Sovereign by C.J. Sansom was first published in 2006 and it’s the third book in the Shardlake series.

It’s 1541 and Shardlake and his assistant Jack Barak have been riding for five days, making their way to the north of England. It’s a particularly gruelling journey as the summer has been so wet, the roads are bad. Shardlake is on a mission for Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and he wants to get to York before  King Henry VIII does. After the revolts in the north Henry is making his way there, the revolt has been quelled and this Royal Progress is to consolidate his power. He’s also expecting to meet with his nephew the Scottish King James V, but James isn’t daft enough to travel into England.

Not everyone has been forgiven though, Sir Edward Broderick is languishing in a filthy prison cell, waiting to be transferred to the Tower in London, and it’s Shardlake’s job to make sure that Broderick doesn’t die before he’s taken to London for interrogation and torture in the Tower. It’s a job that horrifies Shardlake, but he has troubles of his own, it seems that someone is trying to kill him.

This is a fairly hefty book at 658 pages, but it really doesn’t seem that long, it’s so well written the whole thing flows smoothly.  Sansom imagines the arrival of the King and his court, the army and masses of followers, and the effect that his presence has on the people who witness his arrival so well. People couldn’t even look at him, and shook in terror. At this time Henry was married to his fifth wife Katherine Howard, and her silly shenanigans come into the tale too. Sansom also didn’t ignore the problems that so many people descending on a place caused, specifically the amount of sewage involved. There’s more involved in the plot, but that’s as much as I’m going to say.

I’m so glad that I didn’t read this series as they were published because now I don’t have to wait for the next book to be published, I’ve already borrowed it from the library.