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Features

Non-fiction to read if you love Bridgerton

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How victims became the heart of true crime

Hallie Rubenhold author interview for Penguin 2020

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Meet the author: Hallie Rubenhold

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5 things you didn’t know about the women killed by Jack the Ripper

By the award-winning and Sunday Times bestselling author of THE FIVE

The French Lesson

'A thrilling novel of female intrigue, betrayal and revenge. Read it!' LUCY WORSLEY 
'Dark and delicious' Red Magazine 
'Utterly gripping and highly relevant' SIMON SEBAG-MONTEFIORE 
_____________________ 
Fear your neighbour. Praise the Republic. Preach liberty. Hate monarchy. Speak in whispers. Trust no-one. 
 
Revolutionary Paris, 1792: As the city spirals into bloodshed, Henrietta Lightfoot a young Englishwoman runs for her life to the extravagant home of Grace Dalrymple, notorious courtesan to the aristocracy. 
 
But loyalties are tested when she befriends Grace's arch rival, a committed revolutionary and mistress of the most powerful man in France. Trapped in a terrifying game of wits between these two dangerous women, Henrietta is about to learn the most brutal lesson of her life. 
 
A tale of friendship and betrayal, The French Lesson is an eye-popping drama of power and manipulation, as the women written out of the French Revolution tell their own story of smarts and sacrifice. 
 
PERFECT FOR FANS OF HARLOTS and BRIDGERTON 
___________________ 
 
'A gleefully modern retelling of a juicy chapter in history' The Times 
'Rubenhold unfolds a complicated plot with great dexterity' Sunday Times

the book that inspired BBC2’s ‘Harlots’

The Covent Garden Ladies

***By the No. 1 Sunday Times bestselling author of THE FIVE*** 
'A fascinating expose of the seamy side of eighteenth century life' MAIL ON SUNDAY 
'Rubenhold's pages practically reek with smelly, pox-ridden Georgian Soho' GUARDIAN 
------------------------------------------------------- 
 
In 1757, a down-and-out Irish poet, the head waiter at the Shakespear's Head Tavern in Covent Garden, and a celebrated London courtesan became bound together by the publication of a little book: Harris's List of Covent Garden Ladies. This salacious work - detailing the names and 'specialities' of the capital's sex-workers- became one of the eighteenth century's most scandalous bestsellers. 
 
Yet beyond its titillating passages lies a glimpse into the lives of those who lived and died by its profits - a tragicomic opera of the Georgian era, motivated by poverty, passionate love, aspiration and shame. 
 
In this modern and visceral narrative, historian Hallie Rubenhold reveals the story behind Harris's List of Covent Garden Ladies, and the legion of ordinary women whose lives in the sex trade history has chosen to ignore. 
 
 
'Scrupulously researched' DAILY TELEGRAPH 
 
'Crackles with drama and tension' GUARDIAN 
 
'Compelling and ingenious' INDEPENDENT 
 
 
WHAT READERS ARE SAYING: 
 
'This book is an absolute 'must'-read for any person interested in English social history' 5 **** 
'Fascinating' 5 **** 
'Brilliant. Full of intelligent insight which brings this period to vibrant life' 5 ****

Hallie Rubenhold is the Number One Sunday Times bestselling and Baillie Gifford Non-Fiction prize-winning social historian whose expertise lies in revealing stories of previously unknown women and episodes in history. By drawing upon a wealth of formerly unseen archival material and adding a full historical context to the victims' lives, The Five changes the narrative of these murders for ever. Rubenhold's books include Lady Worsley's Whim, dramatized by the BBC as 'The Scandalous Lady W', and Covent Garden Ladies: The Extraordinary Story of Harris's List, which inspired the ITV series 'Harlots'. She has also written two acclaimed novels of female intrigue, revenge and betrayal: Mistress of My Fate and The French Lesson. She lives in London with her husband.

The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper

The Five

THE MULTI AWARD-WINNING #1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER 
 
'Gripping' NEW YORK TIMES 
'At last, the Ripper's victims get a voice... An eloquent, stirring challenge to reject the prevailing Ripper myth' MAIL ON SUNDAY 
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Polly, Annie, Elizabeth, Catherine and Mary-Jane are famous for the same thing, though they never met. 
 
They came from Fleet Street, Knightsbridge, Wolverhampton, Sweden and Wales. They wrote ballads, ran coffee houses, lived on country estates, they breathed ink-dust from printing presses and escaped people-traffickers. 
 
What they had in common was the year of their murders: 1888. 
 
Their murderer was never identified, but the name created for him by the press has become far more famous than any of these five women. 
 
