This book was amazing. I couldnt wait to come home from work just to be able to continue reading every day.

DNF at the halfway mark. Although I really appreciated the preface of the novel and enjoyed the genderbent retelling aspect of it, I could not for the life of me connect with any of the characters or story. I might pick this up again in the future because I heard the ending was worth it but after months of slowly attempting to make my way through it, I’ve decided to DNF it for now.

As someone who recently directed a production of Henry IV, Part 1, I was thoroughly intrigued by and excited for this book. I was immensely let down, however, by the execution of the novel. Even for high fantasy epics, I expect the plot to be discernible at least by the 100 page mark, but it was not, which left me feeling kind of lost and frustrated. Also, the romance between the two love interests were incredibly "insta-love" worthy. Also with a book of this size, the pacing was incredibly too slow, and I had a very difficult time reading this.

I very quickly returned to Tessa Gratton's Shakespeare retellings with this queer take on Henry IV (which of course, I have not read). In this companion to Queens of Innis Lear, we follow the exploits of Lady Hotspur, Prince Hall, and Banna Mora as they seek to bring political peace to Eremoria and reunite with the magic of Innis Lear.

This book is so deeply character-driven. No political decision had been made without the influence of any of the characters, which made the love story between Lady Hotspur and Prince Hal that much more compelling. I love how authentically messy and ambitious all the POV characters were. They didn't feel like pawns to destiny, and instead had their own loves and conflicts. The familial relations especially in Prince Hal's story line really resonated with me. 

With regards to the political world-building, the tension between tradition in an otherwise queernorm world soaked through the pages. The examination was so fascinating, and in many places, made the book un-put-down-able because it didn't have to end in a way defined by bloody history. Figures from Queens of Innis Lear do return in the form of flashbacks, but there is absolutely no requirement to read that book to understand this one.

If you want a book full of disaster queers, including sword lesbians and bisexual wizards, magic, and destiny, definitely pick up Lady Hotspur.

Unfortunately, I did not get the chance to read this ARC prior to the book's publication, but we did end up buying it for our library collection.

The origins of Shakespeare’s Prince Hal (Henry IV, Parts I and II, Henry V) lie in late 14th/early 15th Century English history, although the Bard took considerable liberty in embellishing those events, not to mention creating a panoply of additional (and memorable) characters, Falstaff among them. The historical prince was involved in suppressing the Welsh revolt (c. 1400-1415), led his own army into Wales against Owain Glyndŵr, and fought Henry "Hotspur" Percy at the Battle of Shrewsbury (1403). It seems only fitting that since Shakespeare made free with actual history, other writers should take similar liberties both with the factual record and with Shakespeare’s inventions. Author Tessa Gratton takes both sources, turns them inside out, stands them on their heads, shoves them into a magical kingdom full of Arthurian references, and switches genders.

Lady Hotspur focuses primarily on the character of Prince Hal, in this case a woman, and Hotspur Percy, also a woman, who became passionate lovers early in the book. Politics pull them apart as the fallout from the coup that placed Hal’s mother on the throne of unfolds and the magically imbued island of Innis Lear moves toward rebellion. Banna Mora, who would have been next in line to the throne, and who has been a dear friend to Hal, ends up captive in the island kingdom of Innis Lear, then becomes instrumental in leading its struggle for independence. This may seem like a lot of action, not to mention political intrigue, but it’s spread out over many, many…many pages. Pages of character development, of shifting personal and international relationships, battles, skirmishes, magical workings, and of daily life.

I went through several phases in reading Lady Hotspur. At first I was delighted with the gender swap and the larger-than-life love affair between Hal and Hotspur. Then the pace slowed and I found myself dipping into the story, reading a little, then going off and reading something else, then coming back. Halfway through, the story caught fire for me. It drew me in, kept me turning pages, and held my rapt attention to the very end.

Novels can be “about” many things, and the forward energy can arise from different aspects. A character-driven story has quite a different “feel” from one centered on an idea (such as a mystery) or a plot/sequence of dynamic events (action/adventure). Lady Hotspur is as much about the magical sundering and eventual reunification of two lands as it is a political or military drama, or even a love story. Such a story, in which the world itself is the hero, demands a different pacing than other types of novels. Once I understood this, I was able to settle into a long, deep sojourn in this imaginary landscape.

