Narrated by Anne Boleyn's sister Mary—who managed to keep her head—Gregory's best-seller takes a new look at the oft-told story of the loves of Henry VIII and the political and religious intrigues and rivalries that roiled not just life in the English court but the whole of Europe.

"I don't think there's ever been anything like these characters in American literature."

A mother's story of watching helplessly as her son grows from an angry child into a horrifically violent young man, the book won 2005's Orange Prize for fiction and inspired the recent movie starring Tilda Swinton.

The familiar story of Anna, who naively sacrifices her comfortable (and stifling) marriage for true love and finds herself cut off from everything she knows.

Published in 1998, nearly 40 years after it was begun, this fictionalized memoir—released as a film with Johnny Depp in 2011—contains all the Thompson trademarks: drunken excess; surreal, violent episodes; fascinating, often despicable characters.