The Long Read

I loved the first two books in Hilary Mantel’s Cromwell trilogy, so had to read the third when it was published earlier this year. I ordered it on-line in April.

It’s a real doorstop of a book at 880 pages, and with everything going on these past months and so much else to read (on-line newspapers, all the mag’s I subscribe to, ephemera) it has taken me an absolute age. But I finished it this morning. And once I’d done that, I took a quick photo for my own record, book on knee.

It’s a worthy third volume to the trilogy, fantastically imagined and characterised. I knew the ending of course, but somehow didn’t want to get there. I can see how it had to be on the Booker long list.