Eliza dreams of being
a playwright for the king’s theater, where she will be admired for her witty
turns of phrase rather than her father’s wealth. Beth is beautiful as the day
but poor as a church mouse, so she must marry well, despite her love for her childhood
sweetheart. Zabby comes to England to further her scientific studies—and ends
up saving the life of King Charles II. Soon her friendship with him becomes a
dangerous, impossible obsession. Though she knows she should stay away from the
young, handsome king, Charles has a new bride, Queen Catherine, and a queen
needs ladies in waiting. And so Zabby, Beth, and Eliza, three Elizabeths from
very different walks of life, find themselves at the center of the most
scandal-filled court that England has ever seen.
I really
liked this book in the beginning – even the middle! But once I hit a certain
point, I wasn’t very fond of it.
The
characters were a tossup for me; I’m not sure if I liked most of them or hated
them. Let’s start with our three Elizabeths. Eliza, I really liked her. She was
funny and crude, threatening her suitors with cutting off their… urm, cods. She
was determined to be a playwright no matter what others thought of her. Zabby,
I didn’t really care for. She was smart, a bit strange, and fancied herself in
love with a married man – the king! What was wrong with her? All she wanted was
to sleep with him. Beth was my favourite out of them all. She was sweet,
innocent, pretty, and a tad mad, I believe. She lived for love – it was all she
ever wanted. On their own these three girls would be fine, but together they
made a great big Mary-Sue.
Let’s take
a look at the other characters, shall we? King Charles, I’m not going to sugar
coat it, he was a man-whore. I don’t agree with infidelity. It’s one of the
worst things to do to you spouse. Especially when she is as sweet as Catherine.
She loved Charles with all her heart, but he had tons of mistresses and didn’t
love her like he should’ve. Harry, Beth’s love, was one of my favourite
characters. He loved her after all those years and tried to win her doing
whatever could. They said he was brash, but I think he was in love.
Now you’re
probably wondering why I hated the ending. It might have been because there
wasn’t one. The book just sort of ended. There was only really a closing for
Zabby (if you could call it that). I’m still not 100% sure how Beth was in the
end of the book as there wasn’t even an epilogue to tell me how they were now
faring. It felt although someone had ripped out that last few pages of my book.
I rate this: 3 stars.
No comments:
Post a Comment