The Highway Trilogy

by Deborah Swift 3 books in this series

The Highway Trilogy is a young-adult sequence set during the final years and aftermath of the English Civil Wars. It centres on Abigail and Ralph Chaplin and on Lady Katherine Fanshawe, a fictionalised version of Katherine Ferrers, whose later legend associated her with the ‘Wicked Lady’ highwaywoman. The books move from divided Royalist and Parliamentarian households through the Battle of Worcester to the unsettled years that followed.

Across the trilogy, Swift explores class, loyalty, disability, first love and political idealism. The highwaywoman tradition is used as a dramatic framework, but the novels also evoke the social disruption of civil war and the radical hopes of people who imagined that England might be remade after the fighting.

Reading order

Books in this series (3 books)

1. Shadow on the Highway

Deborah Swift

4.1(1,118)

England, 1650. After her father dies fighting for Parliament, deaf teenager Abigail Chaplin must earn her keep in a household aligned with the Royalist cause. Markyate Manor belongs to the young heiress Katherine Fanshawe, whose confidence and privilege initially put her at odds with Abigail. A…

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2. Spirit of the Highway

Deborah Swift

4.0(572)

England, 1651. Ralph Chaplin is a young Parliamentarian soldier in love with Katherine Fanshawe, an aristocratic Royalist whose family stands on the other side of the country’s divisions. He expects the campaign culminating at Worcester to settle the conflict, but battle gives him a personal enemy…

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3. Lady of the Highway

Deborah Swift

4.3(643)

England after the civil wars. Katherine Fanshawe is determined to preserve Markyate Manor and create a community with friends whose lives have been disrupted by conflict. When her stepfather returns, takes control of the estate and evicts those who worked there, Katherine finds herself blamed for…

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