"BRAVO JUDITH ARNOPP

I am so very thankful to Judith Arnopp for allowing me to tag along on so many trips, as she has played guide to those inner most thoughts and intimate secrets of long ago peoples.
What voices they spoke with in their courtrooms, war rooms and private bedrooms, sharing with her even their most secret and unspoken thoughts.
Oh, had Judith only been my History teacher in my school years! I suppose it is partly because of her education in that area and as a great story teller that I have closed each of her novels with changed heart and understanding of times and people long past.
I have followed Ms. Arnopp through her Medieval journeys and throughout most all of the Tudor years. As I leave her and Henry in the last of this series, dedicated to the man I once sang childhood nursery rhymes about, King Henry, it is with fresh insight and outlook of this famous king, so worthy of remembering!
My only sadness comes from pondering how long it will be before I get to join her on another SPECTACULAR journey!
I am sure whenever it may be, it will be ANOTHER FIVE STAR JOURNEY!"

"Through a glass darkly…would Henry VIII have known this biblical verse? More than likely, yes. Would he have applied it to his own character? With Judith Arnopp’s extraordinary insight, possibly. A prism of reflections and shimmering images, Ms Arnopp’s conclusive novel in her Henrician Chronicle, A Matter of Time: Henry VIII, The Dying of the Light, shines with a brilliance that only years of scholarly and conceptual immersion can hone.

Choosing to reflect the most controversial king in British history through the eyes of his last three wives and oft-doomed courtiers, Ms Arnopp brings us the distorted image of Henry as he saw himself, and as those around him mirrored. The result is a superb character study of this self-destructive man, who in an effort to slay his own mortality only succeeded in decimating those who knew him best. Anne, Catherine, Katherine, Culpeper, Somer, Brandon, Cromwell, Gardner…each is drawn into Henry’s ever-more-desperate denials of his own death throes, and each brings a reflection of the man behind the crown. The ultimate death scene is sharpened with a clever and surprising narrative, befitting the final eulogy on Henry VIII.

An excellent and compelling read. Highly recommend."