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A review by jennifer_mangieri
The Kingmaker's Daughter by Philippa Gregory
1.0
Confession – I’m an English history freak with a long-time special interest in 15th Century England & Richard III, & that’s why I read this – and why I sometimes read historical novels though I know they’re going to be bad! I have some issues with factual content related to this book, but I realize it’s a novel - & I will attempt to review it with that in mind. But for those of you who might be tempted to think the content of this book is at all factual, it isn’t. I’m not going to point out all the discrepancies because I’m sure many of them are intentional & meant to create a better story.
Gregory made almost no attempt to make the 15th century come alive, beyond the details anyone can get by perusing a few history books & novels. Food, a few details about castles, & clothing are all you’re going to get, as if Gregory set out to write a term paper for college on medieval life. There’s no sense of place, no local color, & little sense of the ways in which the 15th century was an enormously different world - & yet people then would not be unrecognizable to us today.
Characters in the novel are mostly flat and uninteresting – which is almost a crime – these were fascinating people, in real life! Gregory did an OK job on Richard III, showing him in a mostly sympathetic light until the end of the book. He and Anne’s sister Isabel are the most interesting characters in the book, showing a range of emotions, and changing throughout the story arc.
I always think it's a mistake to use first-person narration in a historical novel. The Kingmaker's daughter is of course Anne Neville, who became Richard III's wife. Here's how she sees the people around her. Edward IV is hardly in the book, & plays the role of Bewitched King. George of Clarence is a Bad Man at first, then suddenly becomes Good Man, Seeker of Truth, Loving Husband Avenging Death of Wife. Hm. Elizabeth Woodville – for once I find myself feeling sorry for poor Elizabeth – is a Beautiful Bad Witch. Princess Elizabeth is a Spoiled Beauty Out to Get My Husband. Anne’s mother is Bad Mom. Everyone in the book besides Richard & Isabel is all good or all bad. I was surprised that Gregory didn’t populate her book with more side characters to give it some color & background. Though we know so little about Anne, we know she was from a huge extended family; she must have had many cousins & friends of the family who knew her well & who surrounded her during her life.
Gregory’s handling of Anne, her main character, is puzzling, & again the first-person narration really doesn't work. In the first third of the book, Anne is the smart daughter. She's willing to be a little sassy toward her dad; willing to grab hold of her father’s ambition & run with it herself; she can almost single-handedly deliver her sister’s baby on a boat, in the middle of a storm at sea! Anne acts to create her own destiny in marrying Richard, according to Gregory. So far, so good. Then Anne gets married & learns about court intrigue—and she becomes a paranoid, fearful woman who won’t ask her own husband questions about things that affect her life, & she is routinely left out of his plans. It didn't make sense to me within the confines of the book. There doesn’t seem to be a particular reason for the smart, capable girl Anne to become the fearful, shy Anne on the sidelines.
I felt like Gregory was not very interested in Anne after her marriage to Richard. She is almost dismissive of her own heroine. I imagine that Gregory wasn’t able to make much of Anne’s life seem interesting at that point. Historically, we know little of her after this, except as a background to Richard. She sometimes went to court with him, but appears to have taken little part in events. (My personal theory about this is that she was ill, on & off, for much of her life. We know she died of TB & that disease can be present but very slow-moving, for years. I think Anne led a retired life & was not much of a historical player, because she was sick.) She probably led a fairly “typical” life for a medieval Duchess, for the 11 years between marriage & becoming Queen - & that life probably wouldn’t make a very good novel either!
As Anne didn’t get to do much acting on the stage of her life, yet Gregory had to do something with her, she tells us everything going on in Anne’s head, which really seems unbelievable, & is mostly about Anne’s fear of poisons & witchcraft & of the Woodville family in general. Poor woman, I guess if we took Gregory seriously, we might think Anne Neville was a bit soft in the head!
This fear of the Woodvilles/Rivers family, & of poison & witchcraft, is the heart of the book, & I don’t think it stands up. No family is as evil as the Woodville family in the book. No well-educated woman of Anne’s birth & station would have been as paranoid & fearful of poison and witchcraft as Gregory has shown her. Yes, Richard & Anne would have had food tasters—poison was a concern—but I don’t think it would have been an obsession for them. It’s hard to say what they would have believed & worried about regarding witchcraft. It’s true that in Richard’s Act of Parliament claiming the throne, there is language saying that Edward IV’s marriage to Elizabeth Woodville was invalid for various reasons, including the fact that it had been accomplished through “sorcery and witchcraft.” In my opinion, Richard’s Act of Parliament contains a lot of language about the Woodvilles that’s intended to smear them as much as possible—throw everything & see what sticks, in fact. I think, though, this was a feature of the 15th century in England – character assassination and smear tactics, not unlike celebrity gossip of today. Richard smeared the Woodvilles – and they smeared him back, but good! There’s no historical evidence that Richard or Anne or anyone who really knew them, thought the Woodvilles were evil witches. They were hated because they were “upstarts” who took the lands & marriages & titles that the Old Nobility wanted, & because Elizabeth was a powerful woman who had some influence over her husband. The whole poison & witchcraft issue is larger than life in the book as Anne becomes more & more fearful – & frankly it’s boring because it’s repeated over & over. By the end of the book I felt sorry for her but I also felt sorry for Richard having to deal with her, & couldn’t help but think he’d be happier with the Naughty Princess than with Crazy Anne!
