Sharon Kay Penman

"John: If disliking Richard be grounds for accusing a man of conspiracy, I daresay you could implicate half of Christendom in this so-called plot. Richard endears himself easiest to those whove yet to meet him."

"In the year of Christ 1183, the House of Plantagenet was at war against itself."

"Eleanor: Im tired, John, am asking you to keep this charade mercifully brief... for my sake if not for your own. John: For your sake? There was a time when Id have done anything on Gods Earth for you, just to get to acknowledge I was even alive! But now? Youre too late, Mother, years too late!"

"Eleanor: It is a pretty fiction that mothers love each child in equal measure... a fiction, no more than that. There is always a favorite. With me, it was Richard. With Henry, it was you. John: No. I was not his favorite. It was rather that I was the only son he had left. Have you forgotten? My brothers sided with you."

"Youre proving to be a merciless ghost, Papa. I should have expected it, knowing you as I do, Joanna said. Her tears were coming faster now. "What do you mean to do, Papa? Shall you haunt me for the rest of my days?" Her voice broke; kneeling on the icy tiles before Johns coffin, she wept bitterly."

"Servant: My lord! My lord, the Queen has just ridden into the bailey! John: That cannot be! My mother is in Normandy. Servant: No, my lord, shes in the great hall. Eleanor: You both are wrong. Im out in the stairwell."