What do you think?
Rate this book
The Velvet Quartet
By Jude Deveraux. ISBN 0-7394-3766-6. Jude Deveraux's Passionate Velvet Series Comes Alive in The Velvet Quartet, an Exclusive 4-in-1 Rhapsody Edition. This volume includes the following novels, complete and unabridged: The Velvet Promise, Highland Velvet, Velvet Song, and Velvet Angel.
1176 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1983
1 person is currently reading
422 people want to read
About the author
Jude Deveraux
200 books7,075 followersJude Gilliam was born September 20, 1947 in Fairdale, Kentucky. She has a large extended family and is the elder sister of four brothers. She attended Murray State University and received a degree in Art. In 1967, Jude married and took her husband's surname of White, but four years later they divorced. For years, she worked as 5th-grade teacher.
She began writing in 1976, and published her first book, The Enchanted Land (1977) under the name Jude Deveraux. Following the publication of her first novel, she resigned her teaching position. Now, she is the author of 31 New York Times bestsellers.
Jude won readers' hearts with the epic Velvet series, which revolves around the lives of the Montgomery family's irresistible men. Jude's early books are set largely in 15th- and 16th-century England; in them her fierce, impassioned protagonists find themselves in the midst of blood feuds and wars. Her heroines are equally scrappy -- medieval Scarlett O'Haras who often have a low regard for the men who eventually win them over. They're fighters, certainly, but they're also beauties who are preoccupied with survival and family preservation.
Jude has also stepped outside her milieu, with mixed results. Her James River trilogy (River Lady, Lost Lady, and Counterfeit Lady) is set mostly in post-Revolution America; the popular, softer-edged Twin of Fire/Twin of Ice moves to 19th-century Colorado and introduces another hunky-man clan, the Taggerts.
Deveraux manages to evoke a strong and convincing atmosphere for each of her books, but her dialogue and characters are as familiar as a modern-day soap opera's. "Historicals seem to be all I'm capable of," Jude once said in an interview, referring to a now out-of-print attempt at contemporary fiction, 1982's Casa Grande. "I don't want to write family sagas or occult books, and I have no intention of again trying to ruin the contemporary market." Still, Jude did later attempt modern-day romances, such as the lighthearted High Tide (her first murder caper), the contemporary female friendship story The Summerhouse, and the time-traveling Knight in Shining Armor. In fact, with 2002's The Mulberry Tree, Deveraux seems to be getting more comfortable setting stories in the present, which is a good thing, since the fans she won with her historical books are eager to follow her into the future.
Jude married Claude White, who she later divorced in 1993. Around the same time she met Mohammed Montassir with whom she had a son, Sam Alexander Montassir, in 1997. On Oct. 6th, 2005, Sam died at the age of eight in a motorcycle accident.
Jude has lived in several countries and all over the United States. She currently lives in Charlotte, North Carolina and has an additional home in the medieval city of Badolato, Italy.
She began writing in 1976, and published her first book, The Enchanted Land (1977) under the name Jude Deveraux. Following the publication of her first novel, she resigned her teaching position. Now, she is the author of 31 New York Times bestsellers.
Jude won readers' hearts with the epic Velvet series, which revolves around the lives of the Montgomery family's irresistible men. Jude's early books are set largely in 15th- and 16th-century England; in them her fierce, impassioned protagonists find themselves in the midst of blood feuds and wars. Her heroines are equally scrappy -- medieval Scarlett O'Haras who often have a low regard for the men who eventually win them over. They're fighters, certainly, but they're also beauties who are preoccupied with survival and family preservation.
Jude has also stepped outside her milieu, with mixed results. Her James River trilogy (River Lady, Lost Lady, and Counterfeit Lady) is set mostly in post-Revolution America; the popular, softer-edged Twin of Fire/Twin of Ice moves to 19th-century Colorado and introduces another hunky-man clan, the Taggerts.
Deveraux manages to evoke a strong and convincing atmosphere for each of her books, but her dialogue and characters are as familiar as a modern-day soap opera's. "Historicals seem to be all I'm capable of," Jude once said in an interview, referring to a now out-of-print attempt at contemporary fiction, 1982's Casa Grande. "I don't want to write family sagas or occult books, and I have no intention of again trying to ruin the contemporary market." Still, Jude did later attempt modern-day romances, such as the lighthearted High Tide (her first murder caper), the contemporary female friendship story The Summerhouse, and the time-traveling Knight in Shining Armor. In fact, with 2002's The Mulberry Tree, Deveraux seems to be getting more comfortable setting stories in the present, which is a good thing, since the fans she won with her historical books are eager to follow her into the future.
Jude married Claude White, who she later divorced in 1993. Around the same time she met Mohammed Montassir with whom she had a son, Sam Alexander Montassir, in 1997. On Oct. 6th, 2005, Sam died at the age of eight in a motorcycle accident.
Jude has lived in several countries and all over the United States. She currently lives in Charlotte, North Carolina and has an additional home in the medieval city of Badolato, Italy.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
October 9, 2007
Someone who didn't know me very well gave me all four books when I was in college. That was A LONG time ago. I have to admit, I liked all four books so much that I have kept them(now falling apart) all this time. Admittedly, they are hidden in the back of my closet where no one will ever know that I have them, but I've reread all four books countless times. Additionally, I've lent them to my close friends with PhDs (you know who you are!) who also really liked them (but were careful not to let anyone catch them reading them). What can I say? They're complete (but compelling) trash. It's like a car crash. You don't want to look, but you do anyway.
April 10, 2012
My favorite series within Jude Deveraux' collections. I have read and re-read this books over and over throughout the years - still a great series that captivates the heart and essence of these time periods. A must read for the other Jude Deveraux fans out there...
September 30, 2016
Wow. WOW. (And I do not mean the first or second in a good way.) Perhaps rereading this series wasn't such a good idea after all. Perhaps I should have just allowed myself the fuzzy but mostly positive memories of Alpha types and their women I'd formed long, long (long) ago. Because right now I'm wondering what possessed me to read through these again? Because truly, try as I might, I do not recall how... how... how bad these books were. Or how repetitive said aspects were from books one to three to four (I skipped Stephen's sine I have no clue where I stored it.) Or how convenient the goings on could be. Or even just the the douchebaggery, the mind boggling douchebaggery of them all! My disappointment is to the level where I won't even bother to pad my personal challenge by shelving them as four (well... three, if we're being totally above board) separately! How on earth could my memory have failed me so?
October 21, 2009
I have these books listed seperately, but I acutally own this book where they are all in one book. I read it at least once a year. I love the Velvet series~!
December 23, 2012
Loved it
Read
March 4, 2019I've read them all. I think one of my first Jude reads was The Velvet Promise and Sweetbriar and some others. What I read encouraged me to read more of her. And here I am now checklisting all her books.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews