The daughter of Lady Frances Brandon and Henry Grey, 1st Duke of Suffolk, Jane is seen as a burden by her parents, both of whom resent her for being a girl instead of a boy, and is regularly beaten by her mother.

According to Edward's father's will, if all his children were to die without heirs, then the succession to the crown would follow the lineage of his late younger sister, Mary Tudor.

When Mary rides into town proclaiming herself the rightful queen, Jane puts up no fight and is happy to relinquish the title to her cousin.

Thinking Mary will be kind to her, Jane is not worried, even though she is confined to the Tower of London; she had spent her brief "reign" there, and the main change is that she is no longer living in the royal apartments.

Mary signs a warrant for execution of both Lady Jane Grey and her husband, Guilford Dudley.

"[2] Publishers Weekly criticized the book's multiple narrators as "unwieldy" but praised Weir's "deft[ness]... describing Tudor food, manners, clothing, pastimes... and marital politics,"[3] and Kirkus Reviews called it an "affecting portrayal.