PORTRAIT OF AN UNKNOWN WOMAN Vanora Bennett (HarperCollins £15)

When Vanora Bennett saw Holbein's revolutionary pen-and-ink drawing depicting the family of Sir Thomas More gathered informally at home she decided to write the story of Meg Giggs, the quiet young woman on the edge of the picture. Holbein the Younger was the first artist to bring the Renaissance to England in 1526 with his novel and personalised portraits that recorded individuals in a living, decorative way and she was taken with the intimacy, the annotations and the names and ages recorded by painter. Like Tracey Chevalier, who wrote Girl with a Pearl Earring, Bennett was inspired by the beauty of the picture.

At the heart of her novel is the love between Meg and John Clement, More's medical proteg. The two live through an unprecedented period of turmoil in Europe following the split, fuelled by Martin Luther, between Catholics and Protestants, that brought tolerance to breaking point as fanatics on both side threatened to bring to an end the way people believed and worshipped for centuries. This led, in turn, to the complex manoeuvring of the court, the divorce of Henry VIII and the rise of ambitious commoners like More, Wolsey and Cromwell.

Growing up in this vibrant, dangerous Tudor world, the orphaned Meg is taken into More's exalted intellectual family. Loving him as a father, she too believes true nobility lies not in noble blood but in noble behaviour, but finds it increasingly difficult to accept his passionate defence of Catholic orthodoxy, including banning imported books and condoning the whipping and burning of English heretics.

When she learns of John's origins, which could destroy the Tudor dynasty, she remains true to him - despite her attraction to the vibrant, creative Holbein. The artist had come, recommended by the humanist and Renaissance scholar Erasmus, to his good friend More. Bennett makes us see Holbein's unspoken love for Meg through his eyes; he revels in her quick wit and understanding as she revels in his innovative painting of The Ambassadors, rich with ideas from the astronomer Kratzer.

I felt Bennett could have carried her extensive research more lightly, but she has nevertheless written a stirring, multi-layered, timely novel that has given us a different window into the Tudor world and ties in beautifully with the Holbein exhibition at the Tate Britain, which continues until January 7.