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125 reviews for:
Lady Almina and the Real Downton Abbey: The Lost Legacy of Highclere Castle
Fiona Carnarvon
3.45 AVERAGE
125 reviews for:
Lady Almina and the Real Downton Abbey: The Lost Legacy of Highclere Castle
Fiona Carnarvon
3.45 AVERAGE
informative
medium-paced
informative
reflective
medium-paced
Come for Downton Abbey, stay for King Tut.
Not my favorite genre, but a book I surprisingly wanted to finish.
I have registered this book with BookCrossing to track its journey. https://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/11912356/
Not my favorite genre, but a book I surprisingly wanted to finish.
I have registered this book with BookCrossing to track its journey. https://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/11912356/
It's an interesting read, more focused on the war than I expected. Lady Almina spends a considerable amount of her life as a nurse.A large chunk takes place without our lady lead and outside of England, but enjoyable!
informative
This book forever for me to finish for the simple fact that I set it down one day and then couldn't remember where lol! I found it and finished it.
I picked this book up because I loved the Downton Abbey series and was interested in who the real family was that lived at Highclere Castle. Lady Almina is, obviously, the focus of this book. She was the Countess during the same period that Downton is set in, so she is the real life equivalent to Lady Cora. I found her story to be quite interesting and enjoyed the many photos included. The book was well written, and easy to read - not dry as some of this genre can be imo.
The book was written by the current Countess which was interesting too. She was able to find the information in the family archives to bring the fascinating story of Lady Almina to life.
I picked this book up because I loved the Downton Abbey series and was interested in who the real family was that lived at Highclere Castle. Lady Almina is, obviously, the focus of this book. She was the Countess during the same period that Downton is set in, so she is the real life equivalent to Lady Cora. I found her story to be quite interesting and enjoyed the many photos included. The book was well written, and easy to read - not dry as some of this genre can be imo.
The book was written by the current Countess which was interesting too. She was able to find the information in the family archives to bring the fascinating story of Lady Almina to life.
Excellent. The current countess has a knack for producing an eminently enjoyable read. This book tells the story of Almina, the illegitimate daughter to Alfred de Rothschild who married the 5th earl -- the discoverer of king Tut's tomb. This is the quintessential Edwardian story complete with stories of royalty, the First World War, and this woman's need to transform herself from society hostess to head nurse in wartime.
I love Downton Abbey, so of course I had to pick up this book. It didn't blow me away, but it's very interesting to hear what REALLY happened at Highclere Castle during the late Victorian to early Edwardian and WWI, as well as the scandalous (for the time) history of the 5th lady of Carnarvon, as told by the 8th (and current). I so loved hearing that the house really was a hospital during WWI and that Lady Almina was a very good nurse. This is great backstory for anyone who digs Downton.
The story of the the Carnavon family who lived in Highclere Castle, where the show Downton Abbey is filmed. The Earl and Duchess at the time of the turn of the twentieth century and into WWI were pretty extravagant, exciting people. An interesting biography and thanks to Sean for giving this book to me for Christmas!
Being a fan of the PBS show Downton Abbey, I was very excited to learn of some of the real-life adventures of the previous residents of Highclere Castle, where the show takes place and is filmed. This book outlines the life of one of the residents, Lady Almina. This was a slow read, and it took me several times of borrowing it from our library for me to finish it (it is in high demand, so I couldn't renew very often). While I did enjoy it- Lady Almina was very interesting- her husband, the Earl of Carnavon discovered King Tut's tomb in Egypt), once her husband died, the story just kind of stopped. Granted, she stopped living in the castle, but the story had a very abrupt ending. It was so detailed in the beginning, that could have continued with at least some of that detail toward the end. Also, I would have liked to hear even a little bit more about what has happened to the castle after she left. Perhaps a different book will tell me that.
The loan ran out on this before I finished it but I don't miss it. It was a who's who from the glory days of Highclere and although some tidbits were mildly interesting it was simultaneously too detailed and not specific enough to make it interesting. I felt like it read more like the notes from someone's genealogy research than like a biography or portrait of a period in history.