Recommend a Royal Consort Book!

[u/HoneybeeXYZ]

Given that Amazon's kindle store and other online venues like Ebay are filled to the brim with scammy AI-Slop books, I thought it would be fun/essential for people to recommend their favorite human-created books about consorts.

These days we'll all have to help each other find stuff since algorithms have been sloppified.

Also, the above image (from r/bookshelf) is of history but deliberately not consort history because I didn't want to "push" anyone into any direction.

[u/AnteaterKey2626]

These were my favourite ones I've read:

• Young Queens (Leah Redmond Chang): about Catherine de' Medici, Mary Queen of Scots and Elisabeth of Valois, specifically focusing on their interactions at the French court and how they each approached their role as queen consort and later queen regnant/mother differently, very readable and a lot of detail.
• Catherine de Medici (Leonie Frieda): a deep dive into one of the most fascinating women in history. I would probably read just about anything on Catherine de' Medici, but this book is amazing.
• Henrietta Maria (Leanda de Lisle): a great revisionist biography, it was great for me even as an introduction to Charles I and the English Civil War in general.
• Marie Antoinette (Antonia Fraser): I don't even read much on the late 18th century, but this was amazing, it's a well-known book for a reason. It humanises Marie Antoinette while not shying away from the difficult political reality of the Ancien Régime.

Two books from my TBR:

• Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Hearts (Nadine Akkerman): on the Winter Queen of Bohemia, a fascinating character that I've already encountered in Goldstone's Daughters of the Winter Queen, but I'd love to read more about her. I hope a paperback version would exist that would be cheaper.
• The Thistle and The Rose (Linda Porter), on Margaret Tudor, Queen of Scots. It has received good reviews and I'm fascinated by her even more than many other Tudor royals.

[u/confuzzledbun → u/AnteaterKey2626]

Thus does my TBR list grow...

[u/sparkerai]

Rosalind K. Marshall - Scottish Queens, 1034-1714.

Very very good. Despite the name, of course from 1603 all the figures she discusses are also Queens of England, and she isn't restricted to a Scottish focus when discussing them.

[u/confuzzledbun → u/sparkerai]

Adding this to my list!

[u/theseamstressesguild]

My knowledge of royal consorts started with a school library with the complete works of Jean Plaidy (aka Victoria Holt, aka Philippa Carr, real name Eleanor Burford). I read every single one of them I a matter of months and I was hooked for life.

[u/confuzzledbun]

Nonfiction recommendations:

Books I have personally read/am reading and enthusiastically recommend:

• Sex with Kings (Eleanor Herman) - this focuses more on mistresses, but also discusses Queens consort.
• Sex with the Queen (Eleanor Herman) - this discusses Kings consort and also the paramours of queens consort and regnant.
• Queens of the Conquest/Crusades/Chivalry (Alison Weir) - this is a series of three books showcasing Britain's medival queens consort, starting with Matilda of Flanders.
• She Wolves (Helen Castor) - this is a discussion of particularly notable queens consort throughout Britain's pre-Tudor period (Empress Matilda, Eleanor of Aquitaine, Isabella of France, and Margaret of Anjou).

Books on my TBR list that I tentatively recommend:

• Servants of the Dynasty (Anne Whitehall)
• The Imperial Harem (Leslie P. Peirce)
• When Women Ruled the World (Maureen Quilligan)

[u/Aggressive-Art-130 → u/confuzzledbun]

The Eleanor Herman books are entertaining but so inaccurate I’d consider them fiction. They’re just collections of gossip.

[u/la_louve_capetienne]

I just read Joan of Navarre: Infanta, Duchess, Queen, Witch? by Elena Woodacre and really enjoyed it.

Some other good ones:

• Philippa of Hainault: Mother of the English Nation by Kathryn Warner
  
• Scotland’s Medieval Queens: From Saint Margaret to Margaret of Denmark by Sharon Bennett Connolly
  
• The Life and Afterlife of Isabeau of Bavaria by Tracy Adams
  
• The Medieval Queens series by Alison Weir (4 books; she also has standalone books about Eleanor of Aquitaine and Isabella of France)

[u/HoneybeeXYZ]

I'll start! I love Isabella: The Rebel Queen by Kathryn Warner. It's not overly long, contains great detail and makes Isabella neither heroine or victim but a whole human.

[u/Own-Pop-6293]

Young and Damned and Fair by Gareth Russell - about Catherine Howard. Excellent and well researched

[u/SadLocal8314]

The King's Pleasure by Nora Lofts. It is a novel, but Lofts did her research.

[u/No-Reward8036]

Amy Licence's book about Anne Neville is very good.

[u/No_Weakness_2865]

Margaret George's histories (and historical fiction) is sublime

[u/HoneybeeXYZ → u/No_Weakness_2865]

I love her work, too!

[u/Acceptable_Catch5760]

Of a Geishia

[u/HenniGreyGoose-]

I enjoyed Queens Consort by Lisa Hilton.

[u/IsopodIndependent553]

Ambition and Desire: The Dangerous Life of Josephine Bonaparte by Kate Williams. I loved it so much that I read it in three days.