Suzannah Lipscomb exclaims, “What a fun and beautiful gift for Anne Boleyn fans! But what is unexpectedly joyful about it is how elegantly and intelligently the commentaries are written, how scholarly the research that underpins them, and what empathy and imagination they show. This can be given to any true history lover, knowing that their hands, hearts, and minds will be fully engaged.”

The incentive for writing the Queen Anne Boleyn Paper Doll Book was born from a deep desire to lend agency to a woman who lived nearly 500 years ago: Anne Boleyn. What the creator Rebecca Monet eventually discovered in research was both maddening and fascinating.

In fact, when shelooked up the timeline of Anne Boleyn’s life, the primary source did not include the apparently little known of — yet highly formative — years Anne spent away from England on “the continent.” Yet, it was there — at…

Katheryn Howard, The Scandalous Queen: Review by Samantha Yorke

From the publisher: Bestselling author and acclaimed historian Alison Weir tells the tragic story of Henry VIII’s fifth wife, a nineteen-year-old beauty with a hidden past, in this fifth novel in the sweeping Six Tudor Queens series.

In the spring of 1540, Henry VIII, desperate to be rid of his queen, Anna of Kleve, first sets eyes on the enchanting Katheryn Howard. Although the king is now an ailing forty-nine-year-old measuring fifty-four inches around his waist, his amorous gaze lights upon the pretty teenager. Seated near him intentionally by her ambitious Catholic family, Katheryn readily succumbs to the courtship.

Henry is besotted with his bride. He tells the world she is a rose without a thorn, and extols her beauty and her virtue. Katherine delights in the pleasures of being queen and the power she has to do good to others…

On October 12, 1537, King Henry VIII’s wife Jane Seymour gave birth at Hampton Court Palace to his only surviving legitimate son, the future King Edward VI. The labor had been exhausting, but Jane appeared to recover and wrote a letter to Thomas Cromwell announcing the birth of Henry’s heir. After a few day it was apparent that Jane was seriously ill. There are theories on the exact cause of her death but what we do know is that she died on October 24.

This week in 1537 saw the burial of the beloved third wife of Henry VIII.

After the beheading of Anne Boleyn, King Henry VIII and Jane were married quickly. The wedding ceremony took place only eleven days after the execution, with Jane being fitted for her wedding dress as Anne was beheaded.

Yet, as brief as her reign and marriage was, Jane Seymour did something that…