The librarian recommended these, both by Carolyn Meyer — I had read Mary, Bloody Mary before, but I thought I’d read it again (she also wrote Beware Princess Elizabeth, which I know I’ve read also, but don’t remember at all). Of the two, I liked Mary better. Perhaps it’s because the story of Mary Tudor is more sympathetic, or perhaps it’s because Anne Boleyn makes a better villain than sympathetic character. I don’t know. In reading Anne, I found myself unmoved by Anne’s motivation to get King Henry VIII to love her, to leave his wife and to marry her. I found her rise and downfall uninteresting and the writing uninspired. It’s youth fiction, but that’s not an excuse. Mary was better, perhaps because the conflict was more intense — you can’t help but feel moved by a person who was banished simply because she was the daughter of the king and a rival to a person with ambition. In the long run, though, I found myself disturbed by the stories of these women who were so totally in the power of a complete jerk. I was going to readThe Other Boleyn Girl by Phillipa Gregory (about Mary Boleyn) but I don’t think I could handle 650 pages of King Henry treating these women so badly. Maybe I’ll try again later.