I could not believe when I was approved for this title. Alison Weir is one of my favorite author. I was so excited I just about squealed when I got the book. I couldn't wait to get to read it (I read the book in the order I am accepted for them so that is why they may seem in odd placements. Anyway, I love historical fiction and the Tudor era is my favorite.

This books is number three (3) in her Six Tudor Queens series. I haven't read the first two (2) yet, because I have been busy reading other books, but I know enough about how Alison Weir writes and about the era that I could easily follow along. Plus, Alison Weir writes her books well enough you can pick them up at any point and read it and still follow along with them without too much problem figuring out the back story.

Getting to the book. This book is based on Jane Seymour, King Henry VIII third wife and the only one that produce a son for him. For which she tragically dies afterward. You start while Queen Katherine is still reigning as Queen and go through Anne Boleyn rising in power and then Anne Boleyn's fall from reign. You can see how different Jane and Anne are. In my honest opinion, Anne was a woman before her time. She wanted equal rule as Henry had and in that time that was not accepted. Anne was well learned and knew her opinion. The one thing she lacked was how to get her way without arguments and shrewish behavior. Something that Jane excelled at. Jane knew how to get her way by making Henry think he was the one that thought of it. This is how women would get their way in this time era, or at least the smart women did. Jane managed to reconcile Henry and his daughters not by arguing and "stamping her feet" but by careful conversation and suggestions. Jane Seymour was a wonderful queen and well deserving of the praise and love given to her.

She was the only one of King Henry's wives to give him a son. I agree with Alison Weir's determination of how Jane died. Though we will truly never know for certain due to the lack of medical knowledge back then but I completely agree with how Alison Weir thinks Jane died. Trust me, I honestly wanted to cry throughout the end of the book cause I knew what was gonna happen. In my opinion, Katherine (first wife) & Jane (third wife) were the only ones that truly loved the king. All the others were more after what <i>they</i> could gain from the marriage. Again this is my opinion.

Do you need to read this book??? A well rounded yell of YES! If you like Tudor era historical fiction then you can not go wrong with Alison Weir. She writes books that are engaging and keep you enthralled even if you know the story already. Even her non-fiction books are enjoyable to read and that says a lot cause I dislike non-fiction books. This honestly deserves more then five stars, more like ten in my opinion.

Alison Weir never disappoints. Jane Seymour is often overlooked in Tudor historical fiction. I appreciated being able to take a closer look at Jane's life. As always, Weir begins with solid historical research and then fills in the blanks to create her novel. She finishes with a lengthy authors note that explains what is known and what is fictionalized.
Jane Seymour: The Haunted Queen is part of the Six Tudor Queens series, but can be read as a standalone novel. Recommended for Tudor fans.

Jane Seymour: The Haunted Queen , is the third book in Alison Weir’s Six Tudor Queens series, and focuses on Henry VIII’s third wife, Jane Seymour. Told from first person perspective, we are given a glimpse into what life was like at the Tudor court during Henry VIII’s reign from the perspective of Jane.

Alison Weir never fails to amaze me with her astounding ability to bring 16th century England to life. Each time I open up one of her books, I feel as if I have been transported to a different time and place. Her writing is so rich and vivid, and I always feel as if I am right there in the midst of court life, feeling and seeing everything alongside all of the characters.

I really loved the first two books in the Six Tudor Queen series, and this third installment did not disappoint either. Although I didn’t love this one quite as much as the first two books in the series, it was still an amazing read. Jane Seymour is not my favorite of King Henry’s six wives, but I still have a certain fascination with her, as there is so much about her life that remains truly unknown, aside from the fact that she was the queen that finally gave Henry what he desired above all else: a son. Because of the fact that so little is known about Jane before she became Henry’s wife, I was eager to see what Alison Weir had to say about her, and as usual, Ms. Weir did not disappoint.