Now, in this devastating narrative of five lives, historian Hallie Rubenhold finally sets the record straight, and gives these women back their stories. 
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Awards for The Five include: 
- Winner of the BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE for Non-fiction 
- HAY FESTIVAL Book of the Year 2019 
- Winner of the Goodreads Choice Awards for History 
 
PRAISE FOR THE FIVE 
 
'Devastatingly good. The Five will leave you in tears, of pity and of rage.' LUCY WORSLEY 
'Fascinating, compelling, moving.' BRIDGET COLLINS, author of The Binding 
'An angry and important work of historical detection, calling time on the misogyny that has fed the Ripper myth. Powerful and shaming.' GUARDIAN 
'Haunting' SUNDAY TIMES 
'What a brilliant and necessary book' JO BAKER, author of Longbourn 
'Beautifully written and with the grip of a thriller, it will open your eyes and break your heart.' ERIN KELLY 
'An outstanding work of history-from-below ... magnificent' SPECTATOR 
'Deeply researched' THE NEW YORKER

'THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER: Five devastating human stories and a dark and moving portrait of Victorian London - the untold lives of the women killed by Jack the Ripper. 'Powerful and shaming' Guardian

FIVE STARS: At last, the Ripper's victims get a voice... An eloquent, stirring challenge to reject the prevailing Ripper myth.

How fitting that in the year when we celebrate the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage, dignity is finally returned to these unfortunate women.

Professor Dame Sue Black, author of ALL THAT REMAINS

A Ripper narrative that gives voice to the women he silenced; I’ve been waiting for this book for years. Beautifully written and with the grip of a thriller, it will open your eyes and break your heart.

Devastatingly good. The Five will leave you in tears of pity and of rage.

Forests have been felled in the interests of unmasking the murderer, but until now no one has bothered to discover the identity of his victims. The Five is thus an angry and important work of historical detection, calling time on the misogyny that has fed the Ripper myth. . . This is a powerful and a shaming book, but most shameful of all is that it took 130 years to write.

By collating these five deeply affecting biographies ... Rubenhold has given these women the immortality that their murderer does not deserve.

Stupendous. The sort of work that keeps history vital.

IMOGEN HERMES GOWAR, author of THE MERMAID AND MRS HANCOCK

Fascinating, compelling, moving, The Five makes a fierce, passionate argument about the ethics of how we engage with murder. A brilliant,properly thoughtful, responsible piece of political writing.

‘Mary Ann Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes, and Mary Jane Kelly deserve to be thought of as more than eviscerated bodies on an East London street. This haunting book does something to redress that balance.

A highly readable work of rigorous scholarship that plunges the reader into the claustrophobic world of late 19th-century London... The story of these five women – Mary Ann “Polly” Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes and Mary Jane Kelly – is not one of death, but one of life.

Fascinating and hugely important book acts as a timely reminder of what happens when society ceases to care for its most vulnerable residents.

This confidently written book gives a rich insight into the world of the wretched in the late Victorian period. Rubenhold writes in a compassionate but unsentimental style…

An outstanding work of history-from-below … magnificent

Urges us to look beyond the familiar stories... The Five challenges the accepted view of the five canonical victims of Jack the Ripper, and tells the untold stories of their lives.

THE FIVE has received deservedly rave reviews. It's gripping.

A brilliant and important book that will reshape how this case is studied - anyone interested in social history or the history of crime owes a debt to @HallieRubenhold

Becomes a passionate indictment of the true-crime genre, with its fixation on the minds of murderers and its shallow, glancing sympathy for the dead. Hard-edged and heartbreaking

Our fascination with true crime means we often focus on the perpertrator, such as Ted Bundy, rather than the victims. It's time to stop focusing on the killer and start remembering the victims: Polly, Annie, Catherine and Mary-Jane

Deeply researched portraits of the victims as they lived . . . A distinct story that has never been fully or truthfully told.

‘A stunning achievement of forensic research and authorly compasssion’

Hallie Rubenhold is the Number One Sunday Times bestselling and Baillie Gifford Non-Fiction prize-winning social historian whose expertise lies in revealing stories of previously unknown women and episodes in history. As well as The Covent Garden Ladies, Rubenhold's works of non-fiction include the award-winning and Number One bestselling The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper and Lady Worsley's Whim, dramatized by the BBC as 'The Scandalous Lady W'. Her latest work of non-fiction, Bad Women, the story of the disappeared wives and partner of Dr Crippen, is due to be published in 2022. She has also written two acclaimed novels Mistress of My Fate and The French Lesson which are a feminist homage to the literary tropes of the Eighteenth Century. She lives in London with her husband. Meet her @HallieRubenhold

An Eighteenth-Century Tale of Sex, Scandal and Divorce (by the bestselling author of The Five)

The Scandalous Lady W

‘Deliciously lurid’ Sunday Times 
 
The Sunday Times bestselling author of The Five exposes the divorce that scandalised Georgian England. 
 
