Name: We Two
ISBN: 9780345520012

Gillian Gill

Offers a revolutionary portrait of a queen and her prince, revealing at once both an intimate but far-from-idyllic relationship that succeeded against all odds as the strong, feisty queen and the brilliant, fragile prince worked together to build a family based on support, trust, and fidelity.

Victoria and Albert: Rulers, Partners, Rivals

We Two

Jeni Enjaian

I really wish that I could rate this book higher. I find the subject absolutely fascinating, especially since it's an aspect of British history that I do not know nearly as much about as I thought I did. In recent years I have found myself inclined to learn more about this topic thanks in part to the BBC drama Victoria which imbued much more attractive faces to all the historical actors than they actually had. I also kept thinking about the fabulous Doctor Who episode.
Pop culture references aside, Gill attempted to tell the story of one of the most fascinating royal relationships. I use the word attempt because while Gill gives the reader an immense amount of information, she does a poor job in actually telling this story. The narrative has a few problems. 

One, she jumps into the complicated dynastic mess that was the Hanovarians from George III until Victoria giving an incredible amount of detail about certain aspects while vaguely skirting over other details leaving the reader more confused when she started reading than after. 

Two, she dove into a far deeper than necessary exploration of the sexual mores of the relationship than anyone needs to know and also far deeper than anyone save Victoria and Albert can actually know. I found the entire chapter completely unnecessary. 

Three, Gill gives the reader whiplash when describing various aspects of the historical actors and their relationship. Within pages she can go from describing Victoria and Albert's relationship as perfect and harmonious to about to fall apart. In one chapter she can describe Victoria as penniless due to her parents' extravagance to basically rolling in the dough thanks to her new sources of income upon her ascension to the throne before going back to describing her as not having enough money to pay for upkeep of her household and everything else. 

Four, Gill spends a quarter of the book describing Victoria and Albert's background before their marriage, including family histories, before cutting it off nearly abruptly after Albert's death. Yes the book purports to be a biography of their relationship. If she wanted to make that the main point then she should leave out the 100+ pages describing the relationships of their parents and their life prior to even meeting.

The one good thing this book gave me was a desire to read more and find a much better biography.

We Two Victoria and Albert: Rulers, Partners, Rivals

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