REVIEWS
General fiction is classified by period. Within each section, the books are listed in alphabetical order of author.
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ANCIENT EGYPT
THE FLAMING SWORD
Christian Jacq, Simon & Schuster 2002, £10.00, pb,352pp,0743239431
This is the final part of the Queen of Freedom trilogy. The Pharaoh has perished in battle against the detested Hyksos occupiers of the Nile delta, and his eldest son lies dead from poison. The widowed Queen Ahotep prepares the Egyptian army for long drawn-out warfare against the invaders' rule of escalating terror and cruelty under their megalomaniac Emperor. Her campaign must culminate in the taking of the vital strategic city of Avaris if her younger son is ever to reign over an Egypt restored to its rightful greatness and the exercise of all the civilised arts. The Flaming Sword recounts this remarkable woman's fifteen-year struggle. History tells us the rest of the story.
Straightforward narrative, short scenes, a vivid and exotic background, strong elements of good and bad magic, plus a set of really loathsome villains; with one reservation I can recommend this novel, in spite of the enormous body-count, as one to enjoyed by older children and young adults. My reservation is the shallowness of the characterisation - the good are very, very good, the bad are horrid and they do not develop or change. Today's children are capable of appreciating a greater subtlety in their reading matter.
Nevertheless, this popular writer offers readers of all ages a lively introduction to a toweringly important and everlastingly influential ancient civilisation.
Nancy Henshaw
THE HISTORICAL
BIBLICAL
NO WOMAN SO FAIR
Gilbert Morris, Bethany House, 2003, $11.99, pb,35lpp,0764226827
Book two in the Lions of Judah series, No Woman So Fair is yet another retelling of the biblical story of Abraham and Sarah. A beautiful, strong-willed woman, Sarah waits for the man who can engage not only her heart, but also her mind and faith. When she marries Abraham, his quest to serve the unknown god be calls the Eternal One becomes hers as well. God has promised that they will be the mother and father of nations, yet years pass and Sarah remains barren. But their faith in the Eterna l One's promise remains strong, and is rewarded at la st - only to be put to the ultimate test when God asks the ultimate sacrifice of them.
No Woman So Fair is basically an expanded version of the story in Genesis; this is no revisionist or feminist re-imaging. This is a competent, workmanlike novel with some enjoyable characterizations (Sarah, as always, is a matriarch to be reckoned with, practical and frequently delightfully tart), and those looking for a solid traditional retelling of the tale of Abraham and Sarah should enjoy this book.
India Edghill
CLASSICAL
RENDER UNTO CAESAR
Gillian Bradshaw, Forge, 2003, $27.95/C$38.95, hb, 464pp, 0765306530
When Hemogenes, a wealthy, young Alexandrian businessman, travels to Rome during Augustus's reign to collect a debt owed to his family by a powerful Roman counsel, be encounters a level of prejudice toward himself and his fellow Greeks that astounds him. Although many Romans enjoy urutatmg Hellenic ways, it quickly becomes apparent that Alexandrian Greeks are considered little better than dirt under the feet of most Roman citizens. Initially scoffed at by the Roman counsel, Hermogenes sees his problems begin escalating the harder he presses for repayment. To Hermogenes, who is often tempted to drop his quest as the level of violence increases, the debt's satisfaction becomes more a matter of justice than one of money because he attributes the premature deaths of his beloved father and uncle directly to the counsel's refusal to satisfy his long overdue obligation.
As Hermogenes doggedly pursues his suit in an environment filled with brutality and arrogance, his gentle nature and deep sense of humanity have a profound effect on many of those around him, including a female gladiator who eventually becomes his bodyguard and much more. As always, this author's impeccable research is apparent, her characters finely honed and her storytelling mesmerizingso much so that, after finishing the last page, it
was a shock to find myself back in the present once again. Highly recommended! Pat Maynard
ARISTOTLE AND THE SECRETS OF LIFE
Margaret Doody, Century 2003, £15.99, hb, 420pp,0712616152
Stephanos, a gentleman of Athens, has befriended a foreigner, Aristotle, one-time teacher of Alexander. In 330BC they find themselves under threat due to the antiMacedonian feelings in Athens, so they take the opportunity to travel across the Aegean in the direction of Rhodes. Stephanos needs to find a relative of the woman he wants to marry, and Aristotle seeks to return a sick student home. Their journey is far from straightforward.
The story is told in the first -person by young Stephanos, who is not necessarily an attractive character to modem eyes. He's rather a snob, and is somewhat sexist, though the latter fits in well with the ethos of his times. But from Aristotle he's beginning to learn about life and its subtle shades.
This is not a book full of action and high drama. Frequent excursions are taken to philosophic discussion, so that violence, when it happens, is shocking and contrasts sharply with the gent le pace of the book. This makes it all the more effective. The book does not run to a strict fonnula, which gives hope that other such novels will be published in the future.
S Garside-Neville
THE ACCUSERS
Lindsay Davis, Century, 2003, £16.99, hb, 283pp, 0712625569
Falco's fans will revel in Lindsay Davis' new humorous Roman crime novel. This one will delight anyone who has been caught up in a legal battle.
Recently returned from an assignment in Britain, Falco tells the story of his subsequent entanglement with the law in his usual wry, observant style, in the process taking us on an insider's excursion of much of Rome. He is now a married man with two small daughters and faces disaster with added responsibility and anxiety. Aided by his wife Helena and her two brothers, apprentices in the art of informing, he so lve s the murder of an apparent suicide and we learn much of the Roman laws governing debt and inheritance.
Lindsay Davis has written another amusing, page-turning book to add to her previous fourteen winners in the Falco series
Monica Maple
IMMORTAL CAESAR
Patricia Anne Hunter, lstbooks, 2003, £9.30/$ 14.50, pb, 225pp, 1403370087
To reduce the 37 years of the adult life and political and military career of Gaius Julius Caesar to 225 pages can only be done by leaving a great deal out, and this is the problem
ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
with th is book. Wars and personal enmities rage, we encounter Pompey, Cleopatra, Mark Antony and all Caesar's future assassins, but it never becomes clear what it is all about, for the small sca le of the book in proportion to the theme gives no room for context. By comparison, Colleen McCullough's treatment in her monwnental volumes is overlong, it groans with research, and the debates in the senate are endless, but the reasons behind events are at least made clear, as they are not in Ms Hunter's novel. Geography is also a problem; most place names are given their modern forms, but as the narrative moves from Parthia to Britain, Egypt to numerous places in Gaul, the reader feels the lack of a map. Occasionally, too, the pace of events is too fast even for this writer and she loses her grip on chronology; Caesar departs from Rome leaving his daughter a baby; he returns, at my own estimate, five, six or perhaps as much as ten years later , to find her fifteen and fal len in love with Pompey.
Immortal Caesar is the Dictator in predigested form, comfortable to read at one sitting, but real meat must be found elsewhere. This book may, however, inspire the reader to go out and look for it.
