The Sisters: The Saga of The Mitford Family by Mary S. Lovell; Engaging Biography of Provocative, Controversial, Opinionated, and Unique Sisters

 

The Sisters: The Saga of The Mitford Family by Mary S. Lovell; Engaging Biography of Provocative, Controversial, Opinionated, and Unique Sisters 

By Julie Sara Porter 

Bookworm Reviews

There are many controversial wealthy families in the 20th and 21st century who made news because of their scandalous behavior, illegal activity, political involvement, entertainment value, or even just by having a prominent family name. One of those is the Mitford Family, a wealthy titled English family. Mary S. Lovell tells the story of this eccentric family particularly the six Mitford Sisters in her book, The Sisters: The Saga of The Mitford Family.

 The Mitfords were shocking, provocative, controversial, divisive, opinionated, unique, and captivating women that interested, fascinated, and disgusted people with their behavior and involvement in the mid-20th century political, social, artistic, and cultural landscapes. They were the subject of books, movies, and miniseries. They recently appeared in episodes of Peaky Blinders and the miniseries Outrageous.

This book, The Sisters, captures their fascinating dynamic, diverse personalities, stormy private lives, and different views which drove many apart from each other. (On a personal note coming from a large family with mostly sisters, I have always been fond of reading about that bond between siblings particularly sisters. Those women who alternate between best friend and worst enemy for so many of us.)

The Mitfords were the children of David Freeman Mitford, 2nd Baron of Redesdale, Northumbria and his wife Sydney Bowles. They were a wealthy, accomplished and highly intelligent family whose maternal grandfather founded several influential magazines like British Vanity Fair and wrote historical biographies. They were also related to the Churchills.

The Mitford parents had different socio-political views which inspired their children in various ways, not all of them for the better. David was an ardent Conservative and held very traditional views particularly where women were concerned. Sydney later became a Fascist and spoke admirably about Hitler. This view would influence three of her children to catastrophic results.

The Mitford’s privileged upbringing shaped the children early on as their parents experimented with various approaches to childrearing. They raised eldest Nancy with few rules and restrictions but reverted to becoming more rigid with the younger children when they felt that Nancy was becoming too spoiled and argumentative. Because of David's rigid views about men and women, they home schooled the girls but sent their son, Tom, to public school in Eton. They were also raised largely in their family estate in rural Northumbria where their snobbish parents only wanted them to hang out with children of their class.

Because of the home schooling and isolated upbringing in the country, the sisters were largely self-taught. They were voracious readers and devoured the books in the family library. They also created their own activities like writing The Boiler, their own literary magazine and newspaper, developing their own secret society called The Hons (a nickname for hens), raising farm animals for pocket money, and creating a secret language that they called Boudelage. This busy thoughtful upbringing molded their creativity, shaped their independent thoughts, and honed their self reliance.

The Mitfords consisted of seven siblings, six sisters and one brother. They were:

Nancy (1904-1973)- One of my two favorite sisters in the family. The eldest, Nancy had a troubled relationship with her siblings because of her caustic teasing sense of humor and bossy nature. She took the lead in many of their activities like editing and publishing The Boiler, created various games, and gave her younger siblings nicknames.

Nancy and her sister Diana were part of the Bright Young Things of the Roaring Twenties and had a close friendship with author Evelyn Waugh. Nancy had a stormy love life consisting of a broken engagement with Hamish Erskine, a closeted peer, an unhappy marriage to Peter Rodd, an alcoholic politician, and an ongoing tempestuous love affair with Gaston Palewski, a womanizing French colonel.

 Nancy's relationship with Palewski was particularly toxic as she became obsessed with him but he devalued and belittled her and was frequently unfaithful.

Nancy was a moderate Socialist though acknowledged her aristocratic upbringing. She was virulently against Fascism despite her mother and siblings’ support and took part in relief efforts for the war. During WWII, Nancy denounced her sister Diana who was an ardent open Fascist.

Nancy became a novelist. Her works included Highland Fling, a romp about Bright Young Things on vacation in Scotland and Wigs on the Green, a satire of the British Fascist movement particularly her brother in law Oswald Moseley. Her trilogy, Pursuit of Love, Love in a Cold Climate, and Don't Tell Alfred featured fictionalized versions of her family including her father, sisters, and other relatives. Her novels presented light hearted, mocking, and satirical accounts of the times and society in which she lived. 

Eventually she moved to France where she wrote historical biographies about Madame de Pompadour, Emilie du Chatelet, and Frederick of Prussia and various satirical articles and essays mocking British aristocracy. She died of Hodgkin's Lymphoma after years of frequent pain and surgeries cared for by her younger sisters, Diana, Jessica, and Deborah.

Pamela (1907-1994), The second child, she was the more maternal figure in the children's lives when they were younger. She was frail in early years having developed polio but later became physically strong and healthy. 

Nancy and the younger siblings often came to her for advice. Like her older sister, Pamela was a skilled organizer. Nancy influenced her siblings’ creativity but Pamela was more concerned about their practical needs. She began negotiations between her siblings and their father to increase their earnings from raising farm animals to the commercial average that actual farm workers were making. David was impressed by her research and nerve, so he acquiesced to the request.

Pamela married a physician named Derek Jackson which ended in divorce. She had no children but she and Derek briefly raised her sister Diana's children after she was arrested. She was also the subject of a poem by John Betjeman in which he called her “the most rural of them all.” She was flattered but turned down his marriage proposal.

Despite her marriage, Pamela was a lesbian. She fell in love with Giuditta Tommasi, an Italian horsewoman and lived with her for a time in Switzerland. After Guiditta’s death, Pamela remained in Switzerland until the last of their dogs died.

Unlike her involved siblings, Pamela largely stayed out of politics and spent much of her time in the country. She had a vast array of fur and feathered babies and managed farms in Ireland, Switzerland, and England. She became an expert on breeding chickens, even introducing new breeds into Britain. She appeared on television in agricultural themed documentaries and retrospectives about her family.

A lover of animals to the very end, Pamela's final words, before she succumbed to complications from falling down a flight of stairs, were asking which horse won the race the day before. 

Tom (1909-1945)-He was the third child and only boy. He didn't get as much attention and wasn't as widely known as his more colorful sisters but was still a large presence in their youth and adulthood.

 Because of his schooling, he was not as close to his sisters. He shared similar views to Diana, Unity, and their mother Sydney and despite very different opinions was very close to Jessica. 

Tom was bisexual and had serious affairs with Eton classmate, James Lees-Milne and married dancer Tilly Losch. He also dabbled in Fascism before his death in WWII shortly before the war’s end.

Diana (1910-2003)-The fourth child and third daughter, she was considered a great beauty and social butterfly. She had a wide circle of friends, modeled, and posed for portraits. She was particularly fond of her cousin Winston Churchill who nicknamed her “Diana-mite.”

 The three younger sisters treated her like the cool big sister that they could have fun with whereas bossy Nancy and motherly Pamela did not always suffice. Unity particularly worshipped her which was a factor in her own problems. Like her sister Nancy, Diana was part of the “Bright Young Things” social set of the 1920’s and had many friends and lovers among them.

Diana eventually married and divorced Bryan Guinness, heir to the Guinness Family. She also embraced Fascism and their views of racial superiority. She eventually met and began an affair with Sir Oswald Moseley, head of the British Union of Fascists. They later married after the death of Moseley's wife and became a very notorious couple. Their wedding was attended by Hitler and they considered him and his girlfriend, Eva Braun to be close friends. At one point, Diana was considered “Britain's Most Hated Woman.”

