A second title* from new publisher Manderley Press: Rosemary Sutcliff's The Armourer's House. First published in 1951, this is a look at Tudor London through the eyes of young Tamsyn who leaves her Devon home on the coast for her uncle's house on the banks of the Thames.
"The ships and river traffic passing Dolphin House - including the royal barge carrying King Henry VIII and his new Queen Anne Boleyn - feed Tamsyn's imagination and her dreams of going to sea for a life of imagination and discovery. But as she soon finds out, adventure and excitement can also be found closer to home."
The introduction is by Lara Maiklem, author of Mudlarking: Lost and Found on the River Thames, and the illustrations are by Isabel Greenberg. My copy - ordered directly from the publisher - came beautifully wrapped and beribboned.
For more on Rosemary Sutcliff try this post and this (very short!) one.
*Stevenson's Edinburgh: Picturesque Notes, their first book, is here
Luckily, I don't need to buy a new copy of this! I've kept all my Rosemary Sutcliff books for years.
Posted by: callmemadam | 08 December 2021 at 10:35 AM
That was the first Sutcliff I read and I finally got my own copy a few years ago, although not as nice an edition as this! My mother was such a fan she wrote a letter to RS and actually got a response!
At the beginning of the pandemic, she ran into someone in her building who was a fan of Dorothy Dunnett but had not read Sutcliff. It was interesting picking out a book for her to lend - obviously, I wanted the woman to like it but I was quite sure it would not be returned, so I didn't want to lend something rare!
Posted by: Constance | 18 December 2021 at 05:34 AM