The New Murrey and Blue blog

Oh dear…

“….The year is 1483 and England is in peril. The much-despised Richard III [who has murdered the boys in the Tower] is not long for the throne, and the man who will become Henry VII stands poised to snatch the crown for himself. But for twelve-year-old John Collan [to be Lambert Simnel, the book’s hero], living in a remote village with his widowed father, these matters seem far away….”

The above quote is from the Amazon blurb of Jo Harkin’s The Pretender at https://shorturl.at/snTy2 . The pretender in question is, of course, Lambert Simnel. But I’m afraid the book has already been spoiled for me, because I’m darned if I’m going to read 464 pages that start with the usual out-dated Richard-bashing.

My attention was drawn on receiving the following link: https://shorturl.at/5OlBF, which features a pre-publication interview with Jo Harkin. I wondered whether she’d aim for Richard by hurling the rusty old Tudorite knives of More, Morton and Shakespeare into his back. In the interview she mentions the princes in the Tower being killed, but in the book she clearly blames Richard III for the dirty deed!

The cover art on my screen (but not at Amazon UK or .com) shows two filthy-fingernailed hands, one holding a red rose. No, not the hands of Richard III. Instead they’re taken from the well-known NPG portrait of Henry VII. Would you trust that man? Nor me. Not a word he uttered! And his cohorts certainly had knifed Richard in the back at Bosworth. Now Jo Harkin does too.

Online there is nothing but praise for the book’s brilliant writing and plot. Reviewers scramble over themselves with hyperbole. Not having read the book, only the advance publicity, I won’t attempt to argue with such unanimity. The author has clearly excelled….but I still don’t like the same-old, same-old condemnation of Richard III. It flies in the face of the Missing Princes Project’s wonderful discoveries of documentary evidence that Richard did NOT murder his nephews. I won’t even mention Coldridge….

But, of course, there are still “reputable” historians who fly in the face of scientific evidence by insisting that the remains found in Greyfriars, Leicester, aren’t Richard at all. Give me strength.

PS: Hold the mayo! I may have been wrong in my above assessment of The Pretender. Heaven forfend that should be, of course, but there may be much more to this book than I’ve gathered previously. Although I still don’t know the stance it takes about Richard III, and the Amazon blurb makes me twitchy.

by viscountessw