My Lady Jane by Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton, Jodi Meadows-- I'm the Odd One Out AGAIN!!

My Lady Jane

What if King Edward and Lady Jane Grey of 1500's England lived?  What if the story of the story of "Bloody Mary" turned out really differently?

Edward is dying and appoints his cousin Jane as his successor (bypassing both Mary and Elizabeth, his older sisters)-- so far this is following history, right??

But once Edward realizes this is all a conspiracy; he, Jane, and her new husband Gifford must do some conspiring of their own before they all lose their heads.

Meanwhile, there is a sect of the population that can turn into animals (some at will, some involuntarily), and they have been persecuted and discriminated against for generations.  These Eðians (as they are called) must hide and hope for a leader that will end their fear and suffering.

Oh man, I may be all alone in this, but I did not love this book.  I didn't hate it, but still....

I was told this was funny, and I was expecting FUNNY, but I would say it was FUN & LIGHTHEARTED.  Not funny.  Having said that, maybe I'm not breezy enough to enjoy a book like this??  I know it's satire and it's obviously NOT following history, but I didn't feel this book took the non-historical aspect far enough.  It's just, if you're going to go along on your own storyline and completely break apart what really happened historically, than DO IT.  Just go completely off the rails and make it SO MUCH DIFFERENT.  This felt different in a half-assed way.

I'm not trying to be THE HISTORY POLICE, I swear!!  I had to google what the real story was as I started reading this, so clearly I'm not the most historically read person.  The thing is, I either want what really happened or I want something that feels really far away from what did happen.  It was hard for me to wrap my head around this round-about semi-historical, but really really silly story.

And I don't know if you know this-- but I truly hate lessony books.  I love a feminist push just as much as the next gal, but this was WAY too heavy handed.  I felt like it was forcing it down my throat in every way possible and for the time period, it was just absurd.

I know I said I didn't hate this book, and I swear I didn't.  It's a massive book and not one time did I not want to keep reading it-- even when all 3 narrators sounded really similar and there was the "girl who loves books" trope (which you would think I would love, but ends up feeling really lazy to me) and King Edward had no personality other than "I like Gracie".

The parts I liked-- The Eðian part of this book was fun.  There are a lot of horse jokes (because Jane's husband turns into a horse for the entirety of daylight), and I found those a cute part of the book.  I also liked Jane and Gifford's relationship.  It was nice to see them slowly come together and respect one another.

I don't know if I loved that everyone was turning into all these random animals-- would it have been better to have only a few to choose from??  I haven't decided.

So, I just found out that this is a series.  There are other historical Janes that are going to get their paths changed as well.  I actually think that's pretty cool, and I'm hopeful they won't be as ridiculous or lessony.

OVERALL: I'm no fun.  I just didn't LOVE this cute, silly, random book.  It's about Lady Jane Grey, the nine day queen, and what would happen if she (and everyone else) lived.  It's not that it was a BAD book, it's just that it didn't impress me personally.


Date Published: 6/7/2017
How I got this book: Library
Publisher: HarperTeen

Add it to your To-Read List!!

Rating: 3/5

Character: Everyone
Book: The Animorphs series by Katherine Applegate

• The kids can change into animals and must use that power to overthrow an evil-- sounds perfect for this crew.