Asking the Question: What if...?

As you may have noticed before, I think of the people I read about as my friends, and I am not alone. In addition to my recreational reading, I am also currently reading a book called The Book Whisperer, by Donalyn Miller for a class I'm taking. Miller even goes so far as to say that the first time she visited New York it was like visiting an old friend she had met in The Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler (by E.L. Konigsberg). As Anne Shirley would say, Donalyn is a kindred spirit.

The last book I read was an introduction to a new friend. (See my post here.) This week I am spending time with some friends I've known for a while now. Boleyn Reckoning is the final book in a trilogy by Laura Andersen. I met William, Elizabeth, Dominic, and Minuette about a month ago in Boleyn King, and continued the friendships with Boleyn Deceit. I had to wait for Boleyn Reckoning to be returned to the library, and I'm so excited to finally see how everything is resolved.

The Boleyn Trilogy combines two of my very favorite things: reading and history. I became particularly fond of British history during my English Literature class several years ago. The Tudors have been the topic of interest for centuries, and Laura Andersen has a new approach by offering an alternative history in which Anne Boleyn gives birth to a baby boy named William and is never beheaded. The Catholics and the Protestants are still battling for position, and young King William is trying to keep the French from invading and the Catholics from attempting to overthrow him and install his Catholic half-sister, Mary on the throne. In Boleyn Deceit, William follows in his father's footsteps and pursues a marriage based on love rather than politics with the daughter of his mother's lady-in-waiting, Minuette. Meanwhile, she has developed feelings for William's closest friend, Dominic, and at the end of the book they decide to marry without the king's consent, which could very well put their lives at risk. They determine to tell him, but return to court to find that the king has smallpox. Although he survives, he is scarred both physically and emotionally and Dominic and Minuette decide not to confess for fear of hurting him when he is so vulnerable.

As I write this, Minuette and Dominic have still not come clean about their marriage. Minuette is going through the motions of being the king's intended wife and future queen, while Dominic holds his tongue, even while watching William caress his wife's cheek and kiss her neck. Meanwhile, William is attempting to secure the support of the Spanish by arranging a marriage between King Philip and his sister, Elizabeth (for those of you who are not aware, King Philip of Spain was married to Queen Mary I in real life), and Mary is planning to take advantage of the arrival of the Catholic king of Spain to stage a coup.

Anne Boleyn

In addition to my fondness for British history, I also love the idea that one person can change the very course of history. Without Anne Boleyn's insistence that she not be another mistress, Henry VIII may never have attempted to have his marriage to Catherine of Aragon annulled, which would never have lead to the break of England with Rome and the establishment of the Church of England. While the Catholics and Protestants were at odds long before Henry VIII turned England upside down for Anne, I have often wondered how differently history would judge him and how differently the religious conflict would have gone had he never met Anne.

Wallis Simpson

Another woman that had a major influence on the course of England was a woman by the name of Wallis Simpson. An American divorcee, Simpson managed to do what no woman had done before: capture the heart and the fidelity of King Edward VIII. Faced with the decision to choose either the woman he loved or the throne of England, Edward abdicated and married the forbidden Simpson. As a result, his brother became George VI and his niece is the present Queen Elizabeth II. In addition to affecting the line of succession, England's own path was altered. While Edward and Simpson were anti-Semitic and sympathetic to the cause of Mussolini and the Nazis, under the rule of George VI England joined with the Allied Nations to defeat the Axis Powers. How might our world have been different if Edward had remained on the throne and influenced British policy?

The idea that one person - one woman - could affect the course of history fascinates me. Reading another writer's version of what could have been has been a lot of fun so far. I wish Laura Andersen had spent more time developing the character of Elizabeth. She is a fascinating person to study, and I would love to see more of her in this alternate reality. It has been interesting to watch her interactions with Robert Dudley, but the majority of Boleyn Reckoning so far has been focused on the Dominic-Minuette-William love triangle. I cannot see how this will possibly end well. Perhaps Elizabeth will play a bigger role as the story continues. Either way, I look forward to seeing how it all plays out.

 I'll keep you posted.