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★★★★★ 3
A Tudor Tale of Derring-Do for Children
Format: Kindle
Ben Forrester sees a young woman being dragged into the Tower of London and despite the good advice of his friend, Tim and it being a seemingly impossible task, he sets out to rescue her. On the way, there are messages written in invisible ink, a princess dressed as a coal boy - a coal boy dressed as a princess - dungeons with rats and a lot of adventure.
This is an exciting and well-written tale for children, set in the reign of Mary Tudor in the violent and cruel days of the sixteenth century. It has a lot in it to acquaint a reader with life and society at the time and gives a (highly distorted) sketch of the political events of the time.
My one big complaint as a historian is the biased perspective of this book which reinforces many popular myths and misconceptions about both Mary and Elizabeth. As this book might be the first (and for some children maybe the only) experience they have of the period it seems to me tragic that it does so.
To read it you would think Elizabeth was perfect and Mary pure evil. We are told of Mary's burnings but not why they happened or of Elizabeth's subsequent persecutions and none of it is placed in context.
This is a black and white version of history which is horribly inaccurate because it is so, and misleads another generation to despise the woman who was England's first true Queen and who overcame so many challenges including those of politics, religion and rabid misogyny to rule in her own right.
I love the irony that we find out in the historical notes at the back that the story of Ben's escape was based on the real-life escape of a man imprisoned there by Elizabeth on account of his beliefs...
So whilst I can applaud this as a good, immersive, book to help a child learn about the social history of the time, I would hesitate to recommend it because of the way it reinforces the ignorant bias of popular history over the truth.
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Reviewed in the United States on October 4, 2021
