"Bring Up the Bodies" is a sequel to "Wolf Hall" Mantel's 2009 Mann Booker Prize winner. It is possible to read it as an individual book, but it is much more interesting to read "Wolf Hall" first if one hasn't done so. So, if you are familiar with the first book, you know this is about Thomas Cromwell, a nefarious villain in the reign of Henry VIII. Cromwell has oft been presented as a sort of Iago figure encouraging and enabling Henry's excesses, but Mantel is having none of that. Instead she has masterfully created a believable character and given the reader a study of the effects of power on the morality of a rising political star.
Both stories are told from Cromwell's point of view. He is a more likable character in the first book. By the second book, he is deeply involved in the political intrigues of Henry's court. Cromwell's nemesis in the first book is Thomas More, in this book, it is Anne Boleyn. The title refers to the four men who were accused of having relations with Anne and subsequently, along with her, executed. It is likely they were framed to allow the king to make a match with Jane Seymour.
While stories about the Tudors are popular in the romance and bodice-ripper genre, Mantel's Tudor world is all about the powers behind the throne and the politics of an era that was just coming out of the medieval age. I highly recommend both of these books which, although fiction, will give the reader an intelligent grasp of court politics in a dangerous age.
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