Virgin Earth

John Tradescant the Younger has inherited his father's unique collection of plants along with his unerring ability to nurture them. But as gardener to Charles I, he confronts an unbearable dilemma when England descends into Civil War. Fleeing from the chaos, John travels to the Royalist colony of Virginia in America. But the virgin land is not uninhabited. John's plant hunting takes him into the world of the native people--a world he learns to value just as it comes under threat from the colonial settlers. In both the new world and the old, the established order is breaking down and every family has to find its own way to survive. For the Tradescants, through the upheavals of the Commonwealth and the Restoration, this means consolidating their reputations as the greatest gardeners in the country. In this enthralling, free-standing sequel to Earthly Joys, Philippa Gregory again delivers a tour-de-force of powerful politics, personal discovery, and glorious gardening, brilliantly evoking the uncertainties and emotions of these turbulent times.