Bring Up the Bodies

by Hilary Mantel · 2012

Bring Up the Bodies picks up the story of Thomas Cromwell as Henry VIII's infatuation with Anne Boleyn curdles into a search for grounds to remove her. Over a tense few months in 1535-36, Cromwell maneuvers through the English court, weighing old grudges and new alliances as the king's eye turns toward Jane Seymour. Written in Hilary Mantel's distinctive close third-person present tense, the novel traces how ruthless political calculation and self-preservation converge to bring down a queen.

Books mentioned in Bring Up the Bodies (1)

• A Glasse of the Truthe by Henry VIII: “The king – it would be three or four years back and to justify his first divorce – put out a book called A Glass of the Truth.”