By Julie Sara Porter Bookworm Reviews
Reading by Berthe Morisot
While I love to read different types of books, I must admit one of my all-time favorite genres is historical fiction. I love to read books set in a different era, featuring realistic characters that deal with the problems of that era. Many Readers also enjoy engaging into another time period so this list will take us back into the past for some great historical fiction.
Now there is some confusion with what is considered historical. For this list, I settled on books that take place at least forty to fifty years before their publication date (though some cheat a little by having huge chunks that are set in the present). So, I have books from settings from the Ice Age to the late 1960's. I have certain time periods and historic figures that get quite a lot of mention because I have certain favorite eras (The 19th-early 20th century) and figures that I like to read about (the English Royalty, Artists, Writers, Feminists). I also have a fast and loose definition of what is considered historical fiction including some sub-genres as historical fantasy, historical mysteries, and alternate history. Nevertheless, I hope that the Readers find some interesting companions to read during their trips through time. As always if you know any other books please suggest them here or on Facebook.
Who owns history? How do our modern interpretations effect how we see the past? Can we really know what went on in the heads of literary and historic figures? These provocative questions are raised throughout Possession by A.S. Byatt a Romantic novel in which two academics study the presumed affair between two poets.
Minor literary scholar, Roland Michell discovers a letter addressed to noted 19th century poet, Randolph Henry Ash which suggests the married Ash had an affair with another unknown poet. Doing some amateur detective work and asking questions, Michell locates feminist literary critic, Dr. Maud Bailey who shows him the works of Christabel La Motte, a fellow poet who achieved minor fame with a collection of Breton fairy tales and an unfinished epic about Melusine, a half-woman/half-step in French legends. (Not the only time Melusine will be referred to on this list.)
Michell and Bailey's search is interesting as the two literary detectives search through letters, journal entries, and academic essays to determine whether Randolph and Christabel knew each other and had an affair.
While there aren't as many flashbacks as there are in other books on this list, Randolph and Christabel come to life in these reminisces. Each narrative adds to their story and causing more interpretations. The journal entries of Christabel's rommate, Blanche Glover suggests La Motte had a repressed lesbian attraction for Glover. Ash's wife's journal suggests that she and her husband's marriage was passionless and correct by Victorian standards. Ash and La Motte's letters reveal themselves as like-minded individuals who discuss and debate intellectual topics like the value of poetry and the existence of God (Suggesting their romance was not simply one of passion, but also one of intellect of longing to find someone to understand and talk shop with.) These different interpretations show how perspectives change the more their histories are studied and the more academics learn about them.
They also search their poems for common themes and threads that imply they were together such as sea imagery indicating sexuality and white gloves symbolizing concealment. Even though both Randolph Ash and Christabel La Motte are fictional, Byatt does an excellent job of replicating the poets of the era. Ash's poems like "Ask to Embla", and "Ragnarok" are epic and dense similar to the world of Robert Browning. While La Motte's simple nature poems suggest Emily Dickinson, her epic poem "Melusine" seems to be a composite of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Feminist Romance, Aurora Leigh and Christina Rossetti's spiritual fantasy , Goblin Market. The two poets come to life in their own writing, answering more questions about their romance than letters ever could. Byatt should have published separate tie-in books of the works of Randolph Henry Ash and Christabel La Motte making Possession even more metafictional than it already is.
While Michell and Bailey research the two poets, they suffer from disappointing romances in their own lives. Ash and La Motte's appear to possess the researchers as they give into their own passions and engage in their own affair. Soon their lives and those of the poets intersect in very intriguing ways. The ending is satisfactory as the modern couple are determined to get what their historic counterparts couldn't: a happy ending.
19. The Robber Bride by Margaret Atwood
Historic period: 1960's-1980's Vietnam War, Women's Movement Canada
The Women's Movement carried the themes of equality between men and women and that women should bond together to challenge bigger issues like war and sexism. However Margaret Atwood's novel The Robber Bride suggests that if women really are equal to men, then there should be women who could be just as ruthless, cold-hearted, and driven by sexual pleaures as men can be vulnerable, long-suffering, and can suffer from broken hearts. Such figures are not simply men or women but humans.
One of those types of women is Zenia (no last name), a sexual predator who infiltrates the lives of three women and deprived them of their husbands.
The Reader first encounters Zenia at the end of her story after her supposed death and funeral when the three women encounter the no-longer late Zenia walking into cafe. Each of the three, Toni Fremont, a military historian, Charis, a New Age store sales associate, and Roz Grunwald-Andrews,a magazine editor-in-chief, hate Zenia and each of them recall their history with Zenia and their desire for revenge against her.
The book mostly consists of flashbacks involving the three, their men and Zenia. Tony recalls when she first met Zenia during the early '60's before Feminism was the norm and rumors of America's involvememt in Vietnam fill Canada's Universities. Tony meets Zenia at an Andy Warholesque underground party and becomes part of a trio consisting of Tony, Zenia, and West Tony's male friend , future husband, and Zenia's first conquest. After Zenia gets money from Tony and West and Tony plagiarizes a college essay for Zenia, Zenia leaves with West in tow. West returns repentant and broken by Zenia's many affairs and abandonment. Tony feels protective of West and settles into marriage but is constantly worried that West will find and return to Zenia.
Zenia's next conquest is Billy, a draft dodger who aides his fellow anti-war activists in Canada while falling in love with the pacifistic Charis. Charis encounters a seemingly dying Zenia at her Yoga class and invited her to live on her organic farm. Of course Zenia takes Billy leaving Charis alone and pregnant. By the time the '80's hits and Zenia takes over Roz's feminist magazine and takes runs off with Roz's husband, Mitch, The Reader is left wondering why these women continue to trust Zenia.
Besides the turbulent '60's and '70's, the women also carry scars of being small children during WWII. Tony's parents met during the war as her English mother regretted her life as a war bride. Charis's father was killed in the war and she was raised by a sexually abusive uncle explaining her ardent pacifism. Roz was the daughter of a man who helped refugees leave Europe and settle in Canada and the United States. Zenia, especially could be a victim of her past as she tells each woman a different story of her upbringing, causing them and The Reader to wonder about her. Was she the daughter of a White Russian who was forced into child prostitution? Was she from a Romanian Gypsy family and watched her mother get executed by superstitious villagers? Was she from a Jewish family and was displaced during the War? Either way, Zenia's childhood and adulthood suggests a life of hurt and betrayal, of being hurt by outside circumstances so to face it, she has to grow up cunning, ruthless, and prepared to so battle against her fellow man and woman.
As the three women confront Zenia, they learn to unleash their darker feelings of rage, war, and revenge considering themselves just as cunning and ruthless as Zenia. Their final moments with her reveal some hidden truths as each woman embraces and releases her darker nature and learns more about herself and her enemy.
Historic period: 1940's WWII, New York, Washington D.C., Germany
Susan Isaacs' Shining Through is one part romantic comedy and one part spy thriller and features a compelling female protagonist who would be the last person to be either a romantic lead or spy, but ironically that's what makes her perfect for both.
Linda Voss, a half-German Jewish secretary for a Wall Street law firm brushes off her fellow secretaries' comments about her married boss, John Berringer. They go on and on about how handsome, rich, and sophisticated John is. Linda pays it no mind, partly because she is more interested in the War in Europe and partly because she keeps her thoughts towards Mr. Berringer to herself. At least she does until a newly separated and drunken John Berringer falls into her arms. The two take part in a clandestine affair until Linda discovers that she's pregnant. John then does the civil thing and asks her to marry him.
The middle section kind of drags as John and Linda get settled in Washington D.C. for John's new job working for the Defense Department and try to settle into a marriage of opposites as John is sophisticated and cold and Linda is working class and feisty. However, things pick up after Linda obtains an unusual position. Her knowledge and interest in the war, plus her ability to speak flawless German interests her boss and John's father-in-law, Edward Leland. Leland then hires Linda to be his secretary for war related activities to translate letters, listen to eyewitnesses, and send and receive all coded correspondence.
Linda finds this opportunity exciting at least as a counter to her foundering marriage particularly after she miscarries and catches John in bed with his ex-wife.(Which is amazing that John has two women fighting over him since the more the Reader learns of him the more he is revealed to be a boring coward.) Realizing her marriage is over but has a golden opportunity to prove herself, Linda volunteers to go into Germany and send messages to the Allies.
Linda's training is a fascinating read in how it opens up the brutal regiment that spies have to go through. They are given rigid physical training and told to memorize certain legends or stories about their new identities. For example Linda has to assume the name of Lina Auerman, a German war widow. She has to continuously respond as Lina even when her supervisors purposely try to trick her on the streets to reveal her name. This shows how hard the life of a spy can be to be physically and psychologically always on the job. These passages take the glamor out of the job and reveal how draining but committed the people are who go through the training.
