Legacy: The Acclaimed Novel of Elizabeth, England's Most Passionate Queen -- and the Three Men Who Loved Her

I have spent around six years perusing endless amounts of Tudor historical fiction. Along my way I have encountered many portrayals of Elizabeth I; some passable, some horrendous, and some very good. But until I read Legacy, I never found my ideal portrayal. Now I have, and it feels wonderful.I received this book a few months ago, and since then it has not left my bedside table. Although I finished it in a day and a half, I have since read it three more times, not counting the hours I spend flipping to a random page to experience it again. This book is exquisite. Although it tells the entire arc of Elizabeth's story from birth to death, it only weighs in at a few hundred pages. And yet nothing feels rushed or left out. There are countless POVs, which in the hands of a less gifted writer would cause confusion, but in Susan Kay's hands gives us original insights into all the characters of Elizabeth's world. And they're all here, from Thomas Seymour to Henry VIII to numerous foreign ambassadors to the Earl of Essex. Each bring their own unique perspectives on the remarkable woman who dominates their existence.Apart from Elizabeth (who I'll get to in a moment) the best characterizations in the book are Elizabeth's lover, Robert Dudley, and her chief minister, William Cecil. Dudley is portrayed as authentically as I've ever seen him; greedy and self-serving perhaps, but also compellingly human, a man torn in different directions and above all, passionately in love with Elizabeth. Cecil is given just as thorough a treatment. Principled and pragmatic, a family man with a ruthless streak, Cecil loves Elizabeth as much as Dudley does, although in a different way. As the book says, "one desired her body, the other her spirit." The triangle of these three people forms the central conflict of the book, as both men are eventually destroyed by their devotion to her.But it is the portrayal of Elizabeth that makes this book so wonderful. It's as if Susan Kay reached into my mind, pulled out every thought I've ever had about Elizabeth while researching her, and transformed it into a stunning characterization that every few pages made me catch my breath and say "yes!" Her Elizabeth is brilliant, vain, narcissistic, loving, selfish, brave, charming, manipulative, patriotic, and above all magnetically charismatic. She has the "x" factor that other writers of Elizabeth seem to miss; the reason why Elizabeth was such a beloved leader and how she was able to command such affection and fear. To quote the book, "Elizabeth Tudor was a labyrinth. She drew people, without conscious effort, into the maze of her own personality and abandoned them there, leaving them to find their own way out again--if they could. Most found they were unable to, many never even tried. And those few who succeeded were troubled by a vague sense of loss for the rest of their days." (p. 13).I cannot recommend this book more, to everyone from a dedicated student of Tudor history to a complete beginner. Much like Elizabeth, this book is completely magnetic--once you pick it up, I dare you to put it down. It is a book about a fascinating period of history, yes, but first and foremost it is a character study of a truly remarkable woman.

