Bring Up the Bodies - Book Review/Synopsis


Bring Up the Bodies
Written by Hilary Mantel
407 pages


This is a historical novel set in England in 1535 about King Henry VIII’s efforts to rid himself of his wife Anne Boleyn, told from the perspective of Thomas Cromwell, Secretary to the King. Mantel regales us skillfully in a world of wealth, greed, subterfuge, court intrigue, and absolute power. It’s good to be king. It’s also good to be Thomas Cromwell.

Mantel’s Cromwell is a complex man, a master strategist, a collector of intelligence, a man of great loyalties whose purpose is to serve his king. And acquire plenty of personal wealth in the process.

Cromwell spins a web of treasonous evidence around Anne and it’s off with her head, (along with her five convicted paramours.)

That’s the synopsis. Mantel tells it so well. I enjoyed the book greatly and plan to read "Wolf Hall" the first in the Cromwell series.

But it was hard to remember that while fictionalized, these were real people. Maybe it’s the dragon.   Maybe too much "Game of Thrones" imitating life. 
St. George slays the dragon.  St. George's feast day celebrated in the time of Henry VIII and today.   

Thomas Cromwell, c 1485 – July 28 1540, executed for treason by Henry VIII on his wedding day to wife number five, Catherine Howard, (later beheaded for infidelity.) Methinks ole Henry wasn’t too skilled in the sack.

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