While in Germany, Linda is left on her own to navigate her way through the Nazified streets. Thanks to assistance from a pair of local agents, she manages to bluff her way into a job as assistant cook for a commander high up in Hitler's inner circle. Linda's missions in Germany are suspenseful and nail biting as she can't let her guard down even for a moment. She drugs the mistress of the house so she can use a spare key to get into her commander's study so she can copy his files. She makes a friend with a fellow spy but is unable to tell her anything about her real self even her name for fear of revealing too much. She also is able to transmit messages to a courier, but in one unguarded moment the courier is discovered and killed sending Linda on the run.
Even though her cover is blown, Linda retains some courage and spirit still remaining the captivating protagonist that she is. She discovers a mole in the organization and defeats the mole one on one. She also is able to escape Germany with the help of Edward Leland. Isaacs unnecessarily throws another romantic subplot towards the end. However, it does reveal that Linda is a much better person than John Berringer thought she was and that the right person would recognize her true worth.
Linda Voss transforms Shining Through from a standard novel with a weathered professional spy like James Bond. Instead she shows that an ordinary person can show courage, determination, and spirit even through unusual circumstances.
17. In the Company of the Courtesan by Sarah Dunant
Historic period: 16th century Renaissance, Hapsburg Sacking of Rome, Rome and Venice, Italy
Courtesans are fascinating figures throughout history. They often held a higher spot than the common prostitute and had a very exclusive clientele. Classically trained in art, literature, politics, and other subjects that would be forbidden to most women, they were often there to provide an ear to their lover, who could be a king, a pope, or a state leader. They had the reputation of being an official advisor, However they were still victims of misogynists and double standards. They were looked upon as objects and were not permitted to move to center stage obtaining personal power or marriage. Above all they were forbidden to fall in love.
Sarah Dunant captures the life of a courtesan in her brilliant novel In the Company of the Courtesan, which describes a life that is rich in benefits and intrigue but poor in real human emotion.
Fiametta Bianchini is one of Rome's top courtesans. She is the mistress of nobles, artists, writers, and the Pope. Seen through the eyes of Bucino Teodini, her advisor, best friend, and pimp the two make a great pair. Fiametta's attractiveness and sophistication make her the perfect companion while Bucino's observant nature and size as a Little Person allows him to hear any gossip and news that will benefit them. To paraphrase the Pet Shop Boys, Bucino has the brains, Fiametta's has the looks and they make lots of money.
Things are well until Hapsburg mercenaries attack Rome. With a city in ruin, and very few friends or clients including the Pope able to aid them, Fiametta and Bucino are forced to fake penitence particularly Fiametta whose beautiful golden hair is shorn. The two manage to pull off the subterfuge until they find a boat to take them to Fiametta's childhood home of Venice. (Not a pleasure cruise for Bucino, who has hydrophobia and suffers from nightmares of drowning.)
The courtesan's life is exquisitely detailed as the Reader is given an inside glimpse of their lives. Courtesan have to register in a book like every other occupation. They go to church so the local men can admire their beauty and word of mouth can spread. They are given several beauty treatments and herbs to maintain an enchanting seductive presence at all times. Quite often Fiametta is dressed, primped, and massaged as though she were Venetian Barbie.
Renaissance Venice is the perfect world for the Courtesan because they aren't the only ones selling themselves. Everyone is willing to compromise and hide who they really are to get ahead in this deceitful world. A writer friend of the duo wrote a book describing the sex lives of various Roman nobles and was exiled because of it. However he isn't above using the book for potential blackmail. A Jewish merchant friend of Bucino's converts to Christianity even though he is just as misanthropic about his new religion as his old one.A Moorish merchant is under suspicion because of his skin and Muslim religion maintaining a gruff and fearsome facade but he ends up being one of the more helpful characters in the novel. It gets to the point where ironically Fiametta and Bucino are the most honest characters in the book. At least they admit that they are selling themselves.
However that constant life takes its toll on the two in terms of relationships. While Fiametta has an impressive clientele, she is swayed when a younger nobleman falls in love with her. She is intrigued by the fact that someone sees her as more than a pretty face and nightly companion. He sees her as a real woman and this amazes her as she explored the possibility of real love.
Bucino however is furious suspecting ulterior motives. However he too has difficulties forming a real attachment. His protective nature towards Fiametta and suspicions towards others cause him to view La Draga, a childhood friend of Fiametta's and an herbalist, with contempt. Even though La Draga cares for Fiametta, Bucino suspects that she will rob or betray them. The moment when Bucino realized that his suspicions were correct but realized the reasons behind La Draga's deceit are moving as Bucino becomes aware that he ruined a potential love with La Draga before it even began.
In the Company of the Courtesan brilliantly and beautifully shows the toll of living a life where surface is the only thing that matters. Where lying, subterfuge, and selling oneself are the orders of the day. The people don't realize that they gave their humanity away before it's too late.
In terms of historical fiction Edward Rutherfurd's novels could be considered the King (or technically the Prince since James Michener is one of the originators of this
idea of big sprawling epics starring multi-generations). While Philippa Gregory, Margaret George and others (all fine authors) are known for humanizing public figures such as royals, Rutherford takes the approach
of putting "regular people" in the center of epic events and how the average citizen was affected
by the changing times.
Rutherfurd's Sarum was the first in a long line of books detailing history through the eyes of several
generations. First published in 1987, the novel shows the history of England, particularly the history
of Sarum later known as Salisbury the home of Stonehenge through the eyes of several families from the Ice Age all the way up to 1985 during a ceremony honoring Salisbury Cathedral and Stonehenge.
Five families in particular share the spotlight:
The Wilsons-The first family first mentioned during the Ice Age. Often described as fisher folk with very distinct long toes (Rutherfurd often gives families certain genetic traits that carry over the generations). They later have many relatives who scheme and bicker against other characters in attempts to climb higher in status, particularly during the Middle Ages when most of the Wilsons are seen as charismatic but manipulative figures. Ultimately separating into two families, The Forests, wealthy titled landowners and the Wilsons, poorer seafaring relatives. They are present in nearly every chapter.
The Masons-A mostly working class family of skilled tradesmen. Making their debut in the Neolithic era, the Masons took part in building both Stonehenge and the Cathedral. They are also a very religious family having strident Protestants during the Tudor era, Methodists in the Victorian era, and Puritans during the English Civil War. From chapter two on, they are present in every chapter but some more than others.
The Porteus/Porters- Beginning during the Roman era, the Porteus are mostly well-off educated members who seek government administrative or Ecclesiastical positions in the Church. Very strident
law abiding members, they are very prominent in many of the chapters depicting the Roman era and the Middle Ages but begin to disappear towards the 17th century taking only minor roles in the final chapters.
The Shockleys-A mostly farming and business minded family that makes their debut during the Saxon invasion against the Vikings. Very ambitious, strong-willed souls they engage in centuries of rivalries with the Wilsons. They are also known for having members particularly the females who question society's rules and become involved in non-conformist ideals. From their debut on, they are prominent in nearly every chapter.
The Godfreys-A family that began during the Norman Conquest. Originally seen as the archetypal knights with strict moral codes, pilgrimages, and chivalric values, the generations fall further and further into poverty and disgrace until in one of the most heartbreaking scenes a young member in the Victorian era has to sell himself as a human scarecrow before being deported to Australia. More prominent in the Medieval and Renaissance-era chapters, they disappear after their descendant is transported.
In Rutherfurd's work, we see the world through the characters' eyes and what memorable events do the eyes see. Rutherfurd's talent for historic research is present throughout as he portrays these events which much accuracy and dedicated description. He also is good at portraying the little events of the era such as what happens when a young boy gets accused of killing a lord's deer when a yeoman is watching or the measures that many residents took to avoid catching the Bubonic Plague, which of course in many cases proved just as harmful as the plague itself.
Rutherfurd's details are well executed and his characters are good somewhat. They are memorable people facing these events and are affected by them. Some of the best scenes are these little moments with these ordinary people such as when a Shockley member is the lone survivor in his family of 20 after the Black Death. These are such moments that show the readers how these epic events affected even the most ordinary people better than any history text book ever could.
Sometimes the epic scope runs away with Rutherfurd and characters start to repeat themselves in almost comic ways. How many Wilsons or Forests are described as spider-like or how many Shockley women are referred to as tomboys and share a similar love of horseback riding? In Rutherfurd's later novels such as London, Paris, and the Dublin Saga, he does a better job of capturing the various characters and making them stand out more on their own terms. Still, it was an impressive debut on such a expansive epic subject that took a lot of research, a lot of dedication, and a lot of living history.
