My Enemy the Queen [Import] [Paperback]

Victoria Holt (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Fontana Press; Reprinted Ed edition (January 29, 1987)
• ISBN-10: 0006164501
• ISBN-13: 978-0006164500
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,129,607 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Two is company, three is a crowd, but when one is the virgin queen? Oh boy., November 25, 2005

By 

Lilly Flora "by Lilo Drandoff" (Portland, OR) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: My Enemy the Queen (Hardcover)

I have to say, it's kind of sad that history has all but forgotten Lettice Knollys. She was, according to this book, one of the most vibrant and influential people of the day. But she also made a terrible enemy of her queen, perhaps explaining why more people don't know about her.

Everyone who knows something about Queen Elizabeth I knows that she loved a man named Robert Dudley, a man she gave great honors to and had known all her life. Some historians even believe that he killed her wife so he could marry the queen, and that they may have had a son together. But Elizabeth remained unmarried all her days (and supposedly a virgin) while Dudley had two wives in his life.

The second was Lettice. She was the Queen's cousin and possible her niece as her mother was popularly believed to be Henry VIII's daughter through Mary Boleyn. She came to court when Elizabeth came to the crown and soon fell in love with Robert Dudley. Later they would become lovers and eventually marry. But always it was a relationship of three people, the Queen, Robert and Lettice. Later on, the Queen would give her son from her a previous marriage great honors, and eventually was forced to behead him when he led an uprising against the crown. In that relationship too was the Queen, Lettice's son the earl of Essex, and Lettice.

This book is her story. It's a little dry at times, being a supposed memoir Lettice writes before her death at the age of ninety six, but overall not bad. I do like to think of Robert Dudley as an entirely different person as described in this book, but hey, this was the authors vision and if she saw him as grabbing for power (which he was, true) and not truly loving Elizabeth for herself not just for the crown, that's her choice.

The only bad thing about this book is the most annoying way Lettice constantly says how beautiful she is and how she's so much prettier than the queen and all men love her and bla bla bla. It gets old fast. But hey, a vain women would probably write her life story like that.

Other than that, I just like to view Elizabeth and Dudley in a more romantic way then this book does. Possibly I'm deluding myself. But if you're like me, then read this, because its not a story I was familiar with and I bet most people aren't either, and then read the secret Diary of Anne Boleyn, for the very sweet scenes between Elizabeth and Dudley (part of the book takes place right after Elizabeth becomes Queen).

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating historical novel covers the life of Elizabeth I., July 29, 2003

By 

Beth Cholette "doctor_beth" (Upstate NY USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: My Enemy the Queen (Hardcover)

This is a captivating novel that follows the life of Elizabeth I from her innocent girlhood to her eventual death as a never-married queen. The story is solidly based on actual events and people, from the book's narrator, Lettice, to the Queen's suitors, Robert Dudley and Robert Devereaux. The story is told from the point of view of Lettice, a cousin of the Queen's on the Boleyn side who is a rival for Robert Dudley's (Earl of Leicester) affections and who eventually becomes his wife. Lettice's son from her first marriage, Robert Devereaux (Earl of Essex), grows up to become himself a favorite of the Queen's, a situation not without complications. With some poetic license, the engaging stories of these characters/historial figures are set against the compelling backdrop of Elizabethean England; a wonderful read.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The court of Elizabeth I from another viewpoint, October 9, 2006

By 

Misfit (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: My Enemy, The Queen (Mass Market Paperback)

Interesting read, I was fascinated to learn more about Lettice Knowles. From previous books I have read about the period, I had heard Lettice's name occasionally, and knew there was some speculation about whether or not Henry VIII fathered her mother during his affair with Mary Boleyn. We'll never know.

All in all an enjoyable read - not the greatest in the historical fiction genre, but worthwhile to learn more about the secondary players in the times of Elizabeth I.