After the Germans invasion of Britain, the Moseleys were arrested and imprisoned leaving Pamela and her then husband Derek to raise their children. Upon their release, they were exiled and lived in South Africa for a time where their racist and nationalistic views were welcomed by the White Apartheid-supporters.

After Moseley's death, Diana wrote book reviews. One of her columns ended when the editor learned of her previous involvement with Fascism and Nazism and terminated her employment. Her columns and articles then mostly appeared in right wing journals. She also wrote nonfiction works about her husband and her close friends and acquaintances like Wallace Simpson, the Duchess of Windsor.

 She later renounced many of her views but retained others such as her continued administration of Hitler. Many considered her words too little too late. She died of emphysema and heat exhaustion during the Paris heat wave of 2003. 

Unity (1914-1948)-The fifth child and fourth daughter. She resorted to shocking and provocative behavior to be noticed among her loud and busy family and may have had mental health disorders. She did unusual things like release pet snakes and rats in public places to get attention. 

Unity was particularly close to her sister, Jessica whom they referred to each other as “boud.” They communicated in their secret language Boudelage so well that they were not always understood by others. However they also had diverse views concerning the conflicts in the 1930s world in which they were raised.

 Unity supported Nazism and admired Hitler while Jessica became a Communist and devotee of Lenin and Stalin. Supposedly, their bedroom was sharply divided with a German flag, swastikas, and pictures of Hitler on Unity's side and Soviet flag, hammers and sickles, and pictures of Lenin and Stalin on Jessica's. 

There is some evidence that Unity was led to Fascism and eventually Nazism specifically because of her mother, brother, and older sister Diana's influence. That may have been true but her devotion became an obsession and paranoia. She openly spoke about and wrote Anti-Semitic views and was volatile when challenged.

Unity was obsessed with Adolf Hitler to the point of stalking him in Germany. They developed an affair during Hitler's temporary break up with long time lover, Eva Braun. It was a dangerous affair in which the leader infantilized and dominated her and she was submissive towards him. 

Their affair ended when Unity attempted suicide via gunshot on the eve of the German invasion of Britain. She survived and returned to England in the care of her mother and younger sister, Deborah. 

Unity suffered brain damage and amnesia. She fell into a childlike dependent state often requiring care. She may have had a brief passionate relationship with John Anderson, an RAF pilot but it ended quickly when he was reassigned and subsequently killed in battle. Unity eventually died of meningitis caused by cerebral swelling from the bullet. 

Jessica or Decca (1917-1996)-My other favorite Mitford sister. The sixth child and fifth daughter, she was the most outspoken and rebellious child and wasn't afraid to challenge her parents and siblings. She argued with her father when she wanted to go to school and questioned her mother's insistence on only playing with children of their class.

As previously mentioned, Jessica and Unity were close but took directly opposite political views. Jessica read about the Great Depression, the union strikes, racism, and hunger marches. They stoked her social conscience. Her sympathies towards lower income people led her to embrace Communism to the detriment of the rest of the family.

She eventually eloped with Esmond Romily, himself an avowed Communist and a distant cousin of hers and Winston Churchill’s. The Romilys emigrated to Spain where they sided with the Loyalists or Republicans during the Spanish Civil War. They wrote articles denouncing the Nationalists, tested weapons, and argued with their family who insisted on Jessica's return. Eventually the Romilys left Spain and moved to London then the United States.

While in the United States, Jessica became involved in various causes. In lieu of their once close bond, Jessica continued to speak well of Unity, but she was antagonistic towards Diana. After Edmond’s death during the War, Jessica denounced her older sister saying that she and Moseley should be shot. (They only reconciled years later while caring for an ailing Nancy.) 

Jessica eventually remarried a Civil Rights attorney named Robert Treuhaft and became heavily involved in American politics. She took part in protests to stop the execution of Willie McGee and refused to speak in front of the House of Un-American Activities.

Jessica, a self-described “professional muckraker” and investigative journalist wrote books and articles that explored her views in great detail and attacked various institutions and industries in Europe and the United States. Her books included, Hons and Rebels about her childhood, The American Way of Death (considered her most important work), attacking the funeral industry, The Trial of Dr. Benjamin Spock, The Rev. William Sloane Coffin Jr., Michael Ferber, Mitchell Goodman, and Marcus Ruskin, focusing on their protest against the Vietnam War and conspiracy to violate draft laws, Kind and Usual Punishment: The Prison Business attacking the American prison system, and The American Way of Birth, which criticized hospital care towards pregnant women, and articles about Southern attitudes about the Civil Rights movement for Esquire and decrying fraudulent correspondence course businesses for the Atlantic Monthly. 

True to her negative views about the American funeral industry, when Jessica died, her funeral cost a mere $533.31 and her ashes were scattered at sea.

Deborah or Debo (1920-2014)-The youngest of the family, she was considered quiet and sweet tempered. She was often babied by her older siblings and went along with many of the older ones’ schemes.

Deborah's sympathetic nature towards her siblings continued through the adversities. Even after her family stood on opposite political sides, she retained close correspondences with all of them often serving as a bridge among them. Similar to Pamela, she largely stayed out of politics and her views shifted from Conservative to Social Democratic. 

She was also the most sensitive and was greatly affected by her parents' separation when her father moved out of the Mitford home to an island off the west coast of Scotland and her mother remained on the estate. They reunited briefly when Unity returned. However they remained separated, unreconciled, but legally married until David's death in 1958.

Deborah eventually married Andrew Cavendish, the second son of the Duke of Devonshire. His older brother, William was killed in action in 1944 and William’s wife Kathleen “Kick” Kennedy died in a plane crash, Yes she was the sister of John F. Kennedy which linked the Mitfords to another wealthy, famous, controversial, and influential family. After the death of Andrew’s father, he and Deborah became the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire.

 Deborah took to running her husband's ancestral home, Chatsworth House which was in poor condition upon her arrival. She spent time and money renovating, restoring, and modernizing it. It is now one of Britain's most successful stately homes and is open for tours.

Deborah wrote several books on Chatsworth's restoration, the rooms, furnishings, and gardens and other books about home care. She was frequently interviewed about her sisters, including for Lovell's book becoming an unofficial family historian. When she died in 2014, she was honored as the last of the Mitfords.

The Mitford Family were outrageous, scandalous, and colorful. They were women who were highly intelligent, knew their own minds, and chose their own paths. Sometimes those paths led them down dark roads of prejudice, violence, hatred, and animosity. They suffered heartbreak, loss, separation, and the effects of a world that rapidly changed around them. Lovell's book shows that most importantly the sisters were unforgettable. 

The Slither Queen by Tamera Lawrence; A Slithering Sizzling Scintillating Success

 The Slither Queen by Tamera Lawrence; A Slithering Sizzling Scintillating Success

By Julie Sara Porter 

Bookworm Reviews 

Spoilers: I suppose there are worse things to turn into than a serpent. You would be on the shortlist to play The Serpent in an adaptation of The Garden of Eden. You would be yelled at by Samuel L. Jackson in one of his meme-tastic roles. You would be coldblooded all year round especially in the hot summertime. At the very least, you would strike fear into the hearts of anyone with ophidiophobia and would look really awesome doing it. The Slither Queen by Tamera Lawrence is about a group of Shifters who can transform into such creatures in a novel that is slivering, scintillating, and sizzling.

