Following on from the first book in this series, 'Queens of the Conquest', which in my head I refer to as The Book of Matildas, henceforth this shall be known to me as The Book of Eleanors. Five Queens are featured, three of whom are called Eleanor or a variant thereof. So straight away, make sure you've got your concentration hat on! 

The reason for this series is to allow the early Queens of England to be written back into history and for their stories to be told in their own right. This is Weir doing what she does best; weaving the female narrative back through the history we already know about, giving the women their own agency and turning them back into three dimensional characters, but all the while maintaining the historical record. Although this book does still tell a lot of the overarching history from the view of the Kings, it reads like it does so purely to set the scene so we can understand the context of the Queens' actions, location and relationships. It's not perfect, but it's a well-balanced effort.

In one element, this book is much-improved when compared to 'Queens of the Conquest'; where that much more evidence survives for the lives of these women and so a clearer narrative can be drawn of the story of their lives. There is obviously still some elements of missing puzzle pieces, but the whole work feels much more flowing and less fragmented and speculative - this feels more definitive in terms of facts and the author's confidence in relaying them to the audience.

She also does a good job at trying to keep pur characters straight and making sure her readers can easily follow the timeline of events. It is written in a chronological narrative, so while there ate sections 'dedicated' to each Queen, everything follows the march of time and so for much of the book two or three Queens can be involved at the same time. The author has therefore taken the time to utilise different spellings of the same name (I.e. Eleanor, Aelinor, Eleanore) to ensure it is clear which person she's talking about. 

That being said, I did find the chronological way of writing a little frustrating at times precisely because multiple Queens were sharing the spotlight. While this layout makes a lot of sense, I'm not sure that it wouldn't have been easier for the reader to have clearly separated biographies of each Queen, even if that meant moving backwards and forwards in time. It's quite hard to get your head around when half the time you're reading about a Queen that isn't the 'headliners that particular section! 

I also spotted a few typos in the middle, particularly regarding dates I.e. quoting 2015 rather than 1215. This happens a few times within a couple of pages, so it really needs another run through with an editor. Similarly, I think there ate a couple of errors dates wise in the genealogy trees at the beginning of the book. 

I have already read the author's biography of Eleanor of Aquitaine and so I do understand why she didn't focus on her in so much detail. But at the same time, she still had the single biggest section in the book. When this series was first announced, I recall Weir saying that she would not include Eleanor in the books as she already had this biography in print. I wonder if her time might better have been spent reviewing and issuing an updated version of the biography, simply so she could then give the other Queens a little more page space and insight. 

I did enjoy reading it overall, but all it has really done is given me higher hopes for the next one.