A Respectable Trade

From the bestselling author of The Other Boleyn Girl.
Bristol in 1787 is booming, from its stinking docks to its elegant new houses. Josiah Cole, a small dockside trader, is prepared to gamble everything to join the big players of the city. But he needs ready cash and a well-connected wife.

An arranged marriage to Frances Scott is a mutually convenient solution. Trading her social contacts for Josiah’s protection, Frances enters the world of the Bristol merchants and finds her life and fortune dependent on the respectable trade of sugar, rum and slaves.

Once again Philippa Gregory brings her unique combination of a vivid sense of history and inimitable storytelling skills to illuminate a complex period of our past. Powerful, haunting, intensely disturbing, this is a novel of desire and shame, of individuals, of a society, and of a whole continent devastated by the greed of others.

“'The great roar and sweep of history is successfully braided into the intimate daily detail of this compelling and intelligent book' Penny Perrick, THE TIMES 'Philippa Gregory is a very good storyteller indeed'SUNDAY TIMES 'Subtle and exciting.' Daily Express 'Written from instinct, not out of calculation, and it shows.'Peter Ackroyd, The Times”

'The great roar and sweep of history is successfully braided into the intimate daily detail of this compelling and intelligent book' Penny Perrick, THE TIMES 'Philippa Gregory is a very good storyteller indeed' SUNDAY TIMES

Philippa Gregory is an internationally renowned author of historical novels. She holds a PhD in eighteenth-century literature from the University of Edinburgh. Works that have been adapted for television include A Respectable Trade, The Other Boleyn Girl and The Queen's Fool. The Other Boleyn Girl became a major film, starring Scarlett Johansson, Natalie Portman and Eric Bana. Philippa Gregory lives in the North of England with her family.

The devastating consequences of the slave trade in 18th century are explored through the powerful but impossible attraction of well-born Frances and her slave, Mehuru. From the bestselling author of The Other Boleyn Girl. Bristol in 1787 is booming, from its stinking docks to its elegant new houses. Josiah Cole, a small dockside trader, is prepared to gamble everything to join the big players of the city. But he needs ready cash and a well-connected wife. An arranged marriage to Frances Scott is a mutually convenient solution. Trading her social contacts for Josiah's protection, Frances enters the world of the Bristol merchants and finds her life and fortune dependent on the respectable trade of sugar, rum and slaves. Once again Philippa Gregory brings her unique combination of a vivid sense of history and inimitable storytelling skills to illuminate a complex period of our past. Powerful, haunting, intensely disturbing, this is a novel of desire and shame, of individuals, of a society, and of a whole continent devastated by the greed of others.

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