Ann Lyon
SAPP HO 'S LEA P
Erica Jong, W.W. Norton , 2003 , $24.95 / C$37.50 , hb, 316pp, 0393057615 What a historical novel this could have been, a retelling of the life of the iconic poet Sappho! A brilliantly written prologue fires the reader with promise. Sappho stands upon the edge of the Leucadian cliff, looking back upon an eventful life, contemplating suicide. The potential of this beautiful and dramatic opening is, sadly, left unfulfilled. Beginning as a novel in the rich and evocative style of Mary Renault, Sappho's Leap soon veers into historical fantasy. A restless storyline sweeps the heroine from a poetic girlhood in Lesbos to a forced marriage and a lesbian love affair in Syracuse. From there she goes to consult the Delphic Oracle, next to conquer the fleshpots of Alexandria. On her way home to Lesbos , Sappho is shipwrecked , a female Odysseus, on islands well off any map, inhabited by Amazons and centaurs. Fantasy here becomes polemic. Jong's customary lucid prose and moving translations from Sappho's gorgeous fragments simply couldn't carry the burden of what was apparently an everchanging intent.
Juliet Waldron
THE WI NE O F AGAMEMN ON John McKieman, Jaco byte Books (www.jacobytebooks.com) , 2002, AU$25, pb, 576pp , 1741001226
" My name is Odysseus " Yet another retelling of the Trojan War? Yes - by that cleverest of men, Odysseus. So old he has outlived all his comrades, so old he has seen the Siege of Troy
mutate into a glorious lying song, Odysseus wishes to tell the truth before he dies. So, with the aid of a young scribe, he begins revealing stories of high courage and low cunning, of the ambition, passion, hate, and love that sent Fair Helen into the arms of gorgeous, feckless Paris, and brought Agamemnon , King of Men, and the heroic Achaean host after her to death and glory on the windy plains of Troy . ...
The Wine of Agamemnon is a terrific, engrossing read, flawed only by an awkward modem "frame" but it ' s only a page or two at beginn ing and end. The worst thing about the book is the formatting , which is lousy. But once you start reading , you won't care about that. McKieman makes the Epic of Troy new and fresh once more, in one of the oldest and still the best of all ways to tell a story: the lure of a Truth beyond the Official News. "You think you know what happened, just because you've read the TIMES? Watched CNN? Heard the epic songs? You're wrong. I know -"Because I was there. Listen: this is what really happened -
II
India Edghill
THE TRIB UNE'S CURSE: SPQR VIl
John Maddox Roberts, Minotaur, 2003, $22.95 /C$32.95, hb, 248pp, 0312304889
It is 80 B.C. , and Decius Cecilius Metullus the Younger is back again, returned from the war in Gaul to his native Rome, and running for an election that is bound to bankrupt him. On his way up the governmental office ladder to who knows where (no one bas managed to stop Caesar, Decius's commander in SPQR VI, and now his uncle-in-law), Decius gets broadsided into investigating the death of a tribune. Not just any tribune, mind you , but a tribune who bas led the opposition to the Parthian War and one who , days before, stood atop the city gates and uttered to the assembled multitude a curse so terrible and forbidden that every Roman fears annihilation. Who better equipped than Decius to alleviate the stress and strain of impending annihilation and to propitiate the gods?
Now a married , up-and-coming political figure in Rome, Decius just becomes more attractive, more clever and funnier by the page. At the same time that the viciousness and often , rank stupidity, of Roman politics is revealed, the deep and abiding mystery of the Roman religion is sensitively addressed. We never feel that Roberts is making fun of such a silly curse or making fun of Romans for fearing the potentially devastating effects of it. This is a slice of Roman life at its most vulnerable. Imaginative, evocative of the time and place and always seeing the humor in life , Roberts captures the best and worst of Roman society. Julia, Decius ' s new wife and one of the socially climbing matrons of Rome, is a pleasant new addit ion to the cast of characters. It seems like there is no end to the trouble that Decius may
find himself in, come future installments. I can't wait.
Ilysa Magnus
1ST CENTURY AD
LIVING WATE R
Obery Hendricks, HarperSanFrancisco, 2003, $25.95 / C$38.95, hb, 367pp, 0060000872
Biblical women have become popular subjects for historical novels , and Living Water is a superb example of why this subgenre has so much appeal. Although somewhat difficult to read because of the unrelenting misery it so effectively portrays, the novel is, at the same time , impossible to put down.
At its heart, Living Water tells the story of the Samaritan woman at the well who pours Jesus a drink of water and is offered "living water" in exchange. But this is more than a fictional biography of a nameless woman. It is a story of an oppressed people, oppressed to brokenness , humiliated to the point they can no longer find solace even in each other. Racial discrimination is the root cause: the dark-skinned Samaritans are brutalized by the conquering white-skinned Romans. The Samaritan men , helpless, degraded, and unable to protect their wives and daughters , tum from love. Filled with selfloathing, they begin brutalizing their women. The heroine of the tale , nameless for most of the book, is subjected to five marriages of increasing horror. Yet Obery Hendricks is able to paint such compelling portraits of the husbands that their heinous behavior becomes understandable, though never forgivable. Never forgivable , and yet the Samaritan woman's encounter at the well gives her a chance to forgive. In Living Water, Jesus' message in placed within a historical context, but Hendricks' style reminds us that oppression and brutality are not limited to a specific time or place. This inspirational novel shows how Jesus' words can transcend time and place as well.
Sue Asher
THE WELCOM ING DOO R
Kenny Kemp , HarperSanFrancisco , 2002 , $18.95 / C$28.95 , hb , 29lpp , 006008264X
The Welcoming Door is an imaginative story of what could have been the basis for three of Jesus' parables from the Gospels. Before becoming an itinerant preacher, Jesus worked as a carpenter, according to Christian tradition. The stories of the Prodigal Son, the Parable of the Talents, and the Good Samaritan are developed as incidents witnessed/experienced by Jesus/Jeshua during bis carpentry career as a young man.
Pacing of the stories is leisurely , but characters are fully fleshed. Even the evil/greedy/ lazy among them are human and have a core of goodness that Jeshua draws upon. Without preaching , Jeshua emanates love
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ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
that gives hope to the downtrodden and humble characters he meets.
Kemp follows the tradition which believes that Juda, James, and Joses were actual siblings of Jesus, slightly startling to those who have believed him an only child. A few minor anachronisms jar "the trees were about five meters apart", "five minutes had passed". "Jehovah" for the name of the Creator appears several times, although modem Biblical scholarship has not supported its use. Very readable and respectful of Jesus' Jewish heritage, at the same time the novel shows how his message was radically different from messianic expectations.
