The Dangerous Kingdom of Love

Written By Miriam Hanna

The Dangerous Kingdom of Love by Neil Blackmore

Reviewed by Mimi
📘📘📘📘

Thank you to @penguinrandomhouse for sending this over to us! 💜

As the resident historical fiction aficionado I was thrilled when this landed on my pile. I feel that the time around the Tudors has so much intrigue that I can personally never get enough of. This novel was completely different and focused on the idea that King James I was gay. Francis Bacon, a would-be puppet master schemes with the King’s Wife to find the King a companion that they can easily control to replace the inconveniently powerful Carr.

It's full of intrigue, sex, spying and history like all great novels based on that era but completely brilliantly doesn't feel like anything I've read before. It's written from the perspective of Francis Bacon and I found myself howling when he was "shopping around" for a new squeeze. He himself gets very involved in the action and it proves that no matter how much power is at stake, you can never quite trust your heart.

An entertaining read with ample drama to get swept up by.

Miriam Hanna

Aka Mimi. I have known Linda for a very, very long time. We grew up together and you learn very quickly that when she gets an idea in her head, you would be an idiot not to back her to see it through. When the idea of the book club came up it was another lightbulb moment where I knew this wasn't only going to be a success but really fun.


I have always been a bookworm. Remember when you were little and you went shopping with your mum or dad and they gave you a toy or something to occupy yourself with whilst you were in the trolley? I used to get books to keep me quiet. They were and are my ultimate form of escapism and more and more they are about understanding who I am as a person. Books make me cry more than films and TV Shows. I can get lost for hours. I love historic fiction, political thrillers and gritty crime novels but also biographies and memoirs of people I find interesting like sportspeople. I was fortunate to be in the Harry Potter generation and if weren't for those books I don't know what I would have. Young literature was so poor at the point. To have a book that had me and my family queuing up at midnight to buy was seriously special.

Whether you listen to audio books, read off a kindle or stick to carrying around good old fashioned hard copies (that's me!) I truly believe reading is the best way to spend some time every day.


The books I would have with me on a desert island? 📚🏝Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Akzaban, Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, The Chimp Paradox by Steve Peters, The Power by Naomi Alderman, Mom & Me & Mom by Maya Angelou, Goodnight Mister Tom by Michelle Magorian, Born a Crime by Trevor Noah and The Time Traveller’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger.

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