Stunning biography of a terrible King

This is a wonderful work about a decent well meaning man who led England to ruin both politically and militarily. The author does an excellent job of combining empathy for Henry as an individual and the circumstances he inherited with an unsparing evaluation of his utter failure to address any of the problems facing England. I have read/listened to many books on wars of York and Lancaster and this book ranks up there as one of the very best. Henry is placed squarely in the context of his times and all the leading protagonists are also. In the end you end up feeling sorry for most of the people who tried and tried to make a success of Henry's reign and to maintain the House of Lancaster in power. Even the Yorkist lords appear to have tried but Henry was just never going to be even a semi competent king. But it does provide the basis for a wonderful work of both scholarship and biography

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2 people found this helpful

Awful narrator

I found the silly voices used by the narrator very irritating. Also her constant mispronunciation of places such as "Alnwick" grated on my nerves. Her halting delivery was a distraction, putting pauses halfway through sentences making them disjointed also rankled. Such a shame as the book was thorough and well written.

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Performance

Interesting book , enjoyed the listen, performance is excellent. Highly recommend this book if you love medieval history.

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Well researched but a few problems with the performance

The content is terrific but there are a few problems with the performance. Whilst the voice of Jennifer Ness is easy to listen to, and then itself very pleasing and not at all irritating, there are problems with pronunciation. Alnwick is pronounced as it is spelled and not as it should be, a·nuhk. Anselm is Anslem. I know this sounds picky, but over the length of the book, repeated mispronunciations do become very irritating. Surely there is a producer who can put the narrator right on these things. Surely the author listens to it and offers feedback. There are many more examples that don’t jump to mind. I really can’t blame the narrator who reads beautifully otherwise. But the producer must check out these pronunciations.

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2 people found this helpful

Great listen

Such a great listen and love that each chapter is not too over long.

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Biased

It is understandable if a writer is slightly biased towards their subject; however, in this case it was so much so that it became irritating and twisted some facts as well. Everything bad or negative thing is Yorkist propaganda, and she makes out the Yorkists as ruthless monsters. Based on this book, Henry was an unfortunate man, victim of circumstances, nothing whatsoever was his fault. Full of double standards, when the Yorkists executed Lancastrians, it was unjust and cruel, when it was the other way around, it's sad but just. At this point I almost stopped listening. Even if you have sympathy for someone, you should still at least try to be impartial I think.
The performance was not too bad, sometimes she mispronounced words, but that didn't bother me too much.
If you want a more full and less biased picture about Henry and the Wars of the roses, look for another books.

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Engaging exploration of this troubled King

I found Shadow King to be a very accessible telling of the life of Henry VI. I've read quite a few histories of this period and often found them to be impenetrable, the Wars of the Roses can be very confusing blur of names and titles. I feel the success of Johnson's book lies in her ability to look at Henry VI as a person, and through trying to understand the man it makes it far easier to understand the turbulent period that he ruled over (and didn't when he was incarcerated!).The clearly extensive research is also complemented and brought to life by Johnson's natural storytelling. My only slight quibble would be with some of the pronunciations of names and places, but in the grand scheme of things that's a very small quibble indeed. I would highly recommend Shadow King

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Unexpectedly Fascinating.

Very well performed. I thought I knew my History, no idea that Henry directly involved.

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Fascinating

What a great book. Lesser known history narrated brilliantly and written in an engaging way. Can recommend!

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Worth reading

Lots of info about neglected or overshadowed monarch. Very enjoyable and lively. a good read.

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