Mary Queen of Scots

School Library Journal

Gr 9 UpMary , Queen of Scots seems an odd choice for a series about world leaders. Her short and violent tenure as a Catholic Queen of Scotland was marked by a power struggle between Catholicism and Protestantism which she lost. In 1561 she returned from France to rule Scotland, and by 1567 she was forced to abdicate. The story is told in a brisk prose that necessarily oversimplifies some of the controversies that surrounded Mary all of her life. To convey the atmosphere of key events, such as Mary's last days, Stepanek does indulge in some fictionalization. The text is accompanied by portraits of the principal figures and old prints which are accompanied by lengthy captions in bold print. Quotations from Mary and various historians, also in bold print, are scattered throughout the book. The result is overly busy pages that distract from the main text and an occasional illustration that is not very relevant to the text. Helpful features are a list of books for further reading (although it does not include Antonia Fraser's Mary Queen of Scots Dell, 1984; o.p.), a chronology, and a detailed index. The only title for young people currently in print is Mollie Hunter's novel You Never Knew Her as I Did! (Harper, 1981) that focuses on Mary's imprisonment and escape from Lochleven in 1568. Full-length biographies about Mary, Queen of Scots for young people date back to the 1950s and early 1960s. This book does fill a gap satisfactorily. Amy Kellman, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh