I Can’t Believe I Read the Whole Thing

I just finished a biography of Mary Queen of Scots. I think it took me like three months to read. Or it felt like it at least. I just don’t get the time to read like I used to. I just wanted to get done with it before we leave for Mexico because a) it’s not exactly beach reading; and b) who wants to carry that heavy book on a plane?

I had originally bought another biography of her by Antonia Fraser, who is apparently quite the biographer, but reading it was like chewing sawdust so I set it aside. Then I found this one that got good reviews as far as readability went. I had to order it used from some random seller on Amazon and then a week later I saw it on the Publisher’s Remainders table at the book store for about half of what I paid for it. Typical.

I was actually impressed at how easy it was to read. It was just really really long. I did get confused by all the names - Moray and Maitland and Mar and Argyll and Huntley…. wow! It is a long cast of characters. But it was surely fascinating. Really all I knew about her was from both of the Elizabeth movies which of course were told from Elizabeth’s point of view. Truly interesting and tragic stuff.

The minute I finished it, though, my head was about to explode with knowledge so I had to pick up some fluff to read. I’ll probably live, in a literary way, on fluff for a while before diving back into another serious book. I’m looking for a good, readable biography of Elizabeth I if anyone knows of one.

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