Monday 3 February 2014

My Royal Story: Elizabeth by Kathryn Lasky

I wish these books had been around when I was a younger reader.

They tick all my historical fiction/fictionalised history boxes beautifully.

Elizabeth: A Tudor Princess's Diary 1544 is my first dip into The Royal Story series and I can't recommend them highly enough for young lovers of history.

It's an easy to read diary format full of interesting facts about the time.

But the main purpose of a diary is self-reflection and emotions.

We see inside Elizabeth's heart - her complicated feelings for her father and mother, the difficult relationships with her siblings, her affection for young Dudley and her ladies.

We get glimpses of her steely character, her bravery and famous independence.

Kathryn Lasky has also written a Royal Story about Mary Queen of Scots and Marie Antoinette.

Perfect for mature 10+ readers.

Elizabeth also fulfills the criteria for my TBR Pile Challenge and What's in a Name Challenge.

7 comments:

  1. Thank you. I have an 11 year old niece (birthday this week). This would be a good series to start her on.

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    1. Another great book about young Elizabeth is Just A Girl by Australian author Jane Caro.
      And one on young Henry called VIII by M Castor

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  2. That sounds like a great series - I've never heard of them before.

    Adding them to my list (planning our homeschool year and looking for some good books for my daughter to read). Great find!

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    1. Scholastic Australia also do a fabulous My Australian Story series.

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  3. My son liked reading those in Year 6! We read a couple of them together. I think he read Elizabeth, but I don't think I did. I read the Marie Antoinette to feed my French obsession. A few of them I didn't like and thought the writing very dull.

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    Replies
    1. I wondered about the other authors in the series. Kathryn Lasky seems like a fairly safe bet though :-)

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  4. Well done on What's In A Name! I love the look of these books, a good idea for getting young readers into history.

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