Wolf Hall

I don't read a ton of fiction that takes actual historical figures as their characters. I'm not even sure why I made an exception for Wolf Hall, other than the fact that has been so widely acclaimed and since I'm not a historian of the UK, Mantel could write pretty much anything and I would believe it. The achievement here is significant -- Mantel juggles an enormous cast of characters, and the book consists almost entirely of dialogue among them. Cromwell is "he" throughout the course of the book, and with him there are rapid-fire shifts from exterior to interior dialogue. Does this book comport with "what happened"? I can't say -- but it was a powerful read and I enjoyed it immensely.

a marathon of a book.
upon finishing it, i feel both relieved it's over, and proud i made it through
that said, the content is so dense, and my grasp of the politics of King Henry VIII's court is so tenuous, that i often felt out of my depth. yes, i better understand the papacy and it's underlinings as a power source rather than a religious one. yes, i see the political alliances (and debts) of marriages within European powers. yes, i better understand the era's superstition - mired in the plague and other easy deaths. but these were things i did know, however casually. new information was harder to process... the king, in his need to be exalted, has no real friends? the construction of the Church of England was more a money grab than a new marriage for Henry VIII?

Abandoned. The use of 'he' with a view point character added to the confusion of who was who, further confused by jumping between present and past. Not for me.

Astonishing, immersive experience. Feels like you are looking over Cromwell's shoulder as he insinuates himself into the centre of Tudor political intrigue, and in the process changes Britain forever.