Wolf Hall

 Wolf Hall  by Hillary Mantel, 604 pp.   

I really enjoyed this long, detailed, historical novel about a Henry VIII and his first two wives (remember "divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived…", but  weren't there a couple of K(C)atherines and which was which?).  I'm not a big historical novel fan and wasn't especially interested anymore in Henry VIII, a subject perhaps overdramatized on PBS. But you can often trust in the readability of the Man Booker prize winners and I had heard so many other good things about Wolf Hall that I decided to take the plunge on a snow day  and was caught up on the first page by the introduction of the main character,  Thomas Cromwell. Thomas's story, from his childhood as the son of a brutal blacksmith through his world travels and his rise to become one of the most powerful political fixers in Europe is fascinating. Each chapter, while blessedly short, is dense with character revelations. The fact that Thomas is the heart of almost every scene, beautifully describing people and places, interpreting conversation, reflecting the really dangerous religious and political and human realities of the times, carries the reader through the book and makes the history come to life.  I plan to tackle the sequels--Bring Up the Bodies and The Mirror and the Light, just to find out what Thomas, and Mantels, think and how they feel about it all.