Book Review: Plain Jane by Laurien Gardner

With a plain face, Jane Seymour has no suitors and few hopes. Then she is granted a position at court as maid of honor to Queen Catherine. There, Henry VIII ignores his aging wife, showering favor on the dark beauty Anne Boleyn, soon to be his new queen. But he tires of stubborn Anne, and his wandering eye falls on plain Jane. Although she cares for Henry, she must not let herself be swept away by his attentions. For she intends to win not only his heart but also the greatest prize of all--the crown.

My Review: 
Jane has grown up with the knowledge that she is no great beauty and as the years go by, marriage offers are not coming her way, even when she is chosen to go into the service of Catherine of Aragon. It is a difficult time for faithful Jane as Henry VIII has turned his attention to flashy and bitchy Anne Boleyn, causing chaos at Court. After being chosen to serve Anne when she becomes Queen, Jane struggles with her lonely existance and sneers of Anne and her friends but finally catches the eye of Henry himself, giving her the chance to bring Queen Anne down.  

Most Tudor books go their own way with plots and this one is no different. It focuses a lot on Jane's imagined life at home before going to Court. She suffers great pain at hearing her parents complain about how plain she is and her lack of prospects meaning being sent to a convent is a real possibility. In her escape from her sad life, she forms a friendship with the son of a local well connected family William Dormer, who is upset about the arranged marriage he is to be forced into. He sees a wedding to Jane as a way out of her lonely life and his misery, based on companionship rather than passion. Jane asks the King's favourite Sir Francis to help them but William's family are not interested in a Seymour bride. I thought it was an interesting plot because of the wonderful Sir Francis and his affection for Jane and her problems. 

Jane gets the chance to go to Court but life doesn't improve greatly for her. While she is loyal to Queen Catherine, she does not stand out amongst the other women who also seek a husband. I liked the invention of her crush on Thomas Wyatt, the poet who is hopelessly in love with Anne Boleyn, the King's new interest. The way that Thomas plays with Jane's affection is cruel as are the jibes of him and Anne's group, who take delight in putting Jane down. I was smugly satisfied during this part of the book as I knew that they were all going to get paid back when Jane replaces Anne in the King's affections. I liked the action at Court as Henry's changing moods moved the Court through three totally different Queens. Anne is portayed as nasty as you would expect in a book written from the view of Jane and I liked seeing Jane take centre stage in a book about Tudor times.

Niggles. The plot opens with the imagined 'romance' of Jane and William and their attempts to get permission to marry yet later in the book when Jane's star is rising and William is married, he doesn't remember her at all? I found that somewhat strange. He seems to have no recall of wanting to avoid the arranged marriage, cheerfully telling Jane that he always loved his betrothed and wanted to marry her from when he first met her. He came to Jane's house to talk about marrying her at the time yet can't remember meeting her? I just found all this really annoying and pointless! Why bother inventing this romance to have William not even react to Jane's success? It seems like it was meant as another reminder from the author that Jane was so forgetable that William can't remember her, her name or her family, which is stupid.

There was too much of the day to day drudgery that Jane had to endure at home before going to Court and those pages could have been used to focus instead on her short time as Queen. Having proved everyone wrong and risen so high against the odds, I just wanted to see more of her success. I wanted to see the women who sneered at her having to obey her, courtiers begging for her favour, her family grovelling...I wanted that total win for her in the short time she had left. I just felt that there wasn't enough of her life with Henry. My other complaint is that we were told way too often how plain and unattractive she was. It seemed that every page had another put down for Jane and it did get a bit wearing as the book progressed. I felt I didn't need to be reminded so often about how plain she was!

It was a decent read, certainly better than the Anne Boleyn book by the author/authors-there is some debate about whether this is a pen name for one author or several authors working together. However there are better Tudor novels out there.

Read Aug 2019
3 stars.