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The Red Queen by Philippa Gregory
Published by Touchstone, an imprint of Simon & Schuster
One of the only heirs of the Lancaster line of the royal family, Margaret Beauford is a very important young girl, but still a powerless one. She is utterly convinced that she has a vocation and desperately wants to be a nun. As a young lady with royal blood in a time when the king is childless and perhaps slightly crazy, Margaret is not to have the luxury of choosing her own fate and going into a convent. Instead, she is expected to breed, to produce a son for the Lancaster line. Not only that, neither she nor her family have any say in who she is to marry. At twelve she is wedded to King Henry VI’s half-brother, the twenty-something Edmund Tudor. At thirteen, days after the death of her husband, Margaret gives birth to a son, Henry Tudor, and has a vision that he will one day be King of England. Suddenly, Margaret has a new vocation from God: seeing her son crowned.
Gregory’s “The Other Boleyn Girl” is the novel that brought me to historical fiction in college, but much of her work after that went downhill, in my opinion. In fact, I disliked “The Other Queen,” so much (after purchasing it in hardcover), that I nearly swore her off completely. I’m glad I decided to give her another chance with her new series, The Cousin’s War. I thought that the first book in the series, “The White Queen,” was perhaps her best book since “The Other Boleyn Girl.”
“The Red Queen,” I think, is even better. Gregory still suffers from a bit of the repetitiveness that she showcased in “The White Queen,” but I think it came off better, and flowed more naturally in this book. Yes, Margaret did express her belief in her religious vocation ad nauseum in the beginning of the book in particular, but she was a very head strong young preteen and teenager, so it fit with her character. In fact, she was obnoxiously headstrong and self-righteous throughout the entire book. The fact that Gregory kept me enjoying “The Red Queen” as much as I enjoyed “The White Queen” with its much more sympathetic protagonist is what makes me say that this is actually the stronger book.
If you gave up on Gregory after some of her weaker Tudor books, try her Cousin’s War series. You can really start with either “The White Queen” or “The Red Queen,” but I recommend that you give it a try.
This review was done with a book received from the publisher.
* These links are all affiliate links. If you buy your book here I’ll make a very small amount of money that goes towards hosting, giveaways, etc.
Alice knows she is lucky when she is lucky when her father chooses Janyn Perrers for her to wed. Although he is a good deal older than she is, she finds he attractive and he has never been anything but gentle and kind towards her. For awhile, they have a lovely, happy life together, until it becomes clear that he and his family have a dangerous secret involving the Dowager Queen Isabella. When Isabella passes away, Alice ends up under the protection of King Edward III and Queen Philippa, only to become Edward’s long-time mistress, reviled by much of the country.
First of all, let me just do a little cheer that “The King’s Mistress” is English historical fiction that is not about the Tudors, the War of the Roses, or Eleanor of Aquitaine. Hooray! Originality!
Alice Perrers is a fascinating woman, and I am glad that Campion decided to take her on as a subject for this novel. A merchant’s daughter, she neither wanted nor expected to spend any time with the royal family, only to end up as a royal mistress and mother to three of the king’s children. Of course, the higher someone is raised, the more enmity they attract (Tudor fans, think Wolsey and Cromwell). Indeed, Alice ends up vilified by many of those around her, accused of taking advantage of the aging king in his growing senility during their final years together.
Although the beginning was a bit slow, I thought that Campion’s writing was quite good. I thought that, overall, she let Alice’s story unfold very well and very naturally. The only minor thing that annoyed me was Alice’s italicized musings at the beginning of each of the four sections. They all ended with “When had I a choice to be other than I was?” Yes, there was a certain degree to which Alice’s fate was really being decided for her by other people, but I disliked that strong current of helplessness from Alice in these sections, particularly because I found her to be a rather strong character in the book as a whole, working for what she felt was right or what she wanted whenever it was possibly in her somewhat powerless position.
Despite a couple of minor flaws, this was a great work of historical fiction, and I would highly recommend it to people looking for something other than the same old Tudor and War of the Roses historical novels.
I read this book as part of a TLC Book Tour. Check out some of the other tour hosts for more reviews. Links go to the host’s site, not to their specific review.
“The Dark Rose” is the second in Cynthia Harrod-Eagles’ ‘Morland Dynasty’ series. I have previously reviewed the first book, “The Founding.” Because the books deal with successive generations of the same family, they largely stand on their own and do not really contain any significant spoilers for one another.
In “The Dark Rose,” Paul Morland – founder Eleanor’s great-grandson – has become the head of the Morland dynasty. England has had a bit of a change of leadership as well; the house of York, with whom the Morlands were long allied, has fallen and it is the Tudors who now rule. Just as the Tudors are now dealing with contenders to the throne, Paul is dealing with different factions competing for his affection and a place as a member of his family. Between his wife and children and his mistress and illegitimate son, as well as his half-siblings who he believes to be illegitimate, things are quite messy in the Morland household.
