The Royal Circle Series by Katherine Longshore- Series Thoughts

The Royal Circle series is collection of companion novels each about a different girl in the Tudor age- a YA version of Phillipa Gregory's work if you will. Each main character is a real person- if fact, everyone's a real historical figure with the biggest connection between the each book being that they all follow Howards- Catherine Howard in the first book (though her rather dull servant girl Kitty narrates), Anne Boleyn in the second book, and Mary Fitzroy nee Howard in the third.

This series is very overwrought, and I can see why it's mostly out of print in America- though maybe not in the UK? I see a lot of British reviewers of this series on Goodreads. Really, the only book of this series that's all you need to read to get a feel of Katherine Longshore's writing is Gilt, as neither her characters nor her writing really progress the way you'd expect it to. Her character are all interchangeable and her writing is this bizarre mix of Old English and modern slang. 

Do I have a favorite character? Nope. I mean, in real life I'm kind of partial to Anne Boleyn, but in this series she wasn't really Anne Boleyn so I didn't really care about her.

What about favorite book? I suppose I like both Tarnish and Brazen better than Gilt at any rate, but I can't really pick a favorite. I guess I'll go with Brazen since it was the best written and most political of all her books.

I have kind of a nostalgic attachment to Gilt, though. It was, after all, the second book I reviewed on this blog and that means something to me. All in all though, I doubt I'll recommend these books to anyone, unless a person I know really loved The Luxe and is all about the Tudors. I will probably never reread any of these books. 

Gilt: 4.5-5 out of 10
Tarnish: 5 out of 10
Brazen: 5 out of 10

Overall Series Rating: 5 out of 10