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3.0 AVERAGE
3.0 AVERAGE
This book's subject matter is really interesting - the first ever comparative study of reigning female monarchs in European history. Unfortunately, Monter's writing style is super-boring. The book combines comparative sections where he draws conclusions about female kings in general with their individual biographies. He has a tendency, when writing comparatively, to talk about rulers without mentioning their names, which makes it hard to keep track of who is who. Ultimately, I learned a lot from reading this, but it took me months to push through the whole thing.
A cool concept, but I found it very dry and difficult to get through.
It was interesting to read about all the more unknown sovereigns, but it covers a breadth of time that makes it difficult to cover any of them with depth. The lack of depth also makes it a little dry for most people's taste. A lot of this is based on coins and numismatics. The back has some recommendations on further readings where they exist, but this book is kind of like an appetizer to a nonexistent entree because now I want more about some of these women but no English sources exist.