Product Description

Vanessa Ratcliffe is just sixteen, daughter of one of the town's richest men. And in spite of her social standing and convent education Vanessa's provocative manner often draws envious eyes in her direction. Angus Cotton is a rough diamond, living in filthy Ryder's Row, but as engineer at Affleck and Tate he's worth his weight in gold. Angus has ambitious plans for his future, plans that had never included Vanessa - until now..."The Round Tower" is a beautifully imagined story of power, love, honour and greed and an award-winning novel from one of Britain's most popular novelists.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #91325 in Books
• Published on: 2008-05-05
• Original language: English
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• 496 pages

From the Back Cover
Vanessa Ratcliffe is just sixteen, daughter of one of the town’s richest men. And in spite of her social standing and convent education, Vanessa’s provocative manner often draws envious eyes in her direction.

Angus Cotton is a rough diamond, living in filthy Ryder’s Row, but as engineer at Affleck and Tate he’s worth his weight in gold. Angus has ambitious plans for his future, plans that had never included Vanessa – until now…

The Round Tower is a beautifully imagined story of power, love, honour and greed and an award-winning novel from one of Britain's most popular novelists.

About the Author
Catherine Cookson was born in Tyne Dock, the illegitimate daughter of a poverty-stricken woman, Kate, whom she believed to be her older sister. She began work in service but eventually moved south to Hastings, where she met and married Tom Cookson, a local grammar-school master. Although she was originally acclaimed as a regional writer - her novel The Round Tower won the Winifred Holtby Award for the best regional novel of 1968 - her readership quickly spread throughout the world, and her many bestselling novels established her as one of the most popular of contemporary women novelists. After receiving an OBE in 1985, Catherine Cookson was created a Dame of the British Empire in 1993. She was appointed an Honorary Fellow of St Hilda's College, Oxford, in 1997. For many years she lived near Newcastle upon Tyne. She died shortly before her ninety-second birthday, in June 1998.

Customer Reviews

The Round Tower of my Heart
The Round Tower poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
"I have you fast in my fortress,
And will not let you depart,
But put you down into the dungeon,
In the round tower of my heart.

And there will I keep you for ever,
Yes, forever and a day,
Till the walls shall crumble to ruin,
And moulder in dust away!"

I would give the book 10 stars if I could.
What a beautiful story. The thing that hooked me was the round tower poem -above- and after that I couldn't stop reading.

I don't want to spoil not even a bit of the story so I'll tell you very little about it. It's about Van & Angus, she's from a wealthy influential family, he's the son of the house maid. Van gets into trouble & runs away from the luxuries she's lived with all her life. Angus aspires to be rich & win her. What happens is nothing they prepared for.


The "Round Tower" won the Winifred Holtby award
for the best regional novel of 1968

Catherine Cookson stories are multi dimensional, her characters are real, their problems are real & the way they deal with them is real. Her stories are memorable, especially this one. Read IT! It's a keeper.


READ IT! & thank me later ;)

One of her best!
The Round Tower, winner of the Winifred Holtby Award, is one of Catherine Cookson's best novels. Set in the sixties, its a tale of power, love, honour and greed.
Vanessa Ratcliffe, is the daughter of 'God-Almighty,' Jonathan Ratcliffe, one of the town's richest men. She lives in one of the most respectable areas, Brampton Hill and has to contend with her parents and sister, who all value their social prestige.
Angus Cotton is a foremen in one of Jonathan's businesses. His mother is the Ratcliffe's daily and he's big, rough, uncouth and uneducated.
They are from two different worlds, but events brings them together and change their lives-and those of their families-forever.
Cookson has penned another faboulus read where the narrative is gripping and engrossing, the characters leap off the pages and the writing is extraordinary. Highly Recommended!