Dear Heart, How Like You This? by Wendy J Dunn

Is it possible to write a perfect book? This book comes close

to perfection in its well crafted descriptions of beauty, sensitivity and poetry.

This novel tells the story of Anne Boleyn

and Sir Thomas Wyatt and his enduring love for the doomed queen.

A beautiful gem of a novel full of insight and the magical, beautiful

times of the earlier tudor years.

The story is told by Sir Thomas Wyatt from his early years of

childhood spent at the childhood home of Anne Boleyn at Hever

Castle. He often reminiscences of his earlier, happy years spent

in the company of Anne and George Boleyn.

The majestic and inspirational poetry of Sir Thomas Wyatt often

seems to tell its own story written from the heart. This is an exquisite story

of beauty, truth and love. It is a historical

fiction novel. It is mentioned in the notes in a biographical sketch

of Sir Thomas Wyatt that Anne

Boleyn gave to one of her ladies her treasured prayer book for Sir Thomas Wyatt.

This was moments before her impending execution at the scaffold.

I loved following the story, the travels of

Sir Thomas Wyatt to the French

court and also to Italy. He was a diplomat of the tudor court and in his work often spent time

away from the court on government business.

Set during the earlier years of the reign of Henry

VIII this book gives valuable insights into the court of Henry VIII and the

politics of the time during these quite turbulent years.

A story which captures emotion, drama and the mood of the times so well and

is often written from a reflective view point. Quite beautiful!

Some novelists have a gift. Another novel of great beauty and sensitivity is brought

to mind: “Farewell, My Queen” by Chantal Thomas which is a story of the reader

who sat with Marie Antoinette during the final years of the court

and who subsequently wrote her story many years later in Vienna.