Sharon R. (hazeleyes) reviewed One of history's most glamorous and tempestuous couples on + 331 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 2
This book is about Henry Plantagenet king of England, his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine, Eleanor's first husband King Louis VII of France, and Henry Becket, as well as a cast of characters both real and fictional. It's a romantic, tragic story of human nature, ego, love, loss, and the ebb and flow of relations between nations in the 1100s.
Though for me the book pales in the fact of historic fact, and for me the fictional characters and their doings get in the way, still Penman writes excellent historical fiction. She's skillful and powerful, builds and interprets her characters nicely, keeping more or less to the facts of the matters, and the story is a fascinating one.
Penman's Eleanor is as tempestuous, intelligent, politically canny, and gorgeous as was the Queen herself. Penman's Henry is Henry II, and Becket is drawn large. The book perhaps is too ambitious and ranges too widely, but the book has the excitement that readers of fiction hope for.
Though for me the book pales in the fact of historic fact, and for me the fictional characters and their doings get in the way, still Penman writes excellent historical fiction. She's skillful and powerful, builds and interprets her characters nicely, keeping more or less to the facts of the matters, and the story is a fascinating one.
Penman's Eleanor is as tempestuous, intelligent, politically canny, and gorgeous as was the Queen herself. Penman's Henry is Henry II, and Becket is drawn large. The book perhaps is too ambitious and ranges too widely, but the book has the excitement that readers of fiction hope for.
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