Mary McGrigor

I'm going to come straight out and say that I didn't finish this. I don't like historical fiction masquerading as history.

That should be all the review you need, but I will clarify a little. This is a 220 page book, yet it has a bibliography less than a page and a half long: 12 primary sources and 21 secondary sources -- some of them extremely secondary, e.g. the Encyclopedia Britannica and A. R. Myers's 1952 England in the Later Middle Ages (the latter a perfectly good book, but I have the 1971 edition -- much newer than McGrigor's, note) -- and the index never mentions Margaret Douglas!). There are very few sources here which give a detailed look at the middle sixteenth century.

Similarly, there are endnotes, but (if I counted correctly) only 124. For a 220 page book. Most of the statements here are completely unsupported. And either conjectural or unsupported -- e.g. take this statement on p. 40: "Together they [Margaret Douglas and Princess Mary Tudor, the future Mary I] talked of their ambitions, of their hopes of finding suitors and, inevitably, as most girls do, of the so far hidden joys of sex and of whom, in their own young opinions, were the most desirable and dashing men at court."

No footnote on that statement, of course. But I would note that McGrigor has no source for the thoughts of either Margaret or Mary, and that Mary, as Henry VIII's heir apparent, knew she wasn't going to have any real choice of spouse. And, remember, this is Bloody Mary, the Catholic fanatic, who was not exactly the apple of her father's eye.

I won't belabor this. If you don't need your history to be accurate, but just want it to be exciting, this may interest you. (Personally, I need the facts, to try to figure out other historical facts.) Certainly Margaret Douglas -- the second child of Henry VIII's older sister Margaret Tudor, Queen of Scotland, and hence a potential heir to the English throne, as well as the mother of Henry Lord Darnley, the future husband of Mary Queen of Scots -- is well worth a book. But because she's worth a book, it would be nice if it were a reliable book.… (altro)

Argyll: Land of Blood and Beauty is a thorough, extensive history of the clans and the lands of this part of Scotland. It is a thin book (113 pages) but not a quick read. The level of detail is stunning; if this book were combined with similar histories of other parts of Scotland, the total volume would be immense. Excellent photos abound, and the map at the start of the book pinpoints over fifty sites to visit. I can easily imagine someone being inspired to use this book as a travel guide after researching their ancestry.… (altro)