Blake Howard, a conniving and ruthless leader of a serpent cult has kidnapped his newborn daughter, Prisca and her mother, Lustra so Prisca can be used in a ritual. But what Blake doesn't know is that Prisca has stronger abilities than he is aware of. One of these is to send telepathic messages in distress. She sends one out to Rachel Garth, who also possesses snake shape shifting abilities. She recently joined with some magic users including her new boyfriend, Gabe and Ariel, a friendly enemy. Rachel is determined to help Prisca and her mother and discovers that her link to Prisca goes beyond similar powers.

The Slither Queen hovers the right amount between Supernatural Horror and Urban Fantasy. There are some truly chilling skin crawling moments made even creepier by the fact that the characters can turn into serpents and therefore frighten many onlookers and Readers. One of the most startling scenes involves Rachel, who is still new to the shape shifting game and is only learning the difficulties of her powers. One of the difficulties is turning during the worst, most inopportune moments and not knowing when to turn it off. One chilling moment reveals this when she turns into a giant serpent while on a ferris wheel in full view of the public and has trouble reverting back to her human form.

The characters are interesting and complex. Rachel is the type of empathetic self-sacrificing protagonist in this type of subgenre, but she has some edges. Her past is a particularly dark one of abandonment, addiction, and estrangement from her mother and sister. Someone with such a toxic past as hers, could either become a bitter misanthrope living for only themselves or a caring idealist so others don’t suffer the way that they did. In Rachel’s case, she is the latter. 

However, Rachel is somewhat bitter about her past, particularly at her mother. There is a running subplot where she has an uncomfortable reunion with her mother who stumbles into this predicament and she is briefly held captive by Blake and his worshippers. Mother and daughter are torn between their angry resentment and the hope for reconciliation.

Gabe and Blake are a little less complex but serve their purpose. Gabe is both a mentor and love interest to Rachel by guiding her through her shifting mistakes with compassion and knowledge. Blake alternates between seductive charisma and ruthless efficiency. He gives off a dangerous and sophisticated aura where it’s easy to see why he has no trouble mesmerizing potential followers and lovers. When he displays his authoritarian violent murderous tendencies,is when his true nature is revealed underneath the charming exterior.

By far the two most complex and interesting characters in this book are Ariel and Prisca. Ariel walks a thin line between good and evil, being a friend of Gabe’s and a follower of Blake’s cult. She fancies Gabe and resents Rachel’s intrusion in their lives. She conspires with Blake because of her intense romantic feelings for Gabriel and her burning jealousy for Rachel.

 On the one hand, it is somewhat understandable that Ariel would feel possessive of Gabriel for years and rage at his attraction to Rachel, whom they just met. But there also comes a time where she has to learn that she is not entitled to him, nor does her love for Gabriel, justify the harm that she puts on Rachel and Prisca, especially the latter. It’s this line between understanding her behavior while not condoning her actions that make Ariel a complicated fascinating character.

Despite being a newborn, Prisca has more going for her than just sleeping and being breastfed by her mother. Despite being an infant, she has a wide range of powers including shifting and telepathy. This awesome but unskilled power is wrapped inside of a tiny body that can’t even sit up yet. It could be great but also explosive and Blake certainly recognizes this deadly possibility.

She also has some awareness of her surroundings that suggest deep wisdom despite having just been born. Her telepathic communications with Rachel come out in visuals, feelings, and short words to suggest a limited vocabulary and understanding, but an awareness of concepts like cause and effect, danger and safety, and possibly good and evil. 

Prisca’s awesome power and how it relates to Rachel become more evident when we learn some secrets about them that link them together in various ways, physically, emotionally, and magically. 

The Slither Queen might not be the best book for snake haters, but for everyone else it’s a highly recommended Urban Fantasy with plenty of magic, plenty of twists, and plenty of serpentine spirit.

Weekly Reader: Music Boxes by Tonja Drecker; Pas De Dark Fantasy Pirouettes Into The World of Ballet

 

Weekly Reader: Music Boxes by Tonja Drecker; Pas De Dark Fantasy Pirouettes Into The World of Ballet

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: What a way to return after a long hiatus. Tonja Drecker's Music Boxes is a complex YA Dark Fantasy that takes the Readers to a strange and disturbing ballet school. 

Lindsey's family moved from rural Nebraska to New York City, so her younger sister, Bridget, could attend a pre-college program at Julliard as a violin prodigy. Lindsey is out of place and more than a bit jealous, particularly since moving meant that she had to give up her ballet classes and now has to take lessons at the Community Center. 

Lindsey's anger and confusion about her surroundings leads her to Madame Destinee's dance school, a school conveniently located within walking distance of her family's apartment. It is every ballet student's dream: beautiful costumes, talented dancers, and an understanding teacher whose only payment is an agreement to perform in every recital after midnight. "I only desire your talent," Madame Destinee says. What could go wrong?

Music Boxes is a contemporary fantasy that isn't too far from a fairy tale, you know like Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and The Nutcracker. A fairy tale that would make a lovely ballet. 

What makes that type of story often are the visuals and the way that Drecker writes Music Boxes focuses on the strangeness of Madame Destinee and her studio.

Once a character walks into Destinee's studio, it is clear that they practically wandered into a seemingly enchanted world. There are golden staircases with plush cushions. The dancers wear the most beautiful costumes and are so agile and limber that their dancing almost looks like flying. There is no music playing around the studio, just inside the dancer's earbuds and even though the music is different for each person, they move in synchronous choreographed formation.

Destinee is also a one of a kind teacher who knows each dancer's personal struggles, strengths, and weaknesses. She also gives them all sorts of good food, even if it isn't always healthy, but it is very delicious. She is very encouraging towards the newcomers, like Lindsey, and willing to allow them demonstrate their talents. Even the least talented of dancers would want to visit this beautiful, colorful, warm atmosphere.

It's a perfect place for Lindsey to nurture her talent and ambition to be a lead dancer, a prima ballerina.

However, as with many fairy tales there is another side to this wonderful setting. The gingerbread house is the home of a child eating witch. The beautiful singing voice is a mermaid luring sailors to their deaths. The beautiful ornate mansion or palace is the location of child abuse and infanticide. In this case, the dance studio harbors many dark secrets.

There's the fact that the dancers came from different places like Santiago, Boston, Paris, Stockholm, and St. Petersburg. No, they didn't move from there to New York City. They claim to live in those places right now and found their way to Madame Destinee's studio like Lindsey did. It just appeared wherever they lived.

Who is this audience that appears to Destinee's performances every night after midnight? The dancers can't see them but they hear their applause and know that they are there.

Creepiest of all is the collection of music boxes. Each one has a lifelike dancer inside and were made by Destinee's brother who was an expert inventor and toy designer who disappeared one day and was never seen again. Lindsey can't help but notice new ones added to Destinee's collection, new ones with dancers that look awfully familiar.

Definitely the fantastic aspects are the strongest parts of Music Boxes. In fact, it outweighs many of the more realistic tween drama of the rest of the book. Lindsey has an instant rivalry with Adela, one dancer and sort of a romance with Robert, another dancer. Typical stuff for a YA novel and nothing surprising here but I suppose every fairy tale needs the Jealous Antagonist and Prince Charming.

