Elena Collins Books In Order
Book links take you to Amazon. As an Amazon Associate I earn money from qualifying purchases.Publication Order of Standalone Novels
The Witch's Tree | (2022) | Description / Buy at Amazon |
The Lady of the Loch | (2023) | Description / Buy at Amazon |
The Daughter of the Fens | (2023) | Description / Buy at Amazon |
The Wicked Lady | (2024) | Description / Buy at Amazon |
Elena Collins is a bestselling dual timeline historical fiction author that has been writing professionally under her real name Judy Leigh for more than half a dozen years.
Her writing pseudonym is a tribute to Nell Collins, her grandmother on the paternal side. Growing up, she used to enjoy the many stories her grandmother who was a consummate storyteller used to tell.
Before she became a bestselling author, she had been a teacher of theatre and during that time, she lived in many places in the United Kingdom. Following retirement from teaching theatre studies, she went to Falmouth University where she did her master’s degree in Professional Writing.
Writing as Judy Leigh, she published her first two novels with HarperCollins before she moved to Boldwood Books, which has been exclusively publishing her Elena Collins novels.
As Elena, most of her timeslip novels tend to be historical fiction with a mystery or tragedy from the past that is resolved or uncovered in the present day. Over the years, her work has been very popular and has since been translated into more than eight languages.
While she had always written romance as Judy Leigh when her publisher asked her if she would be interested in writing paranormal romance she jumped at the opportunity. As Judy Leigh, she has made a reputation for penning novels about second chances and older women.
Her stories are sometimes uplifting or poignant and often funny. However, she has come to write writing timeline slips or ghostly stories like Elena Collins as this makes it possible for her to work from a different place.
She believes that over the years, there has developed some kind of invisibility to women’s lives and this is why she writes the timeline slip novels as Elena. When she is not penning her blockbuster novels, Elena Collins dabbles in music and art since she has an A level in Art.
In fact, she has four friends that are professional painters who to some extent have inspired some of her characters. Away from home, she can usually be found, raveling writing, and researching in some of England’s most beautiful locations. Nonetheless, theatre and writing remain her biggest loves.
She currently makes her home in Somerset in the Southwest of England, where she lives with her three cats and sets most of her novels.
Elena Collins lives in an old cottage in Somerset that was built in the 17th century. One interesting thing about the house is that it has a witch’s mark or hex fall on the door. This combined with the fact that she had always had paranormal experiences as a child inspired her debut novel The Witch’s Tree.
Growing up, there had been several instances where she had seen ghosts in the house she lived in that she was told were of former inhabitants of the house. There was also that time she saw a ghost a child who was the brother to one of the children she had been babysitting and was informed that the kid had drowned as a six-year-old.
Additionally, the Blackdown Hills near her home has a fascinating history of women that were accused and persecuted during the witch trials. She subsequently went online for information and also found a lot of literature and material from the community that she used to write her novel.
“The Witch’s Tree” which is her debut novel as Elena Collins was first published in 2022 and went on to become a bestselling title.
“The Witch’s Tree” by Elena Collins is a story as old as time about a spirit that never found rest. It starts out in the present day when a love affair comes to an end. Selena is devastated as the relationship could also herald the end of her dreams for the future.
To recover from the heartbreak, she heads out to a country retreat in Ashcombe, a small and quaint village in Somerset, where she will be living in the picturesque and picture postcard-worthy Sloe Cottage.
It seems like the perfect place where she can forget her troubles as she arrives just in time for the start of the spring season. However, it is not long before she is hearing voices from the past. It does seem that the cottage has secrets that will not stay hidden.
Flashback to 1682 and Grace Cotter wants nothing more than a family and husband she can call her own. She is content working on the farm, looking after her aging father, and learning about healing from her grandmother.
Nonetheless, she cannot help but long for love, even if these are dangerous times, and gossip and rumors can be very dangerous and even deadly. One wrong move and it seems her fate is set.
The work draws together two women brought together in a cottage bathed in magic and blood. Cotter’s spirit is looking for rest and only Selena can help it in that quest.
Elena Collins’ novel “The Lady of the Loch” is a work set in 1307 Ravenscraig Castle in Scotland. The lead in the novel is Agnes Fitzgerald, a kitchen maid who has to flee when the castle where she earned her daily bread was sacked by Prince Edward of England and his armies.
She fled to Inverness to put herself at the mercy of the Lady and Lord of Ravenscraig Castle. While it is safe for the moment, the threat of the English still hangs heavy, even as Scotsmen fight for their independence.
But when Agnes sees Cam Buchana swimming in the loch her mind turns towards love and away from war. Agnes begins dreaming of a happy future only to learn that the man of her dreams will have to go to fight alongside Robert de Brus.
Zoe and Leah are twins that are in serious need of change and working at Ravenscraig Castle could not have come at a better time. The castle is ringed by rugged countryside and bordered by a loch which makes for a perfect setting.
However, the locals have been reticent about the castle and none visit it as there are rumors of lost souls and ghosts. The sisters do not believe in the superstition but the overwhelming sadness they can feel from the castle soon becomes impossible to ignore.
Will the sisters ultimately be able to right centuries of heartbreak?