Mary L. Newton
THE TRI B UNE: A Nove l of A ncie nt R ome
Patrick Larkin, Signet, 2003, $6.99/ C$9.99, pb, 392pp,0451209044
Lucius Aurelius Valens is a young man with a talent for getting himself into trouble. In his second military assignment, Syria, he discovers that his superior and the governor of the province are corrupt, and he exposes them. Lucius is quickly transferred to Galilee, to command the third Gallic Cavalry, but on his way to his new post, Lucius and his troops stumble upon a massacre. Decius Junius Silanus, friend and political ally of Emperor Tiberius, is dead and so are his guards. Lucius knows what he must do: "strike back, hard and fast and fiercely." In other words, wipe out the nearest village, Nazara. Only Lucius doesn't think the people of Nazara are involved. Why has Silanus been murdered? What has brought such an exalted personage to poor Judea? And how does a young enigmatic carpenter fit into the story?
Patrick Larkin, co-author of five other thriller and espionage novels, writes directly, with a compelling narrative and descriptive detail. Halfway through, however, Larkin goes astray, introducing an irrelevant love interest that slows down and adds little to the plot. The eleventh-hour surprise ending is also less than satisfying. Still, Larkin has talent for evoking atmosphere and creating characters. Rather than parade his research, he skillfully and naturally weaves relevant facts into scenes and dialogue, which, in a historical novel, is no small accomplishment.
Adelaida Lower
AUGUSTUS
John Williams, Vintage Classics 2003 (Longman 1973), £6.99, pb, 0099445085 Pub in US by University of Arkansas reprint edition, pb, 1557283435
Great nephew, protege and intended heir to Julius Caesar, the latter's assassination leaves Gaius Octavius prey to the men who have survived years of Roman dictatorships and lawlessness. These experienced soldiers and administrators do not intend to have their ambitions thwarted by a 19-year-old boy who is
a friend to poets and notoriously frail in health. In spite of them all, at 33, Octavius, lonely, enigmatic and misunderstood is now Augustus, master of Rome and her empire, scarcely to be challenged over the following 40 years. The two people he truly loves are his daughter Julia and Vergil the poet.
This admirably accessible novel is written mainly in the form of correspondence, personal and political. The first part is dominated by Marcus Antonius, ruthless, charismatic, bullheadedly sure of himself, ultimately brought to ruin by his eastern adventure and the manipulation of Cleopatra.
The second part brings another woman centre stage: Augustus' beloved daughter. This Julia is far more complex than the depraved whore of I, Claudius. Her father gives her an education fit for a ruler and for his sake she submits to three loveless marriages. Intellectually brilliant but less astute than her stepmother, the iron-willed Livia, there is only one possible future for Julia when she falls passionately in love.
Finally, the Emperor who has outlived enemies and friends, melancholic and philosophical, reflects on his long, eventful reign while he enjoys a last peaceful sea voyage to Capri
I found this novel a real treat, and at just over 300 pages it is also mercifully free of 'bloat'.
Nancy Henshaw
A VOTE FOR MURDE R
David Wishart, Hodder & Stoughton, 2003, £18.99,hb,356pp, 0340771291
Marcus Corvinus is enjoying a couple of days out in the Alban Hills where he's propping up the bar of local wineshop, and quietly looking for trouble. He finds it in the form of the murder of a local politician, and he spends much of the book riding round the hills talking to suspects, developing saddle sores and theories. With subplots including Corvinus' run-in with an alcoholic sheep, the reader is in for an entertaining read.
Wishart's approach to his wise-cracking sleuth is highly stylised, leading to much repetition of the man's favourite phrases. There's a fair amount of swearing (mostly from Corvinus, who gets told off for it by his wife!) which won't please delicate readers. But overall, it's an enjoyable romp.
S Garside-Neville
5 TH CENTURY
THE TWELFTH VULTURE O F
RO MULUS : A ttila and th e F all of Rom e Boris Raymond, KLYO Press, 2003, $15.75, pb,604pp,0973053402
Set in the mid to late 5th century, this is a sweeping saga of Rome's decline and eventual fall to barbarian invaders. Author Boris Raymond covers a myriad of clashing cultures and examples of all castes of society. Opening
with Attila the Hun's impending invasion into the Roman Empire's heart, the reader is carried along with the fast-paced events of political intrigue, ambition, and assassinations and their impact on nations both dying and being born. While the action bounces around and seems somewhat choppy, it is most likely due to the immense scope of time and area being covered. The reading is simple and swift and in no way detracts from giving the reader a good general sense of the chaos and the impact Rome's fall had on the known world. Almost all the characters are historical, and The Twelfth Vulture of Romulus interweaves the roles of Roman emperors, ambitious politicians, Popes, invading barbarian kings, prostitutes, exiled nobility, and soldiers while positing some very interesting speculations on the causes of death of some of history's famous and also what some of Rome's patriots may have done to try and save Rome in her death throes.
Suzanne Crane
GUD R UN'S TAPEST RY
Joan Schweighardt, Beagle Bay Books, 2003, $24.95 /C$38,hb,280pp,0967959136
The Nibelungenlied is told in scores of versions both old, like the Poetic Edda upon which Joan Schweighardt based her version, and new. These many enduring versions attest to the power of the tale and to the fact that retelling of the grim twilight of men and worlds may always be welcome with whatever spin a modem teller may set upon her thread. We all know that Sigurd (or Siegfried) must die. What keeps us interested is seeing how he dies in the present retelling. Are the Burgundians the heroes--as they are in the version attributed to their ancient court? Or is Brunhild? And the very historic Huns--?
Unfortunately, Schweighardt betrayed the tale's ancient power for me. I would have been interested to see the usually marginal character Gudrun come into her own, a feminist twist to the skein. But a poor choice of scenes and drama-diffusing chronology work against success. Few of the scenes are shown vividly; they are told instead. An annoyingly passive Gudrun must have details of the most exciting events brought to her by more active (and more interesting) characters while she languishes on furs in either depression or good-girl submission. She doesn't even claim her revenge murder on Attila, catering to a modern distaste for such barbarism, perhaps? This hardly matters, as we aren't set up with the burning need for this revenge by a vivid sack of the city of Worms to spur us on. This event seems too horrible to recount. Only mind-numbing inactivity in reaction seems worth recounting, and so that is the nove l's effect on the reader. Beag le Bay Books' commendable mandate to publish historical nove ls with powerful heroines dropped stitches with this one.
Ann Chamberlin
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ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
6
TH CENTURY
THE RED BRANCH TALES
Randy Lee Eickhoff, Forge, 2003, $29.95 / C$41.95, hb, 400pp, 0312870191
The Red Branch Tales is book six in Randy Lee Eickhoff's endeavor to gather, translate, and retell the ancient Irish stories known as The Ulster Cycle. Based on manuscripts and vellums from the 12 th to 15 th centuries, Eickhoff overcomes difficulties of language and culture to write a thorough, scholarly, yet entertaining book.
