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War of the Roses Series The British author Conn Iggulden is largely known for his historical fiction, along with his fiction and fantasy novels as well. Writing with a high degree of accuracy, he brings a high level of authenticity to his stories, researching his subjects well, bringing the past to life.
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Resources.FlairOur have detailed knowledge of their historical specialty and a proven record of excellent contributions to. Flair categories.To nominate someone else as a Quality Contributor,. Upcoming Events Participant(s)Event FeaturesFeature posts are posted weekly. The current rotation is:. (biweekly).Related subreddits.Follow us on social media. Fair warning, the War of the Roses is a very complex and dense topic to dive into. Any book you pick up worth it's salt, will have (and better have) at least two chapters dedicated to just background before you even begin to get to the foundations of the causes for the War.
The WotR is easily the most defining moment in English history between the Norman invasion and the Civil War and covers decades of history, literally.Having said that, while this is not my subject area, and I'm not terribly well read in the topic, I do have a recommendation for a book that sits astride 'popular history' and 'academic history'. I say that, because again, this is a dense subject and no book that is worth your time would be purely 'pop history'.Alison Weir's, does a good job of making the subject accessible to readers of history, though not to fans of 'lite history.' 'Lite History' to me are those pulpy history paperbacks that tend to populate the military history sections of bookstores about Navy Seals, Special Forces, Nazis, and those god awful books about the Merovingians being descendants of Jesus.While the book only has one footnote that I can recall (giving a rough estimation of price equivalencies between 14th century money and late 20th Century), it does have an extensive bibliography and helpful index. Footnoting would be helpful in knowing the sources and providing additional information (my favorite thing about footnotes!) provided, but since the book is not 'academic' its overlooked. The most helpful addition to the book are simplified family trees which I promise will be useful as the overlapping and twisting mixtures of marriages, second cousins, and family offshoots played a major part in being the cause and agitator of the war, and I promise you will refer to it more than once.While the writing style is very casual and doesn't run down various rabbit hole topics that would fascinate an academic (and confuse the casual), it is still very dense. Keeping track of the names of the players, which Houses they were loyal to, and what role they play requires close attention to be paid or you will find yourself backtracking.
I myself restarted the book three or four times before I reached page 100 over the years as I easily became lost and confused. I don't fault the writer at all as this was my first book on the subject and I often found myself lost. You will still need to sit quietly and read alone; this is not a book to read on a busy cross town bus, its by no means is a summer page turner.Weir has a background in history, but is not a formal academic. She focuses mostly on historical fictions and biographies of England's royalty from the Middle Ages through the Renaissance.
You can clearly tell that she has strong familiarity with the subject, knows how to research, and is thorough in covering the topics she tries to tackle (though through out her career some have been better than others). She presents her works in a way that makes complex histories and dense materials accessible to those who want to go beyond a tv documentary familiarity but not ready to delve into the dense undergrowth of an academic book.For a casual yet informative and quality work, I recommend.Just don't use it as a source for your history paper. I picked this up at the book shop in Westminster Abbey after touring the abbey last summer. I knew literally nothing about the war beforehand, but noticed that it talked about many of the rulers whose graves I had just seen, and so I was interested.
While I did have to book mark the description of Edward III's children and frequently had to check the family trees it provided, I found myself completely engrossed in this book. It is dense with facts and stories about the war while also staying interesting and even entertaining. I loved this book, and would suggest it to anyone interested in English history. I would also suggest that you read her book The Princes in the Tower (I believe that's what it is called) as this first book ends with Henry VI's death and Edward IV's consolidation of power, whereas the next book covers Richard III's seizure of the throne and goes through Henry Tudor establishing the Tudor dynasty. Upvoted for Weir's book.I read it and had the same joys and same troubles. I found myself leaping up out of bed to Google some of the names so I understood where she was going. In the end, her account of this horribly complex period is accessible and comprehensive.
Unlike most accounts of English royal history, the fulcrums on which the Wars of the Roses teetered was not the kings and claimants to the throne but the aristocrats who wielded the wealth and manpower to wage war.Weir makes it clear that the War of the Roses was a long series of political intrigues and broken alliances. You have to read slowly and pay attention. I read the book many years ago and I feel better informed about the period, but I would have to refer back to it if someone wanted names and dates.
As the Beatles once said: It's All Too Much. I've read Alison Weir's novel and absolutely loved it. Also, Trevor Royle's Lancaster Versus York is good if you want some hard data, though I'd suggest Weir first. Dan Jones recently released an historical account of the conflict as well and I loved his Plantagenet novel.
It was a bit fast paced as, although long, he had a ton of information to cram into it. His new novel on The Wars of the Roses is the same length but covers a much shorter span of time (presumably starting with Bollingbroke's rise, as that's where The Plantagenets left off) so I imagine it will be an enthralling read. I'm not an expert on this topic but I was looking to get a good academic history of the War of the Roses recently. There doesn't seem to be a single definitive work, which is pretty common for this kind of subject, since there are many different aspects/events/perspectives to consider when discussing it.
There are several good works on the subject. I found of Michael Hicks' history really useful both in what it says about that work and how it compares it to other, similar general histories. I used it as a basis for picking which history I thought emphasized the topics that interested me the most.
In the opening battle of England’s War of the Roses, the Yorkists defeat King Henry VI’s Lancastrian forces at St. Albans, 20 miles northwest of London. Many Lancastrian nobles perished, including Edmund Beaufort, the duke of Somerset, and the king was forced to submit to the rule of his cousin, Richard of York. The dynastic struggle between the House of York, whose badge was a white rose, and the House of Lancaster, later associated with a red rose, would stretch on for 30 years.Both families, closely related, claimed the throne through descent from the sons of Edward III, the king of England from 1327 to 1377. The first Lancastrian king was Henry IV in 1399, and rebellion and lawlessness were rife during his reign. His son, was more successful and won major victories in the Hundred Years War against France.
His son and successor, Henry VI, had few kingly qualities and lost most of the French land his father had conquered. At home, chaos prevailed and lords with private armies challenged Henry VI’s authority. At times, his ambitious queen, Margaret of Anjou, effectively controlled the crown.
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