The Kingmaker's Daughter by Phillipa Gregory (and other Cousin's War books!)

Ok, so Phillipa Gregory is a wonderful writer. One of my A Level English Lit teachers really wasn't a fan and told me I should move onto more literary historic fiction like Jean Plaidy (I haven't got around to it yet...). But I still think that Phillipa's books are fabulous!

The Kingmaker's Daughter is the third of 5 in the Cousin's War series of books all about the Plantagenets, the royal family before the Tudors, and the key female 'leaders' of their reign. I had been wanting to read this series for a while, but then I saw a trailer for the BBC drama so decided that I really needed to read 'The White Queen' before it came on TV; thankfully my sister had given it to me a year or so previously, so it was already sitting, waiting on my bookshelf. It read fantastically well and was so compelling. I really love the way that Gregory uses real events and uses both historical resources and a little artistic licence to make a novel out of something real. True to expectations; the two are practically disentangleable (apart from points she makes in her afterword of course).

Obviously, as a woman herself, and a historian with such particular interest in strong women at that time of English History, her books were historically believable. What I am finding so incredible about reading the series is how they all tell the same story, yet reading them all is not repetitive or boring. Each novel of the series (that I have read so far...) are based around the same main events *SPOILERS* the overthrow of various kings, the birth of babies, exiles, battles etc. But what Gregory does so well is starting and ending each novel at the point which is relevant for each protaginist. She also does well to include different historic viewpoints about the Plantagenets through her different lead females; for example the mystery of the boys in the tower, where Gregory presents the various historical views as rumours from different sides (or indeed, the viewpoints come from these rumours... who can be sure?!)

So, having read books 1-3 and owning book 4, I imagine I will be reading The Lady of the Rivers some time soon, and very much look forward to it. Then all that remains is to treat myself to The White Princess (book 5).

This didn't turn out so much to be about The Kingmaker's Daughter, but rather the series and Gregory's accuracies, but oh well! Enjoy.

Happy Reading :)