The two dozen stories in this volume primarily concern the Ulaid people of northeastern Ireland. Conchobor is their king. He lives at Emain Macha near present-day Arn1agh, and the famous Cuchulain is his 'Hound.' His enemies are lusty Queen Maeve of Connacht and her husband, Ailill. The gory tales focus on the clash of Ulster and Connacht over borders, bulls, and insults to honor. As in most sagas of this era, the heroes have impulse control problems. Sex knows no marital strictures, and it is discussed in earthy detail. ('Fergus was truly a noble man his [bleep) drew healthy gasps of pleasure from any woman who entered his bed, for he had seven fists in it ') Among the fragmented tales are instructions to princes, a snippet about werewolves, and a partial retelling of the Cattle Raid of Cooley from an often-overlooked source.
Eickhoff has given us a well-documented collection of bits and pieces, fascinating to a devotee but best read as the sixth book in line by those less familiar with the mythology. If The Ulster Tales were on DVD, this volume would be the extra footage.
Lisa Ann Verge
12TH CENTURY
THE FALCO S OF MONTABARD
Elizabeth Chadwick, Time Warner 2003, £17.99,hb,469pp,0316860344
At the end of Elizabeth Chadwick's book, The Winter Mantle, a baby is born out of wedlock to Simon de Senslis and a young girl who subsequently becomes a nun. The baby cannot be brought up in a convent so Simon takes him home to England to be brought up with his own family. The Falcons of Montabard is the boy's story. Now a young man and a past master at attracting trouble, Sabin Fitzsimon gets into one scrape too many and is sent to the Holy Land with Sir Edmund Strongfist and his daughter, Annais. He arrives in Jerusalem and serves under Sir Edmund. Soon there is more trouble and Sabin is forced lo leave Sir Edmund and go with Gerbert de Montabard to his mountain stronghold.
Set in the early 12 th century, the story is a neat mixture of fact and fiction. King Baldwin did, in fact, rule Jerusalem at that time and the
skirmishes between the Christians and the Saracens were fierce and bloody. Until I read the author's note at the end I could not have told who were fictitious characters and who really lived and frankly it did not matter as the marrying of the two was so seamless. This was a book in which I quickly became absorbed and had no difficulty in turning the pages. Elizabeth Chadwick has the medieval period at her fingertips and makes it come beautifully alive in her stories. If you like this period of history you will enjoy this book. I thoroughly recommend it.
Marilyn
Sherlock.
13TH CENTURY
DAUGHTERS OF SUMME R
Sara Conway, Cumberland House, 2003, $22.95/C$34.95, hb, 204pp, 1581823401
It is 1221 in the Northumbrian town of Hexham. The annual fair is about to start, resulting in extra work for Lord Godwin, Hexham 's bailiff, and extra excitement for Hexham's inhabitants. However, neither Lord Godwin nor the town's inhabitants expected this excitement to include the murder of a leading merchant of the town. This merchant had recently begun to suspect his wife of infidelity. Might the murder be connected to this, or perhaps to his unfair dealings with fellow merchants? While this second book in the Lord Godwin series isn't as multi-faceted as the first, Murder on Good Friday, the same vivid descriptions of the period, the landscape, and the characters gave great pleasure to this reader. Conway's writing made me feel as if I were in medieval Northumbria, and the evolving relationships between the characters are most enjoyable to follow. For this reason, try to start with the first book in the series.
Trudi E. Jacobson
THE
ISLESMAN
Nigel Tranter, Hodder & Stoughton, 2003, £18.99, hb, 390pp, 034077018X
In the late 13 th century, Angus Og MacDonald is brought up by his grandfather, the great Angus Mor, to be the future Lord of the Isles, his own father being too studious and weakwilled to be the true heir. His main task is to serve as leader and protector of his people, scattered as they are on remote islands throughout the Hebrides and on the Scottish mainland. Angus solves disputes through both diplomacy and military strength, only resorting to the latter when necessary. The incursion of the English king Edward I into Scottish territory poses a greater risk, for though the Isles are a semi-independent country, any threat to Scotland is a threat to their existence. Joining forces with Robert the Bruce, Angus does all he can to save his land from English occupation. These were exciting times, and for the most part, Tranter does them justice. There are some
passages that recall Jean Plaidy's writing in her later years, that is, sweeping summaries of events that serve to tie up loose plot ends but leave the reader wanting more details. But the research is impeccable as always, and Angus' romantic pursuits are equally as compelling as his military and political confrontations. It also continues to amaze me how Tranter can effectively convey an entire lively conversation without writing a single word of dialogue. Angus Og's story isn't as action-oriented as it might have been, given the subject matter. Still, nobody else could have done it better.
Sarah L. Johnson
SAINT JULIAN
Walter Wangerin, Jr., HarperSanFrancisco and Zondervan, 2003, $19.95 / C$29.95, hb, 210pp, 0060522526
Thirty-six short chapters describe the life of Saint Julian, the Hospitaller, chronicling his auspicious birth through the final redemption that seals his sainthood. Born into the privileged class in the Middle Ages, Julian is fueled by the urge to kill. After a particularly vicious massacre of an entire forest full of animals, Julian learns that he is destined to murder his beloved mother and father. Seeking to escape his fate, he runs off and gains notoriety as an unstoppable knight. He is rewarded with a modest estate that he tends alongside a loving wife. Yet he cannot outrun the prophecy, and after gruesomely fulfilling it, ostracizes himself from civilization. I le eventually finds a way to serve society and atone for his crimes.
Based upon the life of an actual saint, Saint Julian is narrated by a minor cleric who begins by explaining that his life's work has been researching Saint Julian's history. The novel is written in report-like fashion with each chapter representing a facet of Julian's life. All characters, save Julian, are nameless, and even the time period is kept intentionally ambiguous. The narrator periodically intrudes to directly address the reader, but most of the time, the story progresses as the narrator specu !ates on Julian's self-loathing and relationships with those around him. The writing is rather formal with occasional jarring crudeness, such as descriptive slaughters and a rather unexpected love scene.
Julian was a troubled man , and this book is certainly filled with his remorse. Those interested in a fictional account of Saint Julian or enjoy hunting will more than likely find it fascinating.
Suzanne J. Sprague
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ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
14TH CENTURY
THE TEMPLAR'S PENANCE
Michael Jecks, Headline, 2003, £17.99, hb, 364pp, 0755301706
Summer, 1323, Sir Baldwin Fumshill and Bailiff Simon Puttock set out on their 15th medieval mystery; it is my first. They are on pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, and whilst sitting beside a river they hear screams and are amongst the first to discover the brutal murder of a young woman. Lending their investigative skills to the ensuing enquiry headed by the local but Oxford-educated (and therefore English-speaking) pesquidore, Munio, it can only be a matter of time before the culprit is found. The trail nonetheless leads into Portugal , and the unexpected appearance of a person from Baldwin 's past threatens not only the investigation but Baldwin's future.
Michael Jecks observes the period well; the brutality, filth, and stench around the great cathedral is adeptly depicted.
