Great, but I jumbled

This is a great book, I thoroughly enjoyed it. The only complaint I have is one that I saw in another review, which is that the book does jump around a bit. It takes the different areas in his life and goes through each one in chronological order separate from the other parts. For example, you hear about all of his wives before you hear about most of his political life. It would have been better if it was all knit together in order. That way you could see while one marriage may have been awful, what he was dealing with in his kingdom. How these separate parts may have affected each other is lost by separation. In all, it is very good, if awkwardly ordered. The narration was superb. I definitely recommend this book.

4 personnes ont trouvé cela utile

TOO JUMBLED UP TO FOLLOW

Overall this could be a great book. Good characters and an interesting story. But the author jumps back and forth in time, making it difficult for the listener to remain engages. If you stop to do something as simple as check your text messages and miss 60 seconds of the book, when you return you may find yourself in another decade in a different city, not even recognizing the current character. The main events that make this guy relevant to most readers was his brief and crazy marriage to Queen Mary I of England. I was very interested in learning Phil’s reactions to Bloody Mary’s cessation of her monthly period at age 38 shortly after he entered into a political loveless marriage. Any person who lived past 35 years old was considered an elderly senior citizen back then. Old girl somehow confused perimenopause with being pregnant shortly after the wedding but no kid 11 months later. Even today woman of that age are labeled as "mature" for pregnancy. For Mary, it could only have been menopause with gas when she experienced a SECOND phantom pregnancy at 42. I wanted to know what her hubby was thinking as he tried for an heir for 4 years with a cougar he neither loved nor desired. But, either I missed his reaction in the chronological mish-mash or the author left it out. I finally had to give up and try Wikipedia! Still nothing there either. So I never finished the book.

3 personnes ont trouvé cela utile

Informative but disjointed

I enjoyed the thorough research of this book, but it jumps back and forth so much it's hard to remember it all. It doesn't follow a straight chronology; for example: it tells of his marriage to Mary Tudor, then jumps back to when he was a child, talks of the Armada, then about the Escobedo/Perez scandal, then how he was a loving father, then back to Escobedo/Perez, etc. It would be fine if you had the hard copy to refer back to, but difficult as an audiobook.

3 personnes ont trouvé cela utile

Fascinating Man and Era

I enjoyed the very thorough description of Philip II. The author covers not only historical details, but delves into who the man was and why he was that way. The 1500s were a time of great change when the Americas and the Philippines were colonized. My only complaint is minor, and that is the narrator pronounces words with the letter Z in them with a TH sound. This is probably because it’s the way they are pronounced in Spanish, but this is an English translation. Words like Cádiz sound like Cardiff, and Perez sound like Pereth. I had to stop a few times to figure out what the narrator was saying. I also wish the monetary unit had been pounds, euros, or even dollars, instead of ducats. I wasn’t able to follow the value of expenditures. Other than that, it is a great book.

King Philip

I like history audiobooks. I always wanted to know about 16th and 17th century monarchs

Excellent history, Super interesting.

Superb history of an incredibly important historical figure. Great performance too. Gives you a great insight into inquisition, Armada, relations with England, Netherlands and HRE, Valuable depiction of his religious beliefs. So much valuable info! Not a bit boring.