Dark Tides

Dark Tides is the second book in the Fairmile series by Philippa Gregory. Commencing in June 1670, twenty-one years after events in  Tidelands, the first book in the series, this novel continues the story of Alinor, her daughter Alys and grandchildren Sarah and Johnnie who now live in London. Alinor and Alys operate a small warehouse on a wharf in a poorer area on the Thames and just manage to make a small profit. 

Their lives change when Livia arrives from Venice claiming to be the widow of Alys' brother Rob. She begs for their assistance and promises to repay them generously if they assist her to bring Venetian antiquities into England to sell. But is Livia really who she says she is? 

Alinor is convinced that her son is still alive and she asks Sarah to travel to Venice to find Rob and to verify Livia's stories.

Meanwhile Alinor's brother, Ned, has left England to make a new life in New England in America. Ned's story runs parallel with the events in London and Venice as he struggles to decide where his allegiences lie when it is obvious that unrest is brewing between the English settlers and the American Indians who Ned has befriended.

A bibliography, if readers want to further investigate some of the events mentioned in the novel, is provided at the end of the book.