In The Red Queen, her second entry in The Cousin's War series, Philippa Gregory turns her attention to Margaret Beaufort, mother of King Henry VII. She begins with Margaret, of the Lancaster family, as a devoutly religious pre-teen. Even at age 10, Margaret prides herself on her "saint's knees", red and painful because she spends so much time praying, and longs to enter a religious order. Her own mother, though, has other plans for her. At the age of just 12, she's married off to Edmund Tudor, who is twice her age, in the hope that she'll bear an heir for the Lancasters.

She does, having baby Henry at just 13, after a long and painful labor that might have compromised her reproductive system, since she never gave birth again. Her husband is already dead in the Wars of the Roses, and she's married again, at 14, to Henry Stafford. Her son, though, remained in the custody of his uncle Jasper. This second marriage lasted until she was nearly 30, when her husband died in further Wars of the Roses skirmishes. She married one last time, to Thomas Stanley, whose significant forces eventually helped turn the tides against the Yorks, leading to Henry VII's ascension to the throne.

For my money, The Red Queen is a much more successful outing than its predecessor, The White Queen, and the difference is based in characterization. While Elizabeth Woodville wasn't given much of a personality, with Gregory relying on vague witchiness to give her some flair, Beaufort has a will like iron. Denied the religious life she craved, she turns that fanatical devotion to ensuring that her son becomes king. She's given the occasional moment of doubt and a thwarted long-distance love affair with her brother-in-law Jasper Tudor to keep her from being entirely one-dimensional, but her determination and unwillingness to compromise on her vision of glory for her only child creates a vivid character that anchors the book. Margaret definitely believes in fate. I was initially a little hesitant about this series given the weakness of The White Queen, but this book, although it's hardly high literature and probably takes significant liberty with the actual record as Gregory tends to do, was an enjoyable read and I'm looking forward to reading the following entries in the series. ( )

Totally unappealing first person narrator ruined what should have been an interesting slice of historical fiction. ( )

Historical Fiction

1453. Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry Tudor. HOuse of Lancaster. Pious. Fierce. Determined. Unwavering sense of destiny ruled by the will of God. If not a nun the Queen of England. Feigns loyalty to upserper King Richard III (Your). Masterminds great rebellion that leads to the murder of the Kin at the Battle of Bosworth. ( )

Set in the time of the Tudors, Margaret Beaufort is married off at an early age and is a mother by the time she is 14. A headstrong and pious woman who believes she should take inspiration from Joan of Arc and that her son is the true and only heir to the throne. She does not care for the fact that she is to "wed, bed and breed" (i.e. the only reason for her existence is to have children to perpetuate the line). She feels thwarted at every turn that people cant recognise her piety, brains and wealth but doesnt recognise that many of the faults she sees in others are also significant faults in herself. [return][return]This does cover a large swathe of English history where the houses of York and Tudor are constantly fighting to rule the country. It's less than 400 pages long and part of a trilogy that presumably covers the same time from different angles. As a stand alone book it's reasonable if a little lightweight. However I dont know that if the three stories were brought together in the same book that it would necessarily work better - it certainly wouldnt be able to be written in the same voice ( )