Review: Queen by Right - Anne Easter Smith

History remembers Cecily of York standing on the steps of the Market Cross at Ludlow, facing an attacking army while holding the hands of her two young sons. Queen by Right reveals how she came to step into her destiny, beginning with her marriage to Richard, duke of York, whom she meets when she is nine and he is thirteen. Raised together in her father’s household, they become a true love match and together face personal tragedies, pivotal events of history, and deadly political intrigue. All of England knows that Richard has a clear claim to the throne, and when King Henry VI becomes unfit to rule, Cecily must put aside her hopes and fears and help her husband decide what is right for their family and their country.

My thoughts:

If I am gonna be totally honest I never liked the Neville clan, so to read about Cecily was interesting, and I did like her, most of the time.

Cecily Neville is in this book quite lucky as her arranged marriage was wonderful and filled with awesome sex. Got lots of babies too (though maybe she should have kept a closer eye on her brother killing babies.) But this book does not deal with that, it deals with her upbringing, her marriage and up to the point when her son Edward is made king.

The book is interesting even if I have heard the story so many times before, but still I can't keep track of every Somerset, Beaufort and everyone else. So it does always feel new because of that. Quite the tale and I enjoyed the rich setting.

But some things did annoy me. Her obsession with Joanne d'Arc and how Joanne gave her a prophecy. And the biggest issue was how she met Jacquetta Woodwille and disliked her at once. Jacquetta did not do anything but every time they met Cecily looked down on her with her snotty proud nose. This was put there so that when Edward married Elizabeth Cecily own feelings = "prophecy" would ring true, Jacquetta is no good and not the others either.. But the truth was that every time it happened it made me dislike Cecily, she was such a bitch and it always took pages for me to get over it. And she thought something about high airs too, but if J really would have wanted to be high up then wouldn't she have gone for something better than Woodille? But in this book Cecily has her feelings and yup, bitchy. She distrusted the queen's kindness in the beginning too cos of Jacquetta. I can go on and on. Cecily was called proud Cis and cos of those things that sure made me see it, even though the reader was not supposed to see it like that. We were surely supposed to see that aha Woodwilles = evil scheming lot. Just like every Lancastrian in this book were bad, you know babykilling bad (not that they did, but you get the point) and Yorkists are Gods. Not that I mind, I am a bit of a Yorkist...at a point in the war.

Sheesh, how I went on! But it just annoyed me every time. Still it lasted only for a few pages and then I could enjoy the book again. I just wished there had been a reason and not a feeling. Sure feelings are good, but here it was just put so it could be showed later on to ring true.

Conclusion:
A nice historical, recommended to fans of the era.

Cover:
Nice :)

Genre: Historical fiction
Pages: 494
Published: 2011 by Touchstone
Source: Won :)