We return to late Medieval England with The Red Queen, part of the Plantagenet and Tudor series by Philippa Gregory. This book follows Margaret Beaufort as she pursues what she is convinced is her destiny. From a very young age Margaret believes that she has some grand destiny as ordained by God, much like her hero Joan of Arc. After her rather early marriage to Edmund Tudor at the age of only twelve she doesn’t know what to believe. However, when she soon finds herself both pregnant and widowed she comes to the realization that her destiny is to put forth her son, Henry Tudor, for whatever his destiny may be. As the York family starts up a war in an effort to depose King Henry VI, her cousin, she starts thinking about how she is the heiress of the house of Lancaster after the king which means her son may be an heir for the throne of England. With the help of her brother-in-law, Jasper Tudor, she puts all her energy into surviving the war and helping the side of the Lancasters whenever possible even if that means pretending to actually like the Yorks, all so that she can eventually put her own son on the throne.
This was a good book, don’t get me wrong about that part, but I did not enjoy it as much as I thought I would have. The main reason for that is that I really did not like the character and personality of Margaret. If this was even close to what she was really like then I seriously feel sorry for her family and friends. She was extremely arrogant and power hungry like you would not believe. I feel like the book did a good job of portraying her but I am also fairly sure parts of her overall personality might have been slightly exaggerated in order to help the story. It was interesting to see the opposite side of the War of the Roses though as the previous book, The White Queen, covered the York side of the war. The two together did a great job of showing the intricacy of such a complicated and drawn out war. One of the things that I like about this series so far is the amount of detail that is included. You can definitely tell the author had done some rather immense amounts of research into the people and the time period in order to write this series. This was an interesting read even if I didn’t find it overly enjoyable due to the character. I am still giving it 3.5 out of 5 stars.
As you might have gathered this book is a pretty good work of historical fiction and would definitely hold some appeal to readers who prefer that genre. It would probably hold the most appeal to readers who are interested in English history, the War of the Roses and late Medieval England in general. I would recommend that you keep in mind it is still fiction and may not be entirely accurate even if it reads similar to a biography. It is part of a series but you can read each book as a stand-alone without any problems. They were intended to be read that way though you can get a pretty good idea of the time period in general if you read them in chronological order. A decent book that is worth consideration so consider trying it out. If you do decide to try it feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.