Book Trailers: 'Wolf Hall' by Hilary Mantel

Have I mentioned yet how much I love Hilary Mantel? I'm pretty sure I have. But just in case you didn't pay attention the first fourteen times, here is a trailer for the BBC adaptation of the Thomas Crowmwell trilogy. I will keep this brief, thus leaving you with more free time to read the actual novels, which are the greatest. They start slowly and painfully and you will have to slog through for a few hundred pages or so, but once you're able to work out her prose style and get acquainted with the ridiculous number of important characters, you won't be able to read it fast enough, and you, like me, will be anxiously awaiting the publication of the third and final volume.

Book Trailers is a recurring post that tricks you into reading the books that inspired great movies (or just great trailers).

#ReadWomen2014: Hilary Mantel

I have already advocated for Hilary Mantel's most popular and very critically acclaimed novel Wolf Hall and its sequel Bring Up the Bodies. And as if you needed another reason to check them out, the BBC is adapting them with Damian Lewis as Henry VIII, and there is a stage adaptation on Broadway, so you need to read them before they reach total pop culture saturation. Plus volume three in the Thomas Cromwell trilogy is expected to be published in 2015.

When you've completed that task, dive into the rest of the Hilary Mantel oeuvre, which includes her incredible collection of short stories The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher, published earlier this year. She has plenty of other novels and short story collections to check out, as well as a one-volume memoir, but of greatest interest to me is her historical fiction account of the Reign of Terror, A Place of Greater Safety. Everything I've read of heard about it makes it sound like something I would love, and if Wolf Hall is any indication, Mantel has a pretty firm grasp on historical fiction.

What I'm Reading: 'Bring Up the Bodies' by Hilary Mantel

As much as I eventually enjoyed Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall, I initially struggled to get into it, and so I didn't want to wait too long after finishing it before starting in with the sequel Bring Up the Bodies. In many ways I've found it easier and more enjoyable, likely because I've already put the work into the first volume; it's also a slimmer novel and so much of the world has already been "built," so it's very easy to immediately immerse yourself in the unfolding story.  The fact that I already know everything that's going to happen in no way impedes the drama  of it, and I'll use this opportunity yet again to encourage everyone to persevere through this series, which is so rich and rewarding.