Books like this don t come along very often Told with Gareth Russell s characteristic verve and exquisite eye for detail it is a story so compelling and surprising that it feels as if it has been hiding in plain sight for 400 years TRACY BORMAN A warts and all story told with compassion PHILIPPA GREGORY Elizabeth was king Then James was queen English author 1603 James Stuart King of England Scotland and Ireland did not always love wisely but he never failed to do so boldly James Stuart King of England Scotland and Ireland did not always love wisely but he never failed to do so boldly He fell in love three times with a Scottish lord a knight and George Villiers the handsomest man in the whole world He was infatuated three more times with a Highland earl a Welsh lord and an English spy We know so much about the six wives of Henry VIII why not the six loves of James I This groundbreaking new book puts James genius liar spendthrift idealist witch hunter and the men he loved at the centre of one of the most dramatic stories in British royal history Beginning with the brutal and mysterious murder of his father in 1567 James s life encompassed kidnapping witchcraft trials torture his mother s beheading poison political radica