At the outset in his author's notes Jecks clearly describes the two themes of his novel: the difference between the judicial systems of England and Europe in the 1300's, and how the Order of the Templars, destroyed by the jealousy of a King and Pope , managed to survive in pockets under new names.
However, I found the early chapters were confusing and needed constant reference to the Cast of Characters to discover who each individual was as they appeared. When this is sorted out the story, although lacking tension, moves along as red herrings litter the path to justice.
Gwen Sly
15TH CENTURY
PRINCESS OF BYZANTIUM
Josephine Allen, Jaco byte Books (www.jacobytebooks.com), 2000, AU$21, pb, 286pp, 1740530063
Princess Zoe of Byzantium, niece of Emperor Constantine Palaeologus Dragases, is the focus of this overlong novel, set against the backdrop of the last days of the Byzantine Empire in 1453. The author provides a glimpse of a onceglorious, but now crumbling empire on the brink of extinction as the encroaching Turks under Sultan Mehmet prepare to overrun the decaying city. Enter Andras Bakony, a Magyar mercenary from Hungary, to help save the day, or at least to delay the eventual invasion and its brutal aftermath. After their paths converge several times, the princess and the mercenary fall in lust and love.
The princess is beautiful, plucky and strongwilled, the hero is handsome and courageous; the plot contains more adventure and romance than history. Old hatreds, undying devotion, courage, jealousy, greed, court intrigue, and the constant threat of enemy invasion pervade this
THE HISTORJCAL NOVELS REVIEW
drama, complete with detailed descriptions of life in Constantinople, battle scenes, and obligatory sexual interludes. Although set in an earlier century, Cecelia Holland's better researched novel Belt of Gold provides the reader with a more compelling story about life in the Byzantine Empire. A worthy effort that just misses the mark.
Michael I. Shoop
QLuther Blissett, William Heinemann 2003, first pub. 2000, translated from Italian, £10.99, pb, 635pp, 034011576
This European bestseller was written jointly by four young men from Bologna, and originally published anonymously in Italy, where at first it was believed to be the work of Umberto Eco. ('Luther Blissett' is the name of a Milan footballer!) It is the powerful story of Gert, who begins as a rather nai've young man and ends as a cynical opportunist. Disgusted with the sale of indulgences in Germany, he turns to the new faith and becomes an Anabaptist. For the next 30 years he is shadowed by Q, a Papal spy. They never meet, yet they both influence each other.
This is an angry, erudite book of uneven strength - some parts, notably Q's letters, are truly excellent, while others suffer from being self-consciously clever. I felt exhausted after reading a thorough examination of Martin Luther's protests and a stem criticism of Calvin, followed by the Papal response; the rise and expulsion of the Hapsburgs, methods of banking, the bigotry of the Refonners, the Inquisition, the Thirty Years War, the Turkish invasion of Europe and the dire plight of the ordinary people are also comprehensively covered. However, I now feel much better informed about the Reformation and know exactly what an Anabaptist is.
Despite the patchy writing this book is worth reading. It is not light, but it is historically accurate and the picture of everyday life in the l 6'h century is vivid.
Mairead McKerracher
INCAS: THE LIGHT OF MACHU PICHU
A.B. Daniel, Simon & Schuster 2003, £19.99, pb, 359pp, 0743207238, Pub. in the US by Touchstone, 2003, $14.00, tpb, 335 pp, 0743432762
This is the third novel of A.B. Daniel's Incas trilogy set in 16 th century Peru, and continues the story of Spanish nobleman Gabriel Montelucar y Flores and blue-eyed Incan princess Anamaya. The Incas have gathered to retaliate against the Spanish invaders and Gabriel finds himself caught up in the struggle, his loyalties to Spain and his European friends conflicting with his love for Anamaya and the lncan way of life. Anamaya has supernatural powers and Gabriel is confronted with having to learn these skills himself is he is to be her consort and become the puma of lncan legend.
But is his belief strong enough? And can he break free from those who would bind his loyalty to Spain, or else see him dead?
The setting is exotic, the plot racy, the characters have terrific potential to make this an absorbing adventure of a novel, so it is all the more disappointing that it fails to make the grade. If Wilbur Smith couldn't write, he'd probably write like this. The novel is overloaded with repetition, cliches, B movie dialogue and suffers from terminal adjectivitis that completely undermines what could have been powerful writing. I struggled with this one. I knew it was supposed to be exciting but I'm afraid that I couldn't get past the torrid prose.
Susan Hicks
THE FLOATING B OOK
M R Lovie, Virago, 2003, £12.99, pb, 479pp, 184408003X
Venice in 1468 was a magnet for ambitious men who wanted to make a name for themselves. Into this seductive and fabled city come the German von Speyer brothers to set up the first printing press and search for a book that will make their fortunes.
M R Lovie uses this background of one of the most progressive moments in western culture for her second Venetian novel. Many of the people portrayed and the events depicted are historical, and she binds them together with imaginative fictional characters to echo the life of Catullus and his doomed love for Clodia Metelli. It is the newly discovered, tender and erotic poems of Gauis Valerius Catullus, written in antiquity, that Wendelin von Speyer will publish.
There is a haunting rhythm to the book; medieval Venice, with its misty lagoons and fetid breath of sail and canal fusing with the lasciviousness of its inhabitants, is portrayed as a richly interwoven canvas of diverse sensualities.
Ms Lovric has an elegant way with words but perhaps, taking on the guise of the charismatic scribe Felice Feliciano, she descends into overly pretentious descriptions where a dawn cannot break without 'cloudy albumen' nor rise but 'squarely' - and even a house has to be 'auntish'.
A lustful, atmospheric book, skilfully constructed, but perhaps overlong.
Gwen Sly
THE ADVENTURES OF ALIANORE AUD LEY
Brian Wainwright, Jaco byte Books (www.jacobytebooks.com), 2002, $AU19, pb, 190pp, 1741000998
Moving from a sublime Ricardian novel to an hysterically funny one, Wainwright's Alianore Audley holds a place in my heart. What an endearing heroine, if there ever was one. Alianore, by pure mischance (or perhaps great good fortune), leaves her quiet, boring
ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
existence in the convent that her brothers have summarily dumped her in. (Where else can a girl in I 5th century England go?) Clearly, Alianore is not meant for the contemplative life. The alternative is a natural: she becomes a spy for her cousin, Edward IV. Natural? It does seem that way as events unfold. Despite the fact that Alianore is initially sent to the North to gather intelligence for Edward so that she is prevented from getting into mischief, she becomes an invaluable asset to the Yorkist cause.
Alianore's riotously funny insights into the obnoxious and abusive Warwicks, tongue-incheek barbs at Margaret Beaufort and Lord Stanley, disrespectful comments about everyone from "Cousin Edward" to the "Tudor Slimebag" (Henry VII), and loving remembrances of Richard and Anne liberally pepper this all-too brief book. Wainwright has a feel for the period and presents it in a unique and enjoyable fashion.