Anyway – flat characters, unexceptional writing, lack of medieval “flavor”, & weird, unnecessary twists on what should be a fascinating story. I suggest reading Sharon Kaye Penman’s The Sunne in Splendour instead – or Paul Murray Kendall’s bio of Richard III. You’re welcome.
Gregory made almost no attempt to make the 15th century come alive, beyond the details anyone can get by perusing a few history books & novels. Food, a few details about castles, & clothing are all you’re going to get, as if Gregory set out to write a term paper for college on medieval life. There’s no sense of place, no local color, & little sense of the ways in which the 15th century was an enormously different world - & yet people then would not be unrecognizable to us today.
Characters in the novel are mostly flat and uninteresting – which is almost a crime – these were fascinating people, in real life! Gregory did an OK job on Richard III, showing him in a mostly sympathetic light until the end of the book. He and Anne’s sister Isabel are the most interesting characters in the book, showing a range of emotions, and changing throughout the story arc.
I always think it's a mistake to use first-person narration in a historical novel. The Kingmaker's daughter is of course Anne Neville, who became Richard III's wife. Here's how she sees the people around her. Edward IV is hardly in the book, & plays the role of Bewitched King. George of Clarence is a Bad Man at first, then suddenly becomes Good Man, Seeker of Truth, Loving Husband Avenging Death of Wife. Hm. Elizabeth Woodville – for once I find myself feeling sorry for poor Elizabeth – is a Beautiful Bad Witch. Princess Elizabeth is a Spoiled Beauty Out to Get My Husband. Anne’s mother is Bad Mom. Everyone in the book besides Richard & Isabel is all good or all bad. I was surprised that Gregory didn’t populate her book with more side characters to give it some color & background. Though we know so little about Anne, we know she was from a huge extended family; she must have had many cousins & friends of the family who knew her well & who surrounded her during her life.
Gregory’s handling of Anne, her main character, is puzzling, & again the first-person narration really doesn't work. In the first third of the book, Anne is the smart daughter. She's willing to be a little sassy toward her dad; willing to grab hold of her father’s ambition & run with it herself; she can almost single-handedly deliver her sister’s baby on a boat, in the middle of a storm at sea! Anne acts to create her own destiny in marrying Richard, according to Gregory. So far, so good. Then Anne gets married & learns about court intrigue—and she becomes a paranoid, fearful woman who won’t ask her own husband questions about things that affect her life, & she is routinely left out of his plans. It didn't make sense to me within the confines of the book. There doesn’t seem to be a particular reason for the smart, capable girl Anne to become the fearful, shy Anne on the sidelines.
I felt like Gregory was not very interested in Anne after her marriage to Richard. She is almost dismissive of her own heroine. I imagine that Gregory wasn’t able to make much of Anne’s life seem interesting at that point. Historically, we know little of her after this, except as a background to Richard. She sometimes went to court with him, but appears to have taken little part in events. (My personal theory about this is that she was ill, on & off, for much of her life. We know she died of TB & that disease can be present but very slow-moving, for years. I think Anne led a retired life & was not much of a historical player, because she was sick.) She probably led a fairly “typical” life for a medieval Duchess, for the 11 years between marriage & becoming Queen - & that life probably wouldn’t make a very good novel either!
As Anne didn’t get to do much acting on the stage of her life, yet Gregory had to do something with her, she tells us everything going on in Anne’s head, which really seems unbelievable, & is mostly about Anne’s fear of poisons & witchcraft & of the Woodville family in general. Poor woman, I guess if we took Gregory seriously, we might think Anne Neville was a bit soft in the head!
This fear of the Woodvilles/Rivers family, & of poison & witchcraft, is the heart of the book, & I don’t think it stands up. No family is as evil as the Woodville family in the book. No well-educated woman of Anne’s birth & station would have been as paranoid & fearful of poison and witchcraft as Gregory has shown her. Yes, Richard & Anne would have had food tasters—poison was a concern—but I don’t think it would have been an obsession for them. It’s hard to say what they would have believed & worried about regarding witchcraft. It’s true that in Richard’s Act of Parliament claiming the throne, there is language saying that Edward IV’s marriage to Elizabeth Woodville was invalid for various reasons, including the fact that it had been accomplished through “sorcery and witchcraft.” In my opinion, Richard’s Act of Parliament contains a lot of language about the Woodvilles that’s intended to smear them as much as possible—throw everything & see what sticks, in fact. I think, though, this was a feature of the 15th century in England – character assassination and smear tactics, not unlike celebrity gossip of today. Richard smeared the Woodvilles – and they smeared him back, but good! There’s no historical evidence that Richard or Anne or anyone who really knew them, thought the Woodvilles were evil witches. They were hated because they were “upstarts” who took the lands & marriages & titles that the Old Nobility wanted, & because Elizabeth was a powerful woman who had some influence over her husband. The whole poison & witchcraft issue is larger than life in the book as Anne becomes more & more fearful – & frankly it’s boring because it’s repeated over & over. By the end of the book I felt sorry for her but I also felt sorry for Richard having to deal with her, & couldn’t help but think he’d be happier with the Naughty Princess than with Crazy Anne!
Anyway – flat characters, unexceptional writing, lack of medieval “flavor”, & weird, unnecessary twists on what should be a fascinating story. I suggest reading Sharon Kaye Penman’s The Sunne in Splendour instead – or Paul Murray Kendall’s bio of Richard III. You’re welcome.