The Mirror & the Light received mostly laudatory reviews from critics. Henry Holt and Company published the US edition five days later, on 10 March 2020. Initial UK sales were brisk, with over 95,000 copies sold in the first three days.

When it was published in the UK on 5 March 2020, bookstores opened at midnight to sell the title. Saying the project had simply been difficult, Mantel added, 'But that’s not an explanation that has any news value, so people are looking for a dramatic story of the whole process breaking down.'

Mantel dismissed speculation the novel had been delayed due to writer's block, distractions caused by stage and screen adaptations of her previous novels, or because she couldn't bring herself to write Cromwell's execution scene. Though Mantel had originally hoped to publish the book in 2018, it did not appear until March 2020. It describes Cromwell's ascent to the pinnacle of his riches and power, followed by his fall from royal favour and his public execution at Tower Hill in 1540. The Mirror & The Light covers the period following the death of Anne Boleyn in 1536. It is the final novel published in Mantel's lifetime. It won the 2021 Walter Scott Prize for historical fiction. In December 2020, Emily Temple of Literary Hub reported that the novel had made 13 lists of the best books of 2020.

Mantel's twelfth novel, her first in almost eight years, The Mirror & The Light was published in March 2020 to widespread critical acclaim, and enjoyed brisk sales. Following Wolf Hall (2009) and Bring Up the Bodies (2012), it is the final instalment in her trilogy charting the rise and fall of Thomas Cromwell, minister in the court of King Henry VIII, covering the last four years of his life, from 1536 until his death by execution in 1540. The Mirror & The Light is a historical novel by the English writer Hilary Mantel.

Hilary mantel the mirror and the light