Innocent Traitor

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I enjoyed this book, sad and flawed as it was. I knew the bare outline of the life of Lady Jane Grey, although, in spite of having read some version or other of Foxe's Book of Martyrs several times in my childhood, had forgotten that she is considered a martyr by the Anglican Church. It was therefore interesting to read a more detailed version of her story. Yes, I know the account is fictional but with such a reknowned historian writing we can be fairly certain that the events, if not the motives for them, are fairly accurately recounted. Fiction Book Review: Innocent Traitor". Publishers Weekly. 2 October 2006. Archived from the original on 19 February 2019 . Retrieved 19 February 2019. An impressive debut. Weir shows skill at plotting and maintaining tension, and she is clearly going to be a major player in the . . . historical fiction game.”— The Independent Essentially, Weir shoves in every scrap of rumour and gossip from the era. Whether she did this out of sheer bad research or purposely to make things "juicier", I don't know, but it doesn't improve the pedestrian prose, only adds a repellent splash of lurid crassness. AW: I was trying to portray Henry VIII as Jane would have seen him on this occasion, and for this I relied on the many descriptions we have of him as a sociable, affable, and witty man who was concerned to put others at their ease. He was not always the monster of popular caricature, nor the buffoon played by Charles Laughton!

Innocent Traitor - Penguin Random House Innocent Traitor - Penguin Random House

The Lady Elizabeth was bad but mildly entertaining, possibly because of the appearance of one of the most interesting figures from history, but Innocent Traitor is just plain bad. It begins with two very dull parallel birth scenes and gets worse from there. The language is tedious and pedestrian, sending me to sleep rather than catching my attention. The plot drags and is utterly predictable, for example, one day after the family has heard news that some heretics are to be burned, Jane’s nurse decides to take the children out for the day on a trip to visit her sister who lives in Smithfield. Gee, I wonder what will happen?! Yep, that’s right, it all ends in tears and traumatised kiddie-winks. This writing is just so juvenile and limp. The descriptions read just the same as in Weir’s non-fiction histories – incredibly dry, unmemorable lists. The worst of by far though was Weir’s poor research and total misunderstanding and the era. What does come across in this account is Jane's integrity: she may have been a pawn of more powerful people in terms of being placed on the throne, but here she has to be convinced that there is some justification for it first, and it is her courage in holding fast to what she believes to be right that is the ultimate reason for her death at the hands of a reluctant Mary. An impressive debut. Weir shows skill at plotting and maintaining tension, and she is clearly going to be a major player in the . . . historical fiction game.” One of the few joys in Jane's short life was the two years which she spent as a lady in waiting to Queen Katherine Parr, Henry VIII's last wife. Upon Katherine's death in 1548, Jane was unceremoniously and unwillingly returned to her family home. It was then that Jane met tutor to Elizabeth I, Roger Ascham. Ascham noted Jane's complaint about her parents:Extraordinary . . . exhilarating in its color, ambition, and human warmth. The author exhibits a breathtaking grasp of the physical and cultural context of Queen Eleanor’s life.” she goes over, in her head~although she is exhausted and all she wants to do is sleep~i can definitely relate to that~for the thousandth time how she came to be there), beginning with Jane's birth up to her execution. There were some speculative additions to fill in parts of history which remain unknown, and yet Weir's choices are still probable.

Innocent Traitor - Wikiwand Innocent Traitor - Wikiwand

The child of a scheming father and a ruthless mother, for whom she is merely a pawn in a dynastic game with the highest stakes, Jane Grey was born during the harrowingly turbulent period between Anne Boleyn’s beheading and the demise of Jane’s infamous great-uncle, King Henry VIII. With the premature passing of Jane’s adolescent cousin, and Henry’s successor, King Edward VI, comes a struggle for supremacy fueled by political machinations and lethal religious fervor. Lady Jane Grey, the grand niece of Henry VIII, and queen of England for just over a week in 1553 is the subject of Innocent Traitor, Alison Weir’s first work of historical fiction. With over ten works of history to her credit, Weir is one of my favorite British Renaissance and Reformation historians mostly because she presents the Catholic and Protestant theological differences of the era in an impartial manner without resorting to inflammatory or stereotypical rhetoric.As the reader, we watch her grow from childhood to a young adult..although at times I felt the author made Jane too old for the age that she was at. This riveting, richly descriptive novel chronicles the life of Lady Jane Grey. For those unfamiliar with British royal history, fifteen-year-old Lady Jane was named queen of England for nine days in July 1553. She was well-born, highly educated, and a devout Protestant. As the great-niece of King Henry VIII, it would have been customary for her family to forge a marriage alliance with one of the first families of the realm. Her parents have royal ambitions, however, and that is what precipitates tragedy. Pare impossibile, ma nell'Inghilterra del '500 ci fu anche spazio per una regina-bambina e quella regina regnò nove giorni prima di essere condannata per altro tradimento e decapitata a colpi d'ascia su un ceppo. Ma come si è arrivati a tutto ciò?