Innocent Traitor: A Novel of Lady Jane Grey (Hardcover)

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Popular biographer Weir (Eleanor of Aquitaine, etc.) makes her historical fiction debut with this coming-of-age novel set in the time of Henry VIII. Weir's heroine is Lady Jane Grey (1537–1554), whose ascension to the English throne was briefly and unluckily promoted by opponents of Henry's Catholic heir, Mary. As Weir tells it, Jane's parents, the Marquess and Marchioness of Dorset, groom her from infancy to be the perfect consort for Henry's son, Prince Edward, entrusting their daughter to a nurse's care while they attend to affairs at court. Jane relishes lessons in music, theology, philosophy and literature, but struggles to master courtly manners as her mother demands. Not even the beheadings of Anne Boleyn and Katherine Howard deter parental ambition. When Edward dies, Lord and Lady Dorset maneuver the throne for their 16-year-old daughter, risking her life as well as increased violence between Protestants and Catholics. Using multiple narrators, Weir tries to weave a conspiratorial web with Jane caught at the center, but the ever-changing perspectives prove unwieldy: Jane speaking as a four-year-old with a modern historian's vocabulary, for example, just doesn't ring true. But Weir proves herself deft as ever describing Tudor food, manners, clothing, pastimes (including hunting and jousting) and marital politics. (Mar.)
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From The Washington Post

Reviewed by Ron Charles

After publishing 10 works of history about the kings and queens of England, Alison Weir has come over to the dark side and written a novel. The process, she says, "filled me with a heady sense of freedom," but clearly that appraisal is based on the Historian's Heady Sense of Freedom Index, which runs from 1 (using colored note cards) to 10 (hiding in the library after hours). Innocent Traitor is an enormously entertaining novel to read, but writing it was obviously a process of painstaking research, the same sort of hard work that resulted in Weir's bestselling history The Six Wives of Henry VIII. What's different this time is her decision to write about Queen Jane -- England's briefest monarch -- in the voices of the participants. The result is an engrossing story that's suspenseful even though we know poor Jane will end up on the chopping block at 16, one of the first of Bloody Mary's many victims.

The novel rotates through a small collection of narrators, starting with Jane's bitter mother on the day in 1537 when she goes into labor. Jane doesn't emerge from the womb reading Latin, but almost. She quickly grows into an exceptionally, even weirdly, brilliant girl, who struggles to be obedient while remaining true to herself. Any parent might be thrown by a 4-year-old who says, "I must above all remember that each meal is like the Last Supper, so I must eat with as goodly manners as if I were in the company of Our Blessed Lord Himself." But the mean treatment Jane endures from her parents shocks even the family's servants and friends. Jane's mother, as the niece of Henry VIII, is in a position to build a powerful house, but she needs a son, and her failure to produce one makes her impatient and cruel.

The importance of male heirs was, of course, a foundation of this patriarchal society. The disappointment that Jane's parents feel is just a small version of the king-sized anxiety that Henry VIII feels in the boudoir. An intimate scene of the bloated, ulcerated monarch making one last flaccid attempt with his sixth and final wife, Katherine Parr, will put most readers out of the mood for weeks. But Katherine emerges as one of the novel's most fascinating narrators. She comes into the story when Jane's parents send her to live with the royal family in a craven effort to boost their standing. Long deprived of maternal affection, Jane adores the queen, who secretly encourages the girl's radical Protestant ideas and gives her a crash course in surviving the ecclesiastical tensions tearing England part. Who better to teach her than a queen married to a serial wife-killer? Katherine knows the importance of quick denials and heartfelt pleas, but, sadly, this is one lesson Jane will never learn.

Even before the king is dead, Jane's parents and the maniacal duke of Northumberland scheme to subvert the law of succession and drag Jane to the throne as queen. Alternately beating her and appealing to her religious idealism, they succeed -- but only for nine precarious days before Henry VIII's Catholic daughter, Mary, revives her own claim to the throne and begins wrenching England back toward Rome.

This complicated history sweeps along in a remarkably accessible way -- always exciting, always engaging. And the use of multiple voices -- each clearly named and dated -- keeps us at the center of every new outrageous plot twist. You'll be tempted to guffaw at these events, but Weir anticipates that skepticism in a witty author's note: "Some parts of the book may seem far-fetched," she writes. "They are the parts most likely to be based on fact."

