Portrait of an Unknown Woman

I have mixed feelings about this book. Very much in the style of Philippa Gregory, it examines the lives of the More family through the eyes of their ward, Meg Giggs, and the renowned painter, Holbein, who visits them on two separate occasions to paint the family portrait.

There is a meander into fantasy regarding the Princes in the Tower and their connections to this family, which stood out compared to the historical fact within the book.

It dragged in places and yet the ending felt rushed. I enjoyed this book, but not sure I would seek out any more works by this author. ( )

My first time reading this author, and I loved it! If the ending hadn't felt a bit rushed, this probably would have received a perfect score. I will definitely look for more by this author -my new favorite historical! ( )

Holbein, the artist, comes to England and comes to the house of renowned Humanist, Thomas More. More has an unusual family set up, with his children and wards, all of which have been given a lot of access to learning. Holbein paints two portraits of the family group, which show the changes that the family undergoes in the period between.

At the start of the book, Sir Thomas More is part of Henry VIII's inner circle, greatly respected. His star, however, is on the wane, as his commitment to the church of Rome takes him ever further from his humanist roots and the King's favour. The main narrator of the novel is Meg, one of More's wards, who makes a good witness being both on the inside and outside of family affairs.

Bennett marries a good story as well as a lot of historical detail, as the cover says, it is for fans of Philippa Gregory. The book moves at a good pace, and it is interesting to see a well-covered period from a different angle. ( )

Description from Fantastic Fiction:

This title talks about passion, painting and politics in sixteenth-century England. The year is 1526. Hans Holbein the Younger is at the beginning of his remarkable career when he travels to England under the patronage of Sir Thomas More. His arrival brings the Renaissance in painting from Europe to Britain. As a guest in the splendid More household in Chelsea, Holbein begins to paint their first family portrait. Little could he know that in a few short years, the family, Tudor society and England itself would have changed beyond recognition. The great household of the courtier and scholar, Sir Thomas More, was famous for its liveliness and learning. More had taken under his patronage distinguished astrologers, artists, politicians and men of religion, as well as wards of court, proteges and many others. Two people visiting the great house find themselves irresistibly drawn to Meg Giggs, one of More's foster daughters. One of them is John Clements - dark, tall, elegant - an erstwhile tutor, now practising to become a medical doctor; a man of compelling presence and mysterious background. The other is Holbein himself - warm, ebullient, radical and foreign - sent by the great Erasmus to paint the More family portraits. Meg will find herself powerfully drawn to these two wildly contrasting men. She will love one, and marry the other.

My Thoughts:

I picked this book up to read and learn an insight into the More family. I know quite abit about Thomas More but very little about his family. As I have said before the best way for me to learn history is through historical fiction.

This story is told through the eyes of Meg Giggs, ward of Thomas More. I have found very little about her on the internet so I felt so let down with this book. There may be a SPOILER here so be warned. What the author has done which irritated me has changed history as we know it or have been lead to believe. There has never been conclusive evidence to what really happened to the princes in the tower, but we are lead to believe that they were sent in there by the Uncle, Richard 111 and never came out. In this book they did get out and lived under false names. One was John Clement a fictional character that marreid Meg Giggs. This is what got me mad. Why write a book about real historical figures then change what happened to them. The author may as well have just wrote a book about ‘ a family’ set in that particular time period. This book started to irritate me as I cannot read a historical book with facts changed. Fiction I know is not real but when books are supposed to be set around true events then that is what I prefer. I lost heart in this book and did give up.

So ok I have had a good moan and historical fiction fans don’t be put off by my rant as that is just me and what I like to get from a book. ( )

Based on the idea that a man appearing in a second Holbein portrait of the family of Thomas More was a man named John Clement. Creates a fictional story of that man marrying Meg Griggs, and the idea that Meg may have been More's natural child. Good at dealing with More's extreme anti-Protestantism, and the artistic creation of Hans Holbein, assumed here to have been in love with Meg.