Wives four and five - Anne of Cleves and Katherine Howard - take centre stage, alongside Jane Boleyn, sister-in-law of the beheaded Queen, whose memory still casts a shadow across the lives of all three women - the real Boleyn inheritance,

As ever, with her beautifully drawn characters and believable dialogue, Gregory delights in showing us a very human and often unexpected side to well-known events. In this novel she takes, perhaps, her most unusual view - and it is to her credit that she succeeds admirably.

Anne of Cleves, remembered unkindly by history as the 'Flanders mare', receives the customary Gregory makeover. Naive but not unintelligent, her disastrous and brief marriage becomes a triumph - a survivor, the Queen escapes the dreadful fate of her predecessor, emerging independent of the men who've ruled her life.

The most contentious reworking is Jane Boleyn, however. Derided across the centuries for the false testimony which helped condemn her husband and Anne Boleyn for incest and adultery, an entirely unexpected woman appears in Gregory's sympathetic portrait.

But as their preconceptions are overturned, the reader's initial surprise is soon forgotten in the compelling storytelling - however far from the truth it may be.

The most vivid, most utterly real portrait of all though is Katherine Howard.

Self-absorbed, avaricious, provocative, convinced of her own infallibility, heartbreakingly naive - the reader sees the young Queen for what she almost certainly was. Just a teenager.

In this strand comes the real humour and tragedy, deftly mixed as the tale draws to its inexorable conclusion.

In The Boleyn Inheritance, Gregory has lost none of her acknowledged talents - it's a shame fans will not enjoy a similar treatment for the remaining Tudor Queens.