It is long, yet somehow one doesn't want it to end.

The quality of writing is extraordinary, and the way Mantel evokes an era none of us can know is so bold and brazen that the reader falls under her spell completely.

Very cleverly, she does not crave our sympathy for Cromwell in any of the three books; he is a bit of a thug and a man of his time. However, the reader is invited to respect him and to admire his transformation from humble beginnings in Putney to become one of the most consequential people of the 16th Century. At the end, Cromwell accepts his fate, and its inevitability. As inevitable - and unavoidable - as a kick to the head from his father Walter. For if Cromwell had tried to live his life in a way to avoid such a miserable ending, then he would have had no life worth living at all.