Prisoners in the Palace: How Princess Victoria became Queen with the Help of Her Maid, a Reporter, and a Scoundrel

Sixteen-year-old Elizabeth Hastings is a well-born girl with the world at her feet until she's suddenly orphaned. Her parents have left her nothing but debts and sufficient connections to land a position as Princess Victoria's personal maid, where her name is promptly changed to Liza. (So she goes from being Mary Crawley to Anna Smith in one fell swoop.) This is the premise of Prisoners in the Palace by Michaela MacColl. Of course, there's far more to it than meets the eye, for the palace is full of intrigue and scandal: the previous maid has left in disgrace, the wickedly charming Sir John Conroy is plotting to get his share of the power and pounds upon the Princess's ascension, and the dowdy Duchess of Kent, Victoria's mother, is either blind to it all or in on the schemes. Naturally, our heroine Liza zeroes in on the goings on and serves as Victoria's eyes and ears around the palace and beyond.

All told, this is a great piece of historical fiction. I especially appreciated that MacColl included a detailed chapter on the true life and times of Princess Victoria (for example, Sir John was a real life baddie, but Liza Hastings owes her existence entirely to MacColl's imagination). The descriptions of the palace in disrepair and of the sodden slums are eye-opening and intriguing. Liza was sometimes a bit self-righteous for my taste and she sometimes got herself in jams that beggared belief (for this reason, I would compare Prisoners in the Palace to Annette Vallon, which I read before I started blogging and cannot link). Overall, though, I enjoyed the book, which is a quick, light read.