The Stone Rose: The absolutely gripping new historical romance about England's forgotten queen... (The Rose Trilogy Book 3)

I have so enjoyed this trilogy giving life to history’s “She Wolves”. They have all showed another side to these much maligned queens. Isabella never came across to me the way history has painted her. The way Miss.McGrath has told this story is exactly as I imagined Isabella. She was brought up to become a queen ruling a country alongside her husband, the King, whoever he would be. Edward was, unfortunately, inadequate and he must have lived in his brutal father’s shadow all his life. Gaveston didn’t mean to be what he became, he was frivolous and thoughtless and didn’t think properly, but Despenser seemed to be pure evil and no-one was safe from him. He was power mad. To believe Edward was bisexual is much more believable because I do believe that Edward did love Isabella until Despenser pulled them apart and literally wrecked their marriage. All those close to Edward were in fear of their lives from Despenser and Edward never realised it. I tend to believe that Edward didn’t die at Berkeley that night but was taken to Italy to live out his life in a monastery realising his son was making a better job of Kingship. I believe that Edward III did receive the Feschi letters and did meet with his father but obviously could not publish to fact to the world. It was interesting to read about the deClare sisters. Poor Eleanor did come over as unfeeling and brutal with Isabella and her sisters but, I guess she had little choice to be the way she was because of who she was married to. A beautiful book to read as were the first two books of the trilogy. Knowing Miss.McGrath’s adherence to historical fact makes her book totally believable. Thank you for giving Isabella a voice and showing her not as a spoilt, ruthless, money and land grabbing individual but as a caring, loving, astute, intelligent, beautiful woman.

This is the third in the splendid She-Wolves Trilogy and I’ve read them all. This one is about Queen Isabella, wife to Edward II. In my opinion this is the best and a fitting finale to an exploration of women and their role at court. From the opening where we are plunged into All Soul’s Night and every knock at the door could be a horror, to the end, when Isabella is alone and only contemplating the ghost of Edward, her husband and King, we are completely immersed in another world.The novel benefits from the secondary character, Agnes, a real life stone-mason who is commissioned to carve her tomb and is to tell Isabella’s story and make sure we know the truth. Out in the land, England is recovering from the devastation of the Black Death – something that makes these characters’ lives seem even more fragile., Much of court life is political maneuvering and Carol McGrath manages to keep the tensions up by the use of her characters and their personal concerns. For example, at one point Isabella bemoans the fact that her husband was always happiest away from his castle duties and insists on mixing with the peasants, something she thinks beneath him. Isabella is dismayed too by his choice of companions. Those people who, like me, have studied Shakespeare’s Edward II will know of Piers Gaveston, and he features in this book along with another of the King’s favourites, Hugh Despenser.Isabella comes across as a strong woman beset by the troubles of a husband whose ear is poisoned by his favourites who have their own agendas. This is a fascinating slice of history to which Carol McGrath does ample justice in this gripping novel. Historical notes at the end explain the choices the author made.History fans will love this well-researched evocation of court life. Highly recommended.

The Stone Rose is the third and last book in Carol McGrath’s She-Wolf trilogy. This series has been going from strength to strength, and this final instalment is the crown jewel.The central character is Isabella, wife of Edward II. She is of royal blood, the daughter of the king of France and she is well aware of how she is meant to play the role of queen consort to Edward. Her marriage is not an easy or conventional one. Edward enjoys the company, and favours, of men as much as women. His intimate “friendship” with Piers has tragic consequences not only for Piers but also for the crown. Hostile barons, Warwick, Lancaster and a few others, flex their muscles and exert their powers in parliament. The threat of Barons Rebellion is never too far. At the same time the Scottish king, Robert the Bruce and his Scottish nobles are constantly raiding the borders, plundering and pillaging. The battle of Bannockburn ends in Edward’s humiliating defeat. Then there is the famine, and a whole sequence of challenges the king and his queen have to deal with.McGrath’s sense of history, her research and her knowledge are second to none. She paints the wide canvas of the historical background with an assured hand. But being a great historian isn’t her only quality. She is also a fantastic story teller and character builder. She is able to create characters that are alive, vibrant, believable and relatable even though they are removed from our reality by several centuries. It is her attention to detail and her ability to get into her characters’ heads that allows her to convert history into an intimate and visceral work of fiction. She deploys a very successful tool to achieve that: a fictional character of a common woman to complement her historical royal heroine. In this book, it is the character of stonemason, Agnes, whom Isabella engages to help her tell her true story for the posterity.As always with Carol McGrath’s books, this is a fascinating tale of a medieval queen brought to live for a modern reader. You will feel close-up and personal with Isabella – you will feel as if you know and understand her on an intimate level.