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The dinner is delicious, but I pick at my food because at court there is always someone watching you, and I don't want to seem greedy. Our table faces the front of the hall, so it is natural that I look up to see the king at his dinner. In his rich clothes and great collar of gold you might mistake him for one of the old pictures over an altar; I mean, a picture of God. He is so grand and so broad and so weighted with gold and jewels, he sparkles like an old treasure mountain. There is a cloth of gold spread over his great chair, with embroidered curtains hanging down on either side, and every dish is served to him by a servant on his knees. Even the server who offers him a golden bowl to dip his fingers and wipe his hands does so on bended knee. There is another server altogether to hand him the linen cloth. They bow their heads as well when they kneel to him, as if he were of such unearthly importance that they cannot meet his eyes.

-The Boleyn Inheritance by Philippa Gregory

Reading a novel by Philippa Gregory is like eating chocolate. It's so smooth, rich, and delicious that I find myself disappointed every time I finish one of her books. My only consolation is that I still have yet to read all of them - and hopefully she'll never stop writing.

Historical novels need to be written well for me, and hers meet my expectations. This one centers around Henry VIII and three ladies in his court - you know, the one who had multiple wives and killed nearly every one of them. You can almost taste the fear of the women who surrounded him, and wonder how any of them wound up surviving.