In the fall of 2021, I started reading Philippa Gregory’s Plantagenet and Tudor Series. I had been discussing historical fiction with a friend in a writing group. and she mentioned this series. I recognized some of the titles from movies and shows, but I hadn’t read any of them. So, I hit the library and started reading.

The series spends fifteen books covering the Wars of the Roses and the reign of the Tudors. Roughly 150 years of history as of the last book. It tells stories of the reigns of twelve English monarchs, from Henry IV to Elizabeth I. It does so by telling the stories from the eyes of the women: the queens, mistresses, and court ladies who watch great events with an often-overlooked perspective.

(Update: After starting this blog post, I discovered that Philippa Gregory has announced a new book in this series. This book will follow Jane Boleyn and is set five books back from the last book I read. So, this post is a review of the series so far. I will review the next book when it comes out.)

This is a review of my experiences with the series. First, my overall thoughts. Second, I’ll go over structural and literary topics I want to cover. Then I’ll discuss some of the thoughts I had about the women POV characters. And finally, I’ll hit some points about the series as historical fiction.

Overall Thoughts

This wasn’t a series I’d probably ever read if it hadn’t been recommended to me. My historical fiction tends towards military characters or great leaders, with lots of battles and conflict. And, honestly, mostly from male perspectives.

This series has battles that occur, but rarely are we given anything more than a few paragraphs; this series is more concerned with their influence on events. Great leaders are common in every title, but we’re seeing them from a close and personal viewpoints, warts and all. And seeing the series from an a primarily women’s perspective paints the decisions of the era in a very different light.

All that considered, I liked this series. Looking back at the titles, many more of them were ones I would revisit than ones I would be okay never returning to. None of them reached into my lists of favorite books, but I’m still glad I read them.

Literary Thoughts

These are several points about the series from a literary perspective.

One thing real quick, because this will help understand the points below. When Philippa Gregory started writing these books, she was actually writing two different series: The Cousins’ War about the Wars of the Roses and The Tudor Court about the reign of the Tudors. They remained separate for fifteen years, until she combined them into one narrative. This does have an impact on some of the topics I will address below.

Multiple POV Characters

One great thing about this series: it was the first series I’ve read that every book follows a different character. Other series follow one character from start to finish, or switch between characters each chapter. Not this one. Each book followed a different character than the previous.

This means that each book comes with a different attitude, set of skills and relationships to experience. In the shifting politics of the era, this gives each character strengths and vulnerabilities that are markedly different from the preceding book. We see these characters experience great rises and falls, each of which is unique to that characters’ position.

And, it’s nice that the POV characters in one book are supporting characters in other books. So, after reading with one character for a book, you may get to see how the rest of their life plays out in other books.

Assuming they survive their own book, which isn’t always the case.

As a writer, it’s great to see a long series that doesn’t follow the same character through each book, especially a multi-generational series like this one. It’s made me wonder if I could do something similar with one of my ideas

Not Written in Order

By this, I mean the books are not written in chronological order. They are written and inserted into the timeline as they come out. The first book chronologically is the 9th book written in the series. New titles added to the list can (and will) be inserted into the chronology where she wants.

This isn’t the first time I’ve encountered this. The Sharpe series does the same, with Bernard Cornwell adding new stories here and there as he finds stories to develop. It means that as you read them in order, you’ll find the writing style change dramatically, as the book that follows may have been written years before the book you just finished. Her writing style changes as she continues to write. As it does for everyone.

Magic

This series has an odd aspect to it, in that some of the books (particularly the early ones) include some fantastical magic powers. We’re not talking about fireballs or enchanting items. These are more about minor divinations: abilities to see the future or know what’s happening far away.

Not every book has this aspect. Many of them don’t touch upon magic or powers except as an excuse to execute someone. In the books that do have it, it is very minimal, used only to inform the character — and by extension the reader — of important plot events.

It’s a nice way of advancing some stories, without needing the same powers to appear in all of them.

Women’s Perspective

I’ve read plenty of books with women protagonists, but this was a new experience. It was a whole series of novels, written from different women’s viewpoint, all unified by shared experiences with the system they lived in.

Again, this isn’t something new I’ve never experienced. You can’t read historical fiction and expect to find modern sensibilities in previous eras. But there’s a difference between having a few female characters in a male dominated narrative, and having the entire narrative told from their POV.

Influence on the Narrative

For starters, it’s a different read when most of the characters have limited influence and agency instead of just a handful.

Now, the first thought might be to say ‘these characters are passive participants of their own story’, but that’s not the case. None of these characters are weak. They are extremely limited in how they can influence their world, but they do have options. One character might present the best version of themselves, whatever that version needs to be; another might scheme for power to protect herself through family and patrons. How each individual character approached their situation and how they try to control it is up to them. And how well they do so is part of each of their stories.

One more thing: with the rise and fall of the characters in relation to the throne of England, what they do with power once they have it is as much a part of their story as anything else. Which characters try to improve their kingdom, and which ones use their authority to remove their enemies and secure their position? With so many POV characters over the narrative, you get a lot of different answers to this theme.

