Why be first of your name when you get the first instalment of my historical fiction series, set during this very war! Matchlock begins in 1622, when Matthew Lock lands in Europe to investigate the brutal murder of his parents.

Order your copy of Matchlock and the Embassy by clicking here.

Episode 9 of the Thirty Years War, First of His Name, is out NOW!

You can’t have a Habsburg protagonist without also having the anti-Habsburg antagonist, and in the years before the war, few individuals were better placed to challenge the Habsburg position than the Elector Palatine, one of seven men granted the honour of voting for the next Emperor, and a greatly influential ruler in his own right, holding sway over the disconnected lands that snaked along the Rhineland and beyond. Frederick V, Elector Palatine, was a Calvinist member of the House of Wittelsbach, but that wasn’t all. He was also pledged to be married to Elizabeth, daughter of King James I and VI.

This granted him supremely useful connections, which he proved determined to make use of in the coming years, to the detriment of the Empire, but to the wonder and fascination of history friends like us. Check out this instalment of the series to get up close and personal with the REAL Elector Palatine, rather than the idealised version which tends to paint Frederick as feckless, lazy or just plain stupid. On the contrary, Frederick was an amiable, considerate, intelligent ruler, in possession of something profoundly important for posterity – an inherited mission to combat Habsburg influence wherever it could be found.

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