Red Silk

USA Today Bestseller “Stellar…vibrant and witty writing.” – Booklist “Another smart pairing and a genuinely romantic ending.” —Publishers Weekly A sparkling new love story from a historical romance legend, perfect for Bridgerton fans and readers of Sabrina Jeffries, Eloisa James, and Grace Burrowes. In one life-changing windfall, Rosamund Jameson goes from struggling shopkeeper to heiress—and co-owner of a new business. Not only will her sudden fortune allow her to move her millinery shop to fashionable London, but Rosamund will be able to provide her younger sister with a proper entry into society. The only hitch for resourceful Rosamund is her arrogant, infuriatingly handsome business partner... Kevin Radnor is shocked that his late uncle, the Duke of Hollinburgh, bequeathed half his company to a total stranger—worse, a beguiling beauty who can only hinder his enterprise. But Rosamund insists on an active, equal partnership, so Kevin embarks on a plan: a seduction that will lead to a marriage of convenience, giving Rosamund the social status she needs, and guaranteeing him the silent partner he desires. Yet as this charismatic gentleman sets his flirtation in motion, he begins to wonder who is seducing whom—and if he can learn to share himself body and mind, without losing his heart . . . “A book that hooked right into my emotions and gave me what I wanted and needed from a story right now.” —Smart Bitches, Trashy Books “Romance and mystery combine to entertain.” —Fresh Fiction

Elliott Johnston is a working class hero. He and Elizabeth Johnston became Communists in 1941 and he resigned only to join the South Australian Supreme Court Bench.

The Red Silk Cord resulted from my trip to Florence in 2007 where I visited the Hospital of the Innocents and saw the trinkets left behind by loving mothers and fathers who had to leave their babies with the nuns because they could no longer care for them. I built the story around this idea and included the 15th Century historic truths of the time and the Medici family. The story tells the resilience of a young woman, her survival after being raped, giving birth and being persecuted by the baby's father's family. She is helped by a silk merchant and together they go on a journey along the maritime and land silk route to Xian China. They play a part in the discovery of the new and fastest route to China. The emotional and sexual growth of Margherita is explored via a variety of relationships until she eventually discovers what love is. This book is the first in a group of three books named The Red Silk Cord, The Return of the Red Silk Cord and the Revenge of The Red Silk Cord. It includes the Medici families plan to have their fourth son become Pope Leo XI. I sincerely enjoyed writing this book and hope you find it as enjoyable to read as it was for me to write it. Regards Liz Berger M. A. Soc. Sc.

"Red Silk is a history of China’s Yangzi Delta silk industry during the wars, crises, and revolutions of the mid-twentieth century. Based on extensive research in Chinese archives and focused on the 1950s, the book compares two very different groups of silk workers and their experiences in the revolution. Male silk weavers in Shanghai factories enjoyed close ties to the Communist party-state and benefited greatly from socialist policies after 1949. In contrast, workers in silk thread mills, or filatures, were mostly young women who lacked powerful organizations or ties to the revolutionary regime. For many filature workers, working conditions changed little after 1949 and politicized production campaigns added a new burden within the brutal and oppressive factory regime in place since the nineteenth century. Both groups of workers and their employers had to adapt to rapidly changing circumstances. Their actions—protests, petitions, bribery, tax evasion—compelled the party-state to adjust its policies, producing new challenges. The results, though initially positive for many, were ultimately disastrous. By the end of the 1950s, there was widespread conflict and deprivation among silk workers and, despite its impressive recovery under Communist rule, the industry faced a crisis worse than war and revolution."

You will laugh and cry throughout this TRUE international love story - The Red Silk Robe is full of devotion, intrigue, adventure and suspense. From Bristol to Beirut....The Red Silk Robe encompasses love, death, escape, survival and illegal entry into the US with two small children, without friends, family or funds...A survival story of love and strength.. The Red Silk Robe is a true story of a young English girl from Bristol, left without a family, who was determined to live life to the full and experience the world. You will follow her dream of being in show business, her travels, and her chance meeting with a handsome Lebanese 22 year-old in Beirut, Lebanon, which turned into a 'LOVE-AT-FIRST-SIGHT' encounter and marriage.... ...leading to her first dramatic escape from Beirut after betrayal by her Moslem inlaws... her subsequent bare survival in Bristol with her two babies - broke, alone and vulnerable... and her tragic near-death experience... ...then following her return to Beirut to survive and the glorious times for ten years... her second escape from war torn Beirut, amid tanks and riots... ...her arrival in the USA with her two young sons, illegal and broke again - her struggle to survive, travelling from State to State settling up in Dallas, Texas for twenty years... ...finally retiring in the beautiful Riviera Maya. Julia says, 'I do hope you enjoy The Red Silk Robe, it was MY LIFE; I needed to write it before I perhaps began to forget...' 'It could have been a dream, but when I look at my late husband's picture on the wall and the photo of my two sons and grandchildren in my home in beautiful Mexico, I know it was not; it really happened.' Julia dedicates this book to her two sons, Darren and Tarek and to the father they never knew.