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ravensandlace's review against another edition
informative
medium-paced
4.0
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One of my goals for 2020 (besides finishing up any series I’ve started) is branching out my reading. I want to read more diverse books and I want to read books about different time periods besides the same ones I always read about. Normally I stick with King Henry VIII and Russian Tzar time periods. And while I love those time periods, you can honestly only read so much about them before you start getting things repeated.
In my attempt to clear out books I already own, I decided to read about Queen Victoria, one of the longest ruling monarchs of the United Kingdom. I’ve read only one previous book about her so I decided to give another book about her a shot. It fits my goal of wanting to read about different time periods so I figured why not?
This book, Victoria, is about the first few years of her rule. There clearly was a lot of work involved with this book, which is something I can appreciate. I always like to acknowledge when an author puts in a lot of time to make sure their book is as historically accurate as possible. But the reason for the 3 (three) stars had to do with Victoria herself.
Now I don't know if she was childish in real life like she was in this book. But wow, reading this book, was painful at times. Victoria was so childish! I’m amazed she was able to keep her throne. She threw so many tantrums. I was constantly told about how she wanted to rule and she was going to be a good ruler for her people but man, she sure didn’t act like it. She was prone to going through fits and refusing to do any important work if something didn’t go her way. Honestly, that was frustrating to read. It didn’t help that the book was written so impersonally, almost like a biography. I told things more than I was shown.
Overall, this wasn’t a terrible book. I’m still very interested in learning more about Victoria and I’m still interested in more of this author’s work. I just had a lot of issues with Victoria herself and the way this book was written.
Content Warnings
Minor: Blood, Bullying, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Grief, Sexism, and Terminal illness
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