If someone wanted a refresher on the Tudors

Misfit · Post by **Misfit** » Thu May 17th, 2012, 6:03 pm

Help help. I have a comment on my Wolf Hall review over at Amazon and the commenter is asking for suggested books to get up to snuff before she tackles Wolf Hall.

Opinions welcome. Please.

Brenna · Post by **Brenna** » Thu May 17th, 2012, 6:15 pm

Ok, I hope I remember all of the books I've ever read on the Tudors so I give you some good suggestions. Just a few that I recently read first:

Susan Higginbotham's The Queen of Last Hopes (this will set her up for the Tudors at least)

Margaret Campbell Barne's The Tudor Rose (Henry VII and Elizabeth)

Thomas Penn's The Winter King (Henry VII)

Julia Fox's Sister Queens: The Noble, Tragic Lives of Katherine of Aragon and Juana, Queen of Castile

I know I am likely going to regret these suggestions, but Philippa Gregory got me started on the Tudors so if she wanted to start in order:

The Constant Princess
The Other Boleyn Girl
The Boleyn Inheritance
The Queen's Fool
The Virgin's Lover

Margaret George's: The Autobiography of Henry VIII, Elizabeth I

Susan Kay: Legacy

Nora Lofts: The Concubine

Then she can take her pick with the number of books out there about his wives. There are hundreds if not thousands!

boswellbaxter · Post by **boswellbaxter** » Thu May 17th, 2012, 6:51 pm

If she's looking for nonfiction that will help her with Wolf Hall, probably the best book she could read is John Schofield's biography of Thomas Cromwell. (There's also one by Robert Hutchison, but it's unsympathetic to Cromwell.) Failing that, David Loades has just published a short book about the Tudors, and Richard Rex has written books about the Tudors and about Henry VIII. Eric Ives has written about Anne Boleyn, and David Starkey, David Loades, and Antonia Fraser have all written about the wives.

princess garnet · Post by **princess garnet** » Thu May 17th, 2012, 8:39 pm

Any of Jean Plaidy's Tudor novels

Susan · Post by **Susan** » Fri May 18th, 2012, 12:15 am

Some non-fiction Tudor books from my collection (Thanks to Sonja for encouraging me to catalog all my royalty books.):

Erickson, Carolly 1984 Mistress Anne
Fox, Julia 2007 Jane Boleyn
Mattingly, Garrett 1941 Catherine of Aragon
Tremlett, Giles 2010 Catherine of Aragon
Erickson, Carolly 1983 The First Elizabeth
Weir, Alison 1998 The Life of Elizabeth I
Neale, J.E. 1934 Queen Elizabeth
Erickson, Carolly 1980 Great Harry
Weir, Alison 2001 Henry VIII: The King and His Court
Fraser, Antonia 1992 The Wives of Henry VIII
Starkey, David 2003 Six Wives
Weir, Alison 1991 The Six Wives of Henry VIII
Perry, Maria 1998 The Sisters of Henry VIII
Weir, Alison 1996 The Children of Henry VIII
Ashdown, Dulcie 2000 Tudors Cousins: Rivals for the Throne

Misfit · Post by **Misfit** » Fri May 18th, 2012, 12:56 am

Thanks all, keep them coming

rockygirl · Post by **rockygirl** » Wed June 6th, 2012, 1:14 am

[quote=""Brenna""]Ok, I hope I remember all of the books I've ever read on the Tudors so I give you some good suggestions. Just a few that I recently read first:

Susan Higginbotham's The Queen of Last Hopes (this will set her up for the Tudors at least)

Margaret Campbell Barne's The Tudor Rose (Henry VII and Elizabeth)

Thomas Penn's The Winter King (Henry VII)

Julia Fox's Sister Queens: The Noble, Tragic Lives of Katherine of Aragon and Juana, Queen of Castile

I know I am likely going to regret these suggestions, but Philippa Gregory got me started on the Tudors so if she wanted to start in order:

The Constant Princess
The Other Boleyn Girl
The Boleyn Inheritance
The Queen's Fool
The Virgin's Lover

Margaret George's: The Autobiography of Henry VIII, Elizabeth I

Susan Kay: Legacy

Nora Lofts: The Concubine

Then she can take her pick with the number of books out there about his wives. There are hundreds if not thousands![/quote]

How was Sister Queens? I've been debating buying it.

SGM · Post by **SGM** » Wed June 6th, 2012, 5:52 pm

I can't help on fiction but these are easy NF reads:

David Loades has copious books on most of the Tudors, all of which are fairly useful.

G R Elton: Studies in Tudor and Stuart Government - has been subject to some revisionism but much of it is still worthwhile if you want to know how things actually worked.

Neale: produced a study of Elizabeth although much of his work related to Parliament and the Commons and was seriously hit by the revisionists in the 80s and 90s but a little of his theory has experienced some resurgence.

Chistopher Haigh: also published a study of Elizabeth. He was a major revisionist and provides a different insight into the English Reformation.

If you stay away from David Starkey's books written in support of his TV programmes, you can find some other useful works by him about both Henry and Elizabeth.

John Guy is an easy and helpful writer covering Tudor times and people.

I would just add one by Joel Hirstfiled which I can't remember the name of but, I think it is part of the Pelican History of England. Small but very worthwhile.

It's really not my period but I do delve back sometimes in order to understand more of the long term issues which came to a head under James VI and Charles I.

But then my interests tend to be social & economic or politics & government and I am not really interested in relationships so my reading is determined by that.

Brenna · Post by **Brenna** » Wed June 6th, 2012, 11:56 pm

[quote=""rockygirl""]How was Sister Queens? I've been debating buying it.[/quote]

Here is my review:
#3 Julia Fox's Sister Queens: The Noble, Tragic Lives of Katherine of Aragon and Juana, Queen of Castile 454pgs 3.5 (library)
This is a very readable NF that I quite enjoyed. To get a great introduction into the world of Katherine and the Tudors, this is a wonderful book. However, if you are looking for the same for Juana, not so much. It's not because the author doesn't try; it's because the material is obviously not there. A lot of what we know about Juana's life is very basic-raised with her sisters and brother, married to Phillip Duke of Burgundy, gave birth to the Holy Roman Emperor, locked up for the rest of her life. End of story. Hardly takes an entire NF book to flesh that out. I'm still not clear on the connection because these two sisters as they never seem to communicate with one another. Maybe just another way to promote a book on Katherine.