Customer Reviews
Sadly Dissapointed - By: April Chamberlain, 19 Sep 2008 
I was majorly dissapointed when I finished reading this book earlier on this afternoon. The story has the promise of being extremely exciting & the ending highly anticipated. When you come towards the end of the book you realise that a lot of loose ends will not be concluded despite the 600+ pages & the story doesn't seem to be coming towards a climax with 10 pages to go. This book had the makings of a book I wouldn't put down but sadly I wish I hadn't picked it up.
Disappointing - By: stacey987, 05 Sep 2008 
I am a huge fan of The Boleyn Girl & enjoyed The Virgins Lover so was really looking forward to reading this book, however I was very disappointed. The plot just seemed random & to be going nowhere, the end was bizarre, the characters just annoying & unlikeable. However the worst thing about this novel for me was the vile, crude, disgusitngly over described sex scenes. Don't get me wrong I am not a prude who doesn't like sex to ever be mentionedin a book but I think there is a line between being a little graphic & pornography which is crossedin this book. I have read books that have fairly graphic moments but they usually add to the story or make you understand the characters a little better. All they did here was confuse the already random plot & make me feel sick. To be honest I just felt like Gregory was seeing how much she could get away with. I did manage to finish the novel but only because I had faithin Gregory & thought it would pick up - I was wrong. To be honest I was glad to close the book for the last time.If you are new to Gregorys work then do not start with this book as it is certainly not her best. I would not recommend this book to anyone
Not worth the time. - By: J. H. Grunill, 07 Aug 2008 My Mum was given this book as a gift a couple of years ago & now after we have both read it we agreed that if this had been the first book by Philippa Gregory we had come across we would not have bothered reading any more. The central characters we all unlikeable - though Lord Hugh at least seemed to be a fairly reliable depiction of a landed lord at the time. The blurb on the back of the book no way gives an accurate idea of what you can expect inside the covers. I found the wax dolls creepy & something I was uncomfortable reading. The only reason this book has been given one star is that I am unable to give it less.
Brilliant - Better than I had thought it would be - By: A. M. Price, 14 Jul 2008 
I was worried to read this, as I have read all of the Tudor Historical Fiction books by Philippa Gregory & absolutely loved them - I didn't want to find a book that wasn't as good. The beginning almost fulfilled my worry, but then I soon got to the point where I was thinking about reading the next chapter while working. It was really very good. I do agree that the 2 main characters, Alys & Hugo are as bad as each other, but at the same time you still want to know. I couldn't get over the ending; abrupt, but brilliant, it left me wanting more.
Now that I've read this one I can safely say I am going to read every single Philippa Gregory book I find.
Anachronistic rubbish - By: Watford reader, 20 Jun 2008 I find Philippa Gregory's pro-Catholic & anti-Protestant biasin her other books rather irritating anyway, but this goes totally over the top. The idea of persecuting Catholics as heretics for their beliefs is anachronistic at this time; when it happened, it was much more likely to happen under Edward VI or Elizabeth than under Henry VIII, who remained a Catholic to the end.
If you want good historical novels setin this period, go to Margaret Irwin who made her characters people of their time much more convincingly than PG does.
