The Merry Mistress

England, 1483Unloved and publicly disgraced, an adulteress walks the streets of London to Ludgate prison. Her feet are bare; in her hands she carries a penitential candle. Her name is Jane Shore. Philip Lindsay recounts Jane’s story – from her marriage as a child of fourteen to William Shore to her life at court as one of Edward IV’s lovers – with a masterful knowledge of this troubled period in history. Through wars and betrayal, secrecy and discovery, he weaves a compelling tale of a child thrust into the life of a woman, pulling in the reader until they are entirely submerged in her tale of woe and wonder. For Jane Shore was a woman like no other, unafraid of danger and cunning enough to work herself from the position of a simple mercer’s wife to one of the Queen’s most trusted ladies in waiting – and even into the heart of the King. Philip Lindsay was born in Sydney, Australia, the son of Norman Lindsay, the well-known Australian artist and author of The Magic Pudding, an Australian children’s classic. Philip, after an apprenticeship on Sydney newspapers, arrived in England in 1929 and was immediately caught in the English slump. For several years he only just managed to exist until he wrote his first novel, Panama is Burning. Encouraged by Compton Mackenzie’s review of this in the Daily Mail which spurred the realization that historical costume novels were what he really wanted to write, he went on to become one of England’s best known authors in this genre. He had more than thirty books to his credit when he died in 1958.