Chatterbox
12-14-2009, 06:30 PM
(Cross-posting this from my Amazon review...)
I admit that my opinion of this novel was shaped in part by the rather bizarre preface, in which a group of modern day schoolgirls at a slumber party try to conjure up the spirit of "Bloody Mary" in an old mirror without really knowing what they're doing or who Mary Tudor (daughter of Henry VIII, half sister to Elizabeth) may have been. Of course, once all the girls are asleep in their sleeping bags, Mary materializes and studies the sleeping girls, almost tearfully. "Wretched, undeserved name," she says of her nickname. "Would that I could tell you and you would listen."
And that's the device that Julianne Lee uses to launch this novel, one that rushes over or omits Mary's reaction to major life events (her separation from her mother, Catherine of Aragon; her mother's death; the execution of Anne Boleyn) in favor of 'insights' from characters like a pickpocket and a Catholic Londoner. The narrative doesn't flow smoothly, but bumps along - I kept wondering if I was misreading something when in the space of a page or two we moved from Mary at age 11 to Mary age 17. Even more distracting was the interruption to the story itself when Mary addresses the reader (presumably her school girl audience?), as if recounting a history lesson. ("My father's final years were the most pleasant of my adult life" and "I knew my purpose was to save my people from those who would destroy their very souls" are examples of this ponderous device at work.)
Leaving aside the fact that the book is littered with small errors that multiply over time (Lee has Bishop John Fisher being hung; in fact, his sentence was commuted to beheading) and elements that simply don't ring true (would she really have addressed Anne Boleyn as "stepmother" to the latter's face, since Mary rejected the idea that the marriage was valid), this simply is a tedious book. After struggling through the first half, which failed to capture my interest at all, I skimmed over the second half, seeing no sign of any improvement.
It's a shame, because Mary Tudor is, as Lee clumsily notes in the introduction, a monarch who struggles to shake off the reputation earned in the last years of her life and a woman who was known during her life before taking the crown for her generosity and wide-ranging friendships (she was a close friend of Anne of Cleves, for instance) as for her piety and oppression of her sister Elizabeth. She's also one of the only members of the Tudor dynasty who hasn't been written about from several dozen different angles. (I'm convinced that there's nothing fresh at all to say about either Anne Boleyn or her daughter, Elizabeth, by this point.) There have been a few other ham-handed efforts to humanize Mary, such as the rather bad book by Suzannah Dunn, The Queen's Sorrow (Lee's book makes this one seem much stronger in retrospect...)
Perhaps this will appeal to die-hard Tudor historical fiction afficionados, at least those who don't have a knowledge of the character or the period and who thus are less likely to find the frequent interruptions by Mary's first-person summaries of historical events to be deeply irritating. But I'd suggest avoiding this book, and turning instead to the excellent books about Mary by Hilda Lewis. Originally published in (I believe) the 1960s/1970s, they are lively reads, accurate and gripping. Yes, they are out of print (although some of Lewis's other books are being republished, so at least there is hope...) but they are extraordinarily affordable on Amazon's British site. The trilogy begins with I Am Mary Tudor, continues with Mary the Queen and ends with Bloody Mary. Those are excellent four-star books; this I've rated 1.5 stars and rounded up only because I suppose it will appeal as a first step toward understanding a complex character and a turbulent period of history. As far as I'm concerned, unfortunately, it's a purchase that I regret having made. (On the plus side, I did earn a Paperback Swap credit for it.)
On a side note -- I had read Lee's other HF novel, surrounding an investigation into the possible involvement of Mary Queen of Scots in the death of her husband. I found it slightly better, although the main protagonist's willingness to just cast her daily life aside and go investigating was extremely implausible. Still, I'd give it 2 stars to 2.5 stars. Why bother when there's much more and much better stuff out there?? Read Rory Clements (Martyr is excellent) or Elizabeth Byrd or...
I admit that my opinion of this novel was shaped in part by the rather bizarre preface, in which a group of modern day schoolgirls at a slumber party try to conjure up the spirit of "Bloody Mary" in an old mirror without really knowing what they're doing or who Mary Tudor (daughter of Henry VIII, half sister to Elizabeth) may have been. Of course, once all the girls are asleep in their sleeping bags, Mary materializes and studies the sleeping girls, almost tearfully. "Wretched, undeserved name," she says of her nickname. "Would that I could tell you and you would listen."
And that's the device that Julianne Lee uses to launch this novel, one that rushes over or omits Mary's reaction to major life events (her separation from her mother, Catherine of Aragon; her mother's death; the execution of Anne Boleyn) in favor of 'insights' from characters like a pickpocket and a Catholic Londoner. The narrative doesn't flow smoothly, but bumps along - I kept wondering if I was misreading something when in the space of a page or two we moved from Mary at age 11 to Mary age 17. Even more distracting was the interruption to the story itself when Mary addresses the reader (presumably her school girl audience?), as if recounting a history lesson. ("My father's final years were the most pleasant of my adult life" and "I knew my purpose was to save my people from those who would destroy their very souls" are examples of this ponderous device at work.)
Leaving aside the fact that the book is littered with small errors that multiply over time (Lee has Bishop John Fisher being hung; in fact, his sentence was commuted to beheading) and elements that simply don't ring true (would she really have addressed Anne Boleyn as "stepmother" to the latter's face, since Mary rejected the idea that the marriage was valid), this simply is a tedious book. After struggling through the first half, which failed to capture my interest at all, I skimmed over the second half, seeing no sign of any improvement.
It's a shame, because Mary Tudor is, as Lee clumsily notes in the introduction, a monarch who struggles to shake off the reputation earned in the last years of her life and a woman who was known during her life before taking the crown for her generosity and wide-ranging friendships (she was a close friend of Anne of Cleves, for instance) as for her piety and oppression of her sister Elizabeth. She's also one of the only members of the Tudor dynasty who hasn't been written about from several dozen different angles. (I'm convinced that there's nothing fresh at all to say about either Anne Boleyn or her daughter, Elizabeth, by this point.) There have been a few other ham-handed efforts to humanize Mary, such as the rather bad book by Suzannah Dunn, The Queen's Sorrow (Lee's book makes this one seem much stronger in retrospect...)
Perhaps this will appeal to die-hard Tudor historical fiction afficionados, at least those who don't have a knowledge of the character or the period and who thus are less likely to find the frequent interruptions by Mary's first-person summaries of historical events to be deeply irritating. But I'd suggest avoiding this book, and turning instead to the excellent books about Mary by Hilda Lewis. Originally published in (I believe) the 1960s/1970s, they are lively reads, accurate and gripping. Yes, they are out of print (although some of Lewis's other books are being republished, so at least there is hope...) but they are extraordinarily affordable on Amazon's British site. The trilogy begins with I Am Mary Tudor, continues with Mary the Queen and ends with Bloody Mary. Those are excellent four-star books; this I've rated 1.5 stars and rounded up only because I suppose it will appeal as a first step toward understanding a complex character and a turbulent period of history. As far as I'm concerned, unfortunately, it's a purchase that I regret having made. (On the plus side, I did earn a Paperback Swap credit for it.)
On a side note -- I had read Lee's other HF novel, surrounding an investigation into the possible involvement of Mary Queen of Scots in the death of her husband. I found it slightly better, although the main protagonist's willingness to just cast her daily life aside and go investigating was extremely implausible. Still, I'd give it 2 stars to 2.5 stars. Why bother when there's much more and much better stuff out there?? Read Rory Clements (Martyr is excellent) or Elizabeth Byrd or...