When you get to grips and kind of understand this history you definately see where Shakespeare right through to George Martin became absolutely fascinated and took inspiration for their works as its probaby the greatest fiction, non fiction story, you couldn't even imagine it, if even half of it wasn't the truth then whats left blows you away. It doesn’t feel too far removed from today’s world either. A recent U.S. President and the current Canadian Prime Minister both got their jobs based not on their qualifications but because of whom their fathers were. Likewise, having a celebrity parent doesn’t just guarantee you a rich inheritance, but a plum posting on television as though you were some sort of expert on anything other than how it felt to be born with a silver spoon in your mouth (looking at you, Meghan McCain, among others). The author of Powers and Thrones and presenter of Netflix’s Secrets of Great British Castles offers a vivid account of the events that inspired Game of Thrones and Shakespeare’s Henry IV and Richard III

Yeah, I know it sound confusing, but don’t let it. Dan is wonderful at making a complicated matter really simple. He doesn’t write in what I would call a scholarly way. To me, Dan writes for the common person-meaning that if you don’t know anything about the War of the Roses, you will be able to understand what is going on right away. King Arthur! Yes, these British folk were positively obsessed with King Arthur. Except that naming your child Arthur seems to be ensuring them an early death. Alas, there has never been an actual King Arthur, despite many attempts. Just imagine if Elizabeth II had named her son Charles, Arthur. That guy? The first King Arthur? He's not pulling any swords from stones!

License & Copyright

There had not been so successful no so fortunate an English general since the days of Henry V’ Jones observes of Edward IV. But like Henry V, Edward dies young, leaving a child – his twelve- Jones, Dan (29 November 2012). "Christmas 2012: History books of the year". The Daily Telegraph. London. At first Henry VI, seemed merely gentle and weak. As a young man he was a loving – if not very potent - husband to his loyal wife, Margaret of Anjou, and a kindly half-brother to the recent, and very embarrassing, Tudor additions to the royal family. His widowed mother had married a Welshman ‘of no birth neither of livelihood’, one Owen Tudor, with whom she had fallen in love after he had fallen drunk into her lap at a party (or so legend had it). Royal families the world over are just one of the oldest forms of nepotism. As a critic of such behavior, I find it hard to care much when reading about how a “rightful” heir was suddenly cut down by some usurper. In other words, all hail Richard III! Now there was a man who truly fought against the odds – and on the battlefield, to his ultimate demise – and refused to kowtow to the ravings of the blood cult (not that Richard III was above trying to claim his own blood made him superior to those prepubescent boys he threw into the tower). As with his earlier volume, The Plantagenets: The Warrior Kings and Queens Who Made England, Jones has developed narrative nonfiction covering a complicated era of history and made it a pleasure to read. He clearly establishes that the Wars of the Roses were about so much more than who had the strongest royal blood.

Jones’ The Wars of the Roses reads like a novel. I believe that is simply that this period in English history is wilder than any storyteller could fabricate.

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Jones, Dan (18 June 2013). "A scare could be just what the Lions needed". London Evening Standard . Retrieved 23 July 2014. This was good. It is about the Wars of the Roses and nothing to do with the later Tudors, which is what I wanted. I'm pretty well-versed in Henry VIII and family, but have only held a very blurry picture of the wars preceding their reign until now.