The Blood in Winter

Author Jonathan Healey
Narrator Mark Meadows
Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing
Publish Date 26 June 2025
Run Time 13 hours and 30 minutes
Format Audio
Genre Political / legal thriller, Revolutions, uprisings, rebellions, Social and cultural history.

Listen to a sample

What to expect

Bloomsbury presents The Blood in Winter by Jonathan Healey, read by Mark Meadows.

A nation on the cusp of war. A King ousted from his capital by the people. A society on the brink of collapse. From Jonathan Healey comes a thrilling history about the months that sent England into civil war.

'Healey has done it again. The Blood in Winter is history as it should be told, where new light is cast upon one of the most dramatic years in British history. Shaped by meticulous research and a narrative worthy of any political thriller, the result is masterful' ALICE LOXTON

After years of tension between a king and his people, in 1641 England reaches a semblance of peace. Armies have disbanded, legislation has passed to ensure Parliament will continue to sit, and the people are tentatively optimistic. Radical politicians congratulate themselves on a stunning political victory. Royal servants are coming to accept an altered future.

Then comes winter. With it, chaos, protests, political deadlock, and eventually a remarkable attempt by King Charles I to destroy his opponents. On 4 January 1642 Charles marches on the small riverside city of Westminster at the head of an army, seeking to arrest five Members of Parliament. In doing so, he sets in motion a series of events that will lead to bloodshed and war, changing a nation forever.

Why did the English Civil War break out? The Blood in Winter tells the story of an English people's great political awakening, and of a nation that splintered into bloodshed at a terrifying speed. Jonathan Healey recreates the claustrophobic atmosphere of the day, with rowdy protestors in the streets and London blanketed in coal smoke. It is a story of remarkable but flawed characters, all faced with unpalatable choices, and a frightening picture of a society in profound distress.

Critics Review

The Blood in Winter, Jonathan Healey’s brilliant narrative history, sees a spry cast of characters navigate the uncertain lead-up to war . . . energetic and exceptional . . . The Blood in Winter takes us beyond the disputes in Westminster. The particularly novel parts of Healey’s tale show us how common people were well aware of the vicissitudes of royal fortune, and reflect how ideological splintering in the halls of power was felt throughout England long before the battle-lines were drawn . . . A book that bursts with character, a vivid reconstruction of England on the brink . . . Healey’s narrative is original thanks to a well-chosen cast of supporting characters . . . It’s a pleasure to read Healey’s stylish and fluid prose, and he’s fantastic at conveying the importance of “split-second moments” where the tide of history might have turned . . . A rollicking history, packed with fire and excitement

Telegraph

A lucid, fast-paced and exhilarating account of how, if not necessarily why, England descended into civil war . . . Vivid details brighten almost every page . . . Healey turns mere names into figures who linger long in the memory. There is hardly a paragraph not enlivened by his eye for the mannerisms, quirks and eccentricities of the actors in his story. The Blood in Winter is a highly accomplished and impressively accessible account of one of the most complicated and consequential series of events in British history. Its pages teem with larger-than-life personalities and dramatic incident . . . The House of Cards-ish drama remains gripping to the last

Literary Review

Gripping . . . A galloping narrative . . . Healey deftly joins the dots between several points of no return. He writes briskly and accessibly, even to the point of tabloid snappiness . . . The Blood in Winter discreetly, and persuasively, merges different currents in civil war history . . . Healey makes these elite manoeuvres lucid, lively, even suspenseful . . . Gives us gripping history from below as well as from above

Financial Times

Netflix should make this enjoyable English civil war history into an epic drama . . . Healey’s account is an old-fashioned Westminster thriller, meticulously following the relationship between the proud, prickly Charles and his parliamentary critics . . . Healey works hard to create a sense of atmosphere from the confusing, claustrophobic warren of the Palace of Westminster to the reeking streets of the City of London

Sunday Times

Gives a relatively familiar narrative startling freshness . . . A fine, engaging and judicious book

Spectator

Healey has done it again. The Blood in Winter is history as it should be told, where new light is cast upon one of the most dramatic years in British history. Shaped by meticulous research and a narrative worthy of any political thriller, the result is masterful

ALICE LOXTON, author of Eighteen: A History of Britain in Eighteen Young Lives

A gripping and elegantly crafted story. Jonathan Healey writes with clarity, compassion and a keen eye for human truth. A truly affecting read

ROB RINDER

The build-up to the English Civil War is a political thriller like no other. Moving from field to street and alehouse to Parliament, Jonathan Healey captures all the tension and excitement of those critical few months when the country teetered on the brink. He shows clearly, immersively and with a tempo that matches the moment just how quickly a constitution can unravel and violence prevail

JESSIE CHILDS, author of The Siege of Loyalty House

This is everything a history book should be. Healey fills his narrative with portraits of extraordinary characters, which combine to make his account of Britain’s descent into Civil War a truly human one. Nothing could be more relevant to us now, in this political moment, than a history like The Blood in Winter that gives an example of how fast and almost accidentally nations can fall apart, and the individual decisions of conscience that must be made along the way’

OPHELIA FIELD, author of The Favourite

Bristling with energy, packed with humour and humanity, The Blood in Winter unfolds like a thriller to tell the dramatic story of how England collapsed into civil war in 1642. In his trademark clear and compelling style, Healey mines rich research for vivid treasures to give us narrative history at its finest: quite simply superb

MIRANDA MALINS, author of The Puritan Princess

A superb history. Healey has the rare ability to make the seventeenth century accessible without being patronising, and to cover big and important themes while keeping the reader royally entertained

SAM FREEDMAN, author of Failed State

A terrific evocation of one of the most dramatic periods in British history, when everyone was forced to take sides in a monumental conflict whose consequences resonate to this day

PAUL LAY, author of Providence Lost

Healey is in the vanguard of modern popular history, and The Blood in Winter charges like a squadron of cavalry through the tumultuous year that led to the civil wars, giving equal billing to the people’s politics that shook the streets of London and the arguments and doubts that filled the houses of parliament

NADINE AKKERMAN, author of Invisible Agents

This is a wonderful book, exhaustively researched, vigorously argued and teeming with the furious joy of seventeenth-century life

The Times on 'The Blazing World'

A brilliant, bloody account of England's most dramatic century . . . Thrilling

The Telegraph on 'The Blazing World'

User Reviews

Book 4.0

Narration 4.0

4.0

An informative and detailed account about the years leading up to the English Civil War.1641-1642.

ring01 29/07/2025

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