Monday, April 30, 2018

Review: The Lost Tudor Princess by Alison Weir

The Lost Tudor Princess: The Life of Lady Margaret Douglas
Why do I keep giving Weir chance after chance. Yet another 500 plus pages of history lessons replacing much lacking fact. Another case of quantity over quality.

Margaret Douglas, Countess of Lennox, mother of Darnley and mother-in-law of Mary Queen of Scots - yes, a lost Tudor princess; yes, a woman whose life deserves the spotlight; yes, another case where fact is more interesting than fiction. A woman whose life reveals to us very little - and yet - 500 plus pages!

I have said this over and over - I would rather 100 pages of what is known rather than 500 pages of boring, rehashed history, personal opinion, and filling in the gaps with dates and documents. As I stated in my review of Weir's "Elizabeth of York" - "I am trying very hard to fathom the amount of actual information there is on Elizabeth that was worthy of 600 odd pages - quite frankly it required barely a quarter in my opinion. The larger the book ... overcompensating for a distinct lack of anything else.". The same can be said, I am sorry to say, of this tome on Margaret Douglas.


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