Troy Terwilliger’s Reviews > Boleyn Traitor > Status Update

The "storm" she summoned proved to be an uncontrollable mechanism. She taught Henry that laws, treaties, and queens could be discarded if they no longer served his personal desire. In doing so, she unintentionally built the exact cultural sword that would be used against her. It’s what makes watching her reign unravel so compelling: she didn't fall victim to toxic Tudor politics; she played a part inventing it.

In terms of Jane Rochford as a character tone - she is astute and observant and her sardonic humor is very fun! But I can't call her a cynic exactly, she's too accurate for that.

“She won’t get fucked being queenly.”

‘He's one of those problems where the solution is the problem itself.’
'Aporia?’

“He can swive a smiling slut who doesn't matter, he can long for an unobtainable maiden with all his heart, but he can’t stand up for an honest loving wife.”

“The marriage is less than two years old, and it was made -uniquely- for love. Anne has made herself into a new sort of queen, a new sort of wife.. is such a queen, married for love, as secure on her throne as one pledged in a cold-hearted international alliance? Or should a marriage made for love, last only as long as love? Does a husband, married for love, have to be seduced and won over and over again?”(p.15)

“Twenty years ago, someone named him the 'handsomest prince in Christendom' and we have had to keep it up ever since.” Her observations are astute and a bit sardonic. I find her fantastic as a heroine! She isn’t playing anyone’s game but her own.

The quickest way to spread a story in this court is to swear secrecy.