How to give you who read this review a flavor of the times as seen through Alianore's wickedly funny yet loving perspective is tantamount to impossible. You 've just got to be there Read it.
Ilysa Magnus
TREASO
Meredith Whitford, Jaco byte Books (www.jacobytebooks.com), 2000, $AU25, pb, 455pp, 1740530470
When I consider all the books I 've read where Edward IV and Richard Ill have been the primary focus (including Alianore Audley, reviewed above), I will always consider Meredith Whitford' Treason to be one of the finest. Why? Simple - it flows, it's real, the characters are honest , and their actions are consistent with their belief systems and their deepest feelings.
Told from the point of view of Martin Robsart, a fictional cousin of the Yorks, one of the fortunate ones who got to grow old during the Wars of the Roses , it is chock full of historical detail. After his family is slaughtered as a result of a Lancastrian vendetta, Martin, a young boy , comes to live, grow and learn along with Richard and his extended family at Middleham , Warwick 's stronghold. Martin is taught to fight at the side of those who would become his greatest allies, friends and confidants. There is no doubt that Martin is a Yorkist partisan, holding tightly to those values which Edward and Richard represent. It 's fascinating stuff, watching Martin's growing apprehensions about Edward's ability to govern, including the relationship with Jane Shore, the drama leading to the death sentence of George, Duke of Clarence and Edward's untimely death. Through it all, Martin remains Edward's man, and after Edward's death, becomes Richard's man , with all that entails. What is made vividly clear is how honorable a man Richard is, and how the love between
Richard and Anne is the mainstay of Richard's life. After Anne's death , Richard, although a shell of his former self, still holds true to those principles for which he fought his entire life Martin, as the narrator of events soon to end Richard 's fledging kingship, is an ever-vigilant comrade, both in arms and in heart. It is clear that Martin adores Richard, and that the feeling is returned by Richard.
Whitford's new perspective on a well-known and often well-worn story is a joy. Her writing is impeccable, the point of view has just the right spin, and historical fact melds seamlessly with historical fiction.
Ilysa Magnus
16TH CENTURY
THE ELK-DOG HERITAGE
Don Coldsmith, Forge, 2002, $22.95/C$32.95, hb, 224 pp , 03 I 2876181
The third novel written by Coldsmith in his Spanish Bit Saga narrates an episode of the ElkDog People of the American Great Plains during the mid-sixteenth century. Their chief, Heads Off, was formerly a soldier from Coronado's expedition to the Great Plains, left behind when they turned back and adopted by the tribe when sick and injured. He introduced Elk-dogs (horses) to the People, and as a result, the tribe has become powerful and affluent. After a great battle in which the Elk-dogs defeated the Head-Splitters but lost most of their warriors, Heads Off was asked to assume chieftainship of the tribe. As the story begins, Heads Off has become a confident, almost arrogant leader. But youths of his own tribe, eager to prove their manhood, instigate a war with the rival Head-Splitters The spiral of violence divides the tribe proves a challenge to Heads Off's leadership and threatens the tribe with extinction during the harsh winter.
Coldsmith's narration from the Native American point of view is convincing and wellpaced. Although Heads Off is really Spanish, he has integrated into his adopted people almost completely. Information on tools, weapons, food preparation, and clothing seems to be authentic, without overwhelming the reader. Coldsmith writes with respect for the People's philosophy and religious belief system but tells an entertaining tale as well, written from a different perspective than the usual Western.
Mary L. ewton
THE MAID'S REQUEST
Michele Desbordes , Faber & Faber 2003, (trans. Shaun Whiteside) £12.99, hb, l 49pp, 05712 I 0066 (First published by Editions Verdier 1998).
An unnamed Italian artist travels to France at the request of the king to head a team of students allocated to design and build a palace in the Loire valley. There , a self possessed and efficient servant has been assigned to run his
household , a woman who rarely speaks and yet is sensitive to all his needs.
Although they seldom talk, master and maid are always aware of the presence or absence of each other. It is as if one life beats to the rhythm of the other. The master buys the maid gifts and she provides him with comfort in his autumn days. One night , when each is aware that their lives are coming to a close, the maid makes a last, devastating request of her master.
This is a beautiful , lyrical story about love and friendship. Although, on the s urface , little of note seems to happen in the characters' humdrum lives , below the surface emotions surge and chum.
This novel could almost be a blueprint for learning how to accept love and death It shines like a perfect jewel amongst the pebbles.
Sara Wilson
THE PIRATE QUEEN
Alan Gold, HarperCollins Australia, 2003, AU$ l 8.95, pb, 455pp, 0732268281
If not for Irish bards and poets and occasional legal documents, we might not know about the legendary pirate queen who threatened the English treasury or the patriotic chieftain who defied English attempts to subj ugate the Irish Men attempted to write her out of history, but Alan Gold takes the facts and spins a wonderful tale about Grace O'Malley, who grows up aboard her father's ships rather than pursue a more womanly education. She is a natural mariner and a skilled trader, and her exploitslegitimate and otherwise - bring her wealth and notoriety.
Grace's path in life contrasts with that of another prominent woman, Elizabeth I. I !er tale is also deftly woven within these pages to create a tapestry that culminates in a meeting between these two queens. Their live s follow different paths , but both are fraught with peril. When Elizabeth's henchman in Ireland takes Grace's youngest son hostage, the pirate queen dares to venture into the enemy's court and meet the Virgin Queen who would have her head.
Through language and action the characters unveil their strengths and weaknesses, their similarities and difference s until these two extraordinary women, who stepped outside the bounds of traditional female roles and took center stage in the world of men, come to life before the reader's eyes. Gold succinctly provides the complex historical and political background against which Grace and Elizabeth lived their lives. He also provides an intriguing, enlightening, and believable glimpse into a historical meeting about which no clues exist as to what transpired.
Cindy Vallar
HISTORICAL
ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
AS ABOVE, SO BELOW
Rudy Rucker , Forge , 2002 , $23.95 / C$33.95 , hb , 320pp , 0765304031
Rucker has written an engrossing and affecting novel about the great painter Peter Bruegel. The book is divided into 16 vignettes , each of which is preceded by a reproduction of a Bruegel painting that plays a role in that section We first meet Peter in 1552 , when he and a friend are crossing the Alps on their way to see the great artworks of Italy. Within a few pages , we see that Peter ' s senses go beyond those of the average person Objects talk to him, revealing their stories and their essences. The following sections sometimes are continuous, but other times jump months or years , in order to observe Bruegel at key moments. In becoming a part of Peter ' s world , we learn of the artists , engravers , and art patrons of Antwerp and Brussels. One particularly fascinating section explores how paints are made. Rucker ' s research isn't always seamlessly incorporated into the book , though it eve ntually doesn ' t matter as we are swept up in the events of Bruegel ' s life and the times. Spain's brutal regime in the Low Countries plays an increasingly large part as the story continues . Rucker ' s analysis of the paintings, beautifully incorporated in the flow of the narrative , is illuminating and frequently reveals the artworks ' origins in the politics and oppression of the period. By all means , have good color illustrations of Bruegel's work at hand when you read this book! The murky black and white illustrations just aren ' t adequate for discovering the e lements Rucker highlights.
