Queen's Gambit

Summary (from the publisher): Widowed for the second time at age thirty-one Katherine Parr falls deeply for the dashing courtier Thomas Seymour and hopes at last to marry for love. However, obliged to return to court, she attracts the attentions of the ailing, egotistical, and dangerously powerful Henry VIII, who dispatches his love rival, Seymour, to the Continent. No one is in a position to refuse a royal proposal so, haunted by the fates of his previous wives—two executions, two annulments, one death in childbirth—Katherine must wed Henry and become his sixth queen.

Katherine has to employ all her instincts to navigate the treachery of the court, drawing a tight circle of women around her, including her stepdaughter, Meg, traumatized by events from their past that are shrouded in secrecy, and their loyal servant Dot, who knows and sees more than she understands. With the Catholic faction on the rise once more, reformers being burned for heresy, and those close to the king vying for position, Katherine’s survival seems unlikely. Yet as she treads the razor’s edge of court intrigue, she never quite gives up on love.

Review: I won this book as a giveaway on Goodreads. 

Queen's Gambit is about Henry VIII's sixth and final wife, Katherine Parr, who was the only wife to outlive her husband.  Katherine Parr has twice been widowed and now, as a wealthy widow, hopes to marry for love. However, the ailing king decides to make her his most newest queen. In a court fraught with tension and subject to the perils of a temperamental king's whims, Katherine must once again placate an elderly husband in order to not be beheaded like two of his previous wives. 

I'm not surprised that this novel is being compared to Hilary Mantel's novels Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies, for they are both well written historical fiction set in Henry VIII's court, and have very similar writing styles. Both Fremantle and Mantel are experts at capturing characterization, fluidly sliding between points of view, and not falling for the gimmicky, chic-lit quality of many historical fiction novels. Fremantle does an excellent job of capturing the world of a royal court in the 1500s. "Servants scurry everywhere invisibly, heaving logs, rolling kegs, sparking up tinder, strewing floors, turning roasts, plucking fowl, baking bread, chopping and slicing and mixing and kneading and scrubbing. Meals for seven hundred appear in the Great Hall, delivered by an army of unseen staff as if there has been no effort whatsoever in the making of them. The whole palace seems, on the surface, to run by itself: fresh linen finds its way to beds in the blink of an eye; mud from the floor seems to brush itself away; clothes mend themselves; piss pots gleam; dust disappears" (78). 

I like that Fremantle is true to historical accuracy; she does not shy away from talking about lice, the smell from the king's rotting leg, and "muck-filled puddles" (307) in addition to describing the beauty of the court. The descriptive quality of this novel also appealed to me. "That sister is Elizabeth, who has hands like pretty finches and who has inherited the unassailable magnetism of her father. Mary has to make do with the worst of him - his stubby fingers and volatile temper, and those unsettling eyes" (196). Fremantle is excellent at diving into the heart of each character, even when their point of view is never shared, so the reader can understand the motivations or hardships that particular character has to endure.

Fremantle paints a clear picture of Katherine that demonstrates why Henry would have been attracted to her as a wife in the first place. She is a tender nurse, she takes pains to improve the lives of the king's children, is as close to her maid and her stepdaughter as if they are her own daughters. I also really liked Dot, Katherine's loyal servant, who struggles to find her place in the palace after her mistress's rise in status also meant her own rise. Including Dot's point of view also allows the reader to be privy to the underbelly of the palace life; to hear the servant gossip Dot hears, to see who is whispering together behind the backs of those in power. The setting of this book is always, always a tumultuous, high stakes one; "when you go, you are brought down to nothing, regardless of how high you have climbed" (227). 

It's such a shame that after surviving three husbands, especially the harrowing experience of being married to a king with a habit of killing wives, Katherine's life fails to end happily as she hoped. Katherine's love and final husband, Thomas Seymour, turns out to not be the man she thought but instead a power hungry, unfaithful, and jealous man. An early scene in their courtship shows Thomas helping a servant pick up spilled pies, appealing to Katherine's tender heart. Hundreds of pages later, it is revealed that it was a scam: "He once paid me a penny to drop a try of tarts on the palace steps.' 'Why?' 'He never said. And he helped me pick them up..." (322). What a sad fate, to never find happiness in love, or get to raise your own child. 

Stars: 4