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1536: The third and final part of the Wolf Hall Trilogy
The Mirror and the Light
What you need to know before your trail
England, May 1536. Anne Boleyn is dead, decapitated in the space of a heartbeat by a hired French executioner. As her remains are bundled into oblivion, Thomas Cromwell breakfasts with the victors. The blacksmith’s son from Putney emerges from the spring’s bloodbath to continue his climb to power and wealth, while his formidable master, Henry VIII, settles to short-lived happiness with his third queen, Jane Seymour.
Cromwell is a man with only his wits to rely on; he has no great family to back him, no private army. Despite rebellion at home, traitors plotting abroad and the threat of invasion testing Henry’s regime to breaking point, Cromwell’s robust imagination sees a new country in the mirror of the future. But can a nation, or a person, shed the past like a skin? Do the dead continually unbury themselves? What will you do, the Spanish ambassador asks Cromwell, when the king turns on you, as sooner or later he turns on everyone close to him?
Locations
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Discover the palaces and royal places across London with the Mantel Tour
Wolf Hall
Set in the period from 1500 to 1535, Wolf Hall looks at the rapid rise to power of Thomas Cromwell in the court of Henry VIII through to the death of Sir Thomas More.
Bring Up the Bodies starts where Wolf Hall left off and charts the rise and fall of Thomas Cromwell, the powerful minister in the court of King Henry VIII.
The Mirror and the Light is the final part of a trilogy which looks at the final rise and then Cromwell’s dramatic fall including his public execution at Tower Hill in 1540.
BookTrail Boarding Pass: The Mirror and the Light
Destination/location: England, London Author/guide: Hilary Mantel Departure Time: 1520s
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