Captains and the Kings
is an amazing story of an Irish immigrant who discovers the dark side of
America and himself.
Joseph Armagh arrives
in America in 1854, an impoverished orphan with a younger brother and sister to
provide for. In his drive to pursue success and money, Joseph makes powerful
allies and enemies, practically alienates his family, and gets involved with
conspiracies in his drive for success.
Caldwell tries to accomplish two
things with Captains and the Kings and she does at least one very well. The
first accomplishment that this book has is it tells a memorable sprawling story
with fascinating characters. Standing at the center of this large cast is
Armagh himself.
Joseph is an easy person to be
fascinated with or drawn to, but not an easy person to like. He is a completely
contradictory character. As he gets involved with dangerous circumstances like
slave trading, bootlegging, and shady business deals, he wants more of what
these people have to offer. He is a very dark character who scoffs at any hope
or optimism. Joseph
orders the death or disgrace of most enemies with very little conscience. He
marries an unstable woman for position and ostracizes her in pursuit of another
woman. He dominates his brother and sister and becomes furious when they begin
lives of their own.
But Joseph is not a one-dimensional character.
He is a very multi-faceted man with a bit of humanity that shows every once in
awhile. He has a very romantic and chivalrous side which he shows in his scenes
with Elizabeth, a vulnerable woman with a cruel husband. At first dismissive of his children, he slowly
begins to accept them and take pride in them up to the point where he tries to
make his eldest son the first Catholic President of the United States (about 50
years before John F. Kennedy would do this in real life). One of the most
touching scenes that shows Joseph’s better character is where he shows real
regret in disgracing a senator, whom he realizes is a truly good man. Joseph
isn’t aware of the ramifications of this moment until years later after he
loses some family members.
Where Caldwell does
not succeed so well is in wrapping his fascinating story around conspiracy
theories, and offering them in real life.
Joseph comes into a world of The
Committee of Foreign Relations; shadowy men who make decision that affect the
world around them. While it is fascinating reading for a novel, Caldwell’s
theories show a bit of paranoia, especially her introduction. Nothing kills a
work of fiction faster than the writer insisting “these are based on actual
events.” Conspiracy theories are great in many works of fiction, but become
tiresome when repeated and believed in reality.
In the perimeters of
the novel however, these scenes are quite well written simply because of how
Caldwell portrays the Committee members. Joseph and later his son, Rory, become
involved in some chilling meetings where these men discuss upcoming world wars,
stock market panics and crashes, and Communist uprisings in a nonchalant matter
as though they were items on a shopping list. Unlike Joseph, the other members
of the Committee of Foreign Relations aren’t near as defined or faceted but
they aren’t supposed to be. They are neither good nor evil. They are more like
living forces of nature that shape the world to fit their needs. Joseph despite
all of his money, and cynicism is at heart a naive character and doesn’t truly
realize how dangerous they can be until they turn on him and his son. That’s
when he truly sees the darkness of these business acquaintances.
14. Evergreen by Belva Plain
1906-1960's, Ellis Island, Jewish Pogroms, WWI, Great Depression, the Holocaust, Israel's Foundation; Poland, New York
Evergreen is a beautiful captivating story of three generations of a Jewish-American family that experience some of the important events of the 20th Century. But mostly it's a romance about a woman caught between two men that takes an unusual but satisfying resolution.
Anna arrives in the United States from Poland because of a pogrom that results in the death or separation of her family members. She moves to New York City where she finds work as a maid and she captivates the eyes of her employer's son, Paul Werner and a local man, Joseph Friedman. While Paul is charming, handsome and sophisticated, Anna knows that a marriage between them may not be possible. Instead she marries the staid conservative respectable Joseph, a construction worker.
If this were a conventional romance, the narrative would encourage Anna to follow her romantic passions and end with her and Paul eloping to his beautiful European palace. Thankfully, this isn't that type of book. Paul longs for Anna and occasionally she gives into temptation, one time results in the conception of a daughter, Iris. However, the book makes it clear that Joseph is the love of Anna's life. He pulls his family through the Great Depression by working on various low income projects. He helps Anna reunite with her brothers. He also loves and helps Anna care for their children, Iris and Maurice. Belva Plain's writing suggests that it's a faithful loving marriage that is more important than a roaring short-lived passion.
The generations of the Friedman family encounter romances during times of great trouble. Anna's brothers settle down in Austria as garment makers, marry local women, and have families just in time for the Nazis to arrive, leaving one brother in exile and another dead with the rest of his family except for one son-in-law who marries Iris.
A theme that appears in Evergreen is how subsequent generations learn from the mistakes from the previous ones. Maurice marries a Gentile woman despite objections from their families. They remain estranged from their families which adds to the tension of an unhappy marriage already troubled by Depression-era unemployment and alcoholism. This estrangement also leads to a child custody battle between Maurice's family and his in-laws. However it becomes a relief when a grandchild also falls in love with a Gentile and the family not only accepts the marriage but treats the interfaith union as a non-event remembering all the strife the estrangement with Maurice caused.
Evergreen is a book that demonstrates the importance of love between family and how that love is passed through the generations.
13. The Help by Kathryn Stockett-Historic period:1960's The Civil Rights Movement, Mississippi
Sometimes the strongest actions to make change are to report the truth. That's what Skeeter Phelan, Abilene Clark, and Minnie Jackson do in The Help. They report what it's like to be an African-American maid in the service of Southern white families in the early days of the Civil Rights Movement.
An aspiring writer from a prominent white family, Skeeter doesn't find much career satisfaction from writing a domestic advice column. When she applies and is rejected for a job in New York, the editor suggests that she look around for important topics. Skeeter doesn't have to look far. She is curious about the sudden loss of her family's maid (who was more of a mother to Skeeter than her actual mother) and begins to see how abusive some of her friends are to "their help." So she decides to interview some of the local maids to find out what their lives are like and what they really think of their employers.
Two of the most prominent maids have their motives for taking part in the interviews showing that people react to prejudice in different ways. Abilene has been living a life of quiet desperation. Minnie is feisty and has a reputation for mouthing off to her employers. Abilene challenges racism by covertly building up her employer's daughter's self-esteem and giving the little girl's lessons in tolerance and accepting others. Minnie challenges racism by arguing with her employers and playing elaborate pranks such as the humorous and completely justified Terrible Awful in which she delivers a pie with some unusual ingredients to her most recent employer, Skeeter's friend, Hilly. Abilene talks to Skeeter with cozy chats and fond sad memories of children that she loved and cared for who later became racist. Minnie answers Skeeter's questions with hostility and accusations that Skeeter is not helping anyone but herself.
The interviews bring out the best in the three women as they put the book together and reach out to other maids to share their stories. They also work together to hide the interviews from the white community so no one could be fired or hurt by the revelations in the book. The three women are aware of the enormous undertaking that they are making to report the racism around them and bravely do so.
The book not only brings the trio closer together but opens and changes their lives. Skeeter rejects the life her mother wants for her by turning down a politician's bigoted son's marriage proposal and she challenges her friends' treatments of their maids deciding to be more than just a spectator and reporter in race relations. Minnie becomes more trusting towards some white people as she begins to bond with Skeeter and her current employer, an eccentric woman who wants Minnie to teach her how to keep house but is revealed to be a true honest friend to Minnie. While Abilene is removed from her job she emerges a victor because she has proof that her young charge will become a better person who will accept people of all races so her lessons will live on.
12. With Violets by Elizabeth Robards- Historic period: 19th century Impressionist Art Movement, Napoleon III, France
Impressionism is among the most popular art movements. Many painters such as Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, and Edouard Manet were known for the outdoor scenes and light captured art work, scenes that suggested an image rather than the Realistic settings. One of the most overlooked artists was Berthe Morisot, one time model and lover of Manet and a talented artist in her own right. Elizabeth Robards rectifies this omission with her spellbinding novel, With Violets that captures the beginning of the movement and Morisot and Manet's difficult love life.
Berthe Morisot is from a typical upper middle class upbringing with her typical upper middle class family. While she and her sister dabble in painting, her mother only considers that talent for gaining a husband. While painting different art work at the Acadame de Beux-Arts she encounters Edouard Manet, a charming and very married artist that wants to experiment with different art styles with his friends. Edouard and Berthe are captivated by each other's talent, intelligence, and appearance so before long, Manet becomes Morisot's tutor and lover.