This is apparently one of a series of Shakespearean-derived novels, which I wasn’t aware of when I read it. That said, it made no difference to me, and should pose no obstacle to the curious reader.

I want to love LADY HOTSPUR. It’s knights! It’s gay! It’s prophecy surrounding three girls who are here to fuck your shit up! This book is so my jam that it’s not even funny.

But like, this book is huge. And while we get the hints of action, we mostly see the aftermath – I’m hungry for some battle scenes. I got 20% of the way through this book and it wasn’t giving me enough to want to keep going in search of the sweet battle scenes I craved.

I love the prose, I love the world, Hal and Hotspur are all I’ve ever wanted from a fantasy. I love how distinct all of the POV characters are from each other - in a book with more than one narrator, they can sometimes get muddied up in each other, but that was not the case for LADY HOTSPUR. That's why I'm throwing down a sweet 4/5 stars - this book has all the makings of being something glorious.

But I simply don’t have the mental fortitude to get through this story. Maybe when I’m not under fakey house arrest, I’ll load this back up and give it another go.

This book is a great addition to anyone interested in a feminist epic fantasy novel. This is a sequel, so be sure you read the first book first. Anyways, I loved this, but the first book still took my breath away. Since this is an epic fantasy novel, you must be in the mood for the adventure and royal families drama. One of the biggest downfalls for me was that this book was rather slow and almost never picked up the action level to make up for it. It's a hearty book. It takes a lot of time to get through this and also devour the details needed for the story. Essentially, this book is an investment.
The ladies who dominate this book are interesting and enjoyable to read about. The book just didn't engage the reader with these characters like Innis Lear did. Don't get me wrong, I love this series already and I'm invested. I just hoped that this book had a quicker pace and wasn't as long as it is for the details engraved within.

I was disappointed by this one and almost gave up on it several times. It was overwhelmingly long and gave incredibly detailed details into everyone's lives and I just cannot, I don't need every single thing spelled out for me and in that amount of detail. This book could have been 300 pages shorter and it would have been a much better, less dragging read.

It starts off slow and kind of dense, but once the action begins, it's hard to resist the story as it drives forward. It reads as a true epic, one that makes you feel the world really has been reshaped as you read it. Would recommend.

Setting this aside for totally me-not-you reasons, and I fully intend to come back to it, because it's actually really awesome - well written, breathtakingly conceived, and ~*so gaaaaaaay*~.

But I just don't have the bandwidth for it right now. This is some high level epic fantasy with political subplots and intricate worldbuilding, and I just can't process it.

Definitely do give it a try.

I really wish I would have gotten into this sequel more because The Queen of Innis Lear was an enjoyable experience for me last year.

I loved the concept. A retelling of the Shakespearean tragedy King Lear, told in a high fantasy setting. The writing was elegant, with lush descriptions creating an atmospheric setting for this fantasy world. I could picture the jagged cliffs of this island country, the ships from faraway lands docking at port, and the majestic castles. It seemed like a story set in medieval times, with no invented creatures, where the island, trees, and wind are sentient.

but by 100 pages in....nothing of interest had happened, and I felt little to no emotional connection to any of the characters. I couldn't seem to work up any emotional attachment for them or their predicament-of-the-moment. There is earth magic in here - as in being able to communicate with the trees and elements - which I normally enjoy and liked here too. There are all sorts of misunderstandings about events that happened in the past and we are given many flashback opportunities to see for ourselves what actually happened but only after we have watched characters struggle with their misconceptions of those events over long segments of the book.

this is a spectacular sequel to The Queens of Innis Lear, which I adored, with similarly gorgeous language and imagery. think A Song of Ice and Fire but with less characters/convolution and more of an opportunity to get close to the characters emotionally (although I was more immediately drawn to the Innis Lear characters and it took me a bit to warm up to the ones in LH). brutal, beautiful, and compelling.

Unfortunately, I ended up DNFing this book about halfway through. It felt too long and like the action was practically non-existent. I'm happy to give it another shot in the future, but for now it's just not for me.

I'm not really sure how I feel about Lady Hotspur. I liked it but did I enjoy myself. That's the million dollar question. I enjoyed the authors previous book The Queen of Innis Lear and Lady Hotspur is the continuation so I had high hopes. I admit I have not read Shakespeare's Henry IV but I didn't think that would deter me from enjoying the book , it didn't I think I was expecting more of a fantasy read and Lady Hotspur fell more into the literary fantasy read for me which made it quite hard for me to get through and that is entirely my fault, literary fantasy reads are just harder for me to get into and enjoy I will say though I loved the Sapphic relationships.

