The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn (Paperback)

~ (Author) "GOD'S DEATH!" roared Elizabeth..." (more)
Key Phrases: waiting ladies, waiting lady, presence chamber, Cardinal Wolsey, Thomas Wyatt, Thomas Seymour (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

This first novel supposes that Anne Boleyn, second wife to King Henry VIII of England, kept a secret diary that was delivered to her daughter, Elizabeth, upon her succession to the throne. Elizabeth was only three when Anne was renounced by Henry, tried for treason, and sentenced to death. Now, despite her queenly schedule, juggling affairs of state and heart, Elizabeth finds time to read her mother's story avidly and learns lessons that will secure her reign. It is an intriguing premise that knowledge of Anne's sad fate leads Elizabeth resolutely to defy the customs of her time and ignore her advisers' counsel and her suitors' pleas to marry. Remaining single and healthy, Elizabeth rules long and well. Filled with fascinating descriptions of court life and references to historical figures and events, this novel is highly recommended for fiction collections.?Sheila M. Riley, Smithsonian Inst. Libs., Washington, D.C.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Kirkus Reviews

An energetic, full-dress period novel, Maxwell's first, constructed from the adventures of Henry VIII's doomed second queen, mother of Elizabeth I of England. Here, a recently crowned Elizabeth finds her dead mother's diary, discovering not only a legacy of maternal love but the idea that Virgin Queens should stay that way. The story blasts off with a Tudorian ``God's death!'' roared by Elizabeth, but Maxwell doesn't generally weigh the narrative down with archaisms. The dutifully noted battles and political skirmishes of the great powers don't interfere with the upward strides (and missteps) of that peppery commoner, Anne Boleyn. Educated in a French court, and later in England, serving Henry's royal-born Queen Katherine, Anne, to her amazement (and greedy father's delight), is pursued by the King (``He loomed so large, those blue and laughing eyes so bright''). Having been separated from the man she really loved, Anne daringly keeps Henry in courtly pursuit--but out of bed--for six years. Meantime, Henry, determined to change queenly partners, uproots his allegiance to the Pope and creates an English church. The King and Anne marry, but now that the Unattainable has become a marital captive--and a queen unable to produce a son--Henry's frustrations (and desires) prod him to turn elsewhere. Death by execution in the Tower will cut short a life in which the stakes and odds were sky-high. Years later, Elizabeth finds in her mother's diary a pointed message: ``Never relinquish control to any man.'' Those fascinated by the Tudors--those magnificent, truly terrifying political animals--may find the characterizations and the language occasionally too modern. But Anne's straight-from-the- stomacher confessions, and Elizabeth's thundering about, should appeal to all fanciers of imagined portraits of Tudor-era heroines, like the late Eleanor Hibbert's (a.k.a. Victoria Holt, Philippa Carr, Jean Plaidy) gallery of royal queens. (Author tour) -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 281 pages
• Publisher: Touchstone; 1st Scribner Paperback edition (May 28, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0684849690
• ISBN-13: 978-0684849690
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (86 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #56,744 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

42 of 45 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars QUEEN ANNE BOLEYN IN HER OWN WORDS, March 17, 2000

By	JOANNE M. MANUEL "Beatle fan" (BAYONNE, NJ United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Secret Diary of Anne Boleyn (Hardcover)

As an avid reader of Tudor biographies with a particular fascination for Queen Anne Boleyn, I approached this historical fiction novel with some skepticism. I was pleasantly surprised and impressed! Not only was it factually accurate, but the best read on Anne Boleyn I've had. This novel is premised on the idea that Anne Boleyn kept a diary from the inception of her romance with King Henry VIII up until the day before her execution. This diary was discreetly given to Anne's daughter Queen Elizabeth I shortly after her coronation. Most of the book is comprised of the chronological diary excerpts, which I ravenously devoured. Robin Maxwell captured the language pattern of these Medieval times so magnificently. As I read Anne Boleyn's heartfelt thoughts it was a most intimate and poignant experience. I fought back tears reading Anne's tender words for the daughter she would never live to see grow up. This fictional but authentically presented diary gives the reader a personal and unique forum to experience this royal trajedy.

41 of 47 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Taken with a grain of salt, January 22, 2001

By	Margaret P Harvey (Charlottesville, Va United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book attempts at going beyond the facts and trying to explore the feelings, emotions and ambitions of people that lived more than four HUNDRED years ago. While historically inaccurate, I found this book to offer something beyond Alison Weir or Antonia Frasier's stellar, but heavily factual, interpretations. If you want to explore with an open mind the story of what could have happened, then read this book. My only beef with this book had to be the awkward love trysts of both Elizabeth and Anne. These passages about the love making of both queens is out of place and unnecessary at best. Also the constant references to Anne Boleyn's sixth finger, a myth that is slightly possible and mostly unlikely, is annoying. Do not read this book if you are expecting a high brow look at the facts, or even a high brow look at this era. But for a little bit of guilty pleasure in believing this is how it was, this (slightly fantastical) version of the story makes everything just tie up so nicely, that you almost want to believe that there was a diary, and that Anne Boleyn did have contact with Elizabeth I beyond the grave. The reviews for this book so far have all been very true, the bad and the good, because the truth is that this book creates mixed feelings. Try it out, but don't buy it until you know that you are ready for something a little different.

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Absolutely BORING!, June 10, 2004

By A Customer

For someone who researched the Tudor dynasty as tirelessly as Robin Maxwell purports, she completely failed to pick up on the importance of character development and scene juxtaposition. I felt absolutely nothing for Anne's scheming and ministrations; neither did I find her antics unutterably selfish or unmitigatingly powerful. She was as unexciting as a bowl of cottage cheese. Still less did I buy the emotional seesawing of Henry VIII. Granted, true history speaks well for the man's fickle nature, but I cannot believe that he, the King of England and head of his own Church, would've placed all of his ample wits and faith into the promises of a son as given by a mere slip of a girl whose pedigree he had to doctor in order for her to be accepted as his worthy bride. Let us give credit to him as the great sovereign his people rightly believed he was. He may have been lustful and duplicitous, but he was never as stupid as Maxwell portrays him. As far as the changing scenes between Elizabeth and the reading of her mother's diary, Elizabeth herself is nothing but a flitting shadow, sneaking off to read the writings in private (she's the Queen; no matter what Maxwell asserts, she did not need to conceal her actions). This novel leaves me cold, bored and desirous for a giant high school textbook on Tudor England. Want real historical fiction with honorable and sentient central figures who live as vividly in the pages as they did in real life? Try Sharon Kay Penman. She beats the historical pants off Robin Maxwell any day.