The king of the title is Edward I of England and the narrator is the youngest of his five daughters, Elizabeth, struggling in her unhappy arranged marriage to the Count of Holland while longing for a dashing English nobleman.
As a girl of eleven or twelve, I loved Molly Haycraft's airy romances about royal women. Reading this book as an adult, however, I must say I found it a bit too insubstantial.
While basically sweet and innocent in tone, the book does show the down side of princesshood, particularly the forced political marriages often devoid of love or even liking.
Elizabeth is a likeable heroine, and if you're in the mood for something light and love reading about British royals, especially the Plantagenets, as I do, you'll probably enjoy this story.
Want to read a really great book about Edward I and his family, by a natural storyteller who makes history come vividly alive? Read THE THREE EDWARDS by Thomas B. Costain (Molly Haycraft's father!).

This book is almost as much a book on philosphy as it is on the portraits of Queen Elizabeth 1st. Unfortunatley, when the author starts on about the philosphy of painting and perspective things get a bit dense and the language obscure.

This is not a very large book (78 pages), but it does have some interesting things to say about Elizabeth's portraits and how they would have been viewed by their makers and the people who would have viewed them in Elizabeth's lifetime.

The portraits delt with in this book are: 1 Elizabeth as a princess (red dress) 2.The "armada" portrait at woburn Abbey 3.The coronation portrait 4. Elizabeth playing the lute (a minature by Hilliard) 5 Queen Elizabeth and the 3 goddesses 6.The Darnley portrait 7. The "Siena" portrait 8.The "ermine" portrait 9. The "ditchley" portrait 10.The "rainbow" portrait.

There are nice illustrations of all these portraits in the centre of the book. This book is worth a read if you want to find some of the meaning in Elizabeth's portraits, but be warned about it's shortness and wordiness.

Stevenson has crafted an interesting novel for those who are interested in history - with unexpected twists. This is fiction laid on top of historical figures and in the case of Elizabeth, The Winter Queen, her lineage and descendants are important. (Elizabeth was the daughter of James I (1566-1625) of England and sister of Charles I, King of England, during the period of the story.) Yet it is difficult to untangle the characters; a Stuart/Hanover family tree would help a great deal. A listing of the characters would also be very useful. The story takes place when Charles I is king of England; Louis XIII is king of France and Philip IV is king of Spain - and the Netherlands is enormously wealthy by virtue of trade. Set in the Netherlands, the novel hinges on Elizabeth's intimate relationship with an African prince, abducted by Portuguese traders and sold into bondage who "ends up" at the Dutch Court. The well-educated Protestant - and African - prince, Pelegius van Overmeer, becomes a confidante of Elizabeth and from their shared loneliness, love blossoms. There's a fair amount of reference to Pelegius's tribal traditions but it is not clear where the Oyo were located - Nigeria? Pelegius is an interesting character and since this is the first book of a trilogy, Stevenson will undoubtedly clarify the complex history of this period and the role these characters play in history in the next two books. At least, the book had me scurrying to the Internet to try to locate more information!! It's very difficult to locate info on the Yoruba tribe ...

Unlike her other books, this one seems to be an experiment that didn't work.

I'm a diehard Elizabeth George fan. This particular book disappointed me in many ways. I could only complete one of the five stories, and can't recommend it to anyone.

Will this stop me from buying her next novel? Not at all. She's a master in her field.

I'm a great Elizabeth George fan. She is one of a small number of writers whose works I buy in hardbound.

But I'm afraid she's no short story writer.

The collection gets off to a bad start with "Exposure," which ought to be interesting to George fans because of the presence of detective Thomas Lynley. But the story is a mess. I don't understand the perpetrator's motive. The "puzzle" aspect is poorly presented--we're not really given enough of a clue to solve the puzzle ourselves. The perpetrator actually commits two crimes--and I don't believe that the methods used to commit either crime would have worked in real life.

Three of the the stories feature "O. Henry endings," none of which, in my opinion, quite come off.

The title story, "I, Richard" intertwines a sort of pseudo-mystery story concerning the truth about Richard III and the Princes in the Tower, with a modern-day murder story. Unfortunately, to someone who isn't a "Ricardian," the Richard III part is muddled and boring--and the framing murder mystery is unbelievable, except for the ending--which is all too predictable.

Similar motifs recur in several of the stories--giving a slightly stale or repetitious flavor to the collection.

Perhaps the best is "Good Fences Aren't Always Enough," which comes close to being sad and touching. But all of them, even this one, read more like extended jokes than like real stories. The characters in them are paper cutouts. The author's attitude toward her characters is remote and almost contemptuous. She never seems involved with them, nor do we. The stories succeed neither as slices of life nor as clever little clockwork gadgets.

And, incidentally, the book is a rather poor value. There are only five stories in it. It's thin, the type is large, and the lines are widely spaced. By my estimate, it contains roughly about 70,000 words (for [money amount]) or about one-fifth as many as "A Traitor to Memory" ([money amount]). Distinctly short measure, to my way of thinking.

I'm so glad I followed my heart and not some of these reviews and bought the book! I've enjoyed each and every short story and the beginning of each story starts off with why Elizabeth George came to write it or what inspired her to do so. Each story made me curious as to where it was leading me. Granted, one can't compare this with the novels that E. George has written especially if one follows the Lynley series, but each story stands on it's own and left me satisfied at the end of each short story. I've read all of her books and this one was one of my favorites! Well done!