Lindsey's rivalry with Bridget is much more compelling. While Bridget is at times a spoiled brat and Lindsey, a moody whiner, their love for each other is also evident. In an early chapter, both sisters admit their concerns about the move and their worries about their father working two jobs and their mother working in a diner. Bridget asks if these changes were her fault because of her violin talent. Lindsey assures her that they are not and that Bridget has a gift which should be studied and practiced. This dialogue comes back into play in one of the best moments when Lindsey fights Destinee for Bridget and she admits that her love for her sister is stronger than her desire to be a prima ballerina. 

There are some frustrating unanswered questions by the time the book ends and some ambiguity concerning the fates of some characters. But for a contemporary fairy tale, Music Boxes is en pointe.

New Book Alert: The Fairy Tale Code (Anne Anderson Book 1) by Cameron Jace; Intricate Murder Mystery/Treasure Hunt Adventure Brings The Truth Behind The Fairy Tale

 

New Book Alert: The Fairy Tale Code (Anne Anderson Book 1) by Cameron Jace; Intricate Murder Mystery/Scavenger Hunt Adventure Brings The Truth Behind The Fairy Tale

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: I have a soft spot for books and movies that involve treasure and scavenger hunts that provide answers towards history and legends' greatest mysteries. Stuff like The Da Vinci Code, National Treasure, The Indiana Jones movies, Avanti Centrae's Van Ops Series. Plus, I love History Channel documentary series like The Unxplained, History's Greatest Mysteries, and the various series on the Travel Channel hosted by Don Wildman. 

Whether you believe the claims in them, the quests are suspenseful and intricate especially with how the clues and codes are joined together. Questions are asked, theories imposed, and fascinating things even some potential answers are discovered. They make you look at things differently and see that often times there is more behind what we learn and read. At the very least, the claims are fun to speculate upon.

Adding to this subgenre is Cameron Jace's The Fairy Tale Code, the first in his Anne Anderson series. This one takes that type of high adventure and mystery into the world of fairy tales, particularly those gathered by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm.

Folklorist Anne Anderson is called to appraise a copy of the presumed first edition of Grimm's Fairy Tales. Realizing that the book is a fake (and threatened not to reveal it), Anne is then called to solve a bigger mystery. DCI David Tale and his team investigate a woman's body hung on a cross in Lady Chapel Westminster Abbey. There are a few clues pointing to a potential connection to fairy tales as well as a coded message to locate Anne. 

No, Anne doesn't know why there is a message singling her out nor does she know who the woman is. However, the clues lead to a trail in Germany known as the Fairy Tale Road, the real life locations of the inspirations to many famous fairy tales. This clue sends David and Anne on the run to solve the clues and find out the mystery. 

In the meantime, they are being stalked by various strange characters: Tom Jon Gray, who operates on behalf of the British Royal Family, Jacqueline de Rais and Franz Xaver who are trying to preserve their family's names and legacies, Lt. Wolfe, an intense and violent cop from Germany, Bloody Mary Harper, David's sadistic former colleague who has a vicious streak, The Advocate, a mysterious creepy character who pulls everyone's strings, and (my personal favorite characters) The Ovitzs, a family of seven sisters, most of them little people, who either are trying to harm or help Anne and certainly have their own strange secrets and rituals.

I love how intricate the creation and execution of the quest is where each clue leads to a specific location and gives a little more about the history of the participants and their involvement in fairy tales. For example, a picture on a laptop of the WWII-era Ovitz Sisters, aka The Seven Dwarves, reveal that the Ovitz involvement in the fairy tale world goes very deep. Also, the location of the shot is Polle, the site of the real story behind Cinderella. It must have been quite an impressive feat for Jace to create the clues and codes that lead to each solution and each place along the Fairy Tale Road. 

The book also gives some interesting perspectives about the origins of fairy tales that make sense, that herald interesting possibilities. The majority of these stories featured women as protagonists and antagonists, so it would make sense for the stories to be told and gathered by women. This book proposes that a group called The Sisterhood (of which the Ovitzs are members) had and still have a close connection to the Grimm Brothers and the original tales. 

It is also no secret that the original stories are much darker and (pun not intended) grimmer than we are used to. They contained rape, incest, cannibalism, destructive black magic, and homicide in its various forms. They were horror stories that slowly evolved into moralistic stories with potentially dark elements but ultimately happy ever afters. The Fairy Tale Code provides interesting theories about the real meanings behind the stories, why they were so dark, and what compelled the gatherers like the Brothers Grimm and France's Charles Perrault to change and edit them.

Again, whether it is necessarily true in the real world or not, the theories posed in this book are impressive and offer unique perspectives.

Any good mystery adventure makes the main mystery a personal struggle for the characters and The Fairy Tale Code is no exception. Both Anne and David bear personal angst that they hope this mystery will bring solutions towards. Anne was very close to her older sister, Rachel, who introduced her to the world of fairy tales. (They even called each other "Snow White"-Rachel and "Rose Red-"Anne after one of theirs, and my, favorite story.) Unfortunately, something happened that led to an estrangement and Rachel is hard to get in touch with. Plus Anne describes her sister in vague terms implying that she might have a serious mental disorder.

David meanwhile still grieves for his mother who died in a gruesome way when he was still a child. He also speaks about a sister who is missing. A common thread in fairy tales is a sibling looking for another one. Anne and David hope that maybe the solution to this mystery will lead to the answers to their own quests.

 

My favorite characters, The Ovitz Sisters, also have their own struggles with family and its meaning, even as they are involved in this mystery. They are part of The Sisterhood and operate under the behest of a shadowy figure called The Queen who doesn't mind that her subordinates use violence. Many of the sisters follow The Queen's orders without question. Another sister  Lily, questions the orders and whether she is fit to be a sister in every sense of the word, both theirs and in The Sisterhood. She debates what sisterhood means if it conflicts with the personal individual thought.

With its adventurous suspenseful plot, fascinating characters, and strong themes of feminism, family, and the history behind the legend, The Fairy Tale Code isn't just a great book. It's one of my favorite books of 2022. 

New Book Alert: The Titanic Sisters by Patricia Falvey; Fascinating But Misleading Historical Fiction About Two Sisters On Divergent Paths

 

New Book Alert: The Titanic Sisters by Patricia Falvey; Fascinating But Misleading Historical Fiction About Two Sisters On Divergent Paths 

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews 

Spoilers: Somebody should remind either Patricia Falvey or the people at Kensington Books that it's not 1997 and just because something has the Titanic in it doesn't mean that it's the most important feature in that work. That if a book only has the ill fated voyage for the first third, all of 60 pages, then it's not necessary to call the book, The Titanic Sisters. The Sisters are the most important parts of the book, not the Titanic and the title should reflect that. Falvey has written other historical fiction with simple titles like The Yellow House, The Linen Queen, and The Girls of Ennismore. 

The Titanic Sisters is about Irish sisters, Delia and Nora Sweeney as they emigrate to America and find love, independence, self actualization, and a way out of the roles that had been programmed into them. Okay, The Sweeney Sisters might call to mind the SNL sketch starring Nora Dunn and Jan Hooks, but the Irish Sisters, The Donegal Sisters (where they originated), or The Irish Roses of Texas (where they end up) would make good alternate titles.

Well misleading title aside, it's actually a very good book and the protagonists are a great attraction of opposites and their individual journeys. When the book begins, Nora and Delia have a long running case of sibling rivalry. While most parents should never choose a favorite child, no one apparently told Ma and Da Sweeney that. Mrs. Sweeney belittles and verbally abuses the bookish Delia and favors the beautiful Nora who she believes will fulfill her dream of marrying in wealth and living in luxury. Mr. Sweeney ignores Nora and confides in his older, more active daughter who assists him on the farm. The Sweeney parents' preference for one daughter over another spills into the sister's interactions with each other and shapes them into the women who they became. Nora is a vain social climber who wants a way into wealth and high society while Delia is a surly rebel who just yearns for a way out.

