Lowest Price The White Queen: A Novel

If I picked up the telephone book and started reading it, I would finish it just because. I have. The White Queen. Those who can, do, and those who cannot, criticize. This book represents a huge body of work and even disliking it, I am uncomfortable criticizing it but it did not fulfill its promise. I wanted a book about the two lost princes. I wanted to know more about them. Quoting from the back cover: "her two sons become the central figures in a famous unsolved mystery" and remain so despite 411 pages of dry detail about everything and everyone else but insight into the mystery of those two young boys.

The Other Boleyn Girl was worth slugging through because the Boleyn family was unbelievable, jaw dropping characters, and the author did not mince known fact with justification in that book, she just told the story.

The generous attempt to make the main character palatable is probably what is wrong with the book. This was not the story of a strong woman. This was a shallow self-aggrandizing blindly ambitious woman without diplomatic skills nor the wisdom or tact to merge with her husband's family and the young King's advisors. Young Elizabeth does not mature. She remains a medieval mean-girl mall-rat sort of bee-otch. This character invites conflict and stubbornly so to the demise of those she should have loved more than the throne. Had this book been written in the perspective of her eldest daughter with the emotional conflict (love and hate) between them and reflection found naturally in that character the author could have accomplished a far more honest perspective without meddling with history. I found the first person present style distracting. Despite the author's generous attempt to allow the reader to sympathize with the main character, I could not, and as the book went on, even less so. She was not a strong woman; she was a despicable woman with a despicable convenient belief that God above "entitled" her to have and do as she pleased without conscience or consequence (something the character never considered beyond her own satisfaction). I could not like this character at all.

This book is neither fiction nor non-fiction and fence sits. The best writing and most enjoyable were the references to Melusina and pagan practices as the population embraced (poorly, I might add -- thou shall not kill and love thy neighbor were absent Christian concepts despite the appearance of honoring Christianity). When I read historical fiction, I want to be edu-tained. When I want to slug through dry detail I read reference material. This book was neither and this author does know her stuff. The most beautiful and captivating writing was when the author added the legend of Melusina. There her style flowed with ease and was beautifully written. There just was not enough of it. Again, this book was a huge body of work, enormous research, and a valiant effort but even so, it lacked the depth of character necessary to hold it together. Two stars for effort.Get more detail about The White Queen: A Novel.