Book review: "Wars of the Roses: Ravenspur, Rise of the Tudors", by Conn Iggulden (part 4 of a 4 part series)

Synopsis: Earl Warwick is back! This time, it's from exile, and accompanied by a largely French-funded army, with the intent of removing Henry VI from the Tower of London, and sticking him on the throne at Westminster palace, therefore making Edward IV's dubious rule null and void. He's off to a good start, as Edward and Richard of Gloucester (who will one day lament over a lost horse in his role as Richard III) are caught unawares, and forced to flee the country, seeking refuge in the home of the Duke of Burgundy...

But it's not long before they're back, and thanks to Edward's charismatic influence, they're able to rally enough support to stage a counter-attack. A couple of bloody battles later, and power is theirs again, with all ghosts laid to rest...

Right...?

Of course not.

As a shining hope for the Lancaster cause emerges, the last of the Plantagenet line struggles to keep hold of its heirs, and it's "all in" from all players in this bloody 30 year game of cat-and-mouse, as both sides make their way to Bosworth field...

Review: "Who is this man, this over-looked and under-appreciated almost super-human "king", otherwise called "Edward IV"?", is a question that you may well find yourself repeating throughout this final chapter in an outstanding piece of semi-fiction. Yes, it seems that history doesn't like strong leaders nearly as much as it likes devious, cowardly villains (more on that later...)... or perhaps because he was a "usurping king", from a weak and tenuous royal line who's main claim was that some M.P.s (unreliable at the best of times) voted his father, the late Richard of York, to be their stand-in-monarch. Edward had inherited this honour the moment Richard of York STOPPED fighting battle in vain, and his head started having spectacular views of York from it's vantage point of the city's gate. Or maybe it's because his tenacious ambition to be king had dragged out a chaotic, bloody and frankly complicated civil war that seemed to have no end, and which few hoped to survive.

Whatever the reason, Edward is not a favourite for the history classes, and it's a shame because as "Ravenspur" shows he was, for want of a better word, a bit of a bloody legend. Proving himself countless times on the battlefield, often vastly outnumbered, under-prepared, under-funded or (in the case of Towton), knee deep in snow, Edward apparently terrified his opponents... and with good reason. They say "It's not the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog that counts". But just in case the fight inside this dog wasn't enough, life decided to make him over 6 feet tall (a giant in the comparatively short-statured world of 15th Century England)... and also, a ruthless and efficient killing machine.

However, being a giant womanising alpha-male with a steel liver and an appetite for destruction apparently has a downside- namely, you might suddenly die at 40. Cue stage... and... RICHARD ON! After a well-timed accusation that Edward's sons are illegit, Richard makes the noble sacrifice of taking the crown from their barely pubescent heads, and sticking it on his own... and act which, somewhat unsurprisingly, would result in a pretty stressful and risk-filled life! (who'd have thought???).

Lost and found: Richard III

As I was reading Ravenspur, I tried to constantly be aware of how Iggulden was portraying Richard III. Ask anyone (*anyone who is not from Leicester) what they thought of him, and they'll tell you he was a cold-blooded, hunchback fiend, who murdered his nephews and more than likely a few more poor sods on the way. However, it appears that we largely have Shakespeare to blame for this. For all his great works about Italian nobles roaming around the countryside slicing each other up like pastrami, his portrayal of Richard III is hardly flattering... and more importantly, possibly completely inaccurate! As I mentioned before- everyone loves a character, especially if he's been dead for 500 years and has a sinister rumour revolving around him. Undoubtedly, Richard committed ruthless acts on the way to becoming king and beyond... but MORE than his predecessors, or those around him? Unlikely. Iggulden does a great job of leaving us guessing about the princes in the tower, never quite letting on the "truth", and only hinting subtly at possible leads towards potential assassins... However, as he plainly admits at the end, it's his personal opinion that it WAS Richard who quietly disposed of his two nephews.

As for his classic hunchback- again, might be slander, or the misrepresentation of a normal growth of muscle from the result of a lifetime playing around with 2-ton swords. Although, he did have a crooked spine, so unless Shakespeare somehow tampered with THAT, I think the photographic evidence speaks for itself...

Of course, this whole series of books is made infinitely more interesting by the (fairly) recent discovery of Richard's skeleton. In 2012, after a huge amount of research and, as it would turn out, a minimal amount of digging, he was discovered in the FIRST TRENCH dug in the archaeological search for his remains in Leicester. Furthermore, it's said they he was found under a parking space that had the letter "R" (for "Reserved") on it... but, as we've seen so many times in this book, hearsay and rumour are convincing little things. Maybe this will be the final legend that is added to Richard III's name... :)

Richard III skeleton discovered- Youtube

"I told zem we already got one!"- The French knights
outwit an English King yet again...

From the character development throughout the final three books (of which there's FAR TOO LITTLE BLOGSPACE to go into now!), it's evident that Richard WAS a deeply complex person, and far more than a caricature of himself. Which makes what I'm about to comment on even more of a shame. You see, I felt like this whole series was building up to the battle of Bosworth. It's certainly the most famous battle in the War of the Roses, and a natural finale- the murdering, usurping king falling to make way for the younger, more exotic Henry Tudor, recently landed in Wales at the head of a largely French army...

And yet, the battle didn't seem to receive nearly as much attention as the battle of Towton did in Bloodline. It was disappointing to miss out on Iggulden's masterclass of battlefield description, which have proven to be vivid and piercing. It all felt quite rushed at the end- and that's a shame, considering that (as Iggulden himself described), there was a real risk, especially for Richard, who had lost both his wife and son shortly before. Now heir-less, he knew that even if he survived the battle and his bloodline didn't get trampled into the dirt by a horde of angry Welsh and French hired-hands (who were by that time so used to assisting vague claimants to the English throne that they probably saw it as a gap-year), then he'd still have to get a move on to make the Plantagenet name last another decade...

Unfortunately for him, of course, history had other plans.

"Tudor". Now THERE'S a name you
can trust not to cause a scandal... ;)

So, Bosworth fell flat, for me... but that's not to put a damper on a supreme set of books. It's been great fun reading this series- I've learnt more information about the Wars of the Roses than I will probably ever use (and I'm all the happier for it!), and I hope that Conn Iggulden and such writers continue to write books that take the worlds of our fascinating ancestors, and put them in the grasp of the ordinary hobby-reader.

Score: 8/10