Three Maids for a Crown by Ella March Chase

What teenage girl could resist the tragedy of a sixteen year old being beheaded because her parents forced her to take the crown from her cousin? Jane’s effort not to become the puppet her supporters expected her to be was heroic, her courage as she faced death so moving. I have been fascinated with Lady Jane Grey’s story from the time I was in high school. Why did you choose to write about the Grey sisters? Many thanks to Ella for answering my questions. An absorbing and heartbreaking story.Ella March Chase is the author of ‘Three Maids for a Crown’ and ‘The Virgin Queen’s Daughter.’

Lady Jane Grey and her sisters navigate their tragedy with compelling grace, ultimately powerless against the two queens who fear them. “Ella March Chase vividly portrays the paranoia of the Tudor court in Three Maids for a Crown. Not to be missed if you love well-told Tudor stories, or if you have a sister.”-Jeane Westin, author of His Last Letter: Elizabeth I and the Earl of Leicester Each maid triumphs, then falls prey to their cousins, first Queen Mary Tudor and then Elizabeth I, both queens terrified of the three maids' royal Tudor blood. The sisters find the triumphant love their queenly cousins are denied, but each is forced to pay a heavy price. At last, Chase writes their untold story, woven throughout with fascinating period detail. “In Three Maids for a Crown Ella March Chase powerfully evokes the courageous stories of the three truly unforgettable Grey sisters, saintly Jane, beautiful Kat and misshapen Mary. Three Maids for a Crown is a beautiful tale that gives Jane, Katherine, and Mary Grey what they never had in life: a voice.'-Christy English, author of To Be Queen: A Novel of the Early Life of Eleanor of Aquitaine 'With lyrical prose, Ella March Chase tells the riveting story of the Grey sisters, from Lady Jane Grey's nine day reign to all that came after. “Thanks to the skilled craftsmanship of Ella March Chase, the three Grey sisters come vividly to life in Three Maids for a Crown, an intimate portrait of their struggle to survive in the hostile environment of the Tudor court-a world brilliantly recreated in this thoroughly engrossing novel.”-Kate Emerson, author of the Secrets of the Tudor Court Series

“High praise to Ella March Chase, who knows her Tudor history, for putting the fascinating and doomed Grey sisters at the center of an ingenious work of fiction.'- G.

Particularly those of a kindly but haunted Mary I and a vicious, conceited Elizabeth, are unforgettable.'- Booklist

'Chase’s prose is engaging, and her rich, detailed portraits of Renaissance women,

Three Maids for a Crown by Ella March Chase