I have managed to get quite a few blog posts up this month, a bit of reading done as well. But the main thing I’ve been doing the last couple of months is updating my blog, which is now all done! More about this later in my newsletter. This month has also had a few anniversaries for books and my blog, and it is now just a month until my fourth book is released!
My fourth book, ‘Henry VIII’s Quest for an Heir: The King’s Great Matter’, is due to be published on 30 August 2026, now just a month away! It is available to pre-order from my publisher, Pen and Sword, Waterstones and Amazon. It is also available to order from Blackwell’s, who offer free international shipping, if you don’t want to wait for the US release which is scheduled for 30 October 2026.
I am now 65,000 words into my fifth book on Henry VIII’s six queens, which feels like I’m getting close to the end. I am struggling to write quite a lot of the time though, but sometimes you just need to force yourself to get words down on the page and edit it later on. Sometimes once you get some words down, make a start, it then begins to flow.
9 July marked the two-year anniversary of the publication of ‘Tudor Executions: From Nobility to the Block’, and 15 July marked the one-year anniversary of the publication of ‘The Many Faces of Anne Boleyn: Interpreting Image and Perception’. Those two books were published just a year apart, and I’m still not sure how I did that, honestly!
No new podcast recordings or blog posts this month, but gearing up for marketing for book four, so perhaps a few more in the coming months. But a reminder that you can see all of my podcast interviews and guest blog posts on my Substack here. I update this page every time I do anything new. The same can also be found on my website, broken down by book here.
If anyone else is interested in hosting me on their blog or podcast, please just let me know by leaving a comment, contacting me via social media, or emailing me at tudorblogger@gmail.com.
As I mentioned in my introduction to this newsletter, I have been doing some updates to my blog and website. There were empty image spaces and broken links, which I have now filled and fixed. Posts also weren’t tagged or categorised correctly, so I’m not sure what had gone wrong, but this has now been fixed as well. Categories are now listed down the right-hand site of my site so it should be easier to find what you’re interested in.
The main menu bar includes links to each of my books, including podcast interviews and guest blog posts for each one, book reviews both fiction and non-fiction, and media reviews. There are also person profiles for figures from the Wars of the Roses, Tudors, and Stuarts, a page on sources I’ve analysed (which I really want to do more of!), On This Day in History posts, and guests I’ve hosted. These pages will continue to be updated over time as I post more.
I’m aiming to get more posts written and published, especially from the end of the year when my current book manuscript is submitted. Some things are only posted to my blog and not my Substack as well, like the On This Day posts and Person Profiles, though I will link to these on my newsletter each month. Any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask!
If you look at the top menu, there is also a new page on Sharing and Reuse, specifying how my posts and other things can be used, and that none of my work is to be fed into AI or used for AI training. My About page has also been updated.
For those who aren’t aware, I also run a book review blog, which has also recently had a bit of a makeover and a rebrand – https://helenereadsblog.wordpress.com/. This isn’t just history book reviews, but reviews of everything I’m reading, which you can filter by author or genre.
I seem to have had a bumper month of posting this month!
Posts on Substack:
Additional posts on my blog:
On This Day in History – 12 July – Marriage of Henry VIII and Kateryn Parr
On This Day in History – 28 July – Execution of Thomas Cromwell, 1st Earl of Essex
Well hopefully lots more posts! I’m working my way through a backlog of books I’ve been sent from publishers, so expect more book reviews. I also have a few more guests lined up so keep an eye out for those. And I’m dying to delve into some more What If posts as well, though they may have to wait until I have a little more time!
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