King's Fool Mystery Book #1
by Jeri Westerton
My rating: ★★★★☆
Actually 3.7 rounded up to 4 stars.
I'll start by saying that I enjoyed the entire story from start to finish and there was never a point where I felt bored.
---> I immediately fell in love with the character and I already miss him (so I will also read book #2 in the series).
However, there are a few reasons why my score is not a full 4 stars, but 3.7 and it would not be the first book I would recommend to anyone who asked me to suggest a mystery with a "late medieval/early renaissance" setting.
___ THE PLOT____ We are at the court of King Henry VIII, at the time in which his marriage to Catherine of Aragon entered into crisis due to the lack of a male heir and above all due to the king's infatuation with Anne Boleyn.
The "Great Matters" is what everyone whispers about at court, what it is dangerous to talk about openly, why the Spanish ambassador and his diplomats try to find solutions and why the king continually meets with his advisors.
While our narrator, court jester Will Somers, flirts left and right with men and professes his love for the only woman he would like to marry, one day he finds one of the Spanish diplomats having his throat cut.
As it happens, the dead man was the last casual lover with whom he had spent the night two days earlier. A blackmail letter follows that threatens to reveal his bisexuality to the king...circumstances then force him to find the murderer before any more bad consequences ensue.
____________________________
___WHAT I LIKED ___
THE MAIN CHARACTER__ The "hero" of the book is also the narrator of the story: the king's fool, Will Somers.
This 23 year old boy might seem a bit lewd and superficial from what I wrote in the plot, but instead it is easy to become attached to him and feel like he is a little like the friend next door, because from his words and the feelings he tells us, a good heart and great generosity shines through, as well as intelligence and irony.
The story takes place in the present, as events occur, Will shares with us every thought, emotion, hope, fear and suspicion.
Maybe that's what made it all so engaging.
The narrative made me feel like I was at Will's side each second of the story, from the first page to the last one: I walked down every corridor Will went through, I enjoyed every moment of playfulness with the king or with the little dog adopted by our jester, I feared every face-to-face meeting with characters who disagreed with the jester... I experienced all of it firsthand together with Somers.
___ THE PRESENTATION OF THE COURT, OF THE REAL HISTORICAL FIGURES and the few fictional characters ____
In this book I felt as if I was part of an episode of the TV series The Tudors (remember? Year 2007-2010). This is because, by chance, I watched all 8 seasons of the series just a month ago and I must say that it was useful to me so as not to get confused amidst the hundreds of names of real historical figures mentioned (and of which Will explained to us the role) in the story.
King Henry VIII always remained the fickle and capricious man that history tells us and that we have seen in the series, but the author also offers us a warmer facet of the character: a certain paternal affection and a particular tolerance for his jester and understanding of his feelings.
Will loves him like a father and feels that without this emotional warmth he could not live (history tells us that Will Somers remained the king's jester until his death and was also at the court of his 3 children: Edward, Elizabeth and Mary. Looks like he loved them as if they were his family).
I liked the character of Marion, Will's unofficial girlfriend, who knows Will's nature. She is very tolerant, but by her own free choice. She simply loves him as he is, without feeling cuckolded or betrayed.
I liked the courage Will found in himself to stand up to her father, the classic gruff but affectionate man with his daughter, who doesn't want to give his blessing to the engagement.
All the characters around Will (fictional and historical) have few acting lines, but this is enough to fully show us their character traits.
There are no battles and wars in this story.
Only an atmosphere of playfulness and of transformation (of the king's relationships towards his marriage and towards the Church).
It's not a fast-paced "whodunit", but I can assure I never felt bored.
THE REASONS WHY I WOULD NOT RECOMMEND IT TO EVERYONE:
_ _ There is no real investigation. Will Somers asks questions around and tries to understand more about certain situations and characters.
If you think about it, this is totally logical, because Will is neither a detective nor a person who investigates amateurally out of natural curiosity and passion (as in many mysteries where the main character, despite not being a policeman or investigator, has a passion for doing investigations)
Will's job is to make the king and his courtiers laugh and he finds himself forced by events to try to uncover a murderer.
It would have been far-fetched if he had investigated like a real sleuth... so for me the story was perfect like that, however it might not be satisfactory for all readers.
_ _ We are in the Middle Ages and as you can imagine the language among men was not the most refined, nor did they have any problems speaking scurrilously in front of women.
I read this book in English, which is not my native language and although I realized that the "male member" was mentioned several times...reading in a foreign language, the impact of some slightly vulgar words was different... less intense and less annoying.
I admit that if I had read the book in Italian (my country's language), I would have been annoyed and most likely I would have abandoned this reading.
_ _ I have already said that Will Somers, bisexual, continually flirts with all the handsome men who come his way.
Not just flirting, there is kissing and sexual acts. The descriptions are not detailed and vulgar, but I think the author could have avoided "the little services" given to Will by a certain servant.
I'm not bothered by homosexuality, I have no problems with other people's sexual choices... but seeing the protagonist with his underwear down too often... ugh, what a drag!
(Perhaps the author had also watched the series "The Tudors" before writing the book... in fact in that series it seemed that sex was one of the most common and popular pastimes)
Thank you for reading my review, I hope it can be useful to you, but without influencing you too much one way or another.
After all, taste and perception are personal.
---> Sorry for my bad English, as I said I'm Italian.
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