"This is an outstanding piece of work: not only the best life of the king yet produced, but also the most subtle and balanced synthesis of current research on the politics and religion of the reign currently in print." - BBC History Magazine

"Cust comes as close to producing a definitive account of the nature of Charles I's kingship as anyone is likely to do for a long time... We should be grateful ... for this brilliantly conceived and deeply pondered work.  It becomes a crucial point of reference, always trustworthy and enlightening" - History Today

Charles I was a complex man whose career intersected with some of the most dramatic events in English history. He played a central role in provoking the English Civil War, and his execution led to the only republican government Britain has ever known. Historians have struggled to get him into perspective, veering between outright condemnation and measured sympathy.

This biography sets out to challenge recent assessments of Charles as someone ‘unfit to be king’, and emphasises his strengths as a party leader and conviction politician. These characteristics, along with his misjudgement and mishandling of crises, played a critical role in the causes of the English Civil War. Ultimately pushing Charles' enemies into a posiiton where they had little choice but to execute him.

It is an accessible narrative of the high politics of Charles’s reign as a whole, exploring developments in Scotland and Ireland as well as England. It connects this politics with religious conflict, court culture, Renaissance ideas of monarchy and the emergence of a ‘public sphere’ of news and political debate, while also offering a reassessment of topics such as the origins of the Personal Rule, the political role of Queen Henrietta Maria and Charles’s performance as a military commander.