A way out arrives in the form of an invitation for Nora to become a governess in the home of rich American widower, Aidan O'Hanlon. Mr. Sweeney pulls some strings and manages to get Delia a housekeeping job in New York provided that she and Nora travel together. Both sisters are hopeful about their future prospects but not looking forward to traveling together. Nora is particularly beligerant insisting that "it's (her) turn." Reluctantly, the duo travel together on a certain White Star ocean liner on its maiden voyage. 

The Titanic of course sinks and the sisters are separated. A misunderstanding causes Delia to be mistaken for Nora and she takes the governess job at the O'Hanlon's. Meanwhile Nora ends up with amnesia and recuperates in the home of Felicity Barrett Shaw, a wealthy suffragist.

The different paths that the two sisters go on are some of the most interesting parts in the book and reflect the characters of who they were and who they grow to become. Delia bonds with Lily O'Hanlon who has been mute since the death of her mother. One of the most heartfelt moments is when after Aiden finds out that Delia isn't the promised Nora, Lily speaks defending the kind woman with whom she has become close.

Aiden and Delia go through the typical poor governess and rich employer romance that has been seen since Jane Eyre had eyes for Edward Rochester. It's predictable but they share some sweet moments especially concerning their love for Lily.

Delia's story picks up when she, Aiden, and Lily move to Texas. Delia adapts well to the wide open spaces and western lifestyle, no doubt putting her farming experience to good use. She also befriends several eccentric characters like Hans and Mayflower Humboldt, an easygoing German immigrant and his tough talking American wife. Some of the most memorable parts of Delia's story are when she visits Shotgun City, an area outside of Dallas that lives up to its name.

 In Texas, Delia finds a society free from the constraints that she has lived with previously. She feels acceptance in a world where everyone is able to move forward in life. She shares her love of Texas with her author, Falvey, who also emigrated from Ireland and moved to the Lone Star State. In the desert dry wide state of Texas, Delia finds the acceptance that she has longed for.

As interesting as Delia's story is, Nora's is even more so. There is some romance involved with a rich man and again with a fellow emigre, but what stands out the most is Nora's relationship with Mrs. Shaw. 

 Mrs. Shaw lets Nora recuperate in her home and the young woman develops a friendship with her. She is baffled by the older woman's characteristics like driving her car fast but she becomes interested in her commitment to causes like women's suffrage and labor unions. Through Mrs. Shaw's influence, Nora sees a world beyond her small corner of it. She becomes just as dedicated as her friend to help others. She also compares Mrs. Shaw to her vain and superficial mother and realized that the American woman is more understanding and supportive than her mother ever was. Mrs. Sweeney saw her daughter as an extension of herself, one who can fulfill her deferred ambitions. Instead Mrs. Shaw sees Nora as an extension of Nora, one who has plenty of potential but hasn't had the opportunity to show it. Nora finally finds that opportunity thanks to her older friend and mentor.

Nora's character changes particularly when she is hired by an unscrupulous businessman to spy on other characters for his benefit. While Nora takes the job specifically to get some long delayed questions answered, she sees her new employer as a avaricious and vengeful crook. She realizes that the old Nora wouldn't have cared as long as he was rich. She now has more scruples and self respect than to sell herself for money.

The Titanic Sisters gives us two brilliant protagonists who grow into better, more independent women. It's about a lot more than a sinking ship.

Weekly Reader Philippa Gregory Edition: The Queen's Fool (The Plantagenet and Tudor Court Series Vol. XII) by Philippa Gregory; Fictional Protagonist Sees Reign of Queen Mary I Up Close

Weekly Reader Philippa Gregory Edition: The Queen’s Fool (The Plantagenet and Tudor Court Series Vol. XII) by Philippa Gregory; Fictional Protagonist Sees Reign of Queen Mary I Up Close


By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews


Spoilers: Of Philippa Gregory's The Plantagenet and Tudor Court books, The Queen's Fool has a peculiar legacy. It is the only one of the entire series that tells the book through the eyes of a fictional character.

The advantage of this unique volume is that the fictional character is just as well-written and developed as her real-life counterparts.

The fictional character is Hannah Verde, also known as Hannah Greene, a young Jewish woman. Hannah has fled Inquisition-era Spain with her father and Daniel Carpenter, her betrothed. They now live in an England that is reeling from the death of King Henry VIII and ascension of his frail son, King Edward VI.

Hannah tries to settle into life in England by working in her father's print shop making and selling books and not looking forward to her upcoming wedding. One day three men stroll into the shop. Two are Robert Dudley, the son of John Dudley, King Edward's regent and the most powerful man in England, and John Dee, astrologer and advisor to the king. However, the third man gets the most attention when it is revealed that only Hannah can see him and no one else can. Dee reasons that she must have seen an angel and that Hannah possesses clairvoyant abilities, called the Sight.

Seeing a distinct advantage to having a psychic friend, Robert begs for Hannah's services as a fool to King Edward. Hannah finds herself acting as a fool to Edward then after his death to Edward's sister, Queen Mary I. Hannah then is recruited as a spy and go-between among Mary and her younger sister, Princess Elizabeth. She then finds herself caught between worlds:. Raised Jewish but forced to conform to the religions that the Royals practice, arranged to marry Daniel but falling in love with Robert, and becoming a close confidant and unofficial advisor to both Queen Mary and Princess Elizabeth.

Hannah is a fascinating protagonist in that she is completely different from the other narrators of these books. For the first time, we see the court through the eyes of a commoner with no noble or royal distinction. It's interesting reading about how the average working person lived and survived in Tudor England.

We also get to see what it is like to be an outsider and minority in this era. Hannah and her friends and family have to hide their Jewishness from the outside world. They practice their religion in secret by celebrating the High Holy Days in dark rooms behind locked doors and closed drapes. They whisper Hebrew prayers and only privately call one another by secret names that reveal their religion. They hide all of their Torahs and Hebrew language books away from curious customers. It gets to the point where Hannah is ashamed of all of this hiding and becomes dismissive of her religion. She later recants these feelings to the point that she proudly insists that the child who is put into her care is circumcised.

In one heart tugging moment, Hannah is left alone with her father's books and considers destroying them. She can't bring herself to do it, because she realized that she would be no better than the Inquisition that burned her mother and considered “ideas to be dangerous.” As a woman who has a deep thirst for knowledge and learning that is found in books, she cannot bear for that to happen.

Through Hannah's narration, we meet three rulers of England and hear about a fourth. King Edward is young and sickly and unfortunately dies before he can leave any lasting impact. However, he is ruled by regents who use the prince to get their way. After Edward's death, Dudley tries to get his Protestant daughter in law, Jane Grey to become queen and gets her on the throne for nine days before they are arrested and executed. (We only hear about Jane and get no sense of her as a character. Her story is saved for The Last Tudor).


However, we do get to meet Mary and Elizabeth who are interesting in their characterization. Mary is written as a woman who has a full awareness that time is running out for her. She does not ascend the throne until she is in her late-30’s so she is desperate to create a lasting legacy after years of being disgraced, bastardized, and ignored.

