The story of Henry VIII and his six wives has passed from history into legend... the true story however remains obscure to most people, whose knowledge of the affair begins and ends with the aide memoire, `Divorce, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived...' Loades' masterly book recounts the whole sorry tale in detail from Henry's first marriage, to his brother's widow, to the more or less contented old age in the care of the motherly Catherine Parr...