Hilary Mantel is SO brilliant at painting an atmosphere - you really do enter the world of Thomas Cromwell, Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn.

There's one throw away line which personifies the entire style - Cromwell muses about why Westminster Abbey would want the skeleton of an elephant that died and was buried at the Zoo - if not to chop up the bones and sell them as relics of saints.

Mantel is great on details like that (justifying the crushing of monasteries). If you loved Wolf Hall (I did) you'll love this just as much.