Tatiana de Rosnay’s SARAH’S KEY takes the story of a ten year old French girl, and the American journalist excavating her case, to dramatize the unthinkably massive betrayal of 76000 Jewish men, women and children by French citizens and authorities in 1942.

With a plot like clockwork and clear, vivid prose, de Rosnay makes history indelible. Through spare details and deep feeling she conjures the bond between siblings, the casual cruelty of a concierge, and Parisians who profited from properties vacated by the round-up, and the Vichy-pleasing French police who exceeded even Nazi expectations. With a seamless dual timeline, the book’s momentum doesn’t let up.

Alison Weir’s INNOCENT TRAITOR contains a betrayal a page, culminating in the execution of Lady Jane Grey for treason. This was the first work of fiction from the popular historian, and her deep research is beautifully distilled through a fantastic constellation of characters. 

Weir leaves the gate and keeps the pace with such assurance, we are delighted by the storytelling even as we are outraged by accelerating events.  The poisoning of a King, switching of a body, heresies, rape, endless scheming and the unnecessary death of a sixteen year old girl at the will of her cousin.

“Let us being with two girls at a dance” O’Farrell’s command is enthralling from the start. Maggie O’Farrell’s fourth novel, THE VANISHING ACT OF ESME LENNOX is a masterpiece of gothic wrongdoing told in cool, elegant prose. The intimate, ruthless, unthinkably vast wrong done by a sister is set against the wider history of women betrayed by their parents – imprisoned in institutions for life for a moment of adolescent disobedience, sexual activity, or not fitting in.  

Though the novel is infested with betrayal, rape, hypocrisy, infidelity, theft, and terrible derelictions of trust, there are plenty of moments of wry comedy and no hint of over-kill. The novel’s ultimate betrayal, that perfectly patient revenge, is stunning.

A LIFE OF JESUS by Shusaku Endo was a revelation to me. The great Japanese novelist conjures the historical figure with a simplicity that feels preternaturally vivid. The story is rooted in a landscape described with incredible sensory immediacy – the desert, Judean villages, town of Nazareth, Galilea and Garden of Gethsemane are so real you’ll feel you’ve visited. 

Endo comments on his story in progress – without cost to suspense – with lightly worn scholarship and conversational analysis. He doesn’t shrink from miracles or contradictions – and riffs pleasantly, convincingly, on the resurrection itself.  

Mark Twain considered JOAN OF ARC the best of all his books (as well as the one he liked the most) but that is not the consensus, and it’s not so known as the rest.   Twain spent twelve years preparing and two years writing the book, while “the others needed no preparation and got none”. His immersion in the archives and the time he spent researching in France, retrieving the young woman from the myth, and giving her voice and life, is rewarded all the way. 

The  ridiculous narrator gives a convincingly intimate picture of Joan and her phenomenal encounters and adventures, but Twain’s inimitable playfulness, the irony and absurdity, don’t make her betrayal by the King, Cauchon, all those ministers and religious figures, the same country she’d saved, less devastating.

The Constant Princess by Philippa Gregory

Henry divorced Katherine of Aragon after two decades of marriage because she hadn’t “produced” a son. Popular entertainment often portrays her as the embittered first wife, but this highly gratifying novel describes the 15-year-old Spanish princess arriving in England to marry Prince Arthur, the heir to the throne. When Arthur dies unexpectedly, she weds his younger brother, the future Henry VIII. Gregory’s narrative captures Katherine’s resolve and intelligence and foreshadows what is to come. Not much is known about the relationship between Katherine and Arthur, but this author imagines a love story. You’d have to have a heart of stone not to enjoy it.

Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel

This first novel in Mantel’s Thomas Cromwell trilogy won the prestigious Booker Prize. In it, Henry’s exceedingly clever counselor helps oust Katherine of Aragon so the king can marry Anne Boleyn. But three years later, Anne hasn’t had a son either. Cromwell senses the shift in the wind. Mantel’s writing is propulsive, and her dialogue shimmers with acerbic wit. She promotes a revisionist view of Cromwell who is generally depicted as treacherous. Was he a civilized man trying to manage a volatile king or a consigliere pursuing his own ends?

Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel

Some say Mantel’s second Cromwell novel is even better than her first. It garnered another Booker Prize. Here, Cromwell engineers Anne Boleyn’s fall so Henry can marry Jane Seymour. The title refers to the command given to guards to conduct condemned prisoners to the scaffold. Mantel’s storytelling bubbles with energy, although it’s fair to ask whether she gives Cromwell a pass for his horrific solution to Henry’s problem.

Katheryn Howard: The Scandalous Queen by Alison Weir

Jane Seymour gave Henry the son he wanted but died shortly afterward. Cromwell then negotiated a marriage between Henry and Anne of Cleves, but the king never took to this German princess. She wisely agreed to a lucrative divorce while Cromwell lost his head. Alison Weir’s novel paints an endearing picture of Anne and a more troubling one of Henry’s fifth bride, the nineteen-year-old Katheryn Howard. The author, a historian, weaves the factual record into a saga of a heedless young woman, her accommodating lady-in-waiting, and two handsome lovers. All will be executed.  

Firebrand by Elizabeth Fremantle

Henry’s sixth wife, Katherine Parr, is my favorite, and this novel, the source for the 2024 film with Jude Law and Alicia Vikander, dramatizes her alarming predicament. By this time, Henry was a 52-year-old monarch who had executed two wives. She was a 31-year-old widow in love with someone else. But you don’t say “no” to Henry VIIII. Katherine becomes queen and, among other challenges, faces false charges of heresy.

The Matthew Shardlake Mysteries by C. J. Sansom

Shardlake is a Tudor lawyer who investigates murders, and Henry’s queens appear in several of these clever, meaty mysteries. Katherine Parr is the client in Lamentation, and Shardlake is a little sweet on her. But what makes these novels so compelling is their chilling portrait of Tudor politics: everyone must maneuver to please an absolute ruler, and truth often gives way to power.

On This Day in Tudor History by Claire Ridgway

Among Tudor mavens, the old joke is: “On this day in Tudor history, something horrible happened.” Unfortunately, the jest isn’t too far from the truth. The women of Six faced a dangerous, unpredictable world, and historian Claire Ridgway summarizes the era’s tragedies and crises in this smart, readable day-by-day compilation. Ridgway is one of the most trustworthy Tudor experts I know.