What ultimately seems far-fetched, though, is not the ax-wielding murderer who bursts through a wall or the use of arsenic to prolong young King Edward's gruesome death; it's each character's complete self-knowledge and candor. Weir has given these people a strong dose of truth serum and set them down in front of a bright light. No matter how conniving, proud, foolish or deluded they may be with each other, they speak to us without a hint of dramatic irony, clearly and honestly explaining their actions and motives. What's gained in historical clarity comes at the cost of psychological depth, as though, after spending decades laying out the complexities of British history, Weir were unwilling to create characters who would consciously or unconsciously mislead us or who might not fully realize why they behave as they do.

But ambiguity may be too much to ask for from such an enthralling story. You can't resist Jane -- so young, so brilliant, so cruelly used and sacrificed. In the nine days' queen, Weir has found a fascinating and deeply sympathetic figure through which to examine one of the strangest crises of British history.

Copyright 2007, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Ballantine Books (February 27, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0345494857
• ISBN-13: 978-0345494856
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (109 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #300,805 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

50 of 52 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Not bad at all for a first novel-and you can count on the facts all being correct!, April 28, 2007

By	Lilly Flora "by Lilo Drandoff" (Portland, OR) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

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I was both thrilled and slightly apprehensive when I heard that Alison Weir was publishing her first novel. I was thrilled because she has long been one of my favorite historical writers (especially when it comes to the Tudor era) and her books have always been extremely readable, leading me to think she might be a good fiction writer. I was also thrilled because of the subject matter, Lady Jane Grey, the Nine day Queen of England who is easily one of the most interesting and tragic figures of the Tudor age; yet very few fictional books have been written about her. I was apprehensive because I theorized (correctly it turned out) that as a writer who has previously only published non-fiction it seemed that Ms. Weir might have a tendency to be dry and not emotionally expressive in her fictional writing.

Nonetheless for a first novel this a very good book, packed with historical detail (you'd expect nothing less from this author) and various first person viewpoints (mostly female) including: Jane Grey, Frances Brandon (her mother) Mrs. Ellen (her nurse), Queen Catherine Parr, Mary Tudor and John Dudley the Duke of Northumberland. Each person has a very distinctive voice and so the story varies from being told from a cynical viewpoint to a religious one, from a loving nurse to a harsh ambitious parent.

You get a great feel in this book for Jane's life as the unwanted daughter of highly ambitious parent's desperate for a son who compromised by trying their whole lives to marry her off to the boy King Edward. It didn't matter that they made her miserable in their quest to make her a perfect royal bride. And then of course King Edward dies and John Dudley, desperate for power to stay in his hands as he enjoyed it as president of the King's council, changes the succession so Jane (who's maternal grandmother was Henry's little sister) is heir and marries Dudley's youngest son. You know of course, what happens next. Jane is queen for nine days, Mary escapes the planned capture and recaptures her throne without a battle, and eventually Jane is beheaded for her crime.

What's really interesting about this book isn't the history (well it wasn't for me, but I already knew it all) it's the underlying religious debate. In the book the country goes from being semi-catholic after Henry VIII cut off from Rome (but before they were Protestant) to Protestant, to having a Catholic queen and all the time religious fanatics are in charge. King Edward was one, for the Protestants, as was Jane. In fact if someone met Jane Grey today I suspect she would be intolerable because of her "I have the true religion and yours is false" belief system. There was no tolerance back then.

All in all this is a good book, the history is great, the background culture put in place to understand the history was great and the voices were all very distinct. But like I said earlier-there is a lack of emotion, certain dryness in this book. In spite of the highly charged emotional settings and happenings in this book I had a hard time connecting with the characters.

Four stars. And I do hope Ms. Weir writes more novels in the future-unlike other historical fiction authors you can count on the facts in her books being correct.

39 of 47 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A first novel by a longtime historian in Innocent Traitor., March 2, 2007

By	Rebecca Huston "telynor" (On the Banks of the Hudson) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

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Longtime history author Alison Weir has taken on one of the more tragic tales of Tudor kings and queens in her latest work, Innocent Traitor, which takes a close look at the Nine Days Queen, Lady Jane Grey.

The story starts with two women in childbirth. The first is a highborn lady, Frances Grey, who is desperately wishing for a son after her first two children have died. But it's a girl, and Frances has nothing but disappointment and bitterness for the child, and is more than happy to give her over to the care of a nurse, Mrs. Ellen. The other woman is none other than Henry VIII's third wife, Jane Seymour, who finally gives birth to the King's prayed for son, Edward. But Queen Jane dies within weeks of her child's birth, and Frances notes that there might be a link between the two infant children, and she names her daughter Jane in honor of the late queen.

