meganbmoore (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
meganbmoore) wrote2010-04-04 06:54 pm
meganbmoore) wrote2010-04-04 06:54 pm
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The Sixth Wife by Suzannah Dunn
Disclaimer: I would not have finished this book, save that I was reading it while travelling, and there was danger of running out of reading material if I threw it out the car window. Has a stronger argument for Kindle ever been made?
Anyway, this book advertises itself as being about Katherine (Kate) Parr, sixth wife of Henry VIII, and Catherine (Cathy) Brandon, the Duchess of Suffolk, through Cathy’s POV. The beginning of the book, while irritating on certain levels, was also interesting, with Cathy trying to figure out why Kate would do something as out-of-character as marry Thomas Seymour a month and Henry VIII’s death. But then it quickly derails into a plot that, two days later, I realize was essentially an explanation of how poor, helpless Thomas Seymour was unjustly treated and sacrificed by mean, scheming women.
I mean, I knew very quickly that I wasn’t going to agree with Dunn on everything when Cathy’s attitudes regarding Anne Boleyn and Elizabeth Tudor came up, but hey, different people have different opinions about historical figures, and since she chose to write a book about two Tudor era women, surely it was just a case of preference, right? Except, no, not really. The entire book seems to be about how the women of the era really weren’t that great and are way overrated, but the men are just so misunderstood and underappreciated. As we all know, powerful white men get the short end of the stick regarding representation and attention when it comes to European history. Cathy is almost horrifically unlikable and rather hateful towards other women even before she’s sleeping with her pregnant best friend’s husband (which, as far as anyone knows, didn’t actually happen) and thinking about what a manipulative little schemer and seducer 13-year-old Elizabeth is, and various women of the era (the better known, the better) seem to be brought up exclusively to say “Her? She really wasn’t that great. No, really, not her fault, but she’s so overrated.” Kate (who, despite the title, is very much a secondary character) fares better, but comes across as either stupid or deliberately blind to everything around her, and living in a fantasy world.
In the notes, Dunn says that she actually, doesn’t like Cathy, or writing in her head (which made the book make a lot more sense) so it’s possible that Cathy’s attitudes are actually the opposite of Dunn’s own (save that Thomas Seymour is so abused, and so a story must be written about how he was just a poor innocent man ruined by mean, scheming women) but it doesn’t help with the book itself. She mentions loving writing Anne Boleyn in her previous book (which I have, but am now scared to read) which made me hopeful, but then mentions that her book about Queen Mary Tudor was actually going to be about a fictional guy. Sigh.
Anyway, this book advertises itself as being about Katherine (Kate) Parr, sixth wife of Henry VIII, and Catherine (Cathy) Brandon, the Duchess of Suffolk, through Cathy’s POV. The beginning of the book, while irritating on certain levels, was also interesting, with Cathy trying to figure out why Kate would do something as out-of-character as marry Thomas Seymour a month and Henry VIII’s death. But then it quickly derails into a plot that, two days later, I realize was essentially an explanation of how poor, helpless Thomas Seymour was unjustly treated and sacrificed by mean, scheming women.
I mean, I knew very quickly that I wasn’t going to agree with Dunn on everything when Cathy’s attitudes regarding Anne Boleyn and Elizabeth Tudor came up, but hey, different people have different opinions about historical figures, and since she chose to write a book about two Tudor era women, surely it was just a case of preference, right? Except, no, not really. The entire book seems to be about how the women of the era really weren’t that great and are way overrated, but the men are just so misunderstood and underappreciated. As we all know, powerful white men get the short end of the stick regarding representation and attention when it comes to European history. Cathy is almost horrifically unlikable and rather hateful towards other women even before she’s sleeping with her pregnant best friend’s husband (which, as far as anyone knows, didn’t actually happen) and thinking about what a manipulative little schemer and seducer 13-year-old Elizabeth is, and various women of the era (the better known, the better) seem to be brought up exclusively to say “Her? She really wasn’t that great. No, really, not her fault, but she’s so overrated.” Kate (who, despite the title, is very much a secondary character) fares better, but comes across as either stupid or deliberately blind to everything around her, and living in a fantasy world.
In the notes, Dunn says that she actually, doesn’t like Cathy, or writing in her head (which made the book make a lot more sense) so it’s possible that Cathy’s attitudes are actually the opposite of Dunn’s own (save that Thomas Seymour is so abused, and so a story must be written about how he was just a poor innocent man ruined by mean, scheming women) but it doesn’t help with the book itself. She mentions loving writing Anne Boleyn in her previous book (which I have, but am now scared to read) which made me hopeful, but then mentions that her book about Queen Mary Tudor was actually going to be about a fictional guy. Sigh.