Sonia Velton Book order

I was blown away by this dark, enchanting story of witchcraft, power, and injustice. Erzsebet Bathory, infamously known as the 'Blood Countess,' was accused of murdering over 600 peasant girls in Hungary in 1610. This narrative explores a woman's fight for survival within her cruel household. In 1573, Countess Bathory gave birth to an illegitimate daughter, who was handed to a local peasant family for upbringing. Years later, 15-year-old Boroka reluctantly leaves her safe home in the Carpathian foothills when trusted members of the countess's household come to gather new serving girls. Boroka is terrified of the countess's murderous reputation and the cruelty of the castle's women. As plague sweeps through the castle, a tentative bond forms between Boroka and Bathory. However, powerful forces threaten the countess, whose wealth poses a danger to the king. Trust becomes a precarious issue as Boroka navigates her loyalties during the show trial against the notorious 'Blood Countess.' The story weaves a gripping exploration of women's struggles for their truth amidst dark and haunting circumstances.

Erzsébet Báthory was accused of preposterous crimes when it suited the men who ruled Hungary in the early 1600s - The Nightingale's Castle tells the story of a woman who is fighting for her survival and the complicated, often cruel, household over which she presides.

WHEN Esther Thorel, the wife of a Huguenot silk-weaver, rescues Sara Kemp from a brothel she thinks she is doing God’s will. Sara is not convinced being a maid is better than being a whore, but the chance to escape her grasping ‘madam’ is too good to refuse. Inside the Thorels’ tall house in Spitalfields, where the strange cadence of the looms fills the attic, the two women forge an uneasy relationship. The physical intimacies of washing and dressing belie the reality: Sara despises her mistress’s blindness to the hypocrisy of her household, while Esther is too wrapped up in her own secrets to see Sara as anything more than another charitable cause. It is silk that has Esther so distracted. For years she has painted her own designs, dreaming that one day her husband will weave them into reality. When he laughs at her ambition, she strikes up a relationship with one of the journeyman weavers in her attic who teaches her to weave and unwittingly sets in motion events that will change the fate of the whole Thorel household.