Trudi E Jacobson
DISSOLUTION
C. J. Sansom , Viking, 2003 , $24.95 , hb , 387pp , 0670032034
Pub. in the UK by Macmillan, 2003, £14.99, pb , 400pp , 1405005424
This gripping mystery is set in Tudor England during the winter of 1557 , just after a rebellion against the still-new Church of England has been put down by Henry VIII and his vicar general, Thomas Cromwell. The country is divided. While reform seems to be taking hold, many loyal Catholics remain opposed to the strict new rules and regulations. Cromwell is well under way in his plan to dissolve and destroy all vestiges of Catholicism in England. However , when one of Cromwell's comm1ss10ners is murdered while on assignment at the Scarnsea monastery in southern England, he sends Dr. Matthew Shardlake, a lawyer devoted to reform and a personal friend, to find the murderer post haste, fearing further rebellion and the end to his regime.
Accompanying Shardlake is his clerk, Mark Poer. Together they begin to question suspects and umavel the tangle of leads that will, they hope, quickly point to the murderer. But after two more murders are discovered, it becomes
clear that they could be looking at a longer stay than initially intended. Adding to his stress, during the course of his investigation Shardlake hears startling information , leading him to question his loyalties.
In his first published effort, Sansom offers up a historical detective novel in language that is moody , expressive, and precise. The plot, which holds together to the end, is fast-paced and satisfying.
Alice Logsdon
THE GOLDEN THREAD
Louis de Wohl , Ignatius Press, 2001 (cl952) , $14.95,pb,315pp , 0898708133
Louis de Wohl produces another masterpiece by vividly bringing to life not only the life of Inigo de Loyola, a Spanish soldier injured during the siege of Pamplona in 1521 , but also Ulic von der Flue, the Swiss mercenary that shot the cannon that mangled Inigo's leg Ulic's life gets intricately tied up with his enemy's when he is given the task of escorting the seriously wounded Loyola home. Ulic also gets deeply connected to Juanita Perez, a young woman he saved from being raped and who travels with him , disguised as a boy for her own safety , until Ulic can get her to her family in Barcelona.
While Inigo is recuperating from his injuries , he asks for something to read. He is given the only two books in the family household - The Life of Christ and The Flower of the Saints. So begins the journey from soldier to the saint the world knows as Ignatius, the founder of the Society of Jesus and writer of the famous Spiritual Exer cis es. Ulic and Juanita are on a journey of their own and so must find their way amid upheaval in their world.
I highly recommend this and all of de Wohl's novels. They are eminently readable, completely engrossing and extremely wellwritten. Other stories of the saints include The Spear, Lay Siege to Heaven, Citadel of God, Set All Afire , The Restless Flame and The Quiet Light, all available at www.ignatius.com.
Anne Marie Gazzolo
17TH CENTURY
THE JEWESS OF KAIFENG
Sophie Ferrer, Xlibris, 2003, $20.99, pb , 184pp, 1401065295
This well-written historical adventure/ romance set in 17 th century Macao and Kaifeng probably won't find a mainstream publisher due to its unique and unmarketab le setting. However, I'd love to be proven wrong. In 1690, Father Nicolo Pasio, Jesuit friar and occasional assassin, is given orders to infiltrate the Jewish enclave in the Chinese city of Kaifeng in order to steal its sacred Torah. Because Jews first settled in Kaifeng long before the birth of Christ, their scriptures may contain the most authentic version of the Old Testament in
existence. But Nico lo has a secret that he dares not reveal to his Jesuit leaders, and his growing love and respect for Rebecca, a Chinese Jewess who closely guards her people's heritage, cause him to rethink his loyalties . There's sufficient action to keep the pages turning, and Ferrer's characters are more finely drawn than those of most adventure novels. No one could have been more surprised than I to learn that the ancient Jewish settlement of Kaifeng is recorded as historical fact. This is a large-format paperback with small print, slightly more expensive than usual, but I believe it to be worth the money.
Sarah L. Johnson
ALMS FO R OBLIVI ON
Phillip Gooden , Constable 2003, £16.99 , hb , 320pp , 1841193828. pub in US by Carroll&Graf, hb, $24, 0786711426
This is the fourth book in the series telling the adventures of young Nick Revill, a player in the Chamberlains Company of actors in London.
The year is 1602. Queen Elizabeth is sick, probably dying , and the Company are about to put on a private production of Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida for the lawyers of the Middle Temple. Peter Agate , a childhood friend of Nick arrives from Somerset on a foggy day and announces that he is going to try his hand at acting. Nick feels obliged to introduce him to the company and put him up in his own lodgings.
Within days of his arrival Peter is found stabbed to death. This is the first of a series of violent deaths designed to implicate Nick. He sets out to investigate the crimes and finds the truth lies in his old home in Somerset.
This is probably the best book of this series to date. Mr Gooden ' s writing grows more assured and Nick appears to be maturing from the green country boy. It is a pure whodunit , well thought out and I recommend it to any mystery buff.
Mary Tucker
HOLY F OO LS
Joanne Harris, Doubleday 2003 , £15.00, hb , 430pp, 0385603649 To be pub in US in Feb 2004 by William Morrow , $24.95 , 0060559128
From the author of Chocolat comes a tale set in a remote part of France with a taste of seduction, witchcraft and religious superstition. Three words in this novel sum up the essence of the human race as it was then and is still: selfish, shallow and cruel.
Juliette , the beautiful, flame-haired heroine is forced to keep moving on when her life as an actress and rope dancer is thrown into turmoil after a frightening experience when her troupe is accused of spreading p lague. Juliette finds sanctuary as a nun but her safety is short-lived when a dark shadow from the past catches up with her setting in motion a train of terrifying events.
The writing is evocative and the delicate balance between horrors, imagined and real, is perfectly executed. The author captures the
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25, AUG 2003
sights, smells and sounds of the times. There are many complex personalities and each one plays a part in destroying then restoring the nunnery to its former glory. Highly recom nended.
Sarah Crabtree
THE ACCOMPLICE
Kathryn Heyman, Review, 2003, £10.00, hb, 310pp, 0747269734
Stories about shipwrecked mariners have always fascinated me. They show a world far removed from the daily round where anything can happen, and people are given a rare chance to show their true natures unencumbered by who they were in the civilized world. This is not the escapist J M Barrie/Daniel Defoe sort of tale but a true story of the worst excesses that can occur when people are allowed to do whatever they please. The extraordinary events surrounding the wreck of the Batavia in 1629 have been the subject of many books and TV documentaries, but like all compelling stories there is usually room for another retelling and this is a particularly fine one.
