Six Wives: The Queens of Henry VIII - Softcover

"A tribute to Starkey's narrative drive, his puckish wit and sharp discrimination" (Sunday Times)

"Relentlessly scholarly...Starkey's is the best study of Henry's wives ever published... A masterly and persuasive narrative which never loses its grip over the story or the reader" (Evening Standard)

"High-powered history pithily expressed... This study of Henry VIII's women shows David Starkey at his best" (Sunday Telegraph)

"So gripping that one finishes it wishing it were even longer... The punchy style adopted by Starkey is perfectly suited to the story he has to tell" (Mail on Sunday)

"Starkey keeps the narrative alive with a combination of sound chronology, peppery opinion and startling detail... Six Wives provides an intriguing new perspective on this key period in English history" (Daily Telegraph)

Divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived

CATHERINE OF ARAGON: the pious Spanish Catholic who suffered years of miscarriages and failed to produce a male heir...
ANNE BOLEYN: the pretty, clever, French-educated Protestant whose marriage to Henry changed England forever...
JANE SEYMOUR: the demure and submissive contrast to Anne Boleyn's radical and vampish style...
ANNE OF CLEVES: 'the mare of Flanders' whose short marriage to the overweight Henry followed a farcical 'beauty contest'...
CATHERINE HOWARD: the flirtatious teenager whose adulteries made a fool of the ageing king... CATHERINE PARR: the shrewd, religiously radical bluestocking who outlived him...

In this dazzling study, David Starkey gives us a richly textured picture of daily life at the Tudor Court from the woman's point of view. Above all, he establishes the interaction of the private and the public, and demonstrates how the Queens of Henry VIII were central in determining political policy.