Using her vast knowledge of Tudor history, combined with her imagination, Alison Weir managed to weave together a vivid and richly detailed portrait of Jane Seymour’s life. Although I found this book to be a bit slower than the previous two, I still managed to be thoroughly engaged from start to finish. I really felt as if I got to know Jane and the innermost workings of her mind as I was reading, and I feel that I am now more knowledgeable about her, despite the fact that this book is a work of fiction.

The story opens when Jane is ten years old, and jumps forward to when she is eighteen years old. During Jane’s early years, she is adamant to become a nun, but decides that she doesn’t desire that path in life after all, and instead she goes to London to live at court, where she is first a lady-in-waiting to Katherine of Aragon, and then later on, to Anne Boleyn.

Jane was very fond of Katherine of Aragon, as well as devout in her Catholic faith and very against the religious reforms taking place at that time, and it is because of those things that she was not so fond of Anne Boleyn, and this grudge continued, even when Anne Boleyn became queen.

As an avid Anne Boleyn fan and supporter, I have to admit that at times my bias got the best of me, and I found myself annoyed at Jane and her thoughts towards Anne throughout the book. But at the same time, I could see why Jane felt the way she did about Anne, given the circumstances.

This book did drag a bit at times, mostly during during the middle of it. Still, I continued to be absorbed in the story as Jane tried to fit in and find her place in the intriguing and malicious court life. It was especially fascinating to read about how Jane, who is so often described as meek and plain, was able to gain the affections of King Henry and ascend to the throne.

Something that has always interested me about Jane is that, despite the fact that she was the queen that gave Henry his most desired wish (a son) and is said to be his favorite wife because of this, she is so often overshadowed by his other wives. I myself am guilty of not paying much attention to Jane Seymour, but because of this book, I was given the opportunity to gain insight into the life of the queen that I so often overlook.

This book was extremely well written and researched, and I was once again left in awe by Alison Weir’s work. This was not only a delightful glimpse into the life of Jane Seymour, but yet another remarkable tale of life in the Tudor era.

I truly enjoyed this book, and am very much looking forward to the next book in this series!

4.5/5 stars: **Thank you so much to the publisher for giving me the opportunity to read this book for review. This review will be posted on my blog, Amazon, and Goodreads closer to the release date.

Another great one in this series of Henry's 6 queens. I have one pre-ordered in hardback to add to my collection.

5 stars

The reader first makes Jane Seymour’s acquaintance when she is ten years old. She wants badly to be a nun. While her parents advise her to wait until she is eighteen, Jane finds it very hard to wait. When she enters the convent to make her final decision, she comes to the conclusion that the cloistered life is not for her.

With her brother Edward’s first marriage is in shambles, and the death of her sister Margery to the sweating sickness, not all is going well for the Seymour family. Jane secures a position in the palace in service to Queen Catherine. After several years of loyal service, she is persuaded by her ambitious family to go into service with the new Queen Anne. She is sorely tried to leave Catherine, but finally goes to Anne’s home.

After giving birth to a daughter and then having two miscarriages, Anne is losing her favor with the King Henry VIII. Jane is much distressed to learn that she has caught Henry’s eye. While she is still privately loyal to the Princess Dowager Catherine, she cannot stand Queen Anne. She tries to spurn Henry’s advances knowing that her virtue is a precious commodity. Finally, she gives in. She discovers that she is in love with Henry.

Jane is torn. Anne hates her and she is relieved to discover that she has an excuse to leave her service. Cromwell has given his quarters to her eldest brother Edward and his wife to use. She can live there. She meets Henry frequently. Henry proposes to her and Jane assumes that Anne will be sent to a nunnery and her marriage annulled based on Henry’s previous affair with Anne’s sister Mary.

But no, things get horrific when Anne is accused of both adultery and conspiring to murder the King. Jane feels sorry for her, but is elated that she will marry Henry. When the day of execution finally arrives, Jane feels awful. She marries Henry just days later.

She suffers two miscarriages and despairs that she can provide the King with the longed-for son. Jane’s sorrows are plenty. Although she finally got Henry to accept his daughters Mary and Elizabeth back into favor, the political climate is troubling. Jane is timid at times for Henry’s behavior is seemingly at odds with what he has told her.

