PORTRAIT OF AN UNKNOWN WOMAN

Author: Vanora Bennett ISBN: 0061251836 4/2007 HISTORICAL FICTION Publisher: WILLIAM MORROW
Time Period: Medieval

The year is 1527. The great portraitist Hans Holbein, who has fled the reformation in Europe, is making his first trip to England under commission to Sir Thomas More. In the course of six years, Holbein will become a close friend to the More family and paint two nearly identical family portraits. But closer examination of the paintings reveals that the second holds several mysteries... Set against the turmoil, intrigue and, tragedy of Henry VIII's court, Portrait of an Unknown Woman vividly evokes sixteenth-century England on the verge of enormous change. As the Protestant Reformation sweeps across Europe to lap at England's shores, relations between her king and the Catholic Church begin to plummet—driven by Henry VIII's insatiable need for a male heir and the urgings of his cunning mistress Anne Boleyn—and heresy begins to take hold. As tensions rise, Henry VIII turns to his most trusted servant and defender of Catholic orthodoxy, Sir Thomas More to keep peace in England, but soon the entire More family find their own lives at risk. At the center of Portrait of an Unknown Woman is Meg Gigg's, Sir Thomas More's twenty-three year old adopted daughter. Intelligent, headstrong, and tender-hearted, Meg has been schooled in the healing arts. And though she is devoted to her family, events conspire that will cause Meg to question everything she thought she knew—including the desires of her own heart. As the danger to More and his family increases, two men will vie for Meg's affections: John Clement, her former tutor and More's protégé who shares Meg's passion for medicine, but whose true identity will become unclear, and the great Holbein, who's artistic vision will forever alter her understanding of the world. With a striking sense of period detail Portrait of an Unknown Woman is an unforgettable story of sin and religion, desire and deception. It is the story of a young woman on the brink of sensual awakening and of a country on the edge of mayhem.

RRAH's THOUGHTS AND PONDERINGS:

Vanora Bennett makes an impressive debut with PORTRAIT OF AN UNKNOWN WOMAN. Written from first person perspective by the story's main character, Meg Giggs, ward of Sir Thomas More and set during the debate over the King's Great Matter and England's conflict with religion, Ms. Bennett takes readers into the treacherous world of Henry VIII as well as the more sedate, moral and yet chaotic household of Sir Thomas More. Through the learned and intelligent Meg's first person account, we see not just the events that unfold in her own personal life as well as the rest of her family and closest friends, but she gives a different perspective into the enigma that was her guardian, Sir Thomas More.

I'll be honest. This would have been a Top Pick for me if not for the passages on politics and the battle over religious matters that made for some very heavy reading and concentration on my part. At times it was almost like slipping into reading a dissertation rather than a historical fiction novel, bogging down the story's pacing and making it hard for me to stay focused and interested. As much as I love history—especially the Tudor period with all its intriguing figures and tumultuous, world changing events—those passages had me skipping paragraphs, even pages, to go in search of Meg, Sir Thomas, Hans, John and the rest of the personages whose lives and world I wanted so much to become absorbed into.

PORTRAIT OF AN UNKNOWN WOMAN is rich in history and period detail, telling the tale of a lost prince who, perhaps by this account, wasn't really all that lost. It is an interesting theory which Bennett builds upon, skillfully and with style, forging into life the fictional personalities of many real-life characters that many still find so fascinating today. I just wish PORTRAIT OF AN UNKNOWN WOMAN had been a bit less of a studious read. It may help readers to check out the website the author lists in her bibliography and view a portrait painted by Hans Holbein of the entire More household. It does help put into context the theory that this book was built upon.

Nancy Davis