She throws herself into a hasty marriage to Prince Phillip of Spain and is desperate to conceive a child. Even though Hannah's Sight warns Mary that this is a marriage destined for heartbreak, Mary doesn't care. She placates her young husband and looks the other way when he flirts with other women including her own sister. On two emotional occasions, she announces that she is pregnant and goes into seclusion to deliver. Both times, no baby appears and she stays in seclusion long after the believed due dates.

Mary is also fervently devoted to her Catholic religion considering it the only comfort in her tumultuous past of the banishment and death of her mother, the disgrace and dismissal by her father, and the revolving door of stepmothers. Mary's Catholic faith was the one constant in her life, so it's no surprise that she would find solace in it upon adulthood.

However as Mary's life implodes she becomes more ruthless and fanatic. She constantly pressures Elizabeth to convert to Catholicism not listening to the princesses’ claims of illness and not knowing the catechism. Even though she is concerned for her sister's soul, she is still highly suspicious of her and has her put under house arrest numerous times.As her marriage to Phillip disintegrates, Mary becomes a dictator putting Protestants to death if they do not conform to Catholicism. Hannah is horrified as the Queen that she once loved and respected becomes another Inquisitor in her life.

By contrast, Elizabeth gives Hannah someone to admire. Unlike Mary who is dour and shriveled up from all of the waiting, Elizabeth is young and has plenty of years ahead of her. She is vibrant, witty, and alive with fire and passion. When she enters a room, she makes everyone else fade away by her brilliance, especially her sister. (Hannah realizes that Mary had better marry Elizabeth off and fast otherwise she will be in complete competition against her.)

While Hannah looks at Mary as a mother figure and pities her because of her sorrows, she sees Elizabeth as almost an older sister, someone whom Hannah could be like. She sees Elizabeth's independence and how she carries herself at court and wishes she could be that self-assured. She sees how Elizabeth openly flirts with men, loving the attention but refusing to give her heart to them and wishes that she didn't have to be tied down and married. Elizabeth is a woman that Hannah hopes to become.

Elizabeth is a shrewd game player. Her every move, word, and action is calculated to ensure her survival. She will do anything from remaining bedridden from stress related illness to studying the catechism while greeting Protestant ministers in secret, to not only play the game, but to win.

This plays into her romantic relationship. When she lives with her stepmother, Kathryn Parr and Kate's fourth husband, Thomas Seymour, Elizabeth allows Thomas into her bed and plays sexual games with him. Then when Thomas is arrested for treason, Elizabeth denies being with him. (In reality, no one is sure how active Elizabeth was in Thomas's Seymour's seduction of her. Most of her enemies said she was a willing participant. Supporters believed her. Most modern historians believe at the very least, Thomas had committed statutory rape with her and she was a victim who was coerced into being with him.)

Elizabeth pulls the same trick with other men including Prince Phillip and Robert Dudley. She flirts with them to gain powerful allies and the upper hand in her rivalry with Mary. However, what is clear is Elizabeth is a woman with her own mind and will not allow any man to rule over her.

Mary and Elizabeth's influence play into Hannah's life as well. As the Fool, her role in court is to wear men's clothing, tell jokes, and predict the future using cryptic clues. Since she can say whatever she wants, she has the unusual task of being blunt and honest to the monarchs and keep her head. Her gift of the Sight also holds great interest in court.

Through her involvement with Mary and Elizabeth, Hannah sees other alternatives to how a woman could live her life. She had been reluctant to marry Daniel in the first place, and now likes the freedom this strange role as a Fool gives her. Not to mention that she harbors a crush on the handsome and charismatic Robert Dudley. For a time, Hannah is separated from her father and Daniel as they move to Calais and then Genoa. Hannah enjoys her independence and freedom that comes with the territory of being the Fool.

Unfortunately, Hannah's happiness is short lived when Mary suspects her of treason. Hannah flees to Calais and settles into marrying Daniel, giving up her former life of palace intrigue and friendships with the Queen and Princess.

In some of the slowest portions of the book, Hannah has to uncomfortably settle into the life of a Jewish wife and then later, after the English lose possession of Calais, has to go into hiding in the country home of Robert’s wife, Amy. However, they both reveal Hannah's difficulties of conforming to the life of a normal woman of the Tudor era. They also show her reconciliation with her Jewish heritage as she begins to find common ground with Daniel and her father and cares for a young abandoned boy.

While Hannah Greene was not a real person, Philippa Gregory's writing makes her a compelling character that is just as real as everyone else around her.

Weekly Reader Philippa Gregory Edition: The Other Boleyn Girl (The Plantagenet and Tudor Court Series Vol. IX) by Philippa Gregory; Fascinating Novel of The Most Famous Wife of King Henry VIII

Weekly Reader Philippa Gregory Edition: The Other Boleyn Girl (The Plantagenet and Tudor Court Series Vol. IX) by Philippa Gregory; Fascinating Novel of The Most Famous Wife of King Henry VIII

By Julie Sara Porter

Spoilers: Of the six wives of King Henry VIII, the most well known is certainly Anne Boleyn.
The mother of Queen Elizabeth I, Boleyn was the cause of Henry's divorce not only from his first wife, Katherine of Aragon but also his excommunication from the Catholic Church and indirectly inspired Henry's creation of the Church of England.She is also known as the wife who was tried and executed for various charges including adultery, witchcraft, and incest.
In popular culture, Boleyn has been portrayed as everything from a brilliant ambitious woman dedicated to Protestant Reform to an avaricious lustful whore and just about everything in between.

Gregory favors the more villainous or rather anti-heroic approach for Boleyn by writing her as a brilliant strategist who is always looking out for #1 and get whatever she wants becoming a juicy antagonistic character.
To set this book apart from the multitudes of other historical fiction and nonfiction about Anne Boleyn, Gregory wisely tells her version not from Anne's narrative, but that of her younger sister, Mary Boleyn Cary. Mary begins the book as a 14-year-old newlywed who is assigned by her avaricious family to become the lover of King Henry VIII.

Mary is humiliated by the assignment and concerned about publicly embarrassing her husband, William. However, she knows that her mother's powerful family, the Howards particularly her uncle Thomas, have tremendous influence in England and could make things difficult for her should she refuse. Not to mention becoming the King's mistress is a frightfully easy task since Henry is on the outs with his wife, Katherine of Aragon since she couldn't bear him a healthy living son. He has had more than a few women who have warmed his bed in the past such as Margaret Shelto and Bessie Blount, the latter of whom gave birth to the king's illegitimate son, Henry Fitzroy. Using tricks taught by her sister, Anne who learned at the French court in which she was educated, Mary enchants Henry and eventually joins him as his mistress.

Mary's family delights in their newfound lands and titles. Mary gives birth to two children, Henry and Catherine but starts to feel guilty about her role as the mistress of the king. She longs for a different, better life and begins to rebel against her family's commands. Sensing that May is becoming too difficult to control, Uncle Thomas sends in a relief player: Mary's sister, Anne.

While Mary is recuperating from the birth of her second child and vacations in the country to get away from the excessive demands of court and her oppressive family, Anne takes Mary's place in Henry's bed. However, she is not content just to be the king's mistress like the other women satisfied with fancy gowns and a meaningless title. Anne wants to play the long game. She wants to be Henry's wife, the queen.

While The Other Boleyn Girl is the ninth book in the series, it was actually the first written. In many ways, it sets the stage for the themes that are so prevalent throughout the series. Themes such as political intrigue within the palace walls, the strength of the women to get and hold onto their positions, and the rivalry between families particularly siblings.

