The Six Wives of Henry VIII

A "brilliantly written and meticulously researched" biography of royal family life during England's second Tudor monarch ( San Francisco Chronicle). Either annulled, executed, died in childbirth, or widowed, these were the well-known fates of the six queens during the tempestuous, bloody, and splendid reign of Henry VIII of England from 1509 to 1547. But in this "exquisite treatment, sure to become a classic" ( Booklist), they take on more fully realized flesh and blood than ever before. Katherine of Aragon emerges as a staunch though misguided woman of principle; Anne Boleyn, an ambitious adventuress with a penchant for vengeance; Jane Seymour, a strong-minded matriarch in the making; Anne of Cleves, a good-natured woman who jumped at the chance of independence; Katherine Howard, an empty-headed wanton; and Katherine Parr, a warm-blooded bluestocking who survived King Henry to marry a fourth time. "Combin[ing] the accessibility of a popular history with the highest standards of a scholarly thesis", Alison Weir draws on the entire labyrinth of Tudor history, employing every known archive--early biographies, letters, memoirs, account books, and diplomatic reports--to bring vividly to life the fates of the six queens, the machinations of the monarch they married and the myriad and ceaselessly plotting courtiers in their intimate circle ( The Detroit News). In this extraordinary work of sound and brilliant scholarship, "at last we have the truth about Henry VIII's wives" ( Evening Standard).