Okay, so “The Dark Rose” isn’t actually as melodramatic as I made it sound, but Paul does act a bit brooding in much of the first half of the book. In fact, he was so brooding as to be somewhat obnoxious, and gave me a bit of difficulty in getting into the book initially. As Paul grew up a bit more and started to act it, though, I slipped into the book more easily. Things got even easier when Nanette, Paul’s niece, became a major character. She was much easier to identify with, and her life was also a bit more interesting, as for some time she was living at court with Anne Boleyn during Anne’s meteoric rise and fall. Harrod-Eagles changed a few pieces of history for no reason that I could discern, however, and that drew me out of the story a few times. For instance, she had Elizabeth Boleyn, mother of Anne and Mary, dying when the girls were young. That is not true, and it seemed to serve no purpose other than annoy me any time it was mentioned. Then there was the whole thing with the uncle and niece falling in love. I’ve more or less made my peace with the creepiness of the cousins constantly marrying one another (and in EVERY generation…), but the uncle to half-niece was just ick. They seemed like true love and all, but my brain just kept going ‘ick, ick, ick, ick, ick.”
Overall, I did very much enjoy “The Dark Rose,” although perhaps not quite as much as “The Founding.” I liked it enough that I’m excited for “The Princeling,” the next book in the Morland dynasty series.
This review was done with a book received from Danielle at Sourcebooks.
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Synopsis:
When Major Earnest Pettigrew’s brother passes away, he begins to evaluate his life. A widower, his only son living off in London and visiting infrequently, Major Pettigrew is a bit lonely, but somewhat annoyed by most of the women in his town. When Jasmina Ali, proprietor of the village shop, comes to check in on him, he strikes up first a conversation, then a friendship with her. Jasmina is witty and well-read, a perfect partner for Major Pettigrew. She is also a Muslim Pakistani woman, who isn’t always seen as an equal by some of the people in their small town.
Thoughts on the story:
“Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand” is a novel about knowing when to break with tradition and when to hold tight to it; a sweet but not saccharine story of family and love. The ending was perhaps too quick and easy, but I adored the story as a whole. It was just insanely charming, and I’m not really sure what to say about it beyond that.
Thoughts on the audio production:
Peter Altschuler was the absolutely perfect choice to narrate “Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand.” He had this perfect British accent and played the slightly stuffy and slightly sentimental Major perfectly.
Overall:
Lovely story, and even lovelier audiobook.
Buy this book from: Powells: Audio/Print* A local independent bookstore via Indiebound: Print* Amazon: Audio/Print*
This review was done with a book borrowed from the library.
* These links are all affiliate links. If you buy your book here I’ll make a very small amount of money that goes towards hosting, giveaways, etc.
If you don’t already know what this book is about, there is a good chance this isn’t the sort of book you would like, because this has got to be hands-down the most talked about historical fiction novel of the past 12 months: Henry VIII’s court from Thomas Cromwell’s point of view.
Thomas Cromwell. Not, perhaps, the most sympathetic character from Henry VIII’s reign, and there were an awful lot of unsympathetic characters running around that court. In most works of historical fiction, Cromwell is vilified, detested; he is a horrible, horrible man who craves naught but power and influence. Honestly, doesn’t sound like the sort of man that I would like to read a 600 page book about, whose head I would want to be in for that long.
But Mantel does something special with Cromwell in “Wolf Hall.” She humanizes him, and actually makes him sympathetic. Honestly, I’m not even sure how she did it. Although we are somewhat in Cromwell’s head throughout the story, her narration is still in third person and somehow everything seems a little on the distant side – I felt almost as if I was watching everything take place through a pane of frosted glass. And yet, I felt that I understood him, that I cared what he thought and felt.
One of the main things that everyone has talked about with this book is the fact that it is a difficult read. In particular, Mantel almost always refers to Cromwell simply as ‘he’ and, yes, when he’s talking to other men, that gets very confusing. And really, some of the passages are just plain dense, and a bit hard to get through, in the second and third sections particularly.
But then, in the second half of the book, it just all came together for me. I was completely drawn into the story by that point, I was used to Mantel’s writing, and it all just flowed. I loved it. LOVED it. I’ve never read Tudor fiction like this, I’ve never seen Cromwell as a character like this and, despite early difficulties, I absolutely adored it.
If you love literary fiction and historical fiction and are willing to put a little work into your books, I highly recommend “Wolf Hall.”
A note on how I read this: I actually read “Wolf Hall” over about six weeks, reading a section each weekend to discuss on Monday with a friend. Although the discussions petered out, I think that reading it like this really worked well for me. Trying to read the entire thing at once might have burned me out, but having it as my weekend read with other books during the week always left me wanting more, particularly towards the end when I got really into it.
This review was done with a book received as a gift.
* These links are all affiliate links. If you buy your book here I’ll make a very small amount of money that goes towards hosting, giveaways, etc.
Beth F
Sandy
bermudaonion (Kathy)
Stephanie
Trisha
The Red Queen by Philippa Gregory
I read this book as part of a 
The Dark Rose 
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