The way that Gregory accomplishes this in this book is by comparing the internal personal rivalry between Mary and Anne Boleyn with the outward political rivalry between King Henry VIII and his new Protestant Reformation Church against Katherine of Aragon and the Catholic Church. There is an undercurrent of tension as people don't know who to side with, where Henry will turn, and whose life is being threatened today. With no one to oppose him and his mind ever changing, Henry once a scholarly but spoiled boy always trying to get attention transforms into an abusive tyrannical despot willing to put anyone to death if they so much as disagree with him.

Because of this, it is kind of hard to imagine the attraction that so many women had for Ol’Henry. We are told he is handsome and can be outwardly charming given to entertainments like masquerades and jousts. But as the book goes on, his good traits are swept away to reveal the temperamental cruel abusive monster underneath. The only thing that could possibly draw so many women is the power that they would have as Queen of England.

The Boleyn Sisters are well-written because Gregory plays with the whole good sister/bad sister dichotomy. They both pretty much act as prostitutes receiving sexual favors in exchange for their family to receive prominence. Neither can take the moral high ground and they are controlled by a family that acts almost like a Renaissance-era Mafia. They are good at emotionally blackmailing and manipulating the sisters and their bisexual brother, George, to get their way.

What makes Mary and Anne stand out is how they use their status as mistresses for their benefit. Mary finds a life outside of the palace intrigue in the country estate of Hever. She understands the farming cycles and talks to the locals about their crops. Her children thrive in country life away from judgmental prying palace eyes. After her husband's death, Mary even finds love with a minor courtier who is willing to give up his life at Henry's court to be with her. Mary sees a life outside of King Henry's court.

Anne however only sees King Henry's court and she wants to lead it. She does this very skillfully by playing King Henry like a fiddle. Anne has plenty of sexual experience, but unlike her mistress predecessors, she chooses not to act upon it. She gives Henry a little bit to entice him, but refuses to go all the way unless he marries her and makes her queen.

Anne is a very different queen from the previous ones in the series. She doesn't have the lust for battle like Margaret D’Anjou, the patient resilience and second sight of Elizabeth Woodville, or the religious certainty of Margaret Beaufort. She doesn't have the loyalty of Anne Neville nor the kindness of Elizabeth of York. She certainly does not have the fire of a warrior and steely determination to be regent like Katherine of Aragon, the sweet shyness of Jane Seymour, or the strong willed resourcefulness to go beyond failure like Margaret Tudor.

Instead of the advantages in contacts, wisdom, and personality of her predecessors or the sweetness of her immediate successor, Anne has to rely on her wit and cunning nature.
Anne is a manipulative schemer, a femme fatale. She is very observant and uses any secret that she can to move allies to her side. She is very subtle as she gives Henry books on the Protestant Reformation that challenge the Catholic Church specifically it's stance on divorce. She also passes rumors that since Katherine of Aragon was married to Henry's brother Arthur, then according to Biblical standards, it was forbidden for Henry to marry his brother's widow. This plan allows Henry to think, “Hmm, maybe a religion that allows me to divorce my wife and get another isn't such a bad idea after all. Hey, what do you know there is a beautiful intelligent woman who gave me the idea. Wouldn't she make a good second queen?”

Since we see her through Mary's eyes, we see Anne as an irredeemable bad girl and in many ways she is. But like many villainous characters in literature, Anne Boleyn is fascinating because she is so bad. We don't want to be her. We don't root for her but damn it all we enjoy the trouble that she puts us Readers through.

Anne is very haughty and impatient and loses as many allies as she gains. Partly from Henry's caprices which she encourages and partly from her own arrogant nature. She also shows very little compassion for her rivals, almost like a general seeing their enemy soldiers as less than human. She is practically giddy when Katherine of Aragon is banished from court and seethes when her jewels aren't returned to court for Anne to wear. She and Henry make public spectacles of themselves when they wear yellow and dance in jubilation after Katherine's death is announced. (A true event. However in Spain, yellow was the traditional color of mourning and both Henry and Anne were said to grieve for Katherine in private. So this gesture could very well have been a lot more complex and empathetic than Gregory's writing hinted.) Anne is a woman consumed by ambition that takes her to frightening almost inhuman levels.

Unfortunately, that ambition is short-lived once Anne becomes queen. Like all leaders who schemed to get their way to the top, she is on the lookout for anyone else to topple her from her throne using the same tricks that she did to get there. She is highly suspicious of her ladies in waiting particularly the shy devout Jane Seymour which history (and the previous volume The King's Curse) tells us, she has every right to be.

Anne's suspicions and ambitions change into desperation with each miscarriage that she delivers and no son to show for it. Even when her daughter, Elizabeth is born healthy, it's not a cause for celebration for Anne. She knows without a son, her days will be as numbered as Katherine's. Now that Henry has grown accustomed to the idea of trading one wife for another, nothing will stop him from doing it again.

This desperation leads to Anne to commit some scandalous and disgraceful acts in one last ditch attempt to give birth. The birth is graphic as Anne gives birth to a malformed dead baby. (There is no real proof this happened in real life, but was used as evidence against her in her subsequent trial.) This last attempt to maintain her loosening grip ends in failure as Anne and her closest allies including her brother, George, are arrested, tried, and executed. Mary is left alone as the sole Boleyn Sister and only blood heir, free to claim the country life she wanted. Away from the court life that consumed and ultimately destroyed her sister.

The Other Boleyn Girl is among the best books in the series because it covers such a fascinating colorful character. Anne Boleyn had an allure that made her stand out from the other wives: a sophisticated wit, an elegant style, and a cunning nature that made her stand out even long after she died.

Weekly Reader Philippa Gregory Edition: Three Sisters, Three Queens (The Plantagenet and Tudor Court Series Vol. VIII) by Philippa Gregory; Sisterly Competitiveness Reaches It's Zenith Between King Henry VIII's Wife and Sisters

Weekly Reader Philippa Gregory Edition: Three Sisters, Three Queens (The Plantagenet and Tudor Court Series Vol. VIII) by Philippa Gregory; Sisterly Competitiveness Reaches It's Zenith Between King Henry VIII's Wife and Sisters




By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews




Spoilers: Many of the Plantagenet and Tudor Court Series books have an ongoing theme of sisterhood by blood or friendship, and for better or worse. Quite a few of the books deal with the jealousy and competitiveness that sisters share. When those sisters are members of a Royal family, that competitiveness can be very public, costly, and catastrophic.

The eighth volume of the series focuses on Margaret Tudor, second child of King Henry VII and Elizabeth of York and older sister of King Henry VIII. Her lot in life has always been to be the second and overlooked in any situation. She is not in the line of succession because she is a girl so she is not held in as high regard as her brothers, Princes Arthur and Henry. She is not thought of as a great beauty like her younger sister Princess Mary so she is not a serious contender for marriage. When Arthur marries Katherine of Aragon, all eyes and eventual power go to the new arrival from Spain so Margaret is overlooked in her own country.

It's no wonder that she looks forward to her arranged marriage to King James IV of Scotland. She may not know the country that well and it won't be a match made for love but at least she will be the most important woman in her own country.

When the book begins, Margaret is not a pleasant person. While many of the books in the series begin with the protagonists as children, they show a level of maturity that is to be expected of a preteen-teenager of that period. Here Margaret acts like a shrieking vain spoiled brat. She constantly judges Katherine for her clothes, piety, and accent even though she can't help but inwardly admire her composure and how she carries herself as a queen. She also constantly craves attention to the point of demanding it.
It is understandable, given her situation as the unfavorite in the family but it still is annoying to read.
After the difficulties that her predecessors suffer from political intrigue, child marriages, and warfare at young ages, Margaret Tudor is the first chronological Royal in the series that actually behaves like an Entitled Royal Pain.

