Philippa Gregory is my to-go gal for historical fiction, and at this point it feels as though reading anybody else's is a bit of a betrayal. I just adore her writing, and always find myself absolutely swept in her characters, their plotting and the absolute STATE that was English monarchy during and around the Tudor period.
The Boleyn Inheritance is a bit of a follow-on from one of Gregory's most famous works, The Other Boleyn Girl. It's told by three different narrators: Anne of Cleves, Jane Boleyn (married to the late George Boleyn, brother to Anne) and Katherine Howard. It takes us from the aftermath of the death of Anne Boleyn up to a post-Katherine Howard court.
I've always overlooked Anne of Cleves as being a bit of a 'boring' blip in the life and times of Henry VIII. She's the one that he accused of catfishing him with a prettier-than-life portrait just FYI. Gregory brings her to life, recounting her absolute terror of being thrust into a position from which no one has escaped with their life and dignity intact.
At the same time, little Kitty Howard (who's very much not innocent to the wiles of a sexual woman) begins to turn her charm on the King. Whilst he's beginning to see himself as who he really is through the eyes of the court (an obese ageing man, with an awful odour from the festering wound on his leg), Kitty lures him into the belief that he's still as fit as he was as a young King. Men are delightful aren't they?
Soon the court is in turmoil, as the King's favour swings away from Anne of Cleves to the young, beautiful Katherine Howard. But what will happen when the King's innocent young rose turns out to not be as blemish-free as he once imagined?
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