Review: I, Richard Plantagenet the Sequel by J.P. Reedman

Blurb

Before there was a King called Richard III, there was a boy, Richard of the House of York, youngest living child of his large, royal-blooded family. A small, thin, nervous boy who witnesses the terror of the sack of Ludlow and is taken prisoner in its aftermath, along with his mother Cecily and two of his siblings. A child of eight sent for safety to a strange foreign land when his father is killed in battle and one of his brothers murdered, their heads spiked above the gates of York by the Lancastrian victors. A young boy raised to knighthood and a Dukedom by his eldest brother, the warrior-king Edward IV, then sent to Middleham Castle to receive knightly training in the household of his kinsman, Richard Neville–the infamous Warwick the Kingmaker. A place and a man that will shape the future course of Richard’s life… First part in a two part series on Richard III’s childhood and youth.

My Review

I’m reading this series in the right order! This volume gives us a young and insignificant Richard, pretty much locked away in the nursery with his brother George while their world falls apart. They are shuffled from one safe house to another, until finally the inevitable happens:

George and I were admitted to our Mother’s solar. She stood beside the dying fire; to our surprise her hair was down and uncovered. This was a shock—we never saw her hair. Her tresses fell to her hips and were a deep dark chestnut-brown. Little streaks of silver caught in the flickering firelight. Her face was taut, a skull, suddenly aged…
“My sons,” she said, and her voice was hoarse, “I must send you from me this night. You will go from Baynard’s to the house of the widow Alice Martyn.”
“But why?” George blurted, still sleep-addled, not grasping the gravity of the situation. “What have we done wrong to be punished so?”

We are at the beginning of the Wars of the Roses, as the formidable Duke of York strives—and fails—to take the crown he feels belongs to him. Richard sees very little of his father, but he adores his eldest brother Edward who weaves in and out of his life, as he avenges the wrongs done to his family and finally becomes King of England. As Richard reaches his teenaged years, he goes to live with the Earl of Warwick, who treats him well and trains him for knighthood. But alas, when Warwick falls foul of Edward, this leaves Richard in the middle. Our poor boy never seems to get a break! Throughout, George very disagreeably acts in his own self-interest, giving us a clear indication of trouble ahead. Told in first person, this is an enjoyable read and prepares us for the next book.