Not as good as some of the other books about the Boleyn family. In fact, this seems more like a young adult book (I LOVE YA books, don't get me wrong) and did not deliver what I expected ( )

This disappointing alternate-history tale takes an intriguing idea but bogs it down with glacial pacing and ends with a cliff-hanger – an instant disqualification in my book, for any author.

Andersen’s basic idea is full of potential – suppose Anne Boleyn had eventually given Henry the son for which he had delegitimized his firstborn daughter, set aside his lawful wife, and broken the hold of the Catholic church on the crowned heads of Europe? How would the course of history have been changed, or would the ebb and flow of royal intrigue and military adventure have followed the same general path without the indomitable Elizabeth I on the British throne?

The novel begins as Anne Boleyn’s son, William, approaches his eighteenth birthday, ready to leave behind the regency that had guided him after Henry’s death, and become king in his own right. Much of the story is told through the eyes of Minuette, a young woman who shares William’s birthdate and who has been groomed from childhood for a place in court. The other players include names well-known to readers familiar with the historical Tudor court and its intrigues. There are Seymours and Howards aplenty, Lady Jane Grey, the disinherited Mary and the endless Catholic plots surging around her, Elizabeth, Robert Dudley, the sabre-rattling of France and Spain, and even Mary, Queen of Scots in a distant but acknowledged orbit.

The problem is that Andersen sets everything in motion, and then bogs the action down with a couple hundred pages in which not much happens except that the powers behind the throne move their pawns around the chessboard and young William removes himself from pawnhood with military victories and intricate diplomatic maneuvers.

Things only get interesting again when William ceases to think of Minuette as a childhood playmate and realizes she is a desirable young woman. Unfortunately, this creates a romantic triangle that also involves William’s lifelong companion, Dominic. Things get exciting in the last quarter of the book as Minuette is drawn into a dangerous game involving the search for a possibly-forged document that could incite Mary’s followers to open rebellion and as William privately declares his intention to make Minutette his queen, never mind that he has just been betrothed to a French princess.

And just as things seem to be drawing to a head, Andersen drops in another plot complication and abruptly ends this first entry in the Boleyn Trilogy. Sorry, but that just knocked the rest of this series right off my TBR list. ( )

I liked this quite a bit. The premise I found intriguing, in fact I had been awaiting this book. Queen Anne Boleyn does not have the miscarriage that sends her to the tower and eventually her death. Instead she does not lose that baby a healthy son, Prince Henry William is born, the future King Henry XIV. The author more or less pulls it off. I had to stop reading and research the politics of the time to get a feel for the setting. Once I returned to the book I read it in 2 sittings. It is an easy and interesting read. I enjoy the picture of Queen Anne and Lord Rochford old and Elizabeth as she might have been had her father not murdered her mother and gone on a wife shopping spree. Still I feel Princess/Lady Mary is poorly written and conceived and she seems to have marriage to Anne soften Henry VIII. I look forward to the second installment this fall. ( )

As a devotee of the historical fiction genre, you come across a lot of Tudor books. Years ago, I decided to stop reading them altogether, but somehow they still manage to slip into my TBR piles. It's to the point where I have a tag on Goodreads, "Not Another Tudor Book."
And so, when I heard about this book, with a fresh storyline, I thought that it sounded like the perfect excuse to read another yet Tudor book.

In this alternate history, Ann Boleyn gave birth to a son, changing history, saving all of those would-have-been Tudor queens from death. Her son, William, is now ruling as king. It is certainly an interesting concept, and one that had me intrigued.

Everything about this book was fairly average, from the writing to the plot to the characters. Unfortunately, despite the fresh storyline that left Andersen with vast creative license to pursue different avenues of "what ifs" and twists in history, the plot quickly falls into dull and predictable stereotypes. I mean, the most exciting things happening are a love triangle involving The Most Perfect Woman Ever (yawn) and this "mystery" about how someone is plotting to overthrow the king, and the characters wondering who it could be.
It's not the worst choice... and I have definitely read books where these plots are done to enthralling perfection. But... really? Andersen could have explored any avenue, any well known Tudor character and had an opportunity to speculate endlessly about what might have happened. She could have gone anywhere. And this is all that she came up with?

The writing style was not the best, and the characters were pretty badly written, especially the girl who two men are vying for, because of course they are, because she is the most flawless, perfect, dazzlingly beautiful, amazing, fascinating person to have ever walked the earth. That is literally how she is written and fawned over constantly by the author - it was strange and annoying.

I am giving this book 3 stars, although that is perhaps a bit generous, because there was nothing actually horrible here (except the perfect angel character), it was all just sub-par, missed opportunities type of writing.

Despite the interesting twist in history, this one ended up being an un-original disappointment. I can't see myself reading any of the other books in the series. ( )

I enjoyed this much more than the endless books rehashing the grim murders by the Tudors from all possible points of view. ( )