About
I'm a realist in my writing, as well as my art. I don't have as much imagination as many other writers—a handicap (or strength) that comes partly from my training and experience as a mental health researcher/evaluator and program developer. I'm also a flâneuse—a female observer-wanderer. So, I watch, and observe. And listen. That's where the meat of my writing comes from.
But I’m also a sucker for happy endings. I find enough that depresses me about real life, but seek no catharsis by writing about it. I want escape, entertainment. I don’t strive to enlighten. Not consciously, anyway, but because my previous training has given me a bias, I’m interested in the inner lives of characters, including the passages they go through.
I’m inspired by Jane Austen and Elizabeth Gaskell and their awesome feminist heroines. So, I tend not to rely on broad shoulders and heaving bosoms. Instead, I go into protagonists' thoughts and emotions, their conflicts and their joy, their struggles to reach balance and grow. My novels deal with insecurities and disappointments, love/hate relationships with parents, characters who seem to behave out-of-character, and even life events not typically included in romantic fiction.
I have a book blog here:
and musings on travel, art, and food here: Journey on a Limb
The Usurper King (The Plantagenet Legacy Book 3)
Description
<p><span style="color:rgb(15,17,17);font-family:'Amazon Ember', Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;">First, he led his own uprising. Then he captured a forsaken king. Henry had no intention of taking the crown for himself; it was given to him by popular acclaim. Alas, it didn't take long to realize that that having the kingship was much less rewarding than striving for it. Only three months after his coronation, Henry IV had to face a rebellion led by Richard's disgruntled favorites. Repressive measures led to more discontent. His own supporters turned against him, demanding more than he could give. The haughty Percies precipitated the Battle of Shrewsbury which nearly cost him the throne—and his life.</span><br style="color:rgb(15,17,17);font-family:'Amazon Ember', Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;" /><span style="color:rgb(15,17,17);font-family:'Amazon Ember', Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;">To make matters worse, even after Richard II's funeral, the deposed monarch was rumored to be in Scotland, planning his return. The king just wouldn't stay down and malcontents wanted him back.</span></p>
Story Behind The Book
Exploring a character’s inner life is a rather scarce literary commodity nowadays. We love action and anything else that gets our adrenaline going. A character’s musings on what she’s witnessing or her brooding engagement with her feelings slows that action down. Maybe, it’s the downside (or upside, depending on your values) of our high-tech society of fast and vast information.
This book is essentially a love story, not only between lovers, but between mothers and daughters and how they are each shaped by the era they lived in, their unique backgrounds and experiences and how they carry those experiences into the next generation.
Reviews
<p>Journey has woven a beautiful narrative filled with complex relationships and interactions between women – aunts, mothers, and daughters. – <em><strong>GoodbooksToday.com </strong></em></p>
<p>Hello, Agnieszka ! is flawlessly written with a unique plot developed to give the reader an emotional experience. I absolutely loved reading it and could not put it down until the very end. It is one of those love stories so phenomenal that it touches your heart forever. <strong>- </strong>★★★★★<strong><em>Faridah Nassozi for Readers’ Favorite </em> </strong></p>
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