She was a spirited young heiress. He was a handsome baronet with a promising career in government. 
 
 Their marriage had the makings of a fairy tale but ended as one of the most salacious and highly publicised divorces in history. 
 
 For over two hundred years the story of Lady Worsley, her vengeful husband, and her lover, George Maurice Bisset, lay forgotten. Now Hallie Rubenhold throws open a window to a rarely seen view of Georgian England, one coloured by passion, adventure and the defiance of social convention. 
 
 Originally published with the title Lady Worsley's Whim.

First published with the title Lady Worsley’s Whim, read the book behind the major new BBC drama starring Natalie Dormer (Game of Thrones, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay)

It was the divorce that scandalised Georgian England... She was a spirited 
young heiress. He was a handsome baronet with a promising career in government. Their marriage had the makings of a fairy tale but ended as one of the most salacious and highly publicised divorces in history. 
 
For over two hundred years the story of Lady Worsley, her vengeful husband, and her lover, George Maurice Bisset, lay forgotten. Now Hallie Rubenhold, in her impeccably researched book, throws open a window to a rarely seen view of Georgian England, one coloured by passion, adventure and the defiance of social convention. The Worsley's story, their struggles and outrageous lifestyle, promises to shock even the modern reader.

A fabulous story and Rubenhold tells it beautifully

Hallie Rubenhold is in a league of her own. She keeps you glued to the very last page when, exhausted, exasperated and elated, you can at last put the book down and get yourself some sleep.... Nothing else in the genre is close to being this good

Hallie Rubenhold's account of the elopement is gripping but this is far more than an 18th-century bodice-ripper. Rubenhold combines narrative skill with historical expertise, and she traces the knife-edge that women walked between social success and public disgrace with subtlety and assurance

A well-researched account... Highly diverting tale

By the bestselling author of THE FIVE: THE WOMEN KILLED BY JACK THE RIPPER

Harris's List of the Covent Garden Ladies

By the bestselling winner of the Baillie Gifford Prize 2019 for THE FIVE: THE WOMEN KILLED BY JACK THE RIPPER 
 
This is the book that inspired ITV'S hit drama HARLOTS. 
 
If you ever wondered what Jane Austen's Mr Darcy and his fellows got up to on their numerous trips to London, here is the book they would certainly have carried around ... 
 
HARRIS'S LIST OF COVENT GARDEN LADIES was a bestseller in the Eighteenth Century, shifting 250,000 copoies in an age before mass consumerism. A 'guide book' published annually at Christmas, it detailed the names, attributes and 'specialities' of the capital's prostitutes. During its heyday (1759 -95) HARRIS'S LIST was the essential accessory for any serious gentleman of pleasure. 
 
Hallie Rubenhold has collected the funniest, rudest and most bizarre entries penned by Jack Harris, Pimp-General-of-all-England, into this fascinating and mischievous collection.

This is the book that inspired ITV'S hit drama HARLOTS.

The Doctor, the Typist and the murder of Cora Crippen

Crime of the Century

The astonishing feminist retelling story of the downfall of Dr Crippen in Edwardian England, brought to justice by an extraordinary group of musichall women, told by the bestselling author of THE FIVE.

Hallie Rubenhold

Perfect fiction for fans of BBC TV's hit series BRIDGERTON and HARLOTS 
 
'A remarkable picture of a fascinating age' Daily Express 
'A full-blooded historical' Independent 
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My tale is not for the faint of heart. 
 
Born illegitimate in eighteenth-century England, the scandalous Henrietta Lightfoot gives us her version of the truth about her criminal life in this delicious coming-of-age. 
 
Fleeing her childhood home for the big city, Henrietta is now swimming in the London underworld of rakes, rogues, sharks, pimps and courtesans - she quickly sees that true liberty is a man's privilege. 
 
What must Henrietta do to survive in a world designed for men? 
 
Gripping, twisty, shocking, MISTRESS OF MY FATE illuminates the dark lives of the women written out by the masters of eighteenth-century literature. Vibrant and full-blooded, it is an irresistible picaresque story for our times 
 
'Two parts Lizzie Bennett and Tom Jones's Sophia Western to one part Moll Flanders' INDEPENDENT 
 
'Combines extraordinary bawdiness with silky sophistication' DAILY EXPRESS

Hallie Rubenhold

Mistress of My Fate

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