Overall if you love reimaging's and more literary fantasy reads I think you will like Lady Hotspur.

A heartache-heavy rework of the madcap Shakespeare play that inevitably doesn't have the energy of its progenitor 

I haven't engaged much with Shakespeare's history plays before last year, but that changed over the course of 2019 as I was able to take advantage of the Globe Theatre's entire "double Henriad" run: from Richard II to Richard III, with 3-6 Henries in the middle depending on whether you count by monarch or by play [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henriad#Eight-play_Henriad]*. After seeing Richard II in a winter "standalone" production with all women of colour actors (Imperial Radch audiobook narrator Adjoa Andoh played Richard II! King Breq!), Henry IV was my reintroduction to the company's outdoor theatre, complete with £5 standing tickets, stylish branded ponchos, and (for the second two plays) the worst summer cold I've had in years. All of that just added to the energy of a diversely cast ensemble production, complete with women playing Prince Hal, Hotspur, and Falstaff. My mind, therefore, already had very clear casting for Lady Hostpur's reimagining of Henry IV (and let's be clear that the Shakespeare version is also largely untroubled by historical realism, particularly when it comes to Hotspur actually being 15 years older than Hal) and was very ready to see how an explicitly female, romantic take on the characters would unfold.

Lady Hotspur opens at what people who have watched all the Shakespeare plays last year and therefore still mostly remember them will recognise as the close of Richard II. Hal has been raised in court as part of the retinue of King Rossavos, who banished his mother ten years ago and has since been dragging the Kingdom of Aremoria further into debt and ruin. When Mum (also known as Celada) returns to claim not just her lands but the throne itself, she makes short work of the King and wastes no time in re-securing her position, despite some lingering Hal finds herself thrown into life as the Crown Prince, while her friend and the former heir Banna Mora falls from favour. Hal's only consolation is her love affair with Hotspur, a noble soldier whose radiance and temper are renowned. Hotspur, however, had her own loyalties to her land and friends, and things come to a head when Mora is captured by neighbouring Innis Lear (which readers of Gratton's previous book will probably be very familiar with; for everyone else, myself included, its sort of a cross between Fairyland and Wales, and whose presence causes the increasing distance between the influence text and Lady Hotspur's reimagining. Celada's court and Hal's circle end up divided over Celada's refusal to pay a ransom for her return, separating Hal and Hotspur and ending their relationship but not their mutual attraction. Mora instead entrenches herself in Innis Lear, picking up a magical husband and some prophecies, and the stage is set for some epic politics and warfare.

Except, this is Henry IV Part 1, so the extent to which we get involved in heavy politics is deeply dependent on how Prince Hal is feeling - and, it turns out, she's chafing under her mother's rule, and particularly the expectation that she marry a man for childbearing purposes (Lady Hotspur could be clearer on queer acceptance in the various lands, but the dominant belief in Aremoria appears to be that Hal and Hotspur's relationship is not taboo but should not be flaunted, especially at the expense of political childbearing alliances, whereas Innis Lear appears to be more fluid with things). With the help of Lady Ianta Oldcastle (hey, I understood that reference! [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falstaff#John_Oldcastle]) Hal sets up a shadow Court of Rogues in which she can drink and womanise to her heart's content, and generally avoid responsibilities. In the Shakespearean version, Hal's adventures with Falstaff, Poins et al. are treated as fairly uncomplicated, if sometimes quite vindictive and unpleasant, fun; the conflict in the Prince's character only really shows up in scenes with the King, where the weight of expectations is most clearly set out. Because Hal is a viewpoint character for her scenes in Lady Hotspur, however, everything including the Court of Rogues takes on a more morose cast, as she laments the loss of Hotspur and the wider upheaval which her new position has brought, including her inability to continue a friendship with Banna Mora and the expectations her mother has put on her for the future of the Kingdom. Coupled with Ianta Oldcastle's far more gloomy cast as a character who lost her position as founder of the Lady Knights under the previous King and has fallen into alcoholism as a result, there's an air of desperation and falseness about Hal's rebellion which makes it distinctly less enjoyable to witness. And that's not a mood constrained to Hal: Hotspur divides her time between worrying about the warlike machinations of her Aunt and Mother, worrying and being heartbroken over Hal and her unwillingness to step up, and worrying about Banna Mora. And despite their potential to shake things up - and the apparent authorial intent to have it appear as a more positive political space -the scenes and characters in Innis Lear sometimes get lost in slow melancholy of the book, especially with the whole "weight of ancient prophecies and bloodlines" thing hanging over everyone. Basically, this is a long, slow, sad, meditative book, and it's not afraid to make its audience wait multiple chapters between reasons to root for any of its characters.

