Kings and Queens of England - Hardcover

Adult/High School-As the subtitle of this attractive title suggests, Lewis's focus is on royal dirt, and she dishes it out in a breezy, sometimes disconcertingly slangy style (who'd have thought Mary Queen of Scots was an "airhead?"). She surprisingly skips William the Conqueror, even though he was illegitimate and had both a questionable claim to the throne and a gory burial-not infamous enough?-and begins with his lesser-known son, William II. Lewis continues chronologically to 2002, quickly summarizing unblemished rulers (Edward I, George VI) in a couple of sentences and concentrating on the dubious and shocking. The book includes genealogy charts and numerous illustrations, although too many are of the old-fashioned Victorian school. Many quotations aren't footnoted, making it impossible to verify the author's contemporary accounts. There are some errors, inconsistencies, and confusions. For a more formal presentation of British royalty, students can refer to John Cannon and Anne Hargreaves's The Kings & Queens of Britain (Oxford, 2001), an appropriately staid reference. Readers who like Lewis's approach, on the other hand, could branch out to Michael Farquhar's A Treasury of Royal Scandals (Penguin, 2001) or Karl Shaw's Royal Babylon (Virgin, 1999), which cover all of Europe (Farquhar also discusses Roman emperors and popes; Shaw limits his material to 1700 forward).-Ann W. Moore, Schenectady County Public Library, NY
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This chronological survey covers a thousand years of English royalty, from the Norman conquest through today's troubled Windsors. According to Lewis, a regular contributor to Royalty magazine, the British royals' "sensational and often lurid past contains deeds so dark and dastardly that they were covered up and remained secret for centuries." Treachery, treason and regicide reign supreme in this account: thus we read of a plot against a kidnapped Richard the Lionheart by his own brother, John; Lambert Simmel's attempt to trick the Tudors out of their crown; and the well-known trouble of Prince Charles and the late Princess Diana. This breezy narrative is spiked with sidebars, such as "Fact or Fiction" (were the young Edward V and his brother murdered in the Tower of London in the late 15th century?) and "Deeds of Power" (Mary, Queen of Scots's angering of her nobles and her own husband, and their bloody revenge). With more than 200 illustrations, this could be an appealing gift for younger readers intrigued by the powerful and intrigue-laden world of royalty.
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