It is told from the perspective of a survivor, a young woman travelling with her large family to a new life in Australia. Judith Bastiaansz looks back on the petty joys and discomforts of the early part of the voyage, then the storms and the terrible events of the shipwreck. She frequently flicks forward to her feelings about it all today and other things that happened to her in later life, all of which were coloured by the disaster. Like the rumblings of an impending storm, the narrative runs from the innocuous to the dire in gradual stages, building up into a a vast tsunami that washes over everybody.
Kathryn Heyman has worked as a deckhand herself so the descriptions of shipboard life add verisimilitude to a larger-than-life story which needs the contrast of this grounding in ordinary events. Historical novels aren't usually topical but this one has the added dimension of recalling stories in the news showing how being a victim of such terrible events can trigger the worst post-traumatic stress in their victims. A powerful book that succeeds on many levels. Rachel A Hyde
THE WITCH OF COLOGNE
Tobsha Leamer, HarperCollins Australia, 2003, AU$25, pb, 525pp, 0732270642
This first historical by Australian playwright and novelist Leamer has a number of things in its favor: an original setting, an intriguing heroine, and a completely unpredictable plotline. In 1665 Deutz, the Jewish Quarter just outside Cologne, Ruth bas Elazar Saul goes against her father's wishes to practice midwifery. Her remarkable success is due to her previous training in Amsterdam, a more enlightened city, where she had fled years earlier to escape an arranged marriage. The Inquisition's interest in her has less to do with her occupation than her birth, for her late
THE HISTORICAL NOVELS REVIEW
mother, a Sephardic Jew, had made a mortal foe in a Dominican friar whose advances she spumed. Imprisoned for witchcraft, Ruth attracts the interest of Detlef von Tennen, a Catholic cleric who secretly yearns to embrace the revolutionary beliefs creeping across Europe from Holland. When Detlef abandons his position to throw in his lot with Ruth , he takes on not just her enemies but some new ones as well.
The author wins points for realism in choosing historically accurate, refreshingly unromantic character names and in depicting religious persecution vividly , though her gruesome torture scenes are not for the squeamish. The novel's philosophical grasp is not as strong as the author perhaps intends, and the fantastic elements -such as the wraithlike demon Lilith, whose presence midwives guard against - seem to serve little purpose. But the novel succeeds wonderfully as an epic tale of star-crossed lovers who knew what they were giving up to go against popular beliefs, but chose to do so anyway.
Sarah L. Johnson
THE FOURTH QUEEN
Debbie Taylor, Michael Joseph 2003, £10.99, pb, 482pp, 0781146026, pub in the US by Crown, 2003, $23.95, hb, 344pp, 1400049253
Based on a true story, The Fourth Queen is the chronicle of a woman who, after leaving Scotland in 1689 for the New World, was captured by pirates and ultimately became Empress of Morocco.
Debbie Taylor came across a reference to Helen Gloag in a book of local history whilst holidaying in Perthshire; fascinated by the story she set out to discover what life would have been like in a North African harem in the 18 th century.
It is an enthralling story; sold into slavery, Helen had to learn a new language, religion and how to live within a culture which was alien to everything she had ever known.
Harems are luxurious places, full of intrigue, where several hundred women vie with each other for the love of one man. Emperor Sidi Mohammed, darkly masculine but brutal and vicious by tum, was captivated by the white skin and red hair of the Scottish woman whom he made his fourth queen and thus put her life in danger within his arcane court.
Ms Taylor creates within this book a small world as claustrophobic and myopic, mysterious and perfumed as the harem itself. She tells her tale skilfully and expresses most clearly her own fascination with the subject intertwining real people into her fiction.
One to pack in the suitcase - to be read with the addition of sunshine and sand.
Gwen Sly
18TH CEN TURY
THE SCENT OF BETRAYAL
David Donachie, McBooks Press , 2003, $17.95, pb,426pp, 1590130316
David Donachie has enjoyed his share of acclaim as a writer of nautical fiction using the name of Tom Connery as well as his real one. His latest naval adventure with Harry Ludlow carries the reader from an ambush in the Caribbean to a search for the missing treasure of General James Wilkinson in the present-day states of Mississippi and Louisiana. As was the case with the previous four novels in his Privateersman Mysteries series, the author offers an exciting naval tale to go with a baffling "whodunit." Donachie has certainly done his research, as the maritime and social worlds of 1795 come alive in his prose. John R. Vallely
AUDACITY, PRIVATEER OUT OF PORTSMOUTH
J.E. Fender, University Press of New England, 2003, $26.95, hb, 310pp, 1584653167
A seafaring yam of the American Revolution , Audacity plunges into action and claps on sail. Geoffrey Frost , a bold and cunning privateersman, fights by force and stealth. We come in on episode 2 of the saga as Captain Frost returns to Portsmouth , leading four prize vessels after rescuing dozens of New England men from prison in Nova Scotia. His mute confidant Ming Tsun signals Frost not to push his luck, but he engages a British frigate. His motley crew includes a Native American , Caribbean blacks, a one-armed cook who manages to bake fresh bread on board , and a Newfoundland dog. They all serve him willingly. Frost is good to his men, doesn't drink or curse, and worships several gods.
This prodigy spreads himself thin , not stopping to enjoy home and family or even to refit. Frost begins to seem one-dimensional because he never makes a mistake. Although he speaks several languages fluently, most of his dialog consists in shouting orders and being obeyed. He has no opponent worthy of him ; only a hurricane proves a threat, and only the sea engages his emotions Frost cares about his men, but given a chance to rescue a damsel in distress , he does only the decent thing The psychic distance is zoomed-out. The dynamic is loud. Narrative structure is straight-ahead action. "Topmen flew aloft to hand and furl with a furious , determined efficiency as blocks sang, yards racked around, sheets slatted, and sails thrashed as they spilled the wind from one side, swung, and took the wind from another angle " Similar to Parkinson, author of So Near So Far (reviewed this issue), Fender uses an erudite tone and third person voice. He combines realism with the fantastic and leaves us in suspense for the next chapter.
Marcia K. Matthews
25 , AUG 2003
LADY VENGEANCE
Melinda Hammond, Robert Hale, 2003, £ 17.99, hb,272pp, 0709073984
A group of noblemen, frustrated in their efforts to join the Jacobites, rape a young girl at an inn, later killing her father when he seeks redress. After she has left, a valuable ruby cravat pin is missing. They must recover it, as it contains something that could betray them all. When they arrive at her cottage, both she and her mother have fled. Many years later, consumed by bitterness, she returns and wrecks vengeance on them all.
The writing is uncomplicated, and the atmosphere good, but the story is highly improbable and the history not really there, although dates and events are mentioned.
Mairead McKerracher
THORN I MY HEART
Liz Curtis Higgs, WaterBrook