A review by underwaterlily
Katharine Parr: The Sixth Wife by Alison Weir

4.0

I’m reading Alison Weir’s Tudor Queens series out of order. (I started with Katheryn Howard, The Scandalous Queen.) Katharine Parr, the Sixth Wife was published in 2020; as a result, I see parallels between depicted outbreaks of sweating sickness and the COVID-19 pandemic. Katharine’s story is a sad one, losing her father early on to the sweat. She then loses two husbands, her mother, and a beloved stepdaughter, all to various sixteenth century illnesses. Katharine mourns the children she fears she’ll never have, along with her first real love, the rakish Thomas Seymour, whom she gives up in order to marry Henry VIII. The tyrant-king is surprisingly kind to Katharine, and she grows fond of him, though she's aware he could execute her at any moment—for her past romance, for her secret Protestant faith, or because it's Tuesday. She has enemies at court, including a powerful Catholic bishop, Stephen Gardiner. When Henry VIII dies, Katharine isn't informed for several days. She realizes she's lost the opportunity to take charge of young King Edward's education, but she delights in the freedom to finally marry her great love. Alas, Katharine gains even more enemies (including the Princess Mary) for remarrying so soon after Henry VIII's death. Thomas Seymour cheats on her, of course (with Princess Elizabeth, no less), and Katharine ultimately dies giving birth to her longed-for first child, a daughter, Mary, now lost to history. My heart aches for this long-dead queen.