Bustle's List of 11 Historical Novels to Look Forward to This Fall

I was googling something yesterday and accidentally stumbled on Bustle.com, a popular online American women’s magazine with 45 million unique monthly visitors. They had just issued a List of “11 Historical Novels by Women to Look Forward to This Fall”.

Guess what I found? The Green Phoenix: A Novel of the Woman Who Re-made Asia, Empress Xiaozhuang is on that List! Yay!

A tantalizing story of one of history's most fascinating women, The Green Phoenix will show readers a world like they've never seen before. - Sadie Trombetta, BUSTLE

Link to the Bustle Webpage

An In-depth Interview with Bryn Hammond

Bryn Hammond is a Goodreads member and reviewer of my new novel The Green Phoenix: A Novel of the Woman Who Re-made Asia, Empress Xiaozhuang (see her review here). If you like her review, by all means click the "like" button on that review page. She is a long-time scholar of Mongolian steppe history and author of a series of novels about Genghis Khan. She kindly offered to interview me on her blog. Gosh, were those questions stimulating!

Read the in-depth interview here.

A bunch of thanks to you, Bryn!

The Green Phoenix by Alice Poon: A Love Story During Dynastic Change | CYNTHIA ANDERSON | Historical Novel Society

A few days ago I was interviewed by Cynthia Anderson, historical novelist and contributor to Historical Novel Society’s features section, about my new novel. This morning, I was so happy to see the feature article live on HNS’s website!

Link to the article:-

The Green Phoenix by Alice Poon: A Love Story During Dynastic Change | CYNTHIA ANDERSON | Historical Novel Society


Many thanks to Cynthia and HNS!

Book Review - "Roseblood" by Paul Doherty

This was a fascinating page-turner with head-spinning plot twists and a rather predictable ending. The cast is made up of mostly fictional characters, including the two protagonists.

Simon Roseblood is a loyal chancery clerk of John Beaufort’s Lancastrian household, who are staunch supporters of King Henry VI and Margaret of Anjou. Amadeus Sevigny is a chancery clerk of the ambitious York household (Duke of York, his wife Cecily Neville and their nephew Richard Neville) who have set their eyes on the throne. Rivalry between Roseblood and Sevigny is further complicated by intrusion on the scene of a vengeful group of French mercenaries who are bent on annihilating the Beauforts, whom they blame for the massacre in a French village years before. After many twists and turns, Sevigny finds himself in love with Roseblood’s beautiful daughter and being hated by Cecily Neville for a blame he is innocent of. It is enough to make him decide to change allegiance.

Real historical characters are barely featured throughout the novel until the final two chapters.

Overall, it was an entertaining read with very meticulous descriptions of gore, stench and filth of medieval London. I’m giving it 4 stars.