Her final pregnancy is successful and she bears the King a son that they name Edward. That she dies of what we may only speculate. It is a tragedy and one has to wonder what would have become of Jane and England is she had not passed away.

Jane Seymour left very little behind. Much of this novel therefore must be guesswork. But Ms. Weir has done her research well and thoroughly, and gives the reader a plausible story of Jane’s life. While her family was certainly ambitious, as well all courtiers in King Henry VIII’s court, I don’t get the sense that they were any more ambitious than the Boleyn family. Sir Thomas Boleyn, later the Earl of Wiltshire, was widely known to be ready to sacrifice anything, even his children, to advance his favor with the King.

Ms. Weir draws a very good picture of the volatility of King Henry. It was during this period in his life that he became more intemperate and unstable. No longer the kind and generous man he was earlier in his life. One has to wonder just how much damage his marriage to Anne Boleyn did to him. Or perhaps it was his ailments, of which he suffered many. Maybe he was too much of a good-time man, and resented the burdens of ruling the country during this difficult period in history. We shall never really know. He was certainly good at justifying his action, no matter how disastrous or devastating they were.

Ms. Weir gives us another remarkable story of life in the Tudor times. This book is very well written, plotted and researched. I have read many of Alison Weir’s books, and this one is a bit of a departure. Since Jane Seymour left so little behind, this book is perhaps more speculation than her others. But it is based on extensive and exhaustive research. I truly enjoyed it. I am very much looking forward to reading the next in this series, and looking into the life of Anne of Cleves.

I want to thank NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group – Ballantine for forwarding to me a copy of this most remarkable book to read and enjoy.

SHE DID IT AGAIN! ANOTHER ALISON WEIR MASTERPIECE. I love her books. I read them all. And this one did not disappoint. I am captivated by all things Tudor and I did see Jane in a different light. I am glad to have been chosen to read this book through NetGalley. (bowing to author)

Jane Seymour: Haunted Queen is a riveting novel about Henry VIII’s third wife. Alison Weir does an incredible job at seamlessly blending fact and fiction. This is a must read for all historical fiction fans, especially ones slightly obsessed with the Tudor Dynasty.

I have read many of Weir’s books and have found that oftentimes she becomes mired down in facts, which loses the less academic of her readers. She avoids that pitfall here and keeps the reader on the hook. Basing a book on a figure whose end is known can be a challenge but, while adhering to facts, Weir creates an air of suspense and offers an intriguing new theory on events.

Jane Seymour is a well-known figure of history as she was the only one of Henry’s six wives to give him a male heir. However, very little is known about her life so I’m always interested in learning more about her. Weir is known for her in depth research and adherence to facts. Her knowledge and immersion in this period gives credence to her theories about the parts of Seymour’s life that are unknown.

Weir begins the novel with Jane as a girl of ten dedicated to becoming a nun. We see her traditional upbringing on an English estate as she learns domestic arts as well as more studious pursuits. Jane is raised to be loyal, faithful, and dutiful. She will be the picture of the typical wife of a landowner except for her adamant belief she should take vows and join a convent.

When Jane is eighteen she finally convinces her parents to allow her to enter a convent. However, after a probationary period with the nuns, Jane realizes that a cloistered life is not for her and so, she returns to Wulf Hall. Jane becomes restless as she struggles to discover what she wants in life.

As Jane flounders, her older brother Edward’s marriage disintegrates as his role in society grows. Jane’s father also falls off the pedestal on which Jane has him and she is forced to see beyond her sheltered ideals.

The second part of the novel begins with nineteen year old Jane entering the service of Queen Katherine just as Anne Boleyn is making her play for the king. Through Jane we see how Katherine is shunted aside for a younger, hopefully more fertile woman.

During part two and three, a very interesting struggle unfolds within Jane as she watches the Church she was committed to join being abandoned by her country while she is forced to embrace a new religion. Jane remains loyal to Katherine until her family forces her to join Anne’s court.

