Elizabeth I: Red Rose of the House of Tudor by Kathryn Lasky

I picked up Elizabeth I:  Red Rose of the House of Tudor by Kathryn Lasky to preview for Lulu as a supplement to our history studies.  I think this is the first book from The Royal Diaries collection I’ve read before, and I really enjoyed it.  Written in diary format, this story covers a couple of years of Elizabeth’s life, from 1544 to 1547, with a year or so left out because her diary was left behind for about a year when she had to leave the palace where she was staying abruptly.  The story ends shortly after King Henry VIII’s death and Edwards’ coronation.  Before reading this book, I really didn’t know a lot about Queen Elizabeth I, especially her childhood.  Lasky depicts her as an intelligent, independent-minded girl who longed for love and affection from her father.  While there is no bibliography of sources for this book, I assume from Lasky’s afterword that copious amounts of research went into her writing of Elizabeth’s story.   Lasky does a fantastic job of making both Elizabeth and the royal court of King Henry VIII come to life.  The reader gets an insider’s look at the court intrigue and the political maneuvering of Elizabeth’s sister Mary and how much Elizabeth feared and suspected her.  We see the sickly Edward and how much Elizabeth cared for him and the few other children within her circle of friends.  One of the most fascinating parts to me, and I assume it would be to a child who read this book, is Lasky’s descriptions of the various palaces that Elizabeth (sometimes with the royal court; sometimes exiled from it) lives in.  Often, they move to a different palace because the one they’ve been living in is really dirty, with all sorts of vermin and filth from the volume of people living there.  Still, Elizabeth’s spirit and kindness shine through:

“Cheat?” says Jane the Bald [Mary’s fool], her eyebrows sliding up into her glistening scalp in disbelief.  I roll my own eyes heavenward and sigh deeply.  “Let us not pretend to be fools even though that is your occupation, dear Jane.  You and I both know that Princess Mary cheats at cards.”  Am I to remind Jane that I have had five mothers, two of them were beheaded, one a near girl?  I mean, Jane dear, I want to say, if one has half a brain one cannot remain an innocent long in my father’s court.  Yes, Princess Mary does cheat at cards.  And the only reason I agree to go play is because I truly like Lucretia and Jane and feel they need my company much more than Mary does.  (66)

Over all, I give this book a Highly Recommended, but I think I’m going to hold off a year or so on handing it over to Lulu. Palace intrigue isn’t exactly G-rated, and while there’s nothing graphic in this story, there are several references to bawdiness and lewd behavior.  I’m not sure that age nine is the age at which I want my word-collecting Lulu to add these particular gems to her vocabulary.  She already read and enjoyed The Story of Good Queen Bess by Alida Sims Malkus and Good Queen Bess by Diane Stanley, so I think this slightly more mature title will wait for a while.  (Diane Stanley’s books also tend to be quite detailed–probably even more so than the Royal Diaries–but both my girls have already found most of Stanley’s books on our shelves and read them.)  I will definitely keep the The Royal Diaries collection in mind for the future.  (Scholastic, 1999)