a miserable marriage while loving another, and newly widowed Anne struggles to keep herself and her six children alive as she waits for a promised proposal.The poet and courtier Thomas Overbury was already in the Tower of London when he died, apparently of natural causes, in 1613; two years later, accusations that he’d been poisoned reached King James, and suspicion settled on the king’s favourite – and Overbury’s close friend – Robert Carr, now Earl of Somerset, and his wife Frances Howard. Frances (Frankie) Howard, a member of the powerful catholic Howard family, was betrothed to the Earl of Essex as a political union. She was awarded a Double First Class Honours Degree from King's College, University of Cambridge, and a master's degree from the Courtauld Institute, London.

From the communal highs of pitched night battles against the police in Cairo to the solitary lows of defeated exile in New York, Omar Robert Hamilton’s debut is a unique immersion into one of the key chapters of the 21st century. While her family has slid down the social ladder, she is determined to use her skills as a dressmaker and friendship with Frances to improve her circumstances. The mysterious beauty of his creations draw others to him, but can they lay hold of that which possesses him? Their friendship is close and of particular importance to Frances trapped in an unhappy marriage and though Anne warns her of the dangers of breaking out of this, Frances goes her own way. Set in the English court of King James I, Jago has woven a heart-breaking story based on the “Overbury Scandal” when Frances Howard and Anne Turner were accused of poisoning the courtier Thomas Overbury, two years after his supposed “natural” death in The Tower of London” in 1613.

Beautifully written, an enticing tale of female friendship and love set in the court of King James I. The Countess of Essex, Frances 'Frankie' Howard, might seem to be in an enviable position, but she dreams of a marital upgrade. Five very different lives, linked by a common thread, for all have experienced the true and extraordinary beauty of life, bursting through the veil of daily existence, only to disappear again before it can be fully grasped. This also allows the reader some respite from the court scenes to see the way the London poor were living at the time. Il ragazzo, oltre a essere deturpato dal vaiolo, era crudele e impotente, per cui la convivenza tra i due fu all'insegna dei litigi e delle frustate, mentre non arrivava nessun erede.

Siamo convinti di agire con dignità, quando in realtà continuiamo a girare in tondo, troppo rasoterra per capire quale sentiero ci conduca in paradiso e quale all’inferno. It offers an engaging portrayal of the Stuart court, with the rivalry between the Protestants (the Essex clan) and Catholics (the Howards) under the reign of James I.The pressure-cooker of a class system in which everyone is encouraged to spend beyond their means to impress the king makes for some desperate and vicious characters.