Legacy is a lengthy, satisfying, and gorgeously written novel about Queen Elizabeth I and the most important men in her relatively long life and reign.Ms. Kay uses the omniscient, third person perspective throughout, but she still manages to develop the characters very well, whether male or female. To this day, I still give a slight edge to Miles' I, Elizabeth, which is written in first person using Elizabeth as the narrator. But the difference in quality is not great between Legacy and I, Elizabeth, probably amounting to a difference of one-tenth of a point on a typical Olympic judging scale. In short, Legacy is a wonderful work of historical fiction.Legacy goes over 600 pages, which you can devour like a tray of fudge, or savor, as I did, over many weeks. Kay's rich prose does invite, I'm sure, repeated readings over time.This novel has in common with I, Elizabeth and Gregory's The Virgin's Lover an interpretation of Elizabeth's sexuality -- that is to say, each of these books speculates in the same way that Elizabeth had one or two sexual encounters with Robert Dudley over her lifetime, although the encounters are written in wholly unique ways with varying degrees of explicitness. In addition, both Legacy and The Virgin's Lover contain theories about Sir William Cecil's involvement in the plot to have Amy Dudley killed. These theories can't have been dreamed up by both Kay and Gregory, so I am sure they are drawing on previous speculation from several historians.Susan Kay makes Elizabeth quite believable and human. She obviously finds many things to admire about this amazing regent, while pointing out her flaws simultaneously. She definitely likes Elizabeth much better than does Philippa Gregory, who never portrays Elizabeth in a positive light. Seen through the eyes of various men like Thomas Seymour, Dudley, William Cecil and his son, or the quixotic Earl of Essex, Elizabeth glows, bewitches, and smiles, sometimes malevolently and other times enigmatically. Elizabeth's very close relationships with men such as Robert Dudley are presented as stormy and dramatic, and rightly so.In my opinion, Elizabeth is portrayed as the essence of womanhood. Mystery is what draws her men so irresistibly. Elizabeth's moodiness, flirtatious gestures, outright deceptions and delicate physicality lead to correspondingly endless frustration, carnal desire, bemusement, and protectiveness among men. If she were an ordinary maid, men would eventually have mastery over her, but as she is their queen, they can only hope to bask in her reflected glory. I think there's never been another woman like her, and Ms. Kay dares to show how Elizabeth used her power over courtiers and subjects alike. Along the way, however, Elizabeth experienced much danger to her life, and Kay does not skimp on the circumstances surrounding this fact, especially when she covers the threat to Elizabeth's life while Mary was on the throne.I liked the ending of the book. It's creative and satisfying. You cannot say that about many other contemporary works of fiction.

Great

Thoroughly enjoyed the book, it's the sort of book that goes into my library and will be read again. I've read quite a few books about Elizabeth I and this is one of the better ones.

Simply the best book written about the enigma that was Elizabeth the First.Could hardly bear to put it down.Found it easy to empathise with the characters and thoroughly enjoyed the rich description of a bygone age.It explores a fascinating theory held by some in the Tudor world, that Anne Boleyn was a witch and lived on in her daughter. Absorbing and interesting angle, if not totally accurate!!The dilemma posed by Mary, Queen of Scots, was investigated thoroughly and proved to be most thought - provoking.A must-read for people who enjoy a really good, historical novel that brings characters to life and evokes powerful images of life in the Tudor Court.

Coming into this book, I’d yet to read a definitive novel of Elizabeth’s life, something which seemed a bit of a mystery, as Elizabeth is one of the most well known figures of history. Susan Kay's Legacy is grand and ambitious in scope, taking us from the cradle to the grave, and highlighting themes across Elizabeth’s life and seeking to explain how she evolves as a character and makes her later decisions as queen. However, the novel also felt like it dealt with stages of Elizabeth’s life in more brevity, and not nearly as much detail as I wanted. Margaret George’s recent novel Elizabeth was fresh in my mind, which covers the queen's later years, so I was particularly aware of what Kay left out from the autumn of Elizabeth's life and found myself missing what was omitted.Legacy was well-written, the dialogue in particular was sharp and in character, although I missed a certain level of detail. Legacy probably is the novel that comes closest to being a definitive novel of Elizabeth’s life, but for me it just didn’t quite make it, missing it by a hair by virtue of the fact that by focusing on the wider scope Kay sacrificed the details and complexities of the era. Very enjoyable however, and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend Legacy to anyone.

As other reviewers have said, this is a truely amazing book. I was gripped from the first chapter and seriously didn't want it to end.The book is written as a novel around the events of the sixteenth century, with good background before Elizabeth's birth, through her childhood and growing up years. How the events that happened made her who she was. Having read other historical books, I'm not necessarily a fan of Elizabeth herself from the ways she treated others for example, Katherine Grey, and her manipulation of the men around her, but this book restored a little of my faith and gave good reasons for why she acted as she did.I really liked the day to day detail in the book, of Elizabeth and Dudley enjoying quiet evenings in her closet playing chess and sitting by the fire. It made the characters come to life and you almost felt you were there as a casual observer.I will definitely read this book again and would recommend to anyone whether they are interested in this period in history or not.