The Wars of the Roses: The Fall of the Plantagenets and the Rise of the Tudors

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The writing is excellent as you'd expect from Dan Jones but as others have said, it is complicated to follow at times as so many of the men had the same names in those days. This wouldn’t have been a problem if Henry VI was as strong as his father, but alas, as king was very weak, which meant that he needed help to rule his kingdoms. Jones is a born storyteller, peopling the terrifying uncertainties of each moment with a superbly drawn cast of characters and powerfully evoking the brutal realities of civil war. When the Duke of York runs away to avoid a fight at Ludlow we find his wife abandoned at the castle with her two youngest sons, aged nine, and seven.

While the author does a good job describing the many battles, including the major ones of Wakefield, Towton, and of course Bosworth, they are not his main focus.I get that Dan Jones knows a lot more than me, I’m just increasingly fed up with so much stuff getting written off as ‘Tudor propaganda’ when I’m not entirely sure there’s much evidence for it. I felt this was a solid 4 star read and whould recommend it to any one interested in English or Medieval history.

If you're a fan of Game of Thrones or The Tudors then Dan Jones' swashbucklingly entertaining slice of medieval history will be right up your alley. And it is hard not to say the same for this very readable installment that he has produced on the madness that was the Wars of The Roses. This entry was posted in Book review, Edward IV, Elizabeth of York, Elizabeth Woodville, Henry VI, Henry VII, Lancaster, Plantagenet, Richard II, Tudor, Wars of the Roses, York and tagged .One of Henry VI’s earliest advisers, William de la Pole, Duke of Suffolk, was blamed for the loss of Normandy and ended his days on Dover beach, his head stuck on a pole next to its truncated corpse.