Rating: 
Summary: Not What I Expected.
Review: After finishing "The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn", I could not wait to get started on this book. I found it very boring in spots. Especially Arthur's childhood. I enjoyed reading about Queen Elizabeth,she was a very colorful character. Maybe if there would have been more chapters about Elizabeth and Robin I would have enjoyed the book more but then it would have had a different title.
Rating: 
Summary: Not Accurate
Review: After reading Alison Weir's reliable book, The Life of Elizabeth I, it makes me angry when I read things that say Elizabeth wasn't a virgin. All of the facts point to the idea that she WAS (ex: she wasn't stupid--they didn't have birth control back then--and her ladies in waiting, who knew everything about her sleeping habits, never gave any reason to doubt her virginity. There was only malicious gossip spread around). From Ms. Weir's book: "There were numerous stories that she had secretly borne children, although how she could have done so without people knowing of it, given the very public life she led, remained unexplained. The jealous Bess of Hardwick was fond of relaying to Mary, Queen of Scots all the nasty tales she had heard of Elizabeth, such as how she has been discovered often in bed with the Earl of Leicester, or how she had forced Sir Christopher Hatton to make love to her.... Bess later confessed to the Council that she had made up all the tales". (49-50) I don't have much respect for historical fiction that blatantly disregards facts to make the book more exciting for modern audiences. I do NOT recommend this.
After posting the above, a rather amusing fact has been found in the Kirkus review. "As the Spanish Armada prepares to invade England in 1588, the young queen takes as her lover Robin Dudley, Earl of Leicester, and they conceive a son." Has anyone realized that Elizabeth was 55 in 1588? She was born in 1533... this author seriously needs to do more research and less sensationalistic writing.
Rating:
Summary: Shameful, boring and bad sequel to "The Secret Diary of AB"
Review: I enjoyed Robin Maxwell's first book "The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn" and I was excited to learn that a sequel was in the works. However, upon reading this book I was sorely disappointed. The first thing that made my feelings towards this book sour was not the fact that the author stretched and challenged Elizabethan history, but that she did so without considering the character of Elizabeth she had made in her first novel. Elizabeth in "The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn" is headstrong, thoughtful and deep. The Elizabeth you are shown is this book is quarrelsome, selfish and annoying. "Robin" Dudley is also a detestable character once you get down to it. If the whole concept of this book is supposed to be their love the reader should at least like one of the two lovers. But these two characters give you nothing to latch onto from the very start of "The Queen's Bastard." Then we must meet this "bastard" in the form of Arthur who does very little to make you interested in the direction any of the three take in life. The diary entries are assigned to Arthur in this book with interjections of the story of Elizabeth and Robin. These entries are boring and go on endlessly without any reason to enjoy reading them. The plot of Elizabeth and Robin is so cheaply written it belongs in a grocery store aisle. If this wasn't bad enough you can't follow the plot well enough to build any kind of motivation or characterization for Elizabeth, Robin or Arthur. I could not and would not finish this book after I read a passage of several pages about Arthur's butt being sore. The gross and strangely worded sex scenes didn't hurt this book; it was already beyond all measures of a novel gone wrong. I cannot guarantee that you will not like this book but don't expect it to measure up in any way to "The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn" and do not look to this book for anything other than a romance novel of a slightly (and I must stress slightly) historic kind. Robin Maxwell can and has done much, much better than "The Queen's Bastard."
Rating:
Summary: Still trying to finish it....
Review: I have about fifty more pages until I am done with this book; it's taken me more than a month to get to this place! I love historical fiction and devour anything about English history, so after reading "The Secret Dairy of Anne Boleyn" I couldn't wait to get my hands on this sequel (the possibility of an illegitimate royal heir is intriguing). I'm having a hard time finding the desire to read on to the ending; at this point it has dragged on so long that I just don't care. I have to agree with other reviews when they state that the chapters devoted to Arthur Dudley's dairy entries are boring. The endless descriptions of war, spying and fighting (approximately the last quarter of the book)are monotonous and just plain uninteresting. I so eagerly look forward to the chapters devoted to Elizabeth, but there are few towards the end and they almost all have to do with war. And one chapter had something to do with a weird supernatural pagan ceremony encouraging Elizabeth and Robin Dudley to have "relations" for the sake of saving England in the war-bizarre and unnecessary!! It started out well enough, but has turned into a slow-moving war epic - not my cup of tea. On a positive note, as inaccurate as many say this story is, I have learned a great deal about English history during this time. And for good measure, I probably will finish those last 50 pages...and then sell the book to a secondhand bookstore!
Rating: 
Summary: Intriguing . . . and possible!
Review: I love books that take history and suggest something that is not what the history books tell us, yet is presented in such a plausible manner that you cannot help but think, "What if?" "The Queen's Bastard" is such a book, suggesting as it does that a love child was born to the Virgin Queen, Elizabeth I.
I found the story fascinating, moving as it does through so many historical settings and describing them as I might have seen them then. I adore the descriptions of people, fashions, customs, meals, all of which pull the book together and enmesh the reader in the world of Elizabethan England.
I confess, my favorite summer activity is going to Renaissance Faires, and I adore the Elizabethan period, so perhaps my viewpoint is skewed. But if you are the same, grab this book for a good read, though you may wish to start with its predecessor, and read the two straight through.
Happy reading!
Rating:
Summary: It is written in the highest form of storytelling.
Review: I love this book. Forget the plot, which is great, and look at the style it was written in. It is as if you, the reader, was actually there. I was happily surprised when I started to read the novel expecting something dry and without flow and getting a seperate world that I could be part of. A great read.
Rating:
Summary: Fabulous historical novel!
Review: I loved this novel! Robin Maxwell is a master stroyteller and has triumphed with this book. I started reading the book on Thursday and finished it Sunday, as I could not put it down! I like her premise, the plot is intelligent, her characterizations of all the historical characters is right on--I was impressed. I agree with the other reviewer who would like another novel on the further adventures of Arthur Dudley. I have immersed myself in the history of Tudor England since age 8. I have read every intelligent historical novel I could get my hands on about the period. Plus, I have a master's degree in British history. So I consider myseslf an expert on the subject. This novel was hands-down one of the best I have ever read.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent!
Review: I read this book before i read any others in the series. I could not put it down from the moment i opened it! in fact, once finished, i went and bought every other book i could find by Robin Maxwell. She had me believing that this bastard child existed through the whole thing. I highly recommend it to anyone whether they have a specific interest in the period or not, it is an excellent book.
Rating: 
Summary: An OK Read
Review: I realize this book is fiction, but that it MAY have some basis in fact (due to some slight mentionings of Arthur Dudley in other biographical information). However, I thought this book was very well written, a good sequel to "the Secret Diary," as it mentions the diary throughout the book. I did think that the battles at the end just drug on & on...I just wanted to get to the meat of the story. The author did leave the ending open enough (I thought) to write another follow up book on the rest of Arthur's life. All in all, a good read & I would highly recommend it
Rating: 
Summary: A Whole New Light
Review: I realize this book is fiction, but that it MAY have some basis in fact (due to some slight mentionings of Arthur Dudley in other biographical information). However, I thought this book was very well written, a good sequel to "the Secret Diary," as it mentions the diary throughout the book. I did think that the battles at the end just drug on & on...I just wanted to get to the meat of the story. The author did leave the ending open enough (I thought) to write another follow up book on the rest of Arthur's life. All in all, a good read & I would highly recommend it
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