The Mirror & The Light – Hilary Mantel

The Mirror & The Light - Hilary MantelEnfin, Fin.

A long read, this one. Partly due to size – at over 900 pages it’s a long read (and the hardback, which is the version I was reading, was that bit too unwieldy to read in bed) plus it’s a dense read.

The chapters are long, functioning more like sections to designate key timespans, which made it all too easy to stop after a short chunk rather than getting to the end of a chapter which I find sometimes helps me get properly into a longer book.

I’m sure the general weirdness of the (first) year of COVID-19, and the long days of “working from home”, haven’t helped my powers of concentration either.

In particular I found the early/middle sections harder to get through than the other two books, but once I got to Anne of Cleves I was back in the zone.

Goodbye Cremuel.

Author page: The Mirror & The Light – Hilary Mantel


Once I’d finished, I looked up some of the names on Wikipedia. Close this review now if you don’t know how Cromwell’s story ends.

Henry VIII was shown portraits of both Anne of Cleves and her younger sister, Amalia of Cleves, as possible post-Jane Seymour brides. Amalia does not look like a docile damsel in the slightest.  In fact she looks like a young woman who has a mind of her own, and determination to match. Perhaps that’s why she never married.

An unidentified woman by Hans Holbein the Younger.jpg
An unidentified woman by Hans Holbein the Younger (but possibly Amalia of Cleves)

By Hans Holbeinhttps://www.rct.uk/collection/912190/an-unidentified-woman, Public Domain, Link

And “Call-Me” (aka Thomas Wriothesley) looks decidedly duplicitous in this portrait by Hans Holbein the Younger:

Thomas Wriothesley, 1st Earl of Southampton by Hans Holbein the Younger.jpg
Thomas Wriothesley, 1st Earl of Southampton by Hans Holbein the Younger

By Hans Holbein – Metropolitan Museum of Art [1], Public Domain, Link

An Experiment in Love – Hilary Mantel

An Experiment in Love - Hilary Mantel
An Experiment in Love – Hilary Mantel

Carmel and Katrina’s “friendship” is established by chance early on, cemented when their strong mothers settle into their own solidarity. In An Experiment in Love, we are shown how these relationships evolve as the two girls progress through the 1960s state education system to become first generation university students, moving from their home town in Lancashire to study in London in 1970.

Along the way a third girl impinges on the “friendship”, boys and sex arrive on the scene and we watch Carmel’s slow yet steady descent into anorexia.

Publisher page: An Experiment in Love – Hilary Mantel

Bring Up The Bodies – Hilary Mantel

Hilary Mantel’s sequel to Wolf Hall sees Thomas Cromwell manage the machinations to bring about the downfall of Anne Boylen and positioning of Jane Seymour as Henry VIII’s third queen. The style took me a while to adjust to, but, as with Wolf Hall, once I’d tuned in to Cromwell’s narrative, I was hooked. Borrowed from Janette and read over the bitterly cold Easter break in Walton on the Naze.

Publisher’s page: Bring Up The Bodies – Hilary Mantel