The Red Queen – Margaret Drabble

A novel of two parts, both narrated at times by the ghost of the Red Queen of the title – an 18th Century Korean Crown Princess, Lady Hyegyeong. The first part focuses on her life story, complete with a mad husband, court intrigues, mistresses and murder, and the ghostly narrator’s desire to have someone from the 21st century tell her tale. The second, which I feared would be Margaret Drabble‘s Korean research trip travelogue (as the person selected by The Red Queen to tell that tale), but in fact it’s the fictional equivalent – with Dr Babs Halliwell in the starring role as she attends a medical conference in Seoul.

Amazon.co.uk link: The Red Queen – Margaret Drabble