Book Review: The Princes in the Tower by Alison Weir

The Princes in the Tower by Alison Weir
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I have read Alison Weir before, her biography of Eleanor of Aquitaine and her overview history of The Wars of the Roses, and have found her enjoyable.  However, I was disappointed less than 30 pages into this book and it never improved.  I read Princes in the Tower to contrast a biography of Richard III by Paul Murray Kendall, unfortunately instead of well thought out case for Richard III has the murderer of the Princes, I got Sir Thomas More 2.0 and arch villain of Shakespeare.

I give credit to Weir for the information written in Chapters 18-19 & 21 relating to the events that occurred after Bosworth and the discovery of the skeletons that are most likely the Princes and medical exams performed on them.  This later part of the book, save for Chapter 20 which will be written about below, is it's redeeming quality.

However, the rest of the book just made me clinch my jaw and bare through the essential retelling of More with interesting Weir inventions.  One of the reasons can be found in Chapter 20 about Sir James Tyrell's confession about murdering the Princes, a confession that wasn't published.  Weir stated that because Tyrell had held positions under Henry VII, the first Tudor believed that the confession would implicate him in the Princes' murder.  However, Weir also states that Henry VII's "interviewers" also questioned John Dighton about Tyrell's story and he confirmed it, why is this significant? Dighton was one of the two men Tyrell hired to murder the Princes.  Dighton was then let go while Tyrell, who had been arrested in relation to another conspiracy, was executed and afterwards Henry VII told his top officials he knew what happened to Edward V and his brother.  If Henry VII was so concerned about a confession given by someone he had given appointments to, why was Dighton who Henry VII never rewarded allowed to walk away instead of signing a confession have it published before being executed and while keeping Tyrell separate to his own fate?

Weir hoped readers wouldn't catch the problems of her arguments, but this one example shows why I gave this book the rating I did.


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