Like many artists, Manet's true emotions are felt within his art. His first portrait La Balconie, features Berthe, and Manet's wife and brother-in-law standing together in a painting and guess who's features are the most prominent. Another painting shows Morisot seated in a white dress and giving what many describe as a very provocative position. Many put the clues together and it doesn't take too long before gossip comes out that the two are lovers. Berthe's mother is horrified considering this will be a mark on her daughter's marriageable status. Berthe's sister wonders what news of the affair would mean to her status as a newly wed. Many of their friends want to avoid their company particularly Manet's. It was alright for him to have a lover, they say. But to put her in a position of a wife and make her prominent in his life, well that's another matter entirely. The attitudes of the various characters towards the Manet-Morisot Love Affair show the double standard of romances in Paris, particularly when one is married. How lovers are accepted but meant to be kept a separate component in the lives of the lovers and that a man can take as many lovers as he can but a woman must remain pure as the driven snow.
There are some strong moments of character development between the two lovers. Manet, in one dialogue explains his relationship with his wife and her lover, making him understandable why he stays with her and makes the Reader feel a little for Madame Manet (who until then was a cypher, present at social gatherings but flat and uninteresting) who was a victim of the choices of other's but never able to make her own decisions in contrast to Morisot's strive for independence.
Morisot also stands on her own as a character in her passages with and without Manet. When the two are separated by the war against Napoleon III, Berthe worries about her lover's whereabouts and is furious that he was in hiding with his wife and never thought about her. However, she spends her time in exile perfecting her painting craft and getting emotionally involved with another suitor to the point of a proposal. Morisot really comes into her own in her passages without Manet, as an artist and as a woman.
She also comes on her own as an independent spirit and talented artist. When Manet's colleagues discuss breaking from the rigid regulations of the Salon de Paris and form their own gallery that displays their artwork, Morisot is thrilled and gives her support becoming one of the boys. Leaving the Salon with her colleagues gives her a chance to explore art and break free from convention. Manet however objects and Morisot is furious that this man that she once thought of as a trailblazer and an iconoclast is driven to stick to conventions because of his own fear. It is only after Morisot has found her own footing as an artist that she takes control of her life and breaks from her romance with Manet, to become involved with and later marry Manet's younger brother, Edgar Manet, an art dealer and supporter to Morisot and the other Impressionists.
11. Murphy's Law: The Molly Murphy Mysteries by Rhys Bowen
Historic period-Early 20th century Ellis Island, Irish Rebellion, Tammany Hall, Ireland and New York
Many immigrants came to America to search for better work opportunities or because they were displaced by prejudice and violence. In Molly Murphy's case, the violence came from herself. After the protagonist of Rhys Bowen's mystery series murders an English nobleman in self-defense after he tries to rape her, Molly finds herself on the run. In hiding she befriends Kathleen, a dying woman who persuades Molly to pose as the woman and take Kathleen's two children to America to meet their father. (Kathleen can't go, because having Tuberculosis, she would be sent back.)
Unfortunately, murder and trouble follow Molly wherever she goes. At Ellis Island, she encounters a lecherous immigrant who turns up dead. The police are suspicious, especially when they learned that Molly slapped the immigrant earlier when he tried to accost her. While Molly experiences this new country, befriends Kathleen's family, and looks for a job she tracks down clues as to the actual murderer of the dead immigrant.
Molly is a very plucky character who though she is in a lot of dangerous situations, she is never a damsel in distress. She follows leads such as a suspicious bribe-taking Alderman by talking her way into a maid's job. She is also savvy enough to guess potential motives such as realizing that an Ellis Island watchman may have resorted to robbing immigrants but would not have had time to murder them, not to mention too many witnesses.
While she is definitely an amateur detective and makes plenty of rookie mistakes such as being left alone with the actual killer after foolishly calling attention to herself, Molly learns from them and has an uncanny knack for survival. In later installments, Molly shows herself to be a top notch investigator even to the point where she starts her own private investigation firm and gets a good-sized clientele.
Murphy's Law is an excellent start to the series that has some questionable plot points. (The subplot with the children gets overdone and they aren't near as interesting as Sid and Gus, Molly's flamboyant friends who appear in later books in the series; Also the killer meets their end in an almost deus ex machina fashion). But it is a wonderful suspenseful series with a great setting of early 20th century Ireland and New York. Plus, Molly Murphy makes for a fun engaging lead that any Reader would enjoy finding out what trouble she gets into next.
10. Absolution by Murder: The Sister Fidelma Mysteries/Mysteries of Ancient Ireland by Peter Tremayne
Historic period- 5th Century Dark Ages, Ireland's Golden Age, Irish Catholic Church, Ireland
Most people think of the Dark Ages as a time of repression for women, where women were subservient to men. Not so says Peter Tremayne in his introduction to the Sister Fidelma series. Women had many rights in the early Christian-era in Ireland. They could own property, divorce, and were capable of receiving high positions of power like chieftain, abbots, and in the case of Tremayne's fictional protagonist Sister Fidelma of Cashel, they can be a Brehon, which was similar to a criminal attorney/judge in those days. Tremayne described 5th century Ireland as a "feminist's paradise."
In Tremayne's mystery series, Sister Fidelma encounters murders among church members and in the aristocracy often with the background of times of great turmoil and change. In the opening book in the series, Fidelma solves the murder of her mentor, Abbess Etain during a debate between followers of the Irish Catholic and Roman Catholic Church.She teams up with Brother Eadulf, a Saxon monk with experience in herbalism. With her knowledge of the law and his knowledge of medicine and 5th century forensics, Fidelma and Eadulf make an unstoppable team (that develops in subsequent books from friendship to romance to marriage and parenthood, something that was actually encouraged between monks and nuns in early 5th century Catholicism. Celibacy was not encouraged until much later.) They bounce off each other and have some cute couple-like moments such as one upping each other with their knowledge.
The mystery itself is pretty detailed. The clues are apparent once it is figured out (though astute readers will guess a motive if not a suspect early on with one throw-away line) but there are strong motives towards the murder. There are passionate characters passionate about their attractions and their ideas of religion. There is constant war, suspicion, and jealousy between characters. This is the type of atmosphere that would produce a murder and many motives, and just as many red herrings.
Nowhere is the tension as prominent as in the debates between the Christian factions. Men and women constantly argue over such details as the placement of Easter and the style of tonsure, haircuts, that the male priests wear. These arguments seem trivial, but show how people have argued for years over interpretations of religion and why these interpretations led to centuries of conflict. Conflict often leads to violence and of course murder.
The Sister Fidelma series is a great series into the early years of Christianity and how they effected people around them in ways that did not always include good will towards men and women.
9. The Tea Rose by Jennifer Donnelly
Historic 19th century- Ellis Island, Gilded Age, Jack the Ripper, Union Formations
The Tea Rose does three things and all of them rather well. It is a romance between two likeable characters driven apart by circumstances. It is a Thriller that pits the characters against one of the most notorious serial killers of all time. It is also a coming of age story about a woman coming into her own as a self-made millionaire.
Fiona Finnegan, a tea factory worker and Joe Bristow,. a vegetable costermonger have dreams of getting married and opening their own grocers and tea shop. The two work and save pennies for the day when it will come true. They do this despite objections from relatives who tell them that their dreams are foolish and they should accept their lots in life as poor East Ender's. Both Fiona and Joe show their stubborn tenacity early one as Joe suggests improvements to his father's stand and Fiona becomes an expert on identifying types of tea just by smell.
Unfortunately their relationship.comes to an abrupt end as Joe gets involved with his boss's conniving daughter. Joe and Fiona spend most of the book driven apart by circumstances that border on the comical and at times ridiculous. While the two are heart broken, they are able to pick themselves up and find success on their own terms.
The thriller aspect comes in the for of Whitechapel's Most Infamous Son, Jack the Ripper. The book gruesomely describes the deaths of the"Canon Five", the five prostitutes known to be Ripper victims: Polly Nichols, Dark Annie Chapman, Long Lizzie Stride, Catherine Eddowes, and Mary Kelly. The book's version of Jack is involved in London's Underworld and has more victims, including Fiona's family which sends her and her little brother, Seamie on the run to America. These are very tense passages as Fiona's adopted uncle investigates the Ripper murder and talks to some disturbing local character. Most disturbing of all is the Ripper himself (who yes is revealed in this version) whose back story is revealed in a truly graphic manner.
The coming of age aspect appears when Fiona moves to America. She takes over her inebriated uncle's failing grocery business and turns it into a success. She listens to her consumers by offering unusual items such as teas from around the world. She befriends a pair of advertisers and an art dealer who make attractive ad campaigns for her. It isn't long before Fiona. creates Tastea her own brand of teas. Even after success, Fiona continues to innovate her brand by selling scented teas, implementing tea bags, and offering iced tea, particularly for Southern consumers. She even gets property to build a beautiful tea shop creating a chain of tea shops. Fiona's plucky spirit, determination, and business acumen make her a memorable protagonist.
