Hannah is discovered by Robert Dudley and John Dee and subsequently begged as a fool to Edward VI.

As Mary, Elizabeth, and Robert Dudley use Hannah to gather information on their rivals and further their own aims, the novel can plausibly present each side in the complex story.

The Queen's Fool follows Hannah from ages fourteen to nineteen, and her coming-of-age is interspersed among the historical narrative (see Bildungsroman).

The book reached # 29 on the New York Times Best Seller list and had sold 165,000 copies within three weeks of its release.

[1] It is a historically attested fact that a female jester was indeed active at the English royal court in the period covered by the book.

Nine-year-old Hannah Green sees Thomas Seymour and Elizabeth flirting when she delivers books for her father.

Though unwilling at first, Hannah accepts her life at court, serving as the King's Fool and the Dudley family's vassal, performing tasks and errands as requested.

Queen Mary is crowned, making Hannah overjoyed for her mistress and heartbroken that Robert Dudley, for his hand at Northumberland's plot, is in the Tower of London.

Still, when she sees Elizabeth heading for the Tower of London, she promises to join them in Calais when released from service.

She runs the printing shop, taking her father's nurse as a lodger, but flees when Calais falls to the French.

The Queen's Fool reached # 29 on the New York Times Best Seller list and had sold 165,000 copies within three weeks of its release.

[1] AudioFile magazine called main characters Mary, Elizabeth and Hannah "fully three-dimensional and unforgettable", and praised the audiobook recording's narrator Bianca Amato.