What’s in it
Tap a tag: ❤ = this matters to me · tap again ✕ = don’t care · again to reset. The list below updates each time.
24 books with the same feel
Include books by the same authorA Great and Terrible King: Edward I and the Forging of Britain
Marc Morris · 471 pages
The Borgias: The Hidden History
G.J. Meyer · 478 pages
Sweeping aside the gossip, slander, and distortion that have shrouded the Borgias for centuries, G. J. Meyer offers an unprecedented portrait of the infamous Renaissance family and their storied milieu. They burst out of obscurity in Spain to capture the great prize of the papacy, not once but twice. Throughout a tumultuous half-century--as popes, statesmen, warriors, lovers, and breathtakingly am
Elizabeth of York: A Tudor Queen and Her World
Alison Weir · 572 pages
A biography of the first Tudor queen, who was the only living descendent of Yorkist King Edward IV, and mother of the infamous Henry VIII, sheds new light on the life of this enigmatic woman and mother of the Tudor dynasty.
Sword of Allah: Khalid bin Al-Waleed
A.I. Akram · 532 pages
Joan of Arc: A History
Helen Castor · 352 pages
The acclaimed historian Helen Castor -- bestselling author and BBC broadcaster of She-Wolves, the story of England's queens before Elizabeth I -- returns with the incredible story of Joan of Arc, as only a biographer of Castor's enormous talents can tell it. Helen Castor brings us afresh a gripping life of Joan of Arc. Instead of the icon, she gives us a living, breathing young woman, a roaring gi
The Greatest Knight: The Remarkable Life of William Marshal, The Power Behind Five English Thrones
Thomas Asbridge · 464 pages
The story of the largely forgotten William Marshal Pembroke of the English medieval period, who, "as a five-year-old boy ... was sentenced to execution and led to the gallows, yet this landless younger son survived his brush with death, and went on to train as a medieval knight. Against all odds, [he] rose through the ranks--serving at the right hand of five English monarchs--to become a celebrate
Royal Panoply: Brief Lives of the English Monarchs
Carolly Erickson · 368 pages
The Woodvilles: The Wars of the Roses and England's Most Infamous Family
Susan Higginbotham · 224 pages
224 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : 25 cm
Blood Sisters: The Women Behind The War Of The Roses
Sarah Gristwood · 408 pages
"In Pembroke Castle, on 28 January 1457, the 13-year-old Margaret Beaufort gave birth to a son she named Henry. Her husband was already dead; her sufferings in childbirth were grave... England was in the grip of civil war - the War of the Roses. Known to contemporaries as 'The Cousins War', beyond the fields of battle raged a family feud, a violent and emotional domestic drama. For the noble women
Margaret Beaufort: Mother of the Tudor Dynasty
Elizabeth Norton · 263 pages
First-ever biography of Lady Margaret Beaufort. Born in the midst of the Wars of the Roses, Margaret Beaufort became the greatest heiress of her time. She survived a turbulent life, marrying four times and enduring imprisonment before passing her claim to the crown of England to her son, Henry VII, the first of the Tudor monarchs. Margaret's royal blood placed her on the fringes of the Lancastr
Winter King
Thomas Penn · 458 pages
It was 1501. England had been ravaged for decades by conspiracy, violence, murders, coups and counter-coups. Henry VII had clambered to the top of the heap - a fugitive with a flimsy claim to England's crown who through luck, guile and ruthlessness had managed to win the throne and stay on it for sixteen years. Although he built palaces, hosted jousts, gave out lavish presents and sent ambassadors
The Rival Queens: Catherine de' Medici, Her Daughter Marguerite de Valois, and the Betrayal that Ignited a Kingdom
Nancy Goldstone · 448 pages
The Alexiad
Anna Comnena · 560 pages
"Anna Comnena (1083-1153) wrote The Alexiad as an account of the reign of her father, the Byzantine Emperor Alexius I. It is also an important source of information on the Byzantine war with the Normans, and on the First Crusade, in which Alexius participated. While the Byzantines were allied to the Crusaders, they were none the less critical of their behaviour and Anna's book offers a startlingly
Isabella: The Warrior Queen
Kirstin Downey · 532 pages
Drawing on new scholarship, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Woman Behind the New Deal presents a biography of Isabella of Castile, the controversial Queen of Spain who sponsored Christopher Columbus' journey to the New World, established the Spanish Inquisition and became one of the most influential female rulers in history.
Queen Emma: A History of Power, Love, and Greed in 11th-Century England
Harriet O'Brien · 288 pages
The Greatest Traitor: The Life of Sir Roger Mortimer, Ruler of England 1327-1330
Ian Mortimer · 246 pages
William Marshal: The Flower of Chivalry
Georges Duby · 155 pages
The Last Days of Richard III
John Ashdown-Hill · 190 pages
This book contains details about what Richard III did in his last five months, what happened to his body, and how his DNA was found in Canada. This book explores these events from the standpoint of Richard himself and his contemporaries. By deliberately avoiding the hindsight knowledge that he will lose the Battle of Bosworth Field, this book presents a new Richard - not a passive victim, awaiting
Two Lives of Charlemagne
Einhard, Notker the Stammerer · 227 pages
"These two LIVES provide a fascinating contrast. Einhard, who spent twenty-three years in Charlemagne's service, chose to approach his Vita Caroli as a public history and, in beautifully expressed language, recounts Charlemagne's personal life and his achievements in warfare, learning, art, building, and in the skilful administration of the state. Notker the monk's De Carolo Magno is a collection
In Search of Dracula: The History of Dracula and Vampires
Raymond T. McNally, Radu Florescu · 223 pages
The true story behind the legend of Dracula - a biography of Prince Vlad of Transylvania, better known as Vlad the Impaler. This revised edition now includes entries from Bram Stoker's recently discovered diaries, the amazing tale of Nicolae Ceausescu's attempt to make Vlad a national hero, and an examination of recent adaptations in fiction, stage and screen.
The Women of the Cousins' War: The Duchess, the Queen, and the King's Mother
Philippa Gregory, David Baldwin, Michael K. Jones · 342 pages
A non-fiction companion to The White Queen, The Red Queen, and The Lady of the Rivers. Philippa Gregory and two historians, leading experts in their field, tell the extraordinary 'true' stories of the lives of these women who until now have been largely forgotten by history, their background and times, highlighting questions which are raised in the fiction and illuminating the novels. With a forew
Queens Consort: England's Medieval Queens from Eleanor of Aquitaine to Elizabeth of York
Lisa Hilton · 536 pages
Kublai Khan: The Mongol King Who Remade China
John Man · 389 pages
Queen of the Conqueror: The Life of Matilda, Wife of William I
Tracy Borman · 295 pages
Tracy Borman lays out Matilda's remarkable story against one of the most fascinating and transformative periods in European history. Stirring, richly detailed, and wholly involving, Queen of the Conqueror reveals not just an extraordinary figure but an iconic woman who shaped generations, and an era that cast the essential framework for the world we know today.