While The Tea Rose is a great book, it has some glaring flaws. Fiona's younger brother is tacked on and disappears towards the end of the book to the point that the plot could have done as well without him. Fiona has a romance with an American businessman which falls by the wayside and is barely mentioned after it ends. The woman Joe gets into a relationship instead of Fiona is written as conniving but irritating so it's almost a blessing when she disappears. Also the ending is rather rushed as it pulls together all aspects to the book: the romance, the thriller, and the coming of age story in an almost too quick resolution (especially as it involves the resurrection of one character presumed dead through the book, a plot point irritatingly left open ended.) But it is a good book to follow, enjoy, and relax with. Like a warm cup of tea.
8. A Time For Courage: The Suffragette Diary of Kathleen Bowen Washington D.C, 1917 by Kathryn Lasky/ One Eye Laughing, The Other Weeping, The Diary of Julie Weiss, Vienna Austria to New York, 1938 by Barry Denenberg (Dear America Books)-
Historic period: 1917 Women's Suffrage WWI, Washington D.C.; 1938 Holocaust, WWII Vienna, Austria, New York
The Dear America books are an excellent Juvenile series that take a first person view of American History through the eyes of young girls. These girls describe various events such as the Revolutionary War, the Underground Railroad, the Great Depression, Pearl Harbor, and many others. Their narratives are observant, witty, courageous, and give the Reader excellent details of what it's like to be a girl in those time periods. While they are all good books, the two best focus on girls' lives during the Suffrage Movement in 1917 and the Holocaust in 1938.
A Time For Courage focuses on 14 year old Kathleen Bowen as she recounts her mother's involvement in the Suffrage Movement and her sister and best friend's involvement in WWI. Kathleen's diary entries graphically recount her mother and the other suffragist's arrest and placement at the Occoquan Prison with moldy food infested with lice, their hunger strikes, and the guards force feeding them through a tube. Kathleen also shows the difference within families as they deal with dramatic times and causes. Kathleen's father and sisters are supportive of the suffrage movement while Kathleen's Uncle Bayard dominates his family to the point where he divorces his wife and kidnaps his children, ultimately shipping them to Virginia.
One Eye Laughing, The Other Weeping tells of 12-year-old Julie Weiss' life before and during the German occupation of Austria and her subsequent life in New York as she goes to live with her aunt and uncle, alone. Julie describes the awful prejudices that the Austrian Jews faced such as having to post Jewish signs outside their homes and stores and the insults and abuse endured from Nazis. The post-trauma is very real as Julie has a hard time adjusting to life in New York, still plagued by nightmares and fear of the world around her despite her aunt and uncle's kindness.
An aspect that the authors do well is that they never lose sight that their narrators are still very young children. While they exhibit much maturity about their situations, they are still capable of great emotional moods and naivete, qualities that most Readers can relate to. In Kathleen's book, she is very supportive of her mother's suffrage cause quoting Sojourner Truth's "And Arn't I a Woman?" speech, detailing a report in her Latin studies class about how many didn't want to question society's standards in Roman times and 1918 Washington D.C., and even writing a letter to Woodrow Wilson questioning "What is so bad about letting women vote anyway?" However, she also shows very real feelings that many children have in stressful times. When she first hears about the U.S. getting involved in WWI, she fears her father getting called up. When her father is swamped with work, her mother with the suffrage pickets, and her sisters and friend volunteer their services for the war effort, Kathleen feels isolated from her family and complains that she's being ignored. This is a very real sentiment that many people, children especially, feel when their families are involved with causes. They feel strongly for the cause and want to lend their support, but they also want to be with Mom and/or Dad. Lasky captures that confusion well.
Julie Weiss is also captured well in Barry Denenberg's writing especially how it feels when the atmosphere around a young girl can change almost overnight. One month, Julie is laughing with her friends, catching up in school, taking after-school English classes, and arguing with her older brother. The next minute Adolf Hitler conquers Austria without a single shot. Schoolmates who once teased her in a friendly manner are now openly abusive. The family housekeeper who Julie once thought of as a second mother turns on Julie and her family. It is also moving to read about the loss of various friends and family members during the book such as Julie's mother's suicide and her older brother, Max,'s decision to run away to Palestine. The book is filled with the tension of a changing world in which anyone, especially a child, lives in fear of what will happen next.
My favorite parts in each Dear America book are the Epilogues in which the authors tell of the future lives of their protagonists, friends, and family subtly reminding the Readers that these girls were not locked in time where they never aged. Instead they matured, had careers and families of their own, and never lost sight of what they learned living in such dramatic times. For example the reader learns that Kathleen Bowen became a professor in Classics and Archaeology and was involved in the excavation of King Tut's tomb and that Julie Weiss triumphed playing Emily Webb in Our Town and followed her aunt's footsteps as a stage actress on Broadway. They also became shaped by their time periods and the lessons that they learned from them. Kathleen was involved in feminist causes including the League of Women's Voters and Julie traced the whereabouts of most of her friends and family and was visited by her brother who emigrated to Palestine and became involved in forming the government of Israel.
7. The Passion of Artemisia by Susan Vreeland- Historic period: 16th century The Renaissance, Florence, Rome, Padua Italy
Art is often created through suffering. No one understood that concept more than Artemisia Gentileschi. She was taught portrait painting by her father, Otto until she was raped by one of his students. Enduring a public trial, Gentileschi married and moved to Florence where she became one of the few female artists of her day (and at the time the only female accepted into the prestigious Accademia di Arte del Disegno in Florence). She was known for her portraits of Biblical females such as Judith beheading Holoferness and Susannah being accused of adultery by a pair of elders. Because of her earlier rape and trial, many art historians and critics believe that Gentileschi put the pain of accusation in her Susannah painting and her rage against her rapist in her Judith painting.
Vreeland's novel beautifully captures Gentileschi's life and art giving us a passionate woman who was not afraid to question a woman's place in her society and to challenge the expectations of her.
Much of the analysis that Vreeland gives us focuses on Artemisia's relationship with the people in her life, particularly her father, Otto, her husband, Pietro, and her daughter, Palmira. Her relationship with Otto, once close becomes strained because of the rape trial. Artemisia is furious when after her father retrieves a painting that his student stole before the rape and drops all charges. Feeling less valued by her father than his precious painting and suffering from the humiliating trial in which women painfully observed her body, Artemisia is estranged from her father. She proves to be a very passionate woman in her loves and her hates and never forgives him until her father is an old man. Even then she still carries some anger towards him.
Because of her humiliation of the rape and accusations of being a whore, Artemisia throws herself into a marriage with Pietro, a fresco painter. Hoping to see a kindred spirit in the art world, Artemisia at first discovers someone to bounce ideas off of, to share ideas about art and philosophy, and who understands and sympathizes with her past. Once the two move to Florence however, Pietro becomes jealous of Artemisia's success at the Accademia di Arte del Disegno and of her budding artistic career. He turns to drink and verbally abuses his wife, even implying the rape was her fault. He shows his true colors when he admits to not only having an affair with one of Artemisia's models, but also having such a bad reputation in his hometown that he was forced to marry Artemisia even though she was considered "damaged goods." Artemisia shows a lot of spunk within her unhappy marriage by leaving Pietro and starting life as an independent artist and single mother, brave by today's standards even more so during the Renaissance when women were forced to remain in marriage no matter how unhappy they actually were.
The relationship between Artemisia and her daughter, Palmira shows a vast difference between the two in their upbringing and values. Artemisia, while attractive was raised to love and appreciate beauty in art; Palmira is also raised to love and appreciate beauty as well....her own. She grows into a vain and vapid young woman who is less interested in her mother's art than she is in snaring a rich husband. She is constantly frustrated with Artemisia moving them from place to place and being made to live in common surroundings so it is no surprise that she settles into a stable marriage with a wealthy older man, almost as a need to be rid of her mother. While Artemisia challenges convention by being an artist and single mother, Palmira retreats into convention by getting married and becoming a typical Renaissance woman of her day.
The details of the art world are wonderfully observed throughout the book particularly through Artemisia's talent of observing people around her and capturing them in her paintings. She sees a fisher woman's strong arms and gives them to her painting of Judith. She sees a homeless woman's sore feet and is inspired to paint Mary Magdalene with those feet. While she does not intentionally use herself and her rape for her paintings of Judith and Susannah, she is able to capture the rage and judgement because she recalls those from the people around her. She comes by this gift of putting her observations through her art naturally through her father. This becomes most evocative when she sees a fresco that Otto Gentileschi made of a woman that resembled Artemisia but not as a teenager, as the older bitter woman that she later became. This tells Artemisia more about her father's internal struggles about her situation than any words could.
