Lancaster against York

This is an excellent book by a very good author. The narrative in the book starts well before the traditional start of the War of the Roses at the first Battle of St Albans, it in fact starts with the ascension of Richard II and ends with the defeat of Richard III at Bosworth Field and the ascension and reign of Henry VII. There is a family tree of the Yorks and the Lancasters at the front of the book and a well-appreciated appendix that lists many of the well-known aristocratic titles of the period, each entry comes with a list of persons who held that title. Sadly, there are no maps in the book but considering the plethora of place names it would have been a mighty task to include them all in a series of maps. Highly recommended.

Highly readable account of the Wars of the Roses, the dynastic battle between the rival houses of York and Lancaster. Trevor Royle begins his history with the reign of Richard II and takes the reader through all the subsequents upheavals. A good starting point for anyone interested in this subject.

Wish that Royle had employed a better fact checker. Many date errors in text (including the wrong day for the Battle of Bosworth), many errors in the Appendix and errorr of omission in the Index. Looks like he did a rush job on this one. Book is an adequate overview of the period. No new information, most of his sources are secondary and his analysis is derrived from the secondary sources. His primary sources are inconsistently given credit for objectivity.