Read under title - Her Highness, the Traitor ( )

Finally, historical fiction centered on the reign of Edward VI, the political and religious upheaval, the successsion crisis that is balanced and enjoyable to read. Ms. Higginbotham relies on history, extant letters and documents to tell the story of a kingdom at the edge of destruction while balancing toward the modern era. We are shown the period through the eyes and voices of two women close to the throne: Frances Grey, neice of Henry VIII, wife of Henry Grey, Marquis of Dorset and later Duke of Suffolk (by right of Frances) and mother of the Lady Jane, known to us as "The Nine Days' Queen," in part to the amendment to Edward VI's will or "devise" that disinherited Edward's sisters Mary and Elizabeth (but briefly)that made her Queen of England after Edward's death in 1553 at the age of 16; and Jane Dudley, wife of John Dudley, earl of Warwick and duke of Northumberland who ruled England after the death of Edward's uncle the Protector Somerset, and the mother of Guilford Dudley, Jane Grey's husband.

Many works of fiction and a particular movie have portrayed Jane's parents as cruel and heartless, the Northumberlands as grasping, devious, power hungry. As I mentioned above, Ms. Higginbotham doesn't follow suit with what has gone before - because she tells the story through two women usually relegated to being either silent witnesses or hags, Jane Grey is less the innocent martyr for the reformist cause and more a flesh-and-blood teenaged girl who is precocious, opinionated and a pain in the neck at times, but a girl who is true to her faith thanks to her parents' attention to her education and upbringing. She was considered a preeminent scholar and reformist (Protestant) in her learned circle and after her execution, her letters were printed and distributed, cherished by many who espoused 'the new learning,' as the Protestant church was sometimes called. Yet, Jane was absolutely believable and real in Ms. Higginbotham's hands. While reading the book, I felt that Jane Grey would have been the exceptionally bright yet annoying girl in the front row of history class, raising her hand and giving the right answer every time the teacher asked a question and quick to correct we lesser humans if we deigned to give a wrong one! She would be the first to defend and to right a wrong.

Ms. Higginbotham gives us the history and the facts without seven hundred pages to slog through - the minority of Edward VI and the quarrel between his uncles, Jane's brief sojourn as queen proclaimed but not crowned, Mary's swift seizure of the crown that was her right as Henry VIII's eldest daughter, the deaths of Jane, Guilford as a result of uprisings against Mary and her imperial leanings (which Jane and Guilford had nothing to do with), are illustrated here.

The prose is finely-honed, the dialogue wonderful, the characters come to life. If you're tired of yet another Tudor novel with the usual cardboard paperdolls, the same tresses of hair being tossed back and same courtiers sitting and plotting in darkened corners of lively great chambers, pick up this book NOW. This is indeed the Tudor story you don't know - but will want to know as soon as you read the first lines. ( )