Fatal Throne

Fatal Throne is a historical novel for younger readers published in 2018, written by seven authors, with M. T. Anderson's name carried on the edition in this catalogue.

The subject is Henry VIII and the six women he married. The king is presented as a charismatic and extravagant ruler obsessed both with his power and with siring a male heir, and his queens as six ill-fated women whose futures were divorce, beheading or death.

The book is told in first-person accounts that move between the wives and the king himself. Katharine of Aragon is devout and faithful; Anne Boleyn is fiery and is beheaded for adultery; Jane Seymour rises from bullied court maiden to beloved queen and dies after giving birth; Anna of Cleves plays a dangerous hand; Catherine Howard is terrified when old lovers resurface and whisper to Henry's advisers; and Kateryn Parr has to watch her enemies try to ensnare her.

The court around them is filled with the power-hungry and the cutthroat, and the novel shows friends, advisers and even family betraying one another in order to please a king who cannot be pleased.