It is the tragedy of Queen Mary that today, 450 years after her death, she remains the most hated, least understood monarch in English history--remembered best for burning hundreds of Protestant heretics at the stake. Linda Porter's pioneering new biography cuts through the myths to reveal the truth about the first queen to rule England in her own right. Daughter of Henry VIII and Katherine of Aragon, Mary Tudor was a cultured Renaissance princess who was brought to the throne by an audacious coup. She made a grand marriage to Philip of Spain, but her attempts to revitalize England at home and abroad were cut short by her early death at the age of forty-two. The first popular biography of Mary in thirty years, ''The Myth of ''Bloody Mary'''' offers a fascinating, controversial look at this much-maligned queen.