Misogyny

I’ve read books with female characters before. The Honor Harrington series has a strong female protagonist. But these series take place in societies of equality: Honor Harrington is a military officer who only faces sexism on one backwards planet, and ends up changing that planet’s society instead of succumbing to it.

This series has misogyny front and center, and that’s not really a surprise. Late Medical and Early Renaissance England, despite the female monarch who reigned for a good chunk of that time, was not known for its progressive gender views.

Throughout this series, we see the women experience the prejudice and bigotry of their society. They are brides to be married off for political power, or wombs to bear the next heir to the throne. They are sent to seduce lords and kings to advance the family interest, and if they fail (by their own fault or not) they are forgotten and discarded. All too often, parents treated their children as pawns in the political game around the throne, while their children — the characters — either understood or pushed back.

They were several instances where I got angry at what the characters were experiencing. But that’s what the time period was like, and I appreciate that Philippa Gregory doesn’t shy away from showing that.

Historical Fiction

As historical fiction, this series touches upon real events. Following the throne of England, many of these events have great consequences, often for the characters we’re reading with. Also, it was a period I didn’t know much about, so there was a bit of a learning curve while reading. And I do like learning.

But the main thing to remember when it comes to historical fiction is: it’s historical. You can do all the research you want, but you’re still writing a fictional narrative. As a reader, you cannot accept this as historical fact. Sure, you can learn the dates of the important events, but that’s about it. Everything else is suspect.

It Took How Long?

One thing I learned from this series was how long things took to happen. History books may mention dates, but that usually gets lost in the shuttle. For example, you read, ‘Queen Elizabeth captured Mary Queen of Scots, and after some time executed her for plotting against the throne,’ and think it was a period of months or a year.

Nope, 19 years. 1568-1587.

This kind of long-term planning and execution feels so alien, but it’s a part of their world and the characters don’t expect anything else. On the other hand, after getting used to how long it takes for a decision to be made and implemented, it makes some of the quick, impulsive decisions that much more jarring for the characters and readers to experience.

Historical Mysteries

When you’re writing historical fiction, there are always events that you don’t have a historical answer to. Some of these are small questions that weren’t important enough to records answers to Others are big, great mysteries that living historians debate to this day. There are two solutions to this: to ignore or side-step the mystery, or to craft an answer that fits your narrative. Philippa Gregory does both.

As a good example of side-stepping, there’s the Princes in the Tower. The deposed King Edward V and his brother Richard of Shrewsbury, being held in the the Tower of London, disappear without a trace. It’s one of the biggest mysteries of English history. In this series, Gregory never gives an answer. The mystery occurs or is referenced in several books, and each character has their own belief about what happened. But the truth — even the fictional truth — is never revealed.

On the other hand, there’s the death of Amy Robsart, wife of Queen Elizabeth’s lover Robert Dudley. The historical figure was found dead, and her true cause of death was never confirmed one way or the other. But Philippa Gregory provides an answer that works well within the plot of her story. I won’t tell you what it is, but it works well.

From a writer’s perspective, it’s good to see how the same problem can be corrected differently, depending on the needs of the story. If and when I get around to writing historical fiction, I’ll be approaching things like this. I’ll have to.

The Red Queen

If you’ve kept up with my posts on the series, then you know how much I came to hate the Red Queen, the fictional version of Lady Margaret Beaufort, mother of King Henry VII, who appears in six of the fifteen books.

I won’t go through a whole biography of the character or her historical counterpart, but I wanted to take a moment to acknowledge how great this character is. Yes, I hate her, but I appreciate the character.

In the first half of her book, I came to to sympathize with her so much. She was a young girl — only thirteen — when she was widowed while pregnant with the future king. And her entire value to society is as a womb capable of bearing future monarchs. Her own mother tells the doctors to sacrifice Margaret for her child if a problem arises. She survives, only to have her son whisked away for his safety. I had so much pity for her.

And then she became a character I absolutely detested. The lengths she went to get her son on the throne, and how she influenced his court once he was there, were terrible. I understand her reasoning, but I hate bullies and tyrants, and she works up to be a great and powerful one, who terrorizes the characters of five more books.

Yes, I appreciate the character, as much as I hate her. I hope to write a character who evokes a quarter of that response.

Conclusion

There are many reasons I appreciate this series. I learned about an era of history I didn’t know much about. I got to experience a multi-generational epic that spans more than a century. And I got to see the stories through lenses that I’ve never really looked through before. Not only did I enjoy it, but I feel I’ve learned a lot as a writer.

Now, this isn’t the end of my experience with Philippa Gregory. There’s at least one more book in the series coming out. And there are a number of movies and TV shows based of her works that I will watch at some point. I’ll add them to my ever-lengthening list of ‘to watch’ titles.

If you’re interested in reading some of these books but don’t want to check them all out, please feel free to check out my blog posts on the series, or ask for recommendations. Always glad to introduce people to new books.

Now, what should my next series be…?