Formerly published as 'The King's Grave', this book explores the events that led to the discovery of the grave of Richard III in a social services car park back in 2012 alongside the historical narrative of his life, reign and subsequent demonisation by the Tudors, Shakespeare and others. 

This really is a book of two halves for me. The chapters alternate between the two strands, and each have their own merits. The story of Langley's reasons for initiating the project are far from what you would expect. Her reporting of the process from inception to discovery is candid, concise and has a good balance between the objective facts of what happened and her subjective emotional attachment to the story. The detail is there, but it's not so heavily laden with archaeological technobabble or the minutiae of every layer of earth and discovery to make it a slog to read thorough. 

To start with, the historical side has a very similar tone and provides a great insight into the life of this fifteenth century King. However, this aspect does start to get a little bogged down in trying to refute the Shakespearian caricature and on a few occasions it was easy to lose the thread of the point the author was making. The overall picture is very well told, but the writing style just doesn't have quite the same level of engagement for me. I will say that there are also a good number of points and phrases that are repeated, which started to grate on my nerves. 

This version of the book was republished to tie in with the recent film made about the discovery. As a result, I am a little disappointed that there wasn't any update made to this edition, reflecting back on the time that has passed and dealing with the reinterment of Richard's remains. At the time the book was initially published, there was still a Court battle going on over the matter and, while it was clearly resolved, I would have liked to have seen the authors' thoughts on the results of the case and their involvement in his reburial. Feels like they missed a trick!

Overall, I think I got more out of the TV documentary about the dig than I did the book, and I already have a fairly good knowledge of the Wars of the Roses and the reigns of Edward IV, Henry VI and Richard III, so I didn't necessarily need the history lesson either. If you're just coming to this period of history, this book is probably a good starting point though.