Kings & Queens: The Concise Guide Hardcover – 27 Oct. 2007

This is a 'does what it says on the tin' book: a concise guide, which means that it sets out to record the essentials without entering into too much detail. Among its most helpful features are some superb colour illustrations and even a few maps. The only real disappointment are the genealogies on pp. 102-104, which just give the names of the monarchs without reference to their mothers, a poor effort that fails to show their true relationships to each other.This is a great book for when we need to grasp the picture of any particular day and age as quickly as possible without being sidetracked with too much detail. It enables the reader to home in on the reign of a particular monarch, master the salient points and be inspired to access further details elsewhere if their interest has been sufficiently aroused. Another helpful feature is that outstanding events are highlighted in relation to the reign in which they occurred. Examples of this are Magna Carta the Black Death, Geoffrey Chaucer and the Peasants Revolt.There's an introduction and a helpful index. Richard Cavendish and Pip Leahy are to be congratulated on producing such a helpful guide apart from the faux pas over the genealogies. However, it's such a great wee book that it would be churlish to deduct any stars just because of that. I'm simply so pleased to have this hard cover, chunky, joy of a book in my possession. I'm sure lots of people will find it very helpful.

nice handy reference document that puts all our monarchs in their chronological place

Smaller than I thought. My own fault did not read the dimensions. But the book itself is a nice quality with lots of information on the kings and queens of England. If an adult or a Child you will enjoy this informative well presented Concise guide.

Compact and detailed reference guide. Easily portable. Using the book to help me in my role as a visitor guide. Doesn't require charging, or a cell phone signal to operate. Completely reliable!

Great compact little book. Tells you what you need to know, dates, family, interesting facts about the time during their reign. Great for learning the line of the monachy or for reference.

This is excellent. It is a very comprehensive and readable guide to the history of the monarchy of the British Isles. I especially like the overview chapter before each historical period which then details the lives and politics of each sovereign. I initially purchased it for a guide to the personalities of the Wars of the Roses and it does indeed give a very understandable briefing to that particular struggle. If you want a very in-depth history of British kings and queens this is not for you, but as a clear, informative, quick guide,it is unbeatable.

Got this for my husband’s Christmas present. Initially I was disappointed with the size but my husband finds it really informative

My memory for facts is appalling, so history washes over me. Anything I try to remember vanishes from my brain in a trice. 1066, the Tudors, some 20th century wars, that’s my lot. Every so often I try to do something about this. In 2010 I created a Word file of chronology from E H Gombrich’s A Little History of the World and for a brief while had a half-grasp on the evolution of humanity. Seeing Richard II before Christmas galvanised me again, and I’ve spent the last six months working my way through Richard Cavendish's ‘Kings and Queens: the concise guide’, which outlines the history of the monarchy in England, Scotland and Wales. Plenty more notes for my chronological Word file. Nice pictures. Lots of dates and facts. Not a page-turning read, but a solid and pleasing little reference book that has had me enjoying history on TV a lot more while I’m briefly halfway conversant again with where we’ve come from.