"A lucid, well-researched, but unpedantic narrative of 16th-century English royal life and death at a brutal time when a successful noble was one who kept his or her head while others were losing theirs during perennial struggles for power and position. Biographer Plowden relates the oft-told story of Henry VIII and his search for a male heir.... After his death, his devout Catholic daughter, Mary, became queen and an enemy of Protestants. Plowden portrays the teenage Elizabeth as a threat to Mary, who kept the former a prisoner in the Tower of London but was unable to find hard evidence of treason before the Privy Council Court. Elizabeth became a heroine of the Protestants and a popular figure. Plowden's assessment of the 25-year-old Elizabeth, who became queen after Mary's death: sharp tongued and a hard bargainer with acting ability but also with hysterical tendencies perhaps inherited from her mother. From her father she inherited physical energy, family pride, vanity, personal magnetism, political instincts, and earthy peasant cunning, thanks to her Tudor Welsh ancestors. She was an apt scholar who learned discretion, self-discipline, and self-reliance, and the author suggests she used her femininity to disarm critics. Plowden proves that history can be fascinating, readable, and entertaining."—Kirkus Reviews