HERE BE DRAGONS

by Sharon Kay Penman ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 12, 1985

Historians have for some time been declaring that Bad King John of England (1166-1216) of Magna Carta fame was not that bad a king; however, like Richard III, another favorite villain (who has been enthusiastically rehabilitated by several recent novelists, including Penman in her The Sunne In Splendour, 1982), John has been charged (undoubtedly rightfully) with nephew murder and various other bloody excesses. Penman does not give John the hero's halo she awarded to Richard, but still this is a convincing portrait of a fascinating (and fictionally, at least) often neglected king. To tell the story of John and his times, and scan the 12th-century muddle of wars, uneasy alliances, power shifts and inter-dynastic marriages, Penman highlights the career of John via the life of his illegitimate daughter, Joanna, whom he married off to Prince Llewelyn, overlord of northern Wales. Joanna, a neglected waif, claimed by the then-Prince John, adored her father--he was so kind to little children, although his own childhood and youth were decidedly rocky. His mother, Eleanor of Aquitaine, had eyes ""that pinned him to the wall"" and father Henry II, weary of power grabs, promised much, delivered little. Shrewd, pragmatic, ice-blooded when threatened, John was yet generous to the poor and powerless. After succeeding savage brother Richard I, John was not given to foreign conquests like his predecessors. Instead, he mended fences at home--tilting with barons, consolidating their English terrorities, matching wits with the Papacy and Philip of France, and forging alliances. Throughout Joanna's marriage to her adored husband, Llewelyn, there will be conflicts and bloodshed between the lords of England and Wales, sometimes with John leading the pack. Joanna attempts to mediate but will finally oppose her father and reject his love. Her knowledge of the execution of nephew Arthur, and the terrible execution of enemies, including young hostages, estranges them forever. Joanna has her dramatic crisis when she takes a lover for all the wrong reasons. Although somewhat anachronistic in tone and diction, Penman's book neatly untangles a portion of the crisscross politics of the time. A weighty (over 700 pages) but accessible royal portrait, an agreeable love story, and a painstaking reconstruction of some virtuoso medieval wheeling and dealing.

Pub Date: Aug. 12, 1985

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Holt, Rinehart & Winston

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1985

Categories: FICTION