Thankfully, she doesn't stay that way and the book is just as much about Margaret's path to maturity as it is about her carving her own destiny from underneath her sister's shadows.
After she marries James, she is bemused by his abrasive brusque nature and his freer sexuality. Part of that sexuality is to not only openly admit his various love affairs but to accept his illegitimate children into her household. While Margaret is aware of royal extramarital affairs and knows that male royals often have mistresses, she won't have that at her house. She orders James’ illegitimate children out of the castle and back with their mothers or other relatives. James grumbles but willingly accepts. Margaret for once is not content to play second fiddle to anyone and commands that at least as far as Scotland and her marriage bed are concerned, she comes first.

James and Margaret get through that first hurdle fairly well and settle into a fairly happy ultimately loving marriage in which they have two sons and one daughter. Though one son and the daughter die in infancy, Margaret's third son, James survives to become the heir. Just when Margaret and James are contemplating a bright future, King Henry VIII declares war on France and as part of the Auld Alliance, Scotland has to assist France. So James is called to lead the troops and Margaret is declared regent in front of a council of very suspicious old school male nobles who are none too keen about being led by a woman.

Remember how one of Philippa Gregory's strengths in this series is in telling multiple viewpoints of the same events? Well she brings that in full force in this book. What in The Constant Princess was a military triumph for Katherine of Aragon to show her strength and leadership becomes a moment of agony for Margaret Tudor. When English troops kill James, bury him in England, and send his bloody coat to Henry as proof, Margaret is in anguish and is filled with hatred at the smug English queen who caused this. Her rivalry with Katherine turns to grief and hatred.

It is fascinating how Katherine of Aragon transforms from a feisty spiritual warrior in her book to a bloodthirsty villain in Margaret's. That's the true talent in Gregory's book how a savior in one book turns into a terror in another.

Now Margaret has to rule by herself while privately mourning for the husband that she had grown to love. Her widowhood and rule is made more difficult by her council who challenge her every rule, don't care for how she tries to make peace between the feuding clans, and consider the official male regent the Earl of Albany a better potential ruler. However despite the stumbling blocks, Margaret is able to use her leadership skills and forceful nature to make things happen.

One development that occurs because of the war is the importance of Princess Mary’s love life. Suddenly the young unmarried English princess and the recently widowed Scottish queen are debating potential partners. Okay, the King of France Louis XII is old enough to be their grandfather but he has wealth, power, and whichever sister he marries will be in charge of one country or in Margaret's case two. Margaret's claim on Louis ends however when the King sets his interest on the younger more beautiful Mary.

While the title of the book is Three Sisters, Three Queens, Mary probably gets the least amount of development in this book. Most of her story is told through letters to Margaret.
In these letters and in Margaret's recollections, Mary is childish, vapid, and more concerned with fashionable gowns, romance, and looking pretty. As we saw earlier Margaret was the same way, but she goes through a lot of growth and development in her book. Mary however does not.

Mary marries Louis for the financial benefits and to be taken care of even though she has a lover, Charles Brandon waiting in the wings. She doesn't care about ruling, she just wants to be admired and appraised because of her appearance and sunny disposition. Mary's extreme vanity is made apparent after Louis dies and she immediately leaves for England with Charles Brandon and marries him. This sudden marriage incense Harry and Katherine to the point that they estrange from Mary and Charles. It takes a papal dispensation before they forgive the duo.

They are ultimately forgiven, and their money is restored. Charles is accepted into Henry's inner circle despite having no interest in politics, religion, or the monarchy. He is solely seen as merely a charming courtier and Mary is seen as a pretty ornament in the castle. They contribute nothing but good looks and amiable companionship and that is a-okay with them.

Mary's two marriages and her closeness with Katherine, the woman whom Margaret blames for her husband's death reignites her rivalry with them. This causes Margaret to make the most reckless decision of her rulership: to fall in love with and marry Archibald Douglas, the 6th Earl of Angus.

Douglas is at first a supportive courtier, listening to Margaret's troubles and opens up her passionate desires. The first sign that all is suspicious is at their wedding when Douglas tells her that he doesn't have a ring so she supplies him with one. This little moment establishes his character as a moocher and freeloader who abuses his wife's trust for his own benefit.

Douglas does show some positive characteristics however. When the Earl of Albany displaces Margaret and her son James in a coup, Douglas does some quick thinking such as feigning loyalty to her anatgonists to ensure her safety and survival. When Margaret complains about Mary and Katherine again, Douglas brutally sets her straight by reminding her that this fight isn't just about her rivalry with the two women, this is about their kingdoms and she just really needs to shut up about them.

However, Douglas's bad qualities outweigh his good and this becomes noticeable in their marriage. Douglas convinces Margaret to favor his family members causing the clan rivalries to come into focus again undoing the work that she and her late husband,James did to bring those rivalries to an end. Margaret is so blinded by her attraction to Douglas, that she gives him whatever he wants and he slowly gains power through his wife.

During the coup, Margaret is left isolated and dependent on Douglas, even removed from her son. She is forced to appeal to her brother for assistance. While she is in exile, Douglas seizes her throne and shacks up with a mistress that he was once betrothed to.

Historically, Margaret Tudor was the grandmother of Mary Queen of Scots and the parallels are evident. Both had an arranged first marriage that ended with the death of their husbands. Both had unwise second marriages to opportunists who used their marriages as platforms for their own gain. Both had third marriages but ended up exiled from Scotland and separated from the throne and their sons.

However, what separates grandmother and granddaughter is the end results of their exile. Mary Queen of Scots was imprisoned while in England and spent much of her time in captivity and becoming the center of various plots and conspiracies. Ultimately, Queen Elizabeth signed her death warrant and she was executed.

Margaret however takes a different tactic becoming a bolder character by taking control of her life. She divorces Douglas. Despite objections from Douglas, the council, and her family Margaret fully intends to see the divorce through. It becomes particularly hypocritical when Henry insists that “marriage is ordained by God” you know despite his various lovers and him wanting to separate from his own lawfully wedded wife. This hypocrisy makes Margaret even more determined to divorce Douglas. She declares that she will never again “believe that rules should be separate between men and women.”

Margaret manages to divorce Douglas and get him exiled. She falls in love for a third time with Henry Stewart, 1st Earl of Methvan whom she marries. The books ends things on a happy third marriage though in reality, Margaret's third marriage was just as stressful and she separated from him as well.

However, Margaret does create a lasting legacy for her son when King James V is settled into his throne. Margaret becomes instrumental in restoring peace between England and Scotland and arranges her son’s marriage to the French princess, Marie of Guise.

Margaret reaches the end of her book sympathizing with Katherine who is cast aside for Anne Boleyn and Mary who is estranged from her brother when she supports Katherine. Mary also reveals in her final letter to her sister that her looks have faded, and that she is ill and dying.

Margaret realizes that in the three-way competition between the three sisters, Margaret's the only one that came out on top. However, it's a hollow victory as she sincerely mourns how low her sisters have fallen and that instead of enemies and rivals, they could have been friends.

Three Sisters, Three Queens develops Margaret Tudor into a memorable character that can be spoiled, jealous, headstrong, but also forceful, determined, and independent. She goes from a jealous princess into a great queen.