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Historical Henry VIII: The King and His Court by Alison Weir $16.95 / Ballantine Books / 2001 I have not been a great fan of Alison Weir, although it would be hard to say precisely what struck me as a little "off" about her writing-the occasional not-quite-accurate point, a slightly questionable interpretation of a personality-nothing tangible but nonetheless, I have not always felt at ease with her work or with her conclusions. With Henry VIII: The King and His Court, I admit to having had reservations in the beginning, But this book is thorough and evocative, and Weir's use of Henry's passion for building is cleverly woven into the work. She describes how Henry was the one who brought English architecture out of the Middle Ages of battlemented fortresses and moated keeps, and into the sunlight of the Italian and French renaissance influences. And it was Henry who brought erudition, scholarship, and the arts to English society. Furthermore, the palaces which he constructed for the various wives (or to house his children or to accommodate his growing court) outline for us the windings of Henry's unfolding growth or diminution of character. The high and low tides he faced financially are equally imprinted on his building projects, especially in his later years when money went more for fortifications against increasingly vitriolic European foes than for building new castles and manor houses. Henry's reign is reflected in his building, and both are cleverly and attentively covered here. No bland and list-like rendering this. Rather, this biography is a complex and convivial marriage of man with lifestyle, as was mirrored in the homes he chose to create. --Anjuli MacDoanld of Clanranald

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