The Virgin's Lover

Rating:
Summary: Queen Elizabeth? I think not.
Review: For anyone who is unaware, Queen Elizabeth I is widely viewed as one of, if not THE greatest monarch to ever rule. Period. Ignored as a child, she possessed the drive, intelligence, and ambition to pursue her own education, all qualities she brought to the throne. She stabilized a country on the brink of civil war, restored faith in the monarchy, rebased the coinage, expanded the empire, defeated the French and the Spanish, held her own against a male-dominated court and Parliament, created a culture that was idolized by Europe, and created a world superpower that set the stage for the Golden Age and Imperialistic times of Britain, all with a politically brilliant, ruthless mind.

In this book, none of that is evident. She is a whiny, complaintitive, immature, dull, incompetant, you-know-what.

I love Phillippa Gregory's style of writing, her thorough research, and ability to bring a new light to old history, but this complete assassination of Elizabeth is horrendous and unbelievable. I give the two stars for the parts with Lord Cecil, who is a sympathetic, believable character. Every description and dialogue from Elizabeth made me want to scream.

Rating:
Summary: Entertaining yet flawed
Review: As a lover of "The Other Boleyn Girl" and "The Queens Fool" I was very excited to see this book. I was even more excited to see that it was about Queen Elizabeth I. Although it started slow, I found it to be a good read and devoured it in a matter of 3 days.

I feel I must warn lovers of the strong Queen Elizabeth that is often portrayed, you may want to skip this book. The perspective of Elizabeth as a love-sick, indecisive woman is interesting, but I don't really buy into it. Her reign was not perfect, but I highly doubt that she would be as revered as she is if she was really this weak.

Robert Dudley is portrayed both as someone who loves Elizabeth, and as someone who is after the crown. A previous reviewer said that it was hard to understand which side the character was on. I think that although he loved Elizabeth, he also saw an opportunity to raise himself higher and went for it. I enjoyed that aspect because I don't even think Dudley knew which he wanted more. He thought he could have his cake and eat it too. He's not the first, nor will he be that last to attempt that.

Some may find the changing of narrators distracting or hard to follow, but in a story like this I liked seeing the motives behind the main characters. The one major drawback is that it is hard to completely symphasize with any one of them. However, I don't really think we're supposed too.

To conclude, pick this book up if you enjoyed the previous novels. Although not a series I would recommend reading them in order, especially if you're not familiar with the history. However, remember that although loosely based on documented facts, there is a lot of liberties taken. Don't take everything as fact. Enjoy it as a work of historical fiction, and then do some more research on your own if you desire the truth.

Rating:
Summary: Lovers of history will devour Gregory's latest novel
Review: Elizabeth Tudor, the illegitimate daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, has finally come into power on the throne of England. The turmoil and strife that has dogged her since her birth, however, has not ceased just because she's now the reigning monarch.

There are several who would be only too glad to push her from her precarious perch and install another on the seat of power. Strife with France, Spain and Scotland hover as an ever-present danger over the head adorned with golden red hair. If that weren't enough, the country is divided as the battle between Catholics and Protestants continues. What's a queen to do?

This particular Queen finds strength and solace in the company and the arms of Robert Dudley. The pressure is on from her advisors to marry and align England with a country that could increase its strength and security. Elizabeth I, however, waffles and waivers and refuses to make a choice for a husband while spending her time with an ambitious man already married to a virtuous wife.

Robert Dudley was much loved by Queen Elizabeth I and detested by her advisors and the rest of England. While his good looks, charm and silver tongue endeared him to the Queen, it earned him adversaries everywhere else. The fact that he was already married to a good wife, set aside in his pursuit of the Queen, only served to fuel the fire of gossip that spread across England and other European countries.

The star-crossed lovers are separated by the fact that Dudley is not of an equal rank to Elizabeth, that the country strongly opposes the match and that he is still married to Amy Robsart. Even when Amy dies in what is ultimately ruled an accident, the rumors and gossip that it was murder make an already doomed relationship impossible.

Perhaps we'll never know the whole truth surrounding Queen Elizabeth I, Robert Dudley and the death of Amy Robsart. But as she always does, Philippa Gregory presents us with a plausible and perhaps even probable scenario of the events that fascinated one of the world's most powerful countries hundreds of years ago and continues to fascinate us today.

Lovers of history will devour Gregory's latest novel, carried on in the tradition of THE OTHER BOLEYN GIRL and THE QUEEN'S FOOL. Even if you're not a history buff, THE VIRGIN'S LOVER will appeal to anyone who enjoys a good scandal.

--- Reviewed by Amie Taylor


Rating:
Summary: Frustrating
Review: I found this book incredibly frustrating. As I was reading I kept on trying to identify the protagonist. After finishing the book, I'm still looking! Elizabeth is a childish, indecisive, helpless, and conscienceless brat who depends on the men around her to make every decision for her. Amy - for whom the book is titled - is an annoying simpleton who halfway through the book suddenly transforms (seemingly inexplicably) into a quiet, selfless martyr. And Dudley is simply a two-timing cad.

But beyond a lack of having someone to really sympathize with, there were some major flaws in the story itself. Dudley's motivations are suspect throughout - does he love Elizabeth or is he simply using her? And I found it extremely hard to swallow that he should abuse his wife throughout the entire novel but then as soon as she's dead he pines after her as if she were the love of his life. The 180-degree emotional conversion was not only unbelievable, but almost laughable. If you want a good historical fiction about Queen Elizabeth I recommend 'I, Elizabeth' by Rosalind Miles.

