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amylikestoread's review against another edition
3.0
Weir's books are a bit hit and miss for me, sometimes I really enjoy them and sometimes I don't. I found this one a bit dry and I found myself losing interest around halfway through. I'm personally not a massive fan of having the various letters and poems included in their entirety, for some reason I just don't enjoy them. As the book went on there were several sections just containing the letters with little analysis from Weir. While it was interesting to find out about Margaret, I had no idea who she was prior to reading this book, it still didn't keep me engaged throughout. This book did have slightly more from Margaret herself compared to other works by Weir where there is often little source material from the person she's writing about (ie Elizabeth of York), unfortunately due to the time periods, so there was a little less of the "might have" felts. However it was still like many of Weir's other works in the sense that it was more about the political climate around her rather than about Margaret herself and when the focus moved away from her it lost my interest. I will still continue to read Weirs books as she does write about some of the more unknown figures and I use them as a springboard into other works about said figures.
unsolvedmysteries1's review against another edition
challenging
informative
sad
tense
slow-paced
3.5
This book was slow going to read as many poems, letters and lists are included. It was very informative, however. I knew very little about Margaret Douglas, even though she played a vital role in politics and was related to so many Royals.
jenny_mac's review against another edition
4.0
An interesting insight into the life of Margaret Lennox. Easy to read, although the pacing felt strange at times, this might just have been because I was dipping in and out of the hardback. Weir put La Lennox in context, and she certainly lived in interesting times which she did her best to shape. Once again I'm in awe of Dorothy Dunnett's research.
pocketvolcano's review against another edition
5.0
Alison Weir is one of my favorite authors. She does meticulous research on every topic she writes on, and this book is no exception. It was fascinating reading and discovering Lady Margaret Douglas and just how influential in Tudor politics she was. It's a story full of tragedy and ultimate triumph as her grandson became the first monarch of Scotland and England. Definitely a book to recommend for anyone interested in the Tudors and English monarchy overall.
desiree_mcl's review against another edition
3.0
I never thought I'd say that an historical book had too much information.
Well, I'm saying it now. There was a lot of good and interesting information but there was so much of it that it all ended up pretty muddled, I can barely explain the major events let alone some of the smaller events in Margaret's life.
Some portions were very repetitive as well. I don't really want to hear the phrase 'the equivalent of (insert amount) today' any more. It was said a lot, if I had to take a shot every time that phrase was said I would be drunk in ten minutes, especially with the 1 or 2 pages where it seemed like it was at least a page of 5-8 times of that phrase was used.
And I listened to this on audio. The narrator was good when she used her normal voice, when she tried to do all the different voices was when it wasn't working for me. And there were a lot of different voices because there was a lot of quotes used in this novel.
Well, I'm saying it now. There was a lot of good and interesting information but there was so much of it that it all ended up pretty muddled, I can barely explain the major events let alone some of the smaller events in Margaret's life.
Some portions were very repetitive as well. I don't really want to hear the phrase 'the equivalent of (insert amount) today' any more. It was said a lot, if I had to take a shot every time that phrase was said I would be drunk in ten minutes, especially with the 1 or 2 pages where it seemed like it was at least a page of 5-8 times of that phrase was used.
And I listened to this on audio. The narrator was good when she used her normal voice, when she tried to do all the different voices was when it wasn't working for me. And there were a lot of different voices because there was a lot of quotes used in this novel.
babblinglib's review against another edition
4.0
Another excellent Tudor biography by Alison Weir. Margaret had an amazing life. She managed to tick off both Henry VIII and Elizabeth I and live to tell about it. In the end she had a lot of tragedy (much brought on by her own scheming) but as she hoped, but never saw, her grandson took the throne. I love the historical detail of Weir's books. Even though all we know of these people is from small scraps of letters and documents from archives, she manages to make them real.
sammilittlejohns's review against another edition
2.0
Im so sorry, but this book was so hard to read. I found there was just too many facts and too much information and context, and honestly not all of it relevant. It felt as if this was a book about the time featuring a bit about Margaret Douglas. I found it such a drudge to get through, really not my preferred style of biography. There just wasn't much focus about Margaret Douglas, and I came away not really knowing much more about her.