The Spymaster's Daughter
-
-
4.0 • 3 Ratings
-
-
- $10.99
-
- $10.99
Publisher Description
In the court of Elizabeth I, the daughter of the queen’s powerful spymaster becomes a secret agent, and plays a dangerous role in saving her country from its ruthless enemies.
In Tudor England, traitors are everywhere and the queen’s spymaster, Sir Francis Walsingham, is assembling the greatest intelligence-gathering network in the world. Walsingham’s only daughter, Lady Frances Sidney, is smart, courageous, and unhappy in love. She longs for the excitement of decoding encrypted messages and setting traps for those working for rival Mary, Queen of Scots. But Frances's father refuses her any opportunity to contribute to the desperate effort of keeping England safe.
Then Elizabeth, impressed with Frances’s fiery spirit, calls her to court as a lady-in-waiting, and Frances seizes the chance to prove herself. Soon, she wins the trust of her father’s de-coders and begins her secret work, thrilled with the freedom to test her talents. But her peril is compounded as her beauty and wit also attract the romantic attention of two men, one the reckless Earl of Essex and the other her own brilliant but low-born servant, Robert Pauley. And when Frances uncovers the most dire plot of all, she will risk her father’s condemnation, her heart’s longing, and her very life to safeguard her queen.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Westin offers a fresh take on Tudor-era intrigue in her well-paced newest (after Making Do). Lady Frances Sidney is the unhappily married daughter of Queen Elizabeth I's spymaster, Sir Francis Walsingham. All she wants in life is to become a spy, but her father refuses to give her the opportunity. However, Frances is headstrong and determined to see her dreams fulfilled. When Frances becomes a lady-in-waiting to the Queen, Walsingham appoints one of his best spies, Robert Pauley, to be her protector, and Frances soon persuades him to help her become a code-breaker. Meanwhile, she attracts the unwanted attention of the aggressive Earl of Essex, and finds herself falling for coconspirator Pauley. Nevertheless, Frances enjoys her new secret position, but everything changes when she begins uncovering secret messages from Queen Mary, Elizabeth's sister, describing a conspiracy to depose Elizabeth. Pauley and Frances go on a mission to trap the would-be usurpers and save Elizabeth, but they may lose everything in the process. Though Westin manages only a lackluster ending, Frances is a strong protagonist, and readers will enjoy the chemistry between her and Pauley, who proves more than a good match for her tenacity and charisma.
