Daisy Goodwin Books In Order

Publication Order of Victoria Books

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Poetry Collections

Publication Order of Short Stories/Novellas

Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books

Publication Order of The Nation's Favourite Poems Books

Daisy Goodwin is a British television producer and author born and raised in London though she claims Argentinian and Irish ancestry. Goodwin was born to Richard Goodwin a film producer and Jacosta Innes an interior decorator. She did not have the best childhood as her parents separated when she was five and soon after they were divorced. Jason Goodwin the English historian and writer is her half-brother that was adopted by her father when she was little. Growing up, she had all manner of creative people to look up to and she asserted that she would sometimes come home to Ingrid Bergman and Lauren Bacall having tea on their living room sofa. Robert Traill the Irish clergyman was her great grandfather and she included him on Victoria the TV drama that was adapted from her bestselling novel “Victoria.” Goodwin published her first novel, “My Last Duchess,” in 2010. She currently lives with her husband and children in London.

As an eighteen-year-old, Goodwin attended Cambridge University, studying for a degree in history. Her first assignment was on media and Queen Victoria and she went to the library to read the “Diaries” – the journals the queen had kept over her long reign. She had had written more than two million words in her “Diaries,” and Daisy was overwhelmed by the sheer weight and size of the bound volumes. In the library, she opened a 3rd November 1839 and burst out laughing. The entry that was a hilarious description of Albert her husband who has white cashmere breeches and was all wet with nothing underneath. She had always thought of Queen Victoria as an old boot faced stern looking woman with a bonnet but her perceptions changed as she read the creative descriptions. It was an eye-opening moment when she went behind the historical figure to see the personality of the character beyond what had been written in the history books. This was a girl that was madly in love at nineteen and is interested in sex and men yet has a relatable and passionate nature about her. It was the insights into the budding queen that got her interested in the famous women in history and provided a template that she would use in later novels. Her novels depict women of strong emotions, who are interested in what is happening in their world in incredibly vivid color.

Once Daisy Goodwin graduated from Cambridge, she got a Harkness Fellowship and proceeded to Columbia Film School. She then went on to work making arts documentaries at the BBC for nearly a decade before she got a job in the private sector, where she was responsible for several programs including Channel 4’s “Grand Designs.” Goodwin established her company “Silver River Productions” in 2005 and after making it a success, it was sold to Sony in 2012. Apart from her work on TV, she also wrote “Silver River” a memoir. During this time, her interest in writing was heightened and in 2010 she published “My Last Duchess,” her debut novel which was later published in Canada and the US as “American Heiress.” She also contributed several poems that have been featured in a variety of anthologies including prestigious ones such as “The Nations Favorite Love Poems.” She currently has nine bestselling anthologies to her name. Daisy has also worked as a judge and at the Orange Prize for women fiction in 2010, she was the chair of the judges’ panel. Since her debut, she has gone on to write the novels “The Fortune Hunter” and “Victoria” both of which have attained critical and commercial success in Europe and North America. In 2014, she was commissioned to pen the screenplay for her novel “Victoria” that was to be aired as an eight-part series. The series which is about the early life of Queen Victoria was aired on WGBH Masterpiece Theatre and ITV. She also writes a bibliotherapy column for the Daily Maul and reviews for the Sunday Times and the Times.

Daisy Goodwin’s debut novel “The American Heiress” is a dramatic and entertaining novel reminiscent of the gossip magazines of days old. The lead is a headstrong and vivacious young woman named Cora Cash who lives a privileged life given that she is wealthy. No one can match her economic reach or seal but what she lacks and can seemingly never attain is nobility. Determined to marry into nobility, the Cash family pack their stuff and head to England where Cora can be introduced to the high born of English society. It is at the parties and dinners in London that she meets the Duke of Wareham named Ivo. To her surprise, she grows fond of the English nobleman and is over the moon when he finally proposes. However, both of them know that this is a transaction as Ivo is getting access to Cora’s vast wealth while she gets the noble status she cannot acquire otherwise. It looks like a dream come true for the new Duchess of Wareham but when the honeymoon and dream wedding are over, she realizes that the excesses, decadence, and glamour may not be worth it after all. She needs to adjust to the excessive adherence to protocol and avoidance of scandal and she does not like it one bit.

Goodwin’s “The Fortune Hunter” is a novel that tells the story of a young heiress named Charlotte Baird. She stands to inherit the Lennox fortune but does not seem to care for it as all she wants is to become a legendary photographer. But then she meets a notorious ladies man with a passion for hunting and riding named Captain Bay Middleton. Charlotte is determined to chart her path and despite the warnings from her family that the man is a gold digger she intends to continue her dalliance with him. Things get complicated when the Queen of Austria, Empress Elizabeth “Sisi” comes to England to do some hunting. Captain Bay’s superior, Earl Spencer orders him to be the Queen’s pilot and he is not too pleased. When he bumps into his client while on the hunt and feels some tension, he realizes that the danger of doing something stupid is too high. He quickly finds Charlotte intending to convince her to run away with him as he is sure he will do something he will regret if he stays. She will not have a scandal but convinces Bay to wait which makes for a painful time for the man who knows he has been enchanted by Sisi. The truth Charlotte needs is captured on a photographic plate but she wants to believe in Bay. For Bay, he wrestles with whether it is worth it becoming the Queen’s favorite and risk losing Charlotte the only woman he has ever fallen in love with.

Daisy Goodwin’s “Victoria” is set in 1837 and tells the story of Alexandrina Victoria, a petite woman that would later become Queen of Great Britain and Ireland. At the opening of the novel, she is a small and sheltered woman only eighteen years old that nobody thought would ever amount to anything. She seems too unprepossessing and had always been controlled by her family, especially her mother. But the young Queen surprised everyone when William IV dies as she takes the throne and becomes Queen Victoria. She insists on getting her own room and meeting her ministers alone. Lord Melbourne becomes the Queen’s private secretary and there were rumors that he might have been more than that. Nonetheless, everyone believes that she would eventually get married to Prince Albert her cousin. But she had met the man when she was a child and thought him critical and stiff and did not think he would make a good husband.