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This book is two things in one.

First, it is an art book showcasing Graham Turner’s art on the Wars of the Roses.

Second, it is a light history of those wars, illustrated with Turner’s paintings, and a number of photos of artifacts and locations that have survived.

The shortcomings are that the book is physically big enough and heavy enough, that just reading it can be painful to arrange. Also, most of the photos are a bit small to make things out.

This is a shame because the history is good enough to be worth a read, starting with an overview of the end of the Hundred Years War, and a good section on the rise of factions in the English court, which lead to small armed fights between the nobility (like Heworth Moor) even before First St Albans. The main course of the wars is well presented, which is a proverbial problem with the subject.

And Graham Turner’s art is indeed well worth the expansive presentation. I especially appreciate the foreword where he talks about how he got into the subject, and a lot of little discussions on the details of various pieces. There’s also a nice half page set aside discussing the painting of Richard III he was working on when his body was found in 2012.

There’s a Kindle version of the book as well, but considering the size of most electronic devices, I’d probably stick to the physical book despite the inconvenience, because the real star is the art, and it deserves a larger presentation.