Jane watches as Anne’s influence wanes and the King’s interest turns to her. Jane is both torn and excited at the prospect of Henry’s attention but her family pushes her forward without hesitation. Part three ends with Anne’s execution and Jane’s pending nuptials.

Part Four details Jane’s rise to glory as she becomes Queen of England and Henry’s third wife. Jane is twenty-eight while Henry is forty-five. Jane struggles with the nuances of royalty and her sudden rise. She knows she must please Henry as she knows her fate is in his hands.

Jane cements her place in history when she gives Henry his long awaited male heir a little over a year and an half into their marriage. She story is tragically cut short when she dies two weeks after the birth of the prince.

While I, like most people, know the facts of Jane’s life, I was swept away by the possibilities that Weir used to populate the unknown parts. Weir’s attention to detail and devotion to research allow her to postulate plausible theories. This is Weir’s third installment of her series Six Tudor Queens and she shows no weariness of her subject.

I appreciate NetGalley making an advance copy of this novel available to me. Per the publisher’s instructions, this review will not be made available anywhere else on the internet until after its release date.

I was really hoping that I would enjoy this book far more than the last one in the series, but I was really disappointed. I understand that the author was trying to make Jane Seymour more complex than she is usually portrayed, and while, she succeeded in some respects, her characterization ended up being wholly unsympathetic by the end. I just didn't understand how she could be so forgiving, not only of her father for his indiscretions, but of the king. She went from nearly despising him to being head over heels in the span of a chapter or two. She utterly lost me when she wears white for purity at her wedding while being pregnant...after ripping Anne Boleyn apart for doing the exact same thing at her coronation. Even worse is the continued character assassination of the entire Boleyn family. Weir is an accomplished historian, she knows that there is no evidence for much of what she accuses them of in fiction, so I'm not sure why she continues that storyline.

It's been a long time since I've read a historical fiction and I forgot how much I love them. I've seen Alison Weir mentioned quite a bit when it comes to historical fiction so when I saw this one available on NetGalley I decided I had to request it. Thankfully I was approved and I was immediately sucked into the book. For being over 500 pages long it certainly didn't feel like it as I flew through it. Alison Weir has a way of writing that draws the reader into the book and I felt as if I was an observer in King Henry VIII's court watching everything occurring in front of me.

Jane Seymour isn't one of the Henry's wives that I've ever heard much about so I didn't go in with any great expectations. The author notes that not much is actually known about Jane Seymour's inner thoughts but I thoroughly enjoyed her take on what life might have been like for Jane.

I'm curious how the first two books in this series takes place since we see a lot about Anne Boleyn in this one but I enjoyed it so much I want to go back and read them. Definitely a great introduction to Alison Weir's works!

I always thought of Jane Seymour as the one of the two lucky queens of Henry VIII; she gave him his long awaited heir, died days later before she could displease or disappoint him. This would not happen again until Henry died before he could dispose of his sixth queen.

I’ve been fascinated by the Tudor dynasty at the age of 14 after studying Henry VIII and the lengths he went through to have a legitimate son. Over time I went my sense of history became more complete as I studied the War of the Roses, learned more about Margaret Beaufort whose son became Henry VII after defeating the last Plantagenet king and who determined that to bring the white and red together that he should marry Edwards’ daughter Elizabeth. While the beginning of the dynasty had its intrigues and problems none would equal those caused by their second son, Henry.

The novel is well-written, very readable; the characters and event well drawn. I liked the book very much even if I am somewhat disappointed that it is very much fiction, with a little history thrown into the mix. Henry was a tyrant who I believe was not mentally stable, he liked playing roles and games and he hated to be crossed by anyone; the way he treated his daughters, especially Mary is beyond deplorable. This book did nothing to change my opinion that Jane was lucky to die shortly after the birth of the long awaited son, I doubt that if she had lived the author would have been able to spin this tale of Henry at long last finding a woman he could love.

