#which makes up for the occasional chapter spent going “YOU LEAVE WAT TYLER ALONE YOU FUCKING PARASITE”

[nostalgia-tblr]

last book, current book, next book

tagged by @grassangel

Last Book: Death and the Virgin: Elizabeth, Dudley and the Mysterious Fate of Amy Robsart, by a Tory MP (I DIDN'T KNOW). This one was okay overall but I was confused about who the target audience was supposed to be, and part of that is that most of the book isn't actually about Amy Robsart (RIP) so if she's what you picked it up for you'll have to get through a lot of stuff you already know about the Elizabeth/Leicester pairing, and it seemingly dimisses the murder idea about halfway through (she doesn't die until about page 150 or something) only to suddenly decide "well actually" in the final chapter which is too little too late for me - if I pick up a book that promises SCANDAL and MURDER then I want that to be more prominent. (I suppose this book suffers from what plagues many of those Liz/Rob OTP novels, which is that their SCANDALOUS behaviour mostly just isn't by modern standards. OH MY GOD HE TOUCHED HER HAND?! IN FRONT OF THE SPANISH AMBASSADOR?!?! *FAINTS*)

So I wouldn't really recommend that one, and not just because it was written by a Tory MP (don't worry my copy was secondhand).

Current Book(s): Current paper book is Isabella and the Strange Death of Edward II by Paul Doherty, which is full of exciting plot twists that I discussed recently, and the bit I am up to is after Hugh de Spense's been horribly killed but before Edward dies (this is not a spoiler because a) it's in the title of the book and b) this all happened in the 14th century of course he's dead by now), and currently Queen Isabella's shacked up with Roger Mortimer and ruling via her son (which is one of my favourite scheming queen tropes, yay!!) and Edward's in a castle, possibly in poor conditions, and yeah I assume he's about to get murdered and then we'll probably spend a chapter or two discussing whether or not this was Isabella's fault. OH NO, WHO HATH WROUGHT THIS TRAGIC TURN OF EVENTS?

Current Kindle book (main one, as I dip in and out of things a bit) is something about the six wives of Henry VIII by Antonia 'I'm Very Posh BTW' Fraser. Quite enjoying this one despite knowing what's going to happen to all of them. I'm only up to Anne Boleyn though and she's not even queen yet, we're still in The Interminable Divorce Proceedings which I feel is often the hardest part for a writer dealing with The Wives because it involves not much actually happening for ages and everyone gets increasingly depressed about Katherine of Aragon and then as soon as you're past THAT it's time to get depressed about Anne Boleyn. Anyway at the moment it's very awkward because Henry keeps frothing about Leviticus and how he is CURSED BY GOD because sure he has one legitimate child but she's THE WRONG SEX and this sort of thing is the reason Henry is always the least sympathetic character in any fictional version, even when they do a Bitch Anne Boleyn (oh, how edgy!). So there's a good chance I won't get to the end of this one because it's a big book with a complete shit as the 'protagonist' (it's non-fiction but u kno wot I mean) BUT in terms of the writing I'm enjoying it and it's a nice mix of Facts and Commentary so if you want a long book on this topic you could do a lot worse.

Next book(s): for paper book I plan on reading something fairly thin (because ow hand) which has maybe a 90% of being about a dead queen of England, and the next Kindle choice is further away (maybe) and will possibly depend on which Richard III biography is next to get a deep discount on Amazon.

I tag everyone, because why not?