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The Other Boleyn Girl Philippa Gregory Books

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The Other Boleyn Girl Philippa Gregory Books

If you are looking for a fascinating, intriguing story this is the book for you. However, if you are a Tudor fan who insists on accuracy, you may not like this book. "The Other Boleyn Girl" is narrated by Mary Boleyn, the sister of the famous Anne. The two girls, one sweet and blonde and the other dark and ruthless, are used as pawns by their family to gain favor with the king-and thus gain prestige and wealth for the Boleyns. Mary, who is married, is forced to leave her husband when her family pushes her into King Henry's bed. She becomes the king's mistress, but truly loves him. Later in the story Anne ruthlessly destroys the life of the gracious, pious Queen Catherine in order to gain the throne-and uses witchcraft, poison, and incest to further her aims. Ms Gregory uses actual dates and happenings to build her story, and fills them in with speculation and fictitious events. This is not a book for you if you are a stickler for facts-but it is a fast-paced, gripping novel that makes the reader want to keep going to see what's next. I especially liked the book's glimpse into the Tudor court. Most people today have no idea of what it means to have your entire life revolve around the whim of someone who could either make you very fortunate-or put you to death. Courtiers were not just beautiful people who lounged around all day. They had to accompany the ruler EVERYWHERE, even if that meant dinners that went on past midnight, and then getting up for Mass or hunting at dawn. They had to gauge the king's every mood and adjust accordingly. A great job? I will leave that up to the reader.


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The Other Boleyn Girl Philippa Gregory Books Reviews

I can hardly put down these Plantagenet/Tudor novels! Ive blazed through 3 of them in a row and am having to force myself to read something else so that I can save some for later! Some of her books overlap the same time with the same characters but you get a completely different sense of story by reading it in a different characters point of view...SO GOOD!
I'm going to be upfront with readers of this review, I am not a very smart girl. So many of you giving negative reviews really know your Tudors' History. Everything I know about the Tudors stems from *cringe* the television show (love it), Wikipedia, and various other websites around the internet.

But even I, with my very limited knowledge of Tudors History, was seriously annoyed with the mistakes in the book - especially when you consider how self serving they were to the picture perfect main character. I have never seen ANY historian claim (even on Wiki dang it!) that Mary was the younger of the sisters. If I remember right she was actually likely the eldest of the living Boelyn children. This makes sense considering that Mary was the first presented at court and the first married. As another reviewer said her being the youngest adds nothing to the storyline so why not just get it right? I think PG was trying to make Mary as innocent as possible and being just a young teenager made her more likeable to the reader perhaps. However pretty much everything I've read about Mary agrees on the fact that she had some miles on her (classy terminology FTW) when she arrived to the English court. I think the fact that she married someone who was generally deemed below Boelyn level is proof that this is true. It's pointed out how great the Boelyn/ Howard family a million times in this book and someone as pretty as Mary was said to be would have probably fetched a husband from an even better family...unless she had a bad reputation.

In PG's mind sisters are apparently polar opposites. Since Mary is blonde, sweet, and shy, Anne is dark, vile, and loud. I have to say this author really does not seem to like Miss Anne Boelyn very much. This Anne is nasty to everyone, clever but somehow incredibly stupid at the same time, thinks negatively of everyone around her, and even tries to seduce her gay brother several times (what the heck?) in the book. Also, pretty much every thing that Anne was accused of, things that most historians agree are probably false and made up so she could be executed without much argument, are true in this novel. If a person only read this book and never anyhting else about Anne Boelyn they would not have a very good image of her, when in reality Anne was said to have done lots of nice things in her short reign as Queen of England.

As I said before, I am not very smart. I do not usually pick up on misogynistic language and themes - even obvious ones (Snow White anybody?)- but in this book you're practically slapped across the face with it. Mary is quiet, shy, conventionally beautiful, listens to her male handlers (for the most part) and gives into the King's sexual desires as soon as he asks. She is rewarded with beautiful children, a loving husband, and a nice quiet life in the country (because being a farmer's wife in the 16th century was easy as churning butter I guess). Anne, on the other hand, is mean, agressive, sexual (while withholding herself from the king so as not to be another used and disgraced woman), and most of all DARES to think of herself as equal to or (le gasp!) better than the men in her life. No, these behaviors would have NOT been acceptable in Tudor England from a woman, but this book was written in the 21st century by a female author, no less. A little perspective please?

So yes, go ahead and tell me that maybe I'm just too dumb to understand this novel, but I think i'll stick with other adaptions that don't take such a negative veiw of poor Anne.
I've read Philippa Gregory's Cousin's War series, and also the first in this series prior to reading this one. This one returned to the Cousins War style (completely one perspective, vs. in The Constant Princess); I prefer this format. But anyhow, this one really follows three siblings - two Boleyn sisters and their brother. If you've never read Philippa Gregory, I'd encourage you to jump right in - she pulls you into the era and weaves drama and charisma into these historical figures. If you've read some of her work, I don't think you'll be disappointed here. I still have more love for the Cousins War series over this Tudor Court series, but this book makes me want to continue on and read the next.
The book is quite good. My only negative is that the ending was very abrupt, almost as if it didn't matter. Since the rest of the book was fairly detailed, i thought the end was hurried and not in keeping with the rest of the book. Made me wonder if the author was late for her deadline for submission of the manuscript. Otherwise, I enjoyed the book.
If you are looking for a fascinating, intriguing story this is the book for you. However, if you are a Tudor fan who insists on accuracy, you may not like this book. "The Other Boleyn Girl" is narrated by Mary Boleyn, the sister of the famous Anne. The two girls, one sweet and blonde and the other dark and ruthless, are used as pawns by their family to gain favor with the king-and thus gain prestige and wealth for the Boleyns. Mary, who is married, is forced to leave her husband when her family pushes her into King Henry's bed. She becomes the king's mistress, but truly loves him. Later in the story Anne ruthlessly destroys the life of the gracious, pious Queen Catherine in order to gain the throne-and uses witchcraft, poison, and incest to further her aims. Ms Gregory uses actual dates and happenings to build her story, and fills them in with speculation and fictitious events. This is not a book for you if you are a stickler for facts-but it is a fast-paced, gripping novel that makes the reader want to keep going to see what's next. I especially liked the book's glimpse into the Tudor court. Most people today have no idea of what it means to have your entire life revolve around the whim of someone who could either make you very fortunate-or put you to death. Courtiers were not just beautiful people who lounged around all day. They had to accompany the ruler EVERYWHERE, even if that meant dinners that went on past midnight, and then getting up for Mass or hunting at dawn. They had to gauge the king's every mood and adjust accordingly. A great job? I will leave that up to the reader.