Artemisia's life and work show a true artist. Susan Vreeland was able to give that artist a voice and a mind that went into that art and shows us the true woman.
6. Alternate Presidents Edited by Mike Resnick- Historic Period: Various Presidential Elections from 1790-1988
During the presidential elections, various people play the "what if" game. Armchair politicos often grumble, "If my president won, this country would be in better shape." Well Mike Resnick and various other science fiction authors took it upon themselves to ask the question "What if" the elections turned out differently. What if a defeated candidate won? What if a President's administration began earlier or later than what really happened? What would happen to the country, would it be better, worse, or stay the same? The questions are answered in Alternate Presidents.
History's losers are given the spotlight in this anthology by a group of very gifted science fiction authors that take this basic premise: what if the presidential elections that we know turned out differently? Some of the stories are disturbing, some satiric but all are fascinating, none more so than these five stories about would be Commanders of Chief finally given their chances in the Oval Office:
Aaron Burr:"The War of '07" by Jayge Carr-Aaron
Burr is known in history for two things-the infamous 1804 duel against
Alexander Hamilton and for having a very shady personality that often
put him at odds with the other Founding Fathers. Carr pushes Burr's
presumed megalomania up to eleven in a Presidency in which he removes
his enemies by questionable means, eradicates the African and Native
American races, and creates a false war in which he emerges Supreme
Commander. The final paragraphs give the story an eerie sensibility as
the United States devolves into the very thing they tried to break away
from: a monarchy and in Burr's world a dictatorship.
Victoria Woodhull: "We Are Not Amused" by Laura Resnick-Among the would-be POTUS, the most interesting in both alternate and real history is Victoria Woodhull. In reality, the first female candidate in 1872, she was an advocate for "free love" and the legalization of prostitution and exposed the scandalous affairs of many including Rev. Henry Ward Beecher. In Resnick's saucy amusing story, Woodhull takes her free love stance to the White House. In a series of letters between President Woodhull and Queen Victoria, the Queen is shocked by the direction America takes under Woodhull's decisions: returning land to the Native Americans, women who cut their hair, wear short skirts, and talk openly about sex. Not to mention Woodhull herself who lives openly in the White House with her husband and lover! This story gives new meaning to the term "Victorian Era."
Samuel J. Tilden: "I Shall Have A Flight To Glory" by Michael P. Kube-McDowell- Probably none of the candidates in the anthology deserve to have their day in the sun more than Tilden. Winner of the popular vote in the 1876 election, some 20 disputed votes and a compromise to withdraw troops from Reconstruction-era South caused Tilden to concede to Rutherford B. Hayes. In McDowell's story, Tilden, in reality a reformer, embraces the corrupt political machine to take the 1880 election from James A. Garfield. The final pages show through the acquaintanceship between Garfield and one Charles Guiteau that sometimes fate cannot be escaped even in an alternate history.
Thomas E. Dewey "No Other Choice" by Barbara DeLaPlace-Most famous in our timeline as the candidate against Harry Truman in the 1948 election, he also ran against Roosevelt in 1944. In this story, he wins the election because of concerns about Roosevelt's ill health. When Japanese officials remain unswayed by the atomic demonstration (a move that Truman in real life did not do) Dewey has to make the heartbreaking decision to drop the atom bomb on a much larger target than Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Many of DeLaPlace's words are moving as Dewey weighs the outcomes picturing the children on both sides who would suffer and how "he wished that he were someone else, anyone else."
"Dispatches from the Revolution" By Pat Cadigan -While
one would expect an alternate story about Robert Kennedy to explore his
Presidency, Cadigan takes another approach to the idea. Instead she
only gives Kennedy a temporary reprieve to escape Sirhan Sirhan's bullet
in Los Angeles only to die with other political leaders in an explosion
in Chicago during the 1968 Democratic National Convention protest. In a
series of thoughtful and engaging first-person narratives from
activists in hiding, Cadigan tells of the fall out that results in a
United States where segregation runs rampant, where libraries are
audited for objectionable materials, where psychological tests are
required to vote and for "conditional citizenship," and where passports
are required to move from one state to another.
Other candidates are portrayed thoughtfully such as Benjamin Franklin, David R. Atchison, Belva Ann Lockwood, William Jennings Bryan, Robert LaFollette Sr., Huey Long, Adlai Stevenson, Barry Goldwater, George McGovern, Walter Mondale, and Michael Dukakis. In all of these tales, the authors gives a glimpse of a history that could have been and maybe in some cases we should be glad that never was.
There is nothing better than a good mystery except a good mystery with a historic setting. The Mammoth Book of Historical Whodunnits/Detectives present short stories of some of the best detectives, both professional and amateur from days gone by.
These mysteries are sprinkled with various details of characters exploring the murderous dark sides of their environment. The five best stories in this anthology are:
"A Mithraic Mystery" by Mary Reed and Eric Mayer- John the Eunuch, Lord Chamberlain to Emperor Justinian and Empress Theodora, investigates the possible ritual murder of a stranger in the Byzantine court. John enters the mysterious world of secret societies including the male -only cult to worship the god Mithras and it's members who fear competition from the Christian faith practiced publicly (though sometimes not in private) by the Court. Experiencing the Court through the observant John, particularly it's ruthless cunning Empress Theodora, the Reader understands why political intrigue is sometimes referred to as Byzantine with their plots within plots and characters who say one thing and do another.
"The Midwife's Tale" by Margaret Frazer- Medieval era nun, Dame Frevisse investigates the death of a peasant husband. Using a common sense approach and a sympathetic nature to both victim and perpetrator, both traits put Frevisse at odds with the established male-dominated courts of the time. Both this and a previous story, "The Witch's Tale" give not only a memorable lead as Frevisse proves herself an equal and at times superior to make counterparts such as Ellis Peter's Brother Cadfael, but the stories also gives us interesting insights about what it's like to be an outsider in the marginalized groups in society. Particularly the world of peasant women who are thought of as property to their feudal Lords and their own husbands.
"The Murder of Innocence" by P.C. Doherty-Molly Frith, High Sherifess and member of an Elizabethan Secret Service recalls her first case when as a young teen, she and her Worshipful Guardian encounter a dead body at the inn that they are staying. Even at a young age, Molly shows a deft reasoning in solving the murder and a deep understanding of human nature that is wiser than her years. The story takes a dark suspenseful tone when Molly discovers the identity of the murder is closer to her than she originally believed.
"The Curse of the Connecticut Clock" by S.S. Rafferty-Captain Jeremy Cork and his sidekick, Wellman Oakes solve the accidental death of a schoolboy who was trying to solve a puzzle at his school in Colonial era Connecticut. Using an immense talent for deciphering codes and deductive reasoning, Cork is able to piece together the boy's findings, the truth about his death, and the answer to the puzzle that was partly responsible for the boy's death. Cork proves to be a pre-Revolutionary War answer to Sherlock Holmes in this fascinating treasure hunt.
"The Eye of Shiva" by Peter McAlan-Chief of Detectives Inspector Ram Jayram investigates the theft of a very rare, valuable, and possibly cursed jewel in a room of suspects in 19th century British-occupied India. While the jewel hunt is solid and Jayram is up to the task in locating it, the story's most interesting feature is the amount of prejudice that occurs between the white British and Indian characters. Such as when Jayram wittily corrects a bigoted officer's remark that all branches of the Hindu religion are the same. Through these bits of mistrust and racism, McAlan shows that crime often occurs in situations where tension, prejudice, and hatred already thrive.
Other detectives include Steven Saylor's Gordianus the Finder, Peter Tremayne's Sister Fidelma, Edward Hooch's Ben Snow, Robert Von Gulik's Judge Dee, and real historic figures such as William Shakespeare, Captain Cook, and the Biblical Three Wise Men. In all of the stories the wise and winning detectives are able to preserve justice and face up against the worst vices of their days.
4. The Distant Hours by Kate Morton-Historic period: 1940's WWII, England
What if you received a letter many years after it was sent? Wouldn't it bring back memories of your experience with the sender, rekindle an old love, recall a long abandoned ambition? Would you yearn to speak to that person again long after time and distance have separated you?
