Product Description

The first in a stunning new series, The Cousins War, is set amid the tumult and intrigue of The War of the Roses. Internationally bestselling author Philippa Gregory brings this family drama to colourful life through its women, beginning with the story of Elizabeth Woodville, the White Queen The White Queen tells the story of a common woman who ascends to royalty by virtue of her beauty, a woman who rises to the demands of her position and fights tenaciously for the success of her family, a woman whose two sons become the central figures in a mystery that has confounded historians for centuries: the Princes in the Tower whose fate remains unknown to this day. From her uniquely qualified perspective, Philippa Gregory explores the most famous unsolved mystery, informed by impeccable research and framed by her inimitable storytelling skills.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #335 in Books
• Published on: 2009-08-18
• Released on: 2009-08-18
• Binding: Hardcover
• 400 pages

Review
'Gregory has again given the past the kiss of life'
--Daily Express, 7 August 2009

'This fast-paced and incident-packed read vividly recreates the deperate times of the Wars Of The Roses; all murder and strategy, passion, betrayal, castles and long, sweeping dresses. Of [Elizabeth] Woodville herself, Gregory makes a fascinating heroine; strong, ambitious, vengeful, beautiful and tinged with more than a hint of witchcraft. Popular history at its best.'
--Daily Mail, 21 August 2009

Review
`Robust, unpretentious and rather shamefully compelling'

About the Author
Philippa Gregory was an established historian and writer when she discovered her interest in the Tudor period and wrote the internationally bestselling novel The Other Boleyn Girl. Now she is looking at the family that preceded the Tudors: the magnificent Plantaganets, a family of complex rivalries, loves, and hatreds. Her other great interest is the charity that she founded nearly twenty years ago: Gardens for The Gambia. She has raised funds and paid for 140 wells for the primary schools of this poor African country. A former student of Sussex university, and a PhD and Alumna of the Year 2009 of Edinburgh University, her love for history and commitment to historical accuracy are the hallmarks of her writing. She lives with her family on a small farm in Yorkshire. She welcomes visitors to her site www.PhilippaGregory.com

Customer Reviews

Could you care less?
I have read nearly all of Phillipa Gregory's books and especially loved her Tudor series. However I found this book really hard to get into and gave up after the first chapter, though I will finish it one day. It just doesn't have the magic of "The Boleyn Inheritance" and Elizabeth Woodville isn't as sympathetic a character as, say, Katherine in "The Constant Princess". I'd say it was a library book rather than a must buy.

Historical Intrigue
This is my second Philippa Gregory book after reading The Other Queen and I found it very intereresting, compelling reading. It explores a story behind one of British history's most enduring and famous mysteries - the missing princes in the Tower of London. The White Queen herself is a very ambitious woman (Elizabeth Woodville) who is also incredibly beautiful - she uses her beauty to capture the heart of the newly crowned boy king. She marries him and becomes royalty. As she then battles with tenacity to retain her position it is her two sons that become the central figures - there is the fictional link to the princes in the tower. The White Queen does bring the period to life and I welcome more books like this that raise questions from history and stir an interest in the general public. { Steve Horsfall does the same with the thriller Full Story Inside, which includes a link to the skeleton of a baby in Edinburgh Castle - another enduring mystery }. I am now looking forward to the other books in this series.

Good grief
Having read all her other historical novels and enjoyed them, I was really disappointed with this. I've read it all before, and better. The characters are sketchy, as if she's cobbled them together after reading a short history of the period. How could you manage to make these characters boring? The witch plot goes nowhere, the descriptions of battles and other events are poor. She could have gone somewhere quite new with all this, like she did with The Other Boleyn Girl.
Perhaps if you'd never read an historical novel set in this period (and there are loads of them) you would not be so critical of this poor effort. In my view, if you take on an historical novel, either you choose a short time span and write an intense psychological study in the first person (which worked so well in her Tudor novels); or you have to bite the bullet and go for the full monty - the historical novel proper, with a list of characters and a proper family tree at the beginning, involving years of research and with a brick-like result at the end of it. If you succeed, the reader falls into the book and swallows it up, to emerge reluctantly (sometimes days later) blinking at the strangeness of the 21st century.
Try Sharon Penman's Sunne in Splendour instead - don't be put off by its length, and be prepared for a completely different view of these characters.