The problem is, with all this meditative heartbreak, it becomes difficult for Gratton to truly convey the potential dynamism of the three women at Lady Hotspur's heart, despite the textual insistence that they are all something special. This is especially an issue for Hotspur, who we are told burns as bright as the sun, but all we ever really see of her is her constant deflated disappointment in Hal's behaviour and her conflicted, awkward feelings about the slow political and romantic situations she spends 95% of the book responding to. Hal and Banna Mora's respective positions and reputations are generally pretty well-deserved, but play out in a way which really stretches audience sympathy for them both in different ways, and ultimately neither Hal's redemption or Mora's arc into magical uniter of both countries really brought me around to them. The only character who really brings a genuine ray of sunshine into proceedings is Echarmet of Kurake Queen, a scion of one of Celeda's foreign allies (from a matriarchal society which I would definitely read about if the opportunity arose) and potential political match for Hal: and yes, I'm well aware of the irony of picking out one of the very few male characters in Lady Hotspur as a highlight, but Charm is great and deserves justice and nice things forever, OK? In fairness, part of Charm's, uh, charm, is his bringing a non-heteropatriarchal take into Aremoria's court, and essentially becoming one of Hal's lifelines from a direction that she's not expecting, and that's one of the elements that brings things to a still-slow but eventually pretty satisfying (and unexpected!) conclusion

Ultimately, I suspect my main problem with much of Lady Hotspur is that it sits in the uncanny valley between the production I've watched and internalised as "Henry IV", and a completely standalone text. There's nothing at all wrong with slow, meditative queer medieval politics books, but if you are going to transform your title character from the fast-talking, fast-acting centre of a rebellion, who would literally move entire rivers for the sake of their own power and sense of what is right, into a woman whose only real character decisions are deciding whether or not to be with her feckless true love in the hope of changing her, and subsequently whether to stand behind another character (incidentally, I had to look up who Banna Mora's source character was - either Edmund Mortimer was cut from the version of the play that I watched, or just not interesting enough to remember) is one that's inevitably going to create a lot of "wait, what, why?" over those decisions. I'm not sure if this problem would be solved by lack of familiarity with the play, as well, as the disconnect between what we're shown and what we're told about Hotspur would still be there within the text itself. What I'm left with is something I really wish I'd enjoyed more than I did - a book that took a lot of work for a frankly very modest payoff. I'm still intrigued by what Gratton does next (especially if it involves some of Echarmet's Mothers) but, alas, Lady Hotspur isn't quite the knockout I'd hoped.

*If you're counting by monarch, there are also two uncredited Eds in there. History is fun!

Thank you so much for the eARC, I just honestly struggled and struggled through almost every page of it, and probably should have DNFd without giving feedback.

It was so long and gave so many minute, slow burning details into every single character's life, and I didn't find myself caring about any of it.
E ven after enjoying The Queens of Innis Lear at least a little bit, I could never get into Lady Hotspur. The wizard was the one ray of sunshine.

The book went from slow, to abstract, to convoluted, to a straight stream of consciousness during some of the interlude chapters, and regardless that I put it down and picked it up a few times it stayed very hard to follow what was going on at times. I love Shakespeare too but this was so wrong!

The women were supposed to be such good friends but I never felt that at all. Somewhere in those 600 something pages Gratton could have convinced me they were friends. And Hal, good Lord, a man is not going to impale you during intercourse like a sword. I don't love reading about LGBQ characters as long as they aren't ridiculous, but Hal was ridiculous. So were all of them. Attacking each other's "wells" in a main hallway, yes this is a great idea..

Anyway, I really wanted to find some redemption at the end and just did not find it. At all. Not even a bit. The brothers did... What? I think if the whole book turned it down a few notches and stayed on a straighter course it would have had potential.

