Charles I, the 'martyr king', dominates one of the most painful periods in British history in which civil war and revolution led to the execution of a sitting monarch. In Mark Kishlansky's brilliant account it is never in doubt that Charles was faced by men more resolute than he and that his vision for Britain's future conflicted with their desire to maintain its past. This is a fresh new portrait of one of the most moral, talented, loyal, artistically-minded and yet disastrous of all of this country's rulers.