The Boundary Stone
The Stockbridge Series # 1
By- Gail Avery Halverson
Genre- Historical Fiction/Romance
Bound since childhood to an arranged marriage with the restless and irresponsible heir of Houghton Hall, Viscount Miles Houghton; Lady Catherine Abbott, now grown, finds herself torn between duty to her family and her smoldering ambitions. Possessed of a nimble, curious mind, a love of science and the natural world, and a singular talent for illustration, Catherine desperately longs to accomplish something before she resigns herself to a loveless marriage and the idle, aristocratic whirl of parties and social gatherings within the confines of the palatial Houghton Hall.
Banished before his final year of medical training for pushing harder on the boundaries of scientific knowledge than any student at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, the mysterious and driven Simon McKensie has blurred the lines between research and criminality and must now choose between exile to the rural country village of Wells, or the hangman’s noose.
When the terrifying Great Plague of 1665 spreads from London to Wells, the town’s very existence is threatened and Catherine must confront her fears, her place in the world – and the burning passions she has long held inside.
Excerpt-
Naked and shivering in the raw night air, Jakob grabbed a ladle of boiling water from a copper kettle that sat above a small fire chamber and poured it onto a stone reservoir. He stepped gingerly into the steaming wooden chamber to warm his bones.
“Damn, het is koud!” he swore, blowing warm air from his lungs into his clamped fists as he hopped from foot to foot. When his eyes adjusted to the dim light, he suddenly saw Geertje sitting on the boards in front of him. He jumped back, banging his head against the wall.
“Aaaaahhhh!” he yelled, and then froze to the spot, speechless.
Geertje didn’t even blink. She simply sat on the hard, slatted bench and tilted her head to one side, thoughtfully considering the glorious, broad-shouldered lad with an unruly mop of blond hair and earnest brown eyes standing bare-naked before her. Jakob tried desperately to cover himself with one hand, while searching the wall behind him for a cloth with the other. In the glow of the moon shining through a small crack in the wallboards, he stared at her in wide-eyed shock. Then, to his amazement, she’d let the quilt slip slowly to the ground, revealing every last inch of her luxurious body.
About the Author-
GAIL HALVERSON is the playwright and composer of musical plays that have been performed for over 250,000 children since 2004. Writing for both theater and television, she holds a degree in English Literature and Communications from the University of California, Davis; and is currently at work on a television pilot for Double Trouble Productions, Inc. She lives in Northern California with her husband and son. The Boundary Stone is her first novel.
Links-
Twitter- https://twitter.com/gailhalv
Website- http://gailhalv.com/
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