Like many I did not know much about Jane other than she was the eldest daughter of the Seymour’s, a family who was very ambitious, especially her brothers Ned and Thomas. I always though of her a pawn who was played by her family to advance their fortunes and like most women of her era she had little choice in the matter. I knew that he had been a maid to Katherine and thought of her as the true Queen, Henry’s true wife and that their daughter, Mary was the legitimate heir. Most historians have portrayed her as virtuous and utterly under her family’s control; while Ms. Weir has portrayed her as a shrewd woman with more intelligence than was attributed to women in the 16th centaury. She has also portrayed her as very religious, a devout believer of the old faith, but her novel leaves this very much in doubt. Most historians say Jane was meek and submissive ( her motto says a lot) and I’ve often thought this was one of the main reasons that Henry married her; after years of Anne’s shrewishness, intrigues and tempers and Katherine’s and Mary’s stubbornness and defiance he was tired of it and wanted a little quite in his domestic life. As a king, he felt even more than most of his contemporaries that he was the absolute head of his wife, the country and his subjects; he was tired of the turmoil that had been a major part of his life. Katherine had ignored his affairs, Anne did not and she made him and everyone around her miserable with her temper tantrums. In Jane he believed that he had a another queen who would ignore his roaming, be grateful for what attention he did give her, never reproach him or try to give him unwanted advice on how to handle matters but would be there for him whenever and in whatever capacity he wanted. There were a few times that she did voice opinions prior to his and these usually did not end well. These are two quotes that I believe I have read in other works that Henry said to Jane who he supposedly loved when she dared to express an opinion that was different than his. “And you, Madame, would do well not to meddle in matters that do no concern you.” “You forget yourself, Madame”, he snarled. “This has nothing to do with you, I might remind you that the last Queen died in consequence of meddling too much in state affairs. Go attend to other things! He pointed to the great doors. Oh sure, after these outbursts he was somewhat apologetic because he saw how upset she was and second only to his desire for a son was that this third marriage look to be one of bliss, one approved of by God as lawful and true since he had convinced himself that others were not.

No matter how she justified it a devout woman would not let a married man, no matter if he was a king make her his mistress. It didn’t matter that she never believed that he was truly married to Anne that the real queen was Katherine; it still went all religious doctrine to allow it to happen no matter what her family wanted? She and others had condemned Anne when she started with Henry and no matter how she justified it she was doing the same thing that Anne had done. Jane may have been innocent and Henry was the king at seducing women but I wonder of she loved him or was this just a way for her to ease her conscious over her adultery with him? Or was it because she felt so unloved and unwanted by men that she justified as love and convinced herself that he loved her as much as she loved him? Personally, I don’t think Henry was capable of loving anyone but himself. It didn’t matter that she didn’t believe that Anne was his wife in the eyes of God, sex before marriage is adultery and of things had turned out differently; her family could have done the same thing to her that that they did to poor Catherine. Despite the authors claims that she was working to have Mary brought back to court and restored to her position, I find it hard to believe that her family, especially Ned would not work against her e efforts. Considering how he treated the two sons who may have been his, (and were innocent no matter the circumstances) I cannot see him having any sympathy for a royal child, especially a woman, which might rival any claims that Jane’s children would have.

4.25/5 STARS: **I want to thank the author and/or publisher for providing me with a copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review; all opinions are mine.**

I am voluntarily submitting my honest review after receiving an ARC of this ebook via NetGalley.

I discovered Alison Weir's work as a university student, but was thrilled when she made the transition from academic history professor to historical fiction author. In Jane Seymour, Weir applies her deft touch to painting a vivid portrait of the doomed queen as she likely actually was. Her strict adherence to historical record where available, but nuanced insight and perceptive reasoning produce a compelling, lifelike visage for the reader to contemplate. While Jane is often treated as a grasping, ambitious social climber or as a meek, mousy milksop by many writers, Weir describes her in a more complicated, multi-faceted light. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys historical fiction, but especially to those with an interest in the Tudor years.