It is the year 1613, and King James is sending his messenger Andrew Logan into Scotland with secret orders to arrest Sir David Moray, close friend and advisor of the late Prince Henry. Secrets are second nature to Andrew, who must hide his Second Sight to stay alive. Joined by a court scrivener and the scrivener’s spirited daughter Phoebe, Andrew slowly untangles the true purpose of his mission?to frame Sir David for Prince Henry’s murder. But Andrew is unwilling to betray an innocent man.
Phoebe Westaway dislikes Andrew, and their history makes it hard for her to trust him. But as their journey draws them deeper into the dark web of court intrigue, Phoebe begins to suspect that she might have more need of the King’s Messenger and his unusual gifts than she could ever have foreseen.
Dear Susanna Kearsley,
What a treat to read a new book from Susanna Kearsley! Almost immediately I started the novel, I felt completely immersed in the time period and the characters. Andrew, Phoebe, Sir David, young Hector, Phoebe’s father; they are all drawn so well and so fully that I felt I knew them almost at once.
24-year-old Phoebe Westaway lives with her father, Laurence, a teacher and scribe, and her father’s sister, her Aunt Agnes, in St. Bartholomew’s just outside the city of London. Across the road lives Valentine Fox, the man Phoebe thinks she wants to/will marry. And nearby, lives King’s Messenger Andrew Logan, with his mother and younger sisters. Phoebe met Andrew when she was fourteen and he was sixteen when the Logans moved to London from Scotland, following the ascension of King James to the English throne. Andrew was struck by Phoebe’s beauty from the start but Phoebe’s opinions of Andrew were shaped by her association with Valentine. Readers (and listeners) quickly cotton on to the fact that Valentine is not to be trusted. It takes Phoebe longer to do so. For all her 24 years, Phoebe was immature when it came to her willing acceptance of the opinions of others rather than reaching her own conclusions. However, once out of the sphere of influence of Valentine Fox, she starts to rely on her own judgements and it is then she begins to come into her own.
Andrew is commissioned by King James to go into Scotland and take Sir David Moray into custody, returning him to London to “assist with investigations” into the death of the Prince of Wales the year before. It was widely whispered that Prince Henry was poisoned and Queen Anna has come to believe it. It quickly becomes clear that King James may not be embarking on a quest for truth and justice; rather, he is after a scapegoat to quiet his wife and put the matter to rest. Accompanying Andrew is Laurence Westaway, a scrivener, who has been tasked with writing everything Sir David says down, so that “if anything happens to him on the way to London” that account can be his “testimony”. If that all sounds very suss it’s because it totally is.
Andrew has the second sight. He has visions of the future. While they are, for the most part, incomplete, he knows they will always come to pass. He has seen that Laurence Westaway is dying and is reluctant to take him on such an arduous journey. To convince him, Phoebe says she will go along too. After seeing a further vision where Phoebe and Laurence are both with him, Andrew acquiesces.
Almost from the first time they met, Phoebe snubbed Andrew (because Valentine) and Andrew, in return poked her (metaphorically) right back. Their relationship for the past ten years has been acrimonious; they’re always bickering and it’s a constant source of frustration to Phoebe that Andrew always seems to get the last word in their arguments. Phoebe is quick to judge Andrew harshly (for no reason at all) and this has left Andrew defensive.
However, on the long and winding journey from Leith in Scotland to Greenwich, Phoebe’s eyes are opened about the manner of man she rides pillion behind. She sees him as the honourable, kind and protective man he is and finally (finally!) begins to question her misconceptions about him.
Anyone who’s ever read a Susanna Kearsley book will probably be familiar with the Morays. Sir David Moray was a real person who served as the first (and only) gentleman of Prince Henry’s bedchamber. Effectively, Sir David had the raising of the prince for many years. (Royal families are weird and King James’ family was very weird – largely because of King James’ own childhood history of being a pawn and his determination not to be so used again). Each of the royal children was raised away from their parents by separate people, rarely spending any time with the King and/or Queen or their siblings. Sir David was a constant for the prince and they were very close. At the death of Prince Henry, Sir David was devastated, with the grief of a father losing a son. This is all completely true and historically accurate.
Unlike most other Kearsley books, in The King’s Messenger, we are treated to four POV characters – Phoebe, Andrew, Sir David and Queen Anna. While it is true that the bulk of the book is told either from Phoebe or Andrew’s perspective, the other sections provide much-needed context which is, for the most part, drawn from history. (The warrant for Sir David and the journey itself is fictional.)
I very much liked Andrew and, Phoebe (particularly once she removed her head from her behind) but it was Sir David who stole my heart. He was a bit of a scene stealer – but then that’s what tends to happen with the Morays. I didn’t know the history particularly when I began the story and so I was extremely worried about what would become of Sir David. As the book progressed I felt some heart squeezing. The King’s Messenger is predominantly historical fiction but there is a strong romantic element as well. In this case, I knew the HEA would be Phoebe and Andrew but there was no “authorial contract” which guaranteed Sir David would survive. Plus, he was a real man so I knew whatever had actually happened to him would happen to him in the novel. As a result there was some breath-holding and fingernail biting the closer the travelling party drew to London. And no, I’m not going to say more about how it ends.
I did appreciate that Andrew was wise to potential traps and prevented Phoebe from being the author of their downfall early on in the piece. I had wondered what would happen there but Andrew was smarter than his enemies gave him credit for. And I’m super glad that the author didn’t go there as well.
There’s a lengthy author’s note at the end which talks about the real history of King’s Messengers and Sir David and Prince Henry and King James, etc. It’s fascinating in itself but also reminded me of what I already knew – Susanna Kearsley does meticulous research and weaves historical fact with historical fiction so well it can be difficult to know where one ends and one begins (hence the additional value of the author’s note).
I want to say that The King’s Messenger is a gentle book but that’s not really right. The pacing is, or feels, gentle. It rewards patience. There is tension, intrigue and risk throughout the story but it kind of sneaks up on you. It is a book which needs the listener/reader to pay attention. There is no skimming (but why would you even want to?). And it is a book which rewards in the beauty of the language and the way the story lingers, with the melancholy of loss – loss of innocence, loss of loved ones and the loss of possibility. How different would history have been had Prince Henry lived to become King Henry IX?
I listened to The King’s Messenger. There is a something about a Scottish accent that just does it for me and I was treated to great performances from both Angus King and Beth Eyre. King narrated the sections from Andrew’s and Sir David’s POV and Eyre narrated those from Phoebe’s and Queen Anna’s perspective. Both were well able to convey a range of accents and ages and classes in their narration and their delivery of emotion and tension was exactly right.
As has been the case with every other Susanna Kearsley book I’ve had the pleasure to read, The King’s Messenger was worth waiting for and will be one to revisit more than once.
Grade: B+
Regards,
Kaetrin
