Kate Emerson, Secrets of the Tudor Court: Between Two Queens

Secrets of the Tudor Court: Between Two Queens

Kate Emerson

Pocket, Jan 5 2009, $16.00

ISBN: 9781416583271

In 1637 sixteen year old Anne "Nan" Bassett crosses the Narrow Sea from Calais, France to Dover, England along with her older sister Catherine. Nan wants to join the court as a maid of honor to Queen Jane Seymour. Surprisingly King Henry selects her to become a member of his wife's entourage.

When Jane dies in childbirth, Nan leaves the court to move in with her cousin, the Countess of Sussex. Henry not forgetting the lan of Nan orders her back to the court when he marries again and again. With intrigue everywhere inside Henry's court, Nan falls in love, but to survive she must give away her child as her family is no haven since they are caught up in Cromwell seditious activities.

The latest secret at King Henry's court (see Secrets of the Tudor Court: The Pleasure Palace) is an engaging historical starting a maid of honor who keeps her head by keeping her head in crisis. Based on a real maid of honor, Nan is a terrific heroine, but in many ways the aging monarch steals the show as the King seems to obsessively need to prove his manhood as he goes through a few more wives following the death of Jane. Fans will relish Kate Emerson's strong historical tale of life and death at King Henry's court.

Harriet Klausner