That is the dilemma facing mother and daughter Meredith and Edie Burchill in Kate Morton's evocative novel, The Distant Hours. Meredith receives a letter from a mail bag that had been discovered after fifty years. For Meredith it brings back memories of her childhood when she was sent to the country to the mysterious Milderhurst Manor as an evacuee during WWII. For Edith, it brings a mystery connected to her favorite childhood book, The True History of the Mud Man by Raymond Blythe, famous author as well as owner of Milderhurst Manor.
While Meredith is moved by receiving this letter, she refuses to reopen old wounds considering the subject of Milderhurst Manor and her time there closed. Edie, a young editor with a fondness for books, finds this adventure too tempting. She visits Milderhurst and joins a weekly guided tour where she encounters three eccentric sisters, Persephone "Percy", Seraphina "Saffy," and Juniper Blythe, the elderly daughters of Raymond Blythe.
After encountering and clicking with the "Sisters Blythe" (as Edie refers to them: "It seems proper like the Brothers Grimm."), Edie's fascination with them and the mysteries inside Milderhurst Manor, increase as she is requested to interview the Blythes for a prologue for a special edition of the Mud Man.
While Edie's story is fascinating wit her investigations in Milderhurst and her mother's history with the Blythes, it is the flashback story that is the most prominent in the book. In the days before and after WWII, the Reader is introduced to the Sisters Blythe, three women with buried secrets and desires to care out their own identities. These secrets and desires explode one rainy night when Juniper Blythe and her fiancee are scheduled to arrive for dinner and one doesn't turn up.
Percy Blythe, the eldest, is seen as a prim and proper woman who has given her all to Milderhurst, considering it more important to her than any spouse or child. Despite her prim exterior, Percy shows a very independent spirit. She is content to wear trousers despite reservations from others. In one of the more revealing passages, Edie learns that Percy had a forbidden love affair that had ended badly. This aspect of her hidden life shows Percy as a vulnerable woman underneath that prickly exterior and makes the Reader look at her differently through the remainder of the book.
Saffy, Percy's twin, also has her own secrets that threaten her life at Milderhurst. Unlike Percy who is content to remain at her childhood home, Saffy dreams of an independent life in London. She applies for curator and governess jobs without telling Percy and waits patiently by the phone to hear from them hoping that Percy never answers. Despite her ambitions to get away, Saffy has troublesome dreams and flashbacks recalling dark monsters that inspired the writing of her father's Mud Man book. Though she longs for a life of her own, Saffy knows that she is too connected to Milderhurst and the past to leave.
Juniper, the youngest, has her own ambitions colliding with the darkness of Milderhurst. She shares her father Raymond's writing talent and creativity which he strongly encourages. However, she is a woman of great passion and romance which her father objects to never wanting her to make friends or fall in love. This changes as Juniper and her sisters take in Meredith. Juniper and Meredith bond through a love of writing and become friends, becoming Juniper's first real friend. Meredith introduces Juniper to her teacher, Thomas Cavill who strikes a romance with Juniper. However, Juniper exhibits signs of schizophrenia which she reveals by hearing voices which she calls "The Visitors" and has unpredictable bouts of temper which causes her to fear being outside. Not to mention her father left an unusual clause in his will, which prevents any of his daughters to live independent lives outside of Milderhurst keeping a hold on them beyond death.
Into this family circle roams Meredith and eventually Edith. Meredith, a girl from a working class background discovers a new life with the Sisters Blythe, one that encourages books and reading and fills her imagination with thoughts of a better life for herself. Her family however are infuriated with her attachment to the Blythe family telling her to remember her place, a lesson she learns all too well upon adulthood.
While uncovering the mysteries inside Milderhurst, Edie discovers a deeper connection to the mother that she had long thought of as an emotionless cypher, one who she believed never understood Edie's own attachment to books and writing. She learns that Meredith and she shared deeper interests and connections than she ever knew.
The Distant Hours is a strong novel about the bonds between family, parents and children, and between siblings. These bonds change over the years and how we never really know those that surround us every day. That family members carry secrets, goals, and past histories that we may never know until we are older.
3. The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield- Time period: 19th-early 20th century Victorian, Edwardian Period, England
Gothic literature is one of the most intriguing literary genres. When you read a Gothic novel and you hear about a sinister mansion or castle, you know that there is a past connected to it, one of scandal, intrigue, eccentric family members, and ghosts both literal and figurative. The heir apparent to the mantle of the works of Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, and the Mysteries of Udolpho is The Thirteenth Tale which takes the Gothic novel to more modern psychological approach.
Margaret Lea, a young biographer and bookstore co-owner receives a request to interview Vida Winter, the best selling author. The book says that Vida Winter is the most popular modern English author of all time. (Agatha Christie and J.K. Rowling would have a few words with that distinction), but she is a woman of many secrets. In previous interviews, Vida has reported different contradictory things so no one knows her real story. Not anymore, Vida says. Not she will tell Margaret "the truth." Intrigued, Margaret visits Vida's home and hears Vida's story about Angelfield Estate and its bizarre inhabitants.
Vida's story begins with Isabel and Charles, a brother and sister who share a mutual attraction. (Think Jamie and Cersei Lannister.) This union possibly results in Isabel's elopement with a man named March and the birth of Adeline and Emmeline March, , twins who may have been fathered by Charles.
Adeline and Emmeline March are a fascinating pair of characters and steal just about any passage that they are in. They speak in a private language that only they know and no one else can follow. They are capable of one minute sending a perambulator down a meadow just to scare a local nurse and the next minute giggling about the handsome young gardener boy. They are very intriguing in their feral strangeness in which the very thought of separation causes them to react violently or retreat into themselves. Their eventual separation because of outside influences and their own growing maturity causes a division and violence between the twins and a moving resolution to their story.
The more Margaret hears Angelfield's story, the more confused she is about Vida's role in it. Who was she in the story? How much of her story is true and how much is misleading? How much is she telling and how much is she concealing? Who is the mysterious ghost in the story who keeps wandering both in the past and present around Angelfield dressed entirely in white?
Margaret's journey discovering the truth about Angelfield asks just as many questions as it provides answers and is filled with other characters who want to find endings to their stories as well. There is a sweet family of a mother and children who may have a connection to the sinister dealings. A governess who once tried to bring humanity to the March twins disappeared mysteriously and Margaret wants to find her figuring she may have some answers. Then there is a male journalist who had previously visited Vida with a desire to "learn the truth." Each character has a link to Vida's story making the story of Angelfield even larger and involved more people than just Vida and the March Twins.
Even Margaret has a link to the story that she begins to become aware. The biographer is haunted by her own ghost, of a deceased sister. As Margaret opens up the story of Angelfield, she opens up her own past with her sister finding her own resolutions becoming a part of Vida's story.
The Thirteenth Tale reveals the importance of storytelling and how every person has their own story. Through these stories, people may discover deeper connections and answers to their questions. The characters reveal their beginnings and discover their stories' endings.
2. The White Queen/The Other Boleyn Girl (The Cousins' War/The Tudor Court) by Philippa Gregory; Historic period:
15th-16th centuries,The War of the Roses, The Court of Henry VIII, The British Monarchy, Plantagenet and Tudor Courts, England
Good historic fiction takes a character only known from historic accounts and puts us inside their heads. The Reader learns their thoughts and feelings about situations that otherwise we would not know them at all, or only know them through secondary sources. Philippa Gregory is among the best to write about English royalty. She wrote a wonderful ongoing series about the Royal family from Henry VI to Queen Elizabeth I. Each book in the series offers an inside look, usually first person from a female character, that gives us the power struggles over who will take the throne and whose heirs will leave the longest lasting legacy.
The whole series is a marvelous look of English royal history told through various eyes including Margaret Beaufort, the mother of King Henry VII, Lord Robert Dudley, the lover of Queen Elizabeth I, Lady Margaret Pole, who was beheaded by Henry VIII, Henry VIII's wives including Katharine of Aragon, Anne of Cleves, and Katharine Howard, and Hannah Green, a fictional Jewish girl in the court of Mary I "Bloody Mary, and Jane Grey who was queen for less than nine days. The two that stand out the most and certainly have the most attention are The White Queen and The Other Boleyn Girl.
The White Queen stars Elizabeth Woodville, the wife of King Edward IV and sister-in-law of Richard III. Elizabeth has been portrayed differently in various sources (usually depending on how the writers and filmmakers perceive Richard III who has been classified as one of her sworn enemies.) Anything from a naive innocent to an emasculating bitch. Gregory's account portrays her as a strong-willed multifaceted woman, a commoner who dares to greet King Edward to ask for restitution for her family. She not only gets it but receives a proposal of marriage from the king who is besotted by her good looks and charm. King Edward and Queen Elizabeth's marriage for love brings dissension in the court over a king daring to marry a commoner and put her family in positions of trust and power.
