"The Mirror and the Light" by Hilary Mantel

"The Mirror and The Light" is the third and final installment in the Cromwell trilogy by the late, great British writer Hilary Mantel.  (The first two books:  "Wolf Hall" and "Bring Up the Bodies.")  I've been reading the entire trilogy over the past year in a "slow readalong" hosted by Simon at Footnotes & Tangents (dubbed "Wolf Crawl" by participants, lol). (I've also been taking part in another slow readalong Simon has been hosting -- "War & Peace" by Leo Tolstoy -- a chapter a day for the entire year!) 

The trilogy tells the story of Thomas Cromwell, who rises from obscurity as a blacksmith's son to become one of the most powerful men in England, and a right-hand man to King Henry VIII.  This volume picks up where "Bring Up the Bodies" ended -- after the beheading of Queen Anne Boleyn. Henry is newly married to Anne's lady-in-waiting, Jane Seymour, the daughter of a prominent family, who provides him with the male heir he craves.  But then Jane dies after childbirth, and Cromwell encourages Henry to marry the princess Anna of Cleves to secure a political alliance against the French and the Holy Roman Emperor. The marriage is a disaster, Cromwell's grasp on power begins to slip, and his enemies begin to gather round him...  

I fell behind schedule late this summer, and at one point, I was something like 10 weeks behind on my reading (!)(the daily vs weekly reading schedule & chats with "War & Peace" were an advantage in that regard). I started trying to catch up on the last half of the book on the plane trip to visit my parents over the holidays, and finished today. (Yay me!)  

These books are a magnificent achievement of writing -- absolutely spellbinding. Even though you likely know how everything turns out, it you still keep turning the pages.  I am so glad I finally got to read these books, with the benefit of Simon's expert guidance and the insights provided by fellow readers. FYI:  Simon will be re-running Wolf Crawl in 2025 for paying subscribers (along with War & Peace, plus several other books that will be free of charge) -- I highly recommend the experience! (And I'm considering whether to do it again...!) 

A TV adaptation of this volume, starring Mark Rylance as Cromwell and Damien Lewis as Henry, recently aired in the UK, and will be shown on PBS in North America in late March 2025. I'm looking forward to it! 

A solid 5 stars on Goodreads/StoryGraph. 

This was Book #37 read to date in 2024 (and Book #5 finished in December), bringing me to 82%  of my 2024 Goodreads Reading Challenge goal of 45 books. I am (for the moment, anyway...!) 8 (!) books behind schedule to meet my goal. :(  You can find reviews of all my books read to date in 2024 tagged as "2024 books."