Rating:
Summary: Elizabeth - Not great a queen as I thought she was
Review: I have not read very many books and a relative new-comer to the book club. Thus, with the authority laid upon me by the limited collection I have gone through, I can claim that this is the most impressive book I have read in this genre. The superlative should be excused as it will most likely be duplicated in other reviews - It is very temporal as much as it is relative. After sifting through the first few pages, I came across a variety of characters - all of them extraordinary in a way but real people.
Virgin's Lover is an awesome book (I do use "awesome" rather liberally).

Philippa Gregory has masterfully told the tale of Queen Elizabeth and the troubled times she faced. One striking aspect of the book is that none of the central characters are heroic or a villian. It was very difficult to read a book with such a theme. After reading books like the "Lord of the Rings" (I gave up after the first book) - absence of an evil eye and innocent hobbits, I found it difficult to even accept this book. I was a couple of hundred pages into the book and I found myself wondering when the good guy will come and save all of them? We (liberally used to mean myself) are so used to stories which involve good guys coming in and destroying bad guys and bad people are always doomed towards destruction. 200 pages into the book and everyone in the story was evil (again, not an accurate description). Queen Elizabeth was in love with a married man Robert and wandering off to be with him instead of being a Queen. The married "Lord of the Horse" (Robert) of the Queen was "cruel" to his wife, Amy and a very ambitious man: ambitious enough to want to sit on the throne not by dethroning Elizabeth but by marrying her. Amy, sobbing and loving, but jealous of Elizabeth. Cecil - a master politician, who probably would be the only character who is good but his determination to drive Robert away from influencing Elizabeth even to the point of killing an innocent woman, does not help much in establishing him to be a "Good" guy.

Back to the book, It will be difficult for me to comment on this book. I was much immersed in knowing and trying to comprehend the history. I would have described any book which described "Elizabeth's" story and describe it the same manner. Every character was a villian, committed treachery, and were murderers, conspirators and what not? How each character loves another and how difficult it is to do anything about it? And when they do, how much it complicates things?

It took me less than a day to finish this book.

Rating:
Summary: Worst fictionalized account of Elizabeth I have read
Review: I was sorely disappointed in this book, having heard from several people how good it was. Unlike most of the nonfiction work I have read, Queen Elizabeth is made out in this story to be an indecisive romantic simpleton who had to be lead to every important decision she made by the men surrounding her. Instead of masterfully playing the field to keep alliances as most historians feel she did, she is portrayed as whining and indecisive about her lovelife as well, controlled totally by Robert Dudley and William Cecil. I found this book almost insulting in it's lack of strong feminine characters - and here is one of the strongest, most heroic female characters of her age. If you are looking for a hot romance book - this is it. If you want a good piece of historical fiction about Queen Elizabeth I then read Alison Weir.

Rating:
Summary: Frustrating
Review: I wish Philippa Gregory had stopped after The Queen's Fool. I was excited and intrigued by the concept of a novel written from the point of view of Amy Robsart, the long-suffering wife of Robert Dudley, the love of Queen Elizabeth's life. However, the book was mostly about Robert, and both the women in his life were portrayed as whiny, annoying, and more than a little crazy. Serious fans of Elizabeth will not be amused. I found myself waiting anxiously for the stair scene as Elizabeth and Dudley's romance drug interminably on and on, like listening to whiny teenagers.

Rating:
Summary: Good Book!
Review: If you love Historical fiction about British Royalty like I do, then you'll love this book. While I doubt Philippa Gregory could ever replace Jean Plaidy as my favorite historical fiction author, she could definitely come a close second. Her writing isn't quite as elegant as Jean Plaidy but she does have better sex scenes then Plaidy ever did. I'm definitely looking forward to reading her other novels. A

Rating:
Summary: Character assassination at its finest
Review: Looking at the back covers of Gregory's books, I see she has a degree in 18th century literature and a long list of books to her credit. I'm sure she is a fine scholar and writer in her area. Writing about Tudor England, however, is not her strength. Aside from the glaring factual errors (which many reviewers have noted both in this book and others, most notably The Other Boleyn Girl), she just doesn't get the 16th century worldview across. There are anachronisms, both small (riding sidesaddle) and large (false assumptions about the range of literacy and religious practices of the time). These books would be fine reading for someone totally unfamiliar with the period (like the author herself), but for some reason she also seems bent on assassinating the reputations of every notable female political figure on Tudor England. Here Elizabeth is the shallow, histrionic puppet so many (male) 19th century historians dismissed her as (though what else could we expect from the horribly shrewish Anne Boleyn in Gregory's previous work?), and all the good ideas are really Cecil's. Come on! I think it's fitting that only the heroines' torsos are pictured on the covers, to indicate that Gregory's stories and characterizations are entire physical. Thy're more about the costumes and weak-romance-novel intrigue; we never truly get into anyone's mind.

And yes, I know it's fiction. But why bother to write historical fiction if so much of the history is wrong? (Not "open to question"--just plain wrong.) Why not write about a fictional queen?

Rating:
Summary: Good Gregory - good STORY
Review: Phillippa Gregory's latest novel "The Virgin's Lover" is much better than her previous one, "The Queen's Fool." Gregory has returned to fabulous STORY telling, loosely based on history & filled in with fantastical "what if?" ideas. Fans of Elizabethan history be warned: this is a story, so let it sweep you up for a few days & just ignore all of the inconsistencies!

I was disappointed that Gregory did not develop a truley ruthless character in this book as she has in others such as "Wide Acre," "The Favored Child" and "The Other Bolyen Girl." Those characters make her books a true guilty pleasure... the characters do reprehensible things, but yet you can't wait to read more! Cecil, Elizabeth & Robert Dudley may behave unethically, but the circumstances (political, ambition, etc...) seem to make them almost understandable. That took away some of the fun I had hoped for.

If you are a fan of Phillippa Gregory, and especially if you were let down by her last book, you will enjoy this one.