Elizabeth encounters many enemies, none more so than Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick AKA "The Kingmaker" who helped put Edward on the throne and Edward's greedy younger brother, George Duke of Clarence. When a battle results in the death of her father and brother, Elizabeth blames both Warwick and George for it. Using her powers that her mother says were descended from Melusine, a water spirit from French legend, Elizabeth curses them.She also brings about curses to other enemies such as when her sons, Edward V, and Richard, the young Duke of Gloucester are sent to the Tower of London and never return.
Elizabeth is a fascinating character as she pushes herself forward in life. She is a strong guide to her husband, such as when she argues for executions of his enemies or for their release. She also knows when to keep silent. In one frightening moment, she has a vision that Edward and his brothers suffocate King Henry VI in his sleep even though he was practically catatonic and no threat to him. However, she does not question or challenge it since she believes that Henry is her husband's enemy and therefore hers. She also rewards the loyalty of those closest to her, particularly when she gives Warwick's orphaned daughters the chance to be her ladies-in-waiting
Even though she is forced to spend some her time in sanctuary (particularly in one memorable passage where she has to give birth to her eldest son), before and after her husband's reign Elizabeth is never at a loss for a plan. She is someone who is always able to use her wiles, supernatural abilities, and alliances to her advantage. When Richard III becomes king, she forms an alliance with her family's enemies the Lancasters so their son could marry her daughter, seeing them as the lesser of the two evils.When her daughter Elizabeth of York marries Henry Tudor, it ends the War of the Roses by combining the Houses of York and Lancaster forever.
The strongest statement is in her curse after her sons were believed to be killed. She curses that whoever killed them would have no male issue on the throne for very long and that the family line would end with a barren girl. (Of course history shows how that turned out with the subsequent reign of the Tudor family).
While Elizabeth Woodville is able to bring about power with her alliances and supernatural abilities, Anne Boleyn possesses no such abilities. Instead she achieves her goals by using charm, beauty, and an ability to win a monarch to her side. In Gregory's novel, The Other Boleyn Girl, Anne is just one of the many ladies-in-waiting to Queen Katharine of Aragon hoping to catch the eye of Henry VIII. Not wanting to be simply bedded and discarded like her sister, Mary, who is also the narrator of the book, Anne wants to play the long game. She wants to be Queen of England.
Anne is equal parts prostitute and CEO as she manipulates and seduces Henry. Anne uses the tricks she learned in the French court to seduce the king just enough and then withhold so she and her family can receive favors. She also brings books about Protestantism that challenges Henry VIII's Catholic court and his way of thinking so he can believe "Hey maybe a religion that allows a monarch to divorce is not such a bad idea."She also subtly uses hints that bring about suspicions in Henry's mind about Katharine, comparing her appearance and fertility to Katharine's as well as challenging the idea that Katharine had been married to Henry's older brother previously and how it could be considered a sin against God. (Hence why God has punished Henry and Katharine with only one girl and various miscarriages and deceased infants). While she does not exhibit as many positive traits as Elizabeth such as strength or intelligence in making alliances (in fact Anne loses many), Anne is also a memorable character because she is so bad. She is conniving, charming, and very skillful in her abilities to win Henry.
Anne of course is not alone in her plan. She is backed by her mother's family, who behave almost like a mafia family with their control over others' lives. Her sister, Mary, Henry's earlier mistress is aware of the fact that her husband received titles just because he allowed Henry to sleep with his wife. Her brother, George, is also very encouraging towards Anne's progress particularly as he hides his own disgust at his conniving wife, Jane and his lust for a young nobleman. Then there's her uncle, who behaves like the Mafia Don. Her uncle Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk pimps out his nieces to the king so he can gain power for himself. He is able to control Anne from behind the scenes until she decides that she no longer needs him. With a family like that, it is easy to see where Anne gets it.
Anne's position in court is challenged not only by her disassociation with Norfolk but also her inability to produce a male heir resulting in the birth of only one girl, Elizabeth. Anne begins to also fear the accusations of witchcraft that somehow she seduced the king with her powers away from Katharine. In one last desperate attempt at survival, so she doesn't end up divorced and abandoned like Katharine or tried and executed, Anne does something desperate to conceive a baby. Her decision and its aftermath resulting in a monstrous dead baby are rather graphic but show Anne's anguish about doing anything to stay alive and foreshadows the monster that Henry becomes.
There are some historic inaccuracies to these books (The story about Anne Boleyn's monster as well as its conception were merely rumors and not factual as the books imply; While the books portray Henry VII as uncaring and abusive towards Elizabeth of York, in reality theirs was a very loving marriage; Not to mention the identity of a young man claiming to be the younger of the two Princes in the Tower is verified in the book but was under much suspicion in real life) But Philippa Gregory's writing gives us very real believable characters whose struggles, triumphs, family relationships, and love affairs are identifiable and understandable. These characters just happened to have sat on England's throne.
1. Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley- Historic period: 1st century, Arthurian Age Camelot, Paganism, Goddess Religions, Christianity, England
The stories of King Arthur could almost get their own section in a book store or a library. Everybody has had their voice heard, Merlin, Arthur, Mordred, and in Bradley's case the women of Camelot tell their sides to the story. Besides retelling the Arthurian legend from another pair of eyes, this book takes a look at religious dissension and the power of women in a society that is slowly being dominated by men.
Morgan Le Fey, the lead protagonist, is the latest in a long line or Priestesses of Avalon, recipients of the Goddess and protectors of magic and ancient secrets. She inherited the title from her mysterious aunt, Vivienne and recounts the life of King Arthur and eventual fall of Camelot.
All of the usual points in the Arthurian legend are present in the novel, Arthur's birth at Tintagel from his mother Igraine and father, Uther; his marriage to Gwenyfahr and her affair with Lancelot; the conception of Mordred; and of course Arthur's death by Mordred's hand. However, they are given well-rounded perspectives that characterizes all of Camelot's cast of characters into interesting perspectives. For example, Arthur's conception is less of a magical form of trickery and deception of Merlin, than it is the ultimate fulfilling of a prophecy and a chance to give Igraine a sense of free will from her tyrannical husband, Gorlois.
Each character is given a new perspective, but none more strongly than Morgaine AKA Morgan Le Fey. The half-sister of Arthur, Morgaine has usually been portrayed as an evil seductive witch sleeping with one knight after another, in some versions, her half-brother. Bradley instead sees her as one of the few remnants of a dying race. A woman desperately clinging to her pagan faith as it becomes swallowed by Christianity and the warfare around her. Morgaine is a strong-willed character trying to fight against the prophecies that are written and the Second Sight that blesses and curses her, each time falling into the predictions no matter what choices she makes.
Morgaine is also given a romantic nature, which she reveals in her encounters with Lancelot, Kevin (a bard who is destined to be the next "Merlin"), and Sir Accolon, fighting her role as a studious priestess and a hot-blooded young woman searching for true love.
Morgaine becomes a symbol for the pagan faith, particularly in her scenes with Gwynefahr. Morgaine feels the connection from the Goddess and nature, while Gwynefahr prays to the Saints and Jesus inside stone chapels. Morgaine struggles to keep Goddess worship alive while fighting with Vivienne; while Gwynefahr clashes with her husband's pagan background and her own lustful feelings for Lancelot. The two women vie in their spiritual pursuits, and their own claims to Camelot's legacy.
Mists of Avalon gives a fresh perspective of the world of King Arthur that opens the reader's eyes to a deeper perspective of the legend.
Update: I have only just recently learned of the abuse allegations towards Marion Zimmer Bradley from her daughter. I find the situation appalling and believe Moira Grayland. However I continue to love Mists of Avalon and recommend it highly as a beautiful look at the Arthurian legends, one that explored the roots of early Paganism, and a strong feminist statement. Next month, I will post a blog entry that will discuss my feelings towards Bradley, Mists of Avalon, the sex abuse allegations, and the separation of art and the artist.
Honorable mention: The Sunne in Splendour by Sharon Kay Penman, I Claudius by Robert Grave, I Victoria by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles, I Elizabeth by Rosalind Miles, and Mary: Queen of Scotland and the Isles by Margaret George, The Secret Diary of Charlotte Bronte by Syrie James, Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Walters, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke,The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco, My Name is America Books by Various authors, Amethyst by Mary Rose-Hayes, Ben-Hur: A Tale of Christ by Lew Wallace, The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy, Stardust by Joseph Kanon, The Biograph Girl, by William J. Mann, Swing Sisters by Jeanne Westin, The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden, The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett, The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro, Shogun by James Clavell, The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough, Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon, Beloved by Toni Morrison, The Color Purple by Alice Walker
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