Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel

In one of the few books to be awarded the Booker Prize that is also readable Miss Mantel has drawn us a portrait of Thomas Cromwell that contrasts markedly with the devious and manipulative character that we have seen in so many books about the Court of Henry the Eighth. Usualy portrayed as the betrayer of his patron Wolsey and the facilitator of Henry's divorce and remarriage, the eager despoiler of the monasteries and always available for Tudor dirty work a more odious character hardly strides the pages of British history. In Wolf Hall we are shown instead a thoughtful, loyal and hard working employee of Wolsey, surmounting an abused childhood and adventurous early career to become the prop for a volatile and self-centred monarch. All the time that I was reading this book the mental picture I had of Cromwell was that of the actor Michael Kitchen in his carefully understated role in Foyles War. An excellent book.