We first see Jane through the eyes of her mother, and Mrs. Ellen. Mrs. Ellen is devoted to her charge, and tries to make life as bearable as possible for Jane, who not only is precociously bright, but is subjected to physical abuse by her parents, and at best, indifference. Both Frances and her husband, Henry Grey, the Marquess of Dorset, are ruthlessly ambitious and see their daughter as something to use, and treat her with behavior that today would be called mental and emotional abuse. Frances in particular sees nothing wrong with slapping, pinching and whipping her daughter whenever poor Jane makes a mistake, and the only time the child has any comfort is when she travels to the King's court.

It's here that the novel starts to fall into place. Young Jane, with her Tudor colouring of red hair and grey blue eyes is a favorite of her great-uncle, the king, and his last wife, the scholarly Katherine Parr. Jane finds in the Queen a kindred spirit and a kindly woman who only wants Jane to be happy. For Jane, it is a blessed respite from the torments of her family home, and she also makes the aquaitance of the king's two daughters, Mary and Elizabeth. Mary is ferverently Catholic and while she treats Jane kindly, Jane is more than a little wary of her. Elizabeth is bold, clever and Jane finds that she can discuss politics and philosophy with her, but also finds that she's far more risk taking, especially when King Henry dies, and Queen Katherine starts turning her attention to a former suitor, Thomas Seymour.

Thomas Seymour is blindly jealous of his elder brother, now Lord Protector for the new King, a boy of nine years. Thomas not only tries to woo Queen Katherine, but also Mary and Elizabeth, and it seems, even young Jane. But for Jane, he has a different destiny in mind -- a possible wedding to the young king. And Jane finds herself caught up in royal politics, and in lover's secrets, and soon enough is set on a path that will make her a legend...

Despite knowing quite well how Lady Jane's story is going to turn out, I found this to be an exciting read. Alison Weir uses her extensive research into the history and private lives of England's Tudor dynasty to tell a story of family betrayal that is heartbreaking to say the very least. Each person in the story, from Jane, her mother Frances, the Lady Mary, Katherine Parr, the Dudley and Seymour families, and even Mrs. Ellen, has a voice here. Each one is distinct and has their own mannerisms, and we get to see motivations and plots spinning. Weir also focuses on just enough details to set the mood, but sometimes overuses a phrase -- courtiers, for example, are nearly always "peacock" -- but also takes care not to let the story itself get lost in the trivia.

But if the reader thinks that this is a dry read, it's not. That's what I was surprised with, and Weir keeps the story moving at a rapid pace, shifting point of view from one character to another. At times the story gets dizzying and at first the use of first-person-narrative for the voice gets hard to keep track of. It's not an easy style to use, but Weir manages to pull it off, and by the middle to the end of the story, I had hardly any trouble with it at all.

Summing up, if you want an exciting historical novel with a heroine who actually lived, I would suggest this one. While it doesn't have actual romance to it, or at least romance that isn't being motivated by polical scheming, it does have plenty of plot to chew over. Jane may come off as a little, self-righteous prig by the end of the story, but you can still feel sympathy for her right up to the very end.

Two nonfiction biographies about Lady Jane Grey and her family have been published, one by Mary M. Luke, and the other by Alison Plowden. There has also been a film, "Lady Jane" that takes some liberties with the relationship between Jane and Guilford Dudley, but is also very close in feel to the book.

Recommended.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Unlucky Lady, September 18, 2007

By	Linda "katknit" (CT, United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

"A beautiful daughter, my lady," announces the midwife uncertainly. "Healthy and vigorous." I should be joyful, thanking God for the safe arrival of a lusty child. Instead, my spirits plummet. All this-for nothing.

So begins the story of Lady Jane Grey. Historian and gifted author Alison Weir, in her first foray into the realm of fiction, has brought the world of Tudor England vividly alive in her version of the events that took place after the death of Henry VIII. Through first person narratives by Jane herself and a number of the other central characters, Jane's brief, tragic life unfolds. Known today as the Nine Days Queen, this maltreated girl was the innocent, unwilling pawn of her parents' political ambitions and victim of the vicious religious conflict that tore England apart during the 16th century. All the pageantry, plotting, and maneuvering of the royal court swirls around Jane as she grows, until the age of 15 when she is horrified to find that she has been declared Queen of England in place of the rightful heir, the Catholic (soon to be "Bloody") Mary. Vibrant characters, a plot that's hard to believe but true, and accurate period detail make this first novel an enthralling page-turner.

If Jane had been the hoped-for son , would her fate have been different? Would her brother's? Somehow, with the the Marquess and Marchioness of Dorset as parents, that's doubtful. The dearth of male heirs was a plague on the house of Tudor.