Book review: "The Constant Princess" by Phillipa Gregory

Having read several of Phillipa Gregory's Tudor romances before, I was kind of excited to read a new one. I loved The Other Boleyn Girl (though not the movie) and The Queen's Fool; I liked The Boleyn Inheritance. I really disliked The Virgin's Lover, though. Since I'd read her previous book, I knew that Gregory takes a lot of liberties with history, and I was prepared for that.

However, I found that The Constant Princess is similar to The Virgin's Lover: both take a well-known historical figure and turn her character completely upside down. In The Virgin's Lover it was Elizabeth I; in this book it was Katherine of Aragon, first wife of Henry VIII. Katherine was a Spanish princess, raised by a warrior queen and a scheming king who were waging a holy war against the Moors. She was betrothed at a very young age to Arthur, the oldest son of Henry VII, and was married to him at around fifteen. He died soon afterward, and seven years later she was re-married to his younger brother, Henry. For the rest of her life, Katherine maintained that her marriage to Arthur had never been consummated, and so her marriage to Henry was legal with or without a papal dispensation.

In this book, Gregory puts forth the idea that this was a great lie. Most of the book is taken up by Katherine describing Spain and contrasting it with England, either to herself or to Arthur during their brief marriage. The Katherine of this book was deeply in love with her husband, and he with her; but because she was painfully shy and raised in a very prim court, Arthur snuck in to her chamber, where they would spend the night talking about their plans for England and their pasts. Then Arthur contracted the mysterious sweating sickness and died--but on his deathbed, in Gregory's novel, he made Katherine promise to marry his brother so she could become queen and fulfill their grand designs for the country's future. Everything Katherine does after that, from fighting to marry Henry to having children, she does for Arthur.

Here's the problem: Katherine was a very staunch, very devout Catholic. Even if she was willing to commit the sin of lying, it's hard to believe she would lie about her marriage being consummated. It's not as simple as telling a lie about being a virgin; it's a lie about being within the "forbidden degrees of consanguinity" in relation to Henry. It would mean that she would be committing incest, basically. It would mean she was fornicating outside of marriage, because her marriage to Henry would be invalid. It would mean that her children would be bastards. It would be a lie of far-reaching consequences, and unless her religious devotion was a false front, telling such a lie would be out of character. So basically, this entire book is based upon a premise that seems incredibly unlikely.

The fact that Gregory completely created some details also makes it less agreeable. For instance, there's an entire plotline where Katherine miscarries her first child (true) and then spends another several months in seclusion because a court doctor told her she was carrying twins and one was still to be born (false). During this time Henry takes his first mistress (false--it was during Katherine's second pregnancy), a woman named Anne (false--it was Margaret Blount). Granted these are small details, and all historical fiction takes those sorts of liberties--but there was no reason for it, and it just adds another layer of falseness to this entire book.

It's also a strangely paced story. There's a lot of exposition as Katherine describes Spain, describes her mother, describes her journey to England; she and Arthur fall in love and talk; she tries to be all wily and worldly and schemes to marry Henry; she marries Henry, had a child that dies, gets upset by his first affair .... and then everything fast-forwards and Katherine walks in to the courtroom to make her famous plea to Henry when he's trying to nullify their marriage.

Overall, I just wasn't impressed with this book. It felt like an idle romantic daydream drawn long, followed by a quick rush to resolve the story. I didn't even fully read the second half of the book; I skimmed over drawn-out descriptions and angst diary-like pages. This book is definitely one to skip.