Again I am sorry for not turning this review in until February but it otherwise would have been a no feedback/dnf and that felt even worse😭

I have finally completed this thing - and let me tell ya, it was worth it, but still has a lot of questionable decisions that made the book a lot less enjoyable than it could have been. It is basically a retelling of Shakespeare's Henry IV with heavy emphasis on part 1. It is gender bent and queered up, so there will be a lot of rep across the whole of the community. The chapters are broken into narratives mostly by the three main ladies - Banna Mora, Lady Hotspur, and Prince Hal. There are other characters thrown in as the book rolls a long, and some of the action is broken up by some interludes.

One of the best things about the book is that the writing style. If you're here for some pretty passages, beautiful details, and flowery speeches, it delivers that in spades. Some of the characters are just beautifully portrayed, especially Banna Mora and Lady Hotspur. Hotspur does work really well as a gender bent character, mostly because her role is very much tied to loyalty, battle, and duty. Lady Hotspur is easily more a foil to Prince Hal than Banna Mora- the Learish Prince who is fighting for the throne - Hotspur is more bold and true, where as Prince Hal is wavering and timid in her new role.

While I enjoyed parts of the book, I would have to say that much of it is disconnected. When it all comes together, the book is just wonderful and engaging. Beyond that, though, it is too jumbled and messy, especially near the beginning, to really grasp what is going on. I believe it is because it is trying to retell the play but with magic, make Hotspur a lead, and allude to events in The Queens of Innis Lear. It's a lot to handle, and at times, it falls short most of the time. I will say that I enjoyed genderbending the characters, and also the surprise of making Hal and Hotspur lovers. Hal is not a great character - and I am half annoyed and glad that Hal took so long to wake up to her shortcomings. The book also seems to speed through part 2 of Henry IV, and alludes to when Hal becomes the queen (or basically when Prince Henry becomes Henry V), so it seems to not have any conclusion.

Also, note that some readers in the LGBT community might be frustrated with how the story plays out, all the characters are queer but most get bittersweet endings. Only problem is that the story does force marriages on a couple of characters in the name of keeping the line alive, despite the huge amount of magic the novel likes to throw around. Yes, the characters all end up with their s/o's like the play, but there were a couple parts that made me a little queasy, especially since it seemed that Hotspur was only Hal-sexual, but then almost sexually assaults her own new husband. Again, yes, her character in the play was very similar - Harry Percy thought that sex with is wife was basically a battle in the bedroom. Hotspur never really acted like that with Hal (they did have a lot of angry make up sex, but it was very much consented to on both sides), so to have her basically attack her new husband for sex (at that point they were both in love with other people) was jarring. Also, Hal is definitely a lesbian, so to have her marry a male character (Prince Henry's wife is not mentioned in the play) and not rule on her own is very, very annoying.

There's a lot to unpack here, but I think the main takeaways from the novel is that I enjoyed only a few parts of the book, while at times I had to step away from it to really process what I was reading. Some folks will not enjoy how dense it is, especially with the magic systems that are a hold over from Gratton's first book, The Queens of Innis Lear. I'd say the first book is much more tightly knit, and much easier to follow.

So I didn’t like this book as much as I hoped it would. I really tried but struggles to get into it, it would take me fifteen minutes to get through three pages...

It’s a really shame as I loved the Queens of Innis Lear, up there with my top books. Maybe I will circle round and try this book again, but I need to take a break on it for now.

DNF p. 40

It pains me to stop reading this book but I’ve been trying to get back in to it for over a month now with little success. Perhaps it’s because I haven’t read The Queens of Innis Lear yet—I didn’t think it was necessary since this book wasn’t listed as being part of a series, at least not when I requested it, but there are references to things that happened to that book and I think I’d have a better sense of the world had I read it first. I can usually pick things up fairly quickly but I’m confused about who’s who, in part because characters are referred to by both their nicknames and formal titles interchangeably, and there are all the changing politics to keep track of as well.

For now, I plan to read The Queens of Innis Lear and then I’ll circle back around to this one. Normally I love Tessa Gratton’s books but I’ve only read her contemporary fantasy thus far and high fantasy has taken more adjustment than I would have guessed.

CW: battle/war references, death of loved ones, violence, execution