Born in 1533, Elizabeth I was the product of the doomed marriage of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. In 1558, on her Catholic sister Mary's death, she ascended the throne and reigned for 45 years. Loved and respected by her subjects and idolised by future generations, Gloriana's fierce devotion to her country and its people made her England's fairest queen and icon. Royal marriage in the age of Elizabeth was a political business. Unions between great familes could be the key to security at home and to the making of great empires. No one represented a better prize than Elizabeth. She encouraged attention and spent her life surrounded by suitors, but she remained, until the end, married only to her kingdom. This, the third volume of Alison Plowden's Elizabethan quartet, plots the true story of the Virgin Queen's courtships and her career as "the greatest tease in history".

Elizabeth I is perhaps England's most famous monarch. Born in 1533, the product of the doomed marriage of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, Elizabeth was heir to her father's title, then disinherited and finally imprisoned her half sister Mary. Her childhood was one of fear and danger, she was aware from the outset that the eyes of the world were upon her and that to survive she would have to rely on her own judgement and strength of character. Many tried to use her for their own ends, however she rose out of the shadows and on the detah of her sister, she became Gloriana - England's most iconic queen.

The Tudor era belongs to its women. No other period of English history has produced so many notable and interesting women, and into other periods have they so powerfully influenced the course of political events. Mary Tudor, Elizabeth I and, at moments of high drama, Mary Queen of Scots dominated the political scene for more than half a century, while in the previous fifty years Henry VIII's marital escapades brought six more women to the centre of attention. In this book the women of the royal family are the central characters; the royal women set the style and between them they provide a dazzling variety of personalities as well as illustrating almost every aspect of life as it affected women in Tudor England. We know what they ate, how they dressed, the books they read and the letters they wrote. Even the greatest of them suffered the universal legal and physiological disabilities of womanhood - some survived them, some went under. Now revised and updated, Alison Plowden's beautifully written account of the women behind the scenes and at the forefront of sixteenth-century English history will be welcomed by anyone interested in exploring this popular period of history from the point of view of the women who made it.

The House of Tudor changed the history of Britain forever. The Tudor monarchs have been immortalised in novels and films for generations. However, the true history of this incredible dynasty is often romanticised and fact is overlooked. Alison Plowden's accessible and beautifully written history traces the family's turbulent reign of power from Henry VII, the first Tudor monarch, who fathered the great Henry VIII. Henry VIII went onto revolutionise England's armed forces and implement controversial reforms in England. Yet, he is perhaps most remembered for his tumultuous love life and the fates of his six wives, including Anne of Boleyn, who sparked an international crisis. He fathered four known offspring, including Mary I and Gloriana - Elizabeth I, the Virgin Queen, who reigned for 44 years in what is known as England's Golden Age. This book not only re-tells the familiar stories of these famous monarchs, revealing the truth behind the scandals; but it also recounts the history of the less well-known Tudor monarchs: Edward VI, Lady Jane Grey (the uncrowned Queen of England), and those who came directly before and after them - Edward IV and James I.If you read on history of the Tudors, make it this one - you are sure to be enthralled and surprised by how the facts are often more incredible than the fiction surrounding them.Review“Alison Plowden is clearly under the spell of the Tudors as she writes here of the beginnings of the family and the lives of the five Tudor rulers - from Henry VII, who brought the Wars of the Roses to a close and ascended the throne in 1485, to Elizabeth I.  Plowden’s Tudor portraits are enchanting history and at the same time they comprise a family story of enormous complexity, vitality and fascination. Her retelling has the spirit, romance and freshness of the completely new.”  --  Publishers Weekly"An ornate, admiring history of everyone's favorite dynasty. Plowden writes with regal flair." -- Kirkus