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lib_07's review against another edition
2.0
Having read Alison Weir's great book "The Six Wives of Henry VIII", I was really looking forward to reading this. Unfortunately, I was disappointed. This book proves that there is too little information available to make a complete biography of Mary Boleyn. Instead of learning about Mary, the book becomes more about the people around her. There is a lot of pages devoted to her birth, who was first: Mary or Anne, etc. This book had a lot of potential, but, sadly, it didn't live up.
bdzimmerman15's review
4.0
I have always loved Mary, ever since I read The Other Boleyn Girl. When I read this, I was so surprised to find out how much I truly didn’t know about Mary. What a biography. Well, as much as it could be. It was nice to hear about her, her life and all the stuff that she went through. It was an interesting book. One full of research and hard work to truly represent the story of Mary’s life and I’m appreciative of that. What a woman Mary was. Much more than her stories would ever tell you! I truly enjoyed this look into her life.
sidewalk_pirate's review against another edition
1.0
I understand, there is not much evidence to find about Mary. As interesting as it would be to learn more about this elusive person. She rubbed elbows with many great people in history. I would love to know what she thought about most of them, what her impressions were, what she thought about her own life and how she felt her family treated her.
Alas, it is not to be!
One is already used to Mrs. Weir contradicting herself within the same page of her own books, nothing new in this department also here in this book. Furthermore, the padding (desperately necessary in a book about a person where so little is known) is utterly irrelevant! The padding is not even about Mary, or her contemporaries! It is pages upon pages about improvements to the diverse manor houses and castles her family owned, made by her GRANDFATHER. Or Pages on which child was born first (ok, this is rather a point about Mary, I give you that, but the "proof" Mrs. Weir cites for her theory is utterly laughable!)
Mary is an interesting personality, however Mrs. Weir managed to make her sound utterly boring and redundant! I think this book has done poor Mary more harm then good. She has not only been overlooked by history, but evidently also by her attempted biographer, Mrs. Weir.
Save your money, do yourself a favor and read something less aggravating and ANY of Mrs Weir's books! This was not the first one I attempted. I have the same problem with ALL of her books. After a few pages I fin myself arguing out loud with the incredible audacity of Mrs. Weir's theories and the haphazard way she "proofs" them.
I am -by no means- a historian, or even what I would consider to be a expert in any way, shape or form, but I do recognize a bad book when I see one! There are much better books on the Tudors out there, albeit none about Mary at all and after having a look at this book, it should be clear why there haven't been previous attempts and why there should not be any more, unless new material is discovered about her.
Alas, it is not to be!
One is already used to Mrs. Weir contradicting herself within the same page of her own books, nothing new in this department also here in this book. Furthermore, the padding (desperately necessary in a book about a person where so little is known) is utterly irrelevant! The padding is not even about Mary, or her contemporaries! It is pages upon pages about improvements to the diverse manor houses and castles her family owned, made by her GRANDFATHER. Or Pages on which child was born first (ok, this is rather a point about Mary, I give you that, but the "proof" Mrs. Weir cites for her theory is utterly laughable!)
Mary is an interesting personality, however Mrs. Weir managed to make her sound utterly boring and redundant! I think this book has done poor Mary more harm then good. She has not only been overlooked by history, but evidently also by her attempted biographer, Mrs. Weir.
Save your money, do yourself a favor and read something less aggravating and ANY of Mrs Weir's books! This was not the first one I attempted. I have the same problem with ALL of her books. After a few pages I fin myself arguing out loud with the incredible audacity of Mrs. Weir's theories and the haphazard way she "proofs" them.
I am -by no means- a historian, or even what I would consider to be a expert in any way, shape or form, but I do recognize a bad book when I see one! There are much better books on the Tudors out there, albeit none about Mary at all and after having a look at this book, it should be clear why there haven't been previous attempts and why there should not be any more, unless new material is discovered about her.
shadowkate's review against another edition
3.0
It was a good and interesting look at the life of Mary Boleyn. The first part is a little slow as it talks about who the eldest daughter is and tries to put a birth year on Mary. After that it picks up. Enjoyable if you like historical biographies.
dei2dei's review against another edition
5.0
As always, Weir educates and illuminates with eloquent phrasing, solid arguments, and brings the characters to life while making it an enjoyable read.
clueliss's review against another edition
4.0
Interesting non fiction read about the maligned Boleyn sister.
clotalksbooks's review against another edition
I'm afraid this was a DNF for me 😢 I normally love Alison's books but this one just wasn't going anywhere. Felt it was just about discrediting other writers and talking about other people rather than Mary! I didn't pick this up to learn about her mother, or Anne, or Henry's other mistresses... I wanted to learn about Mary. I listened to 3 hours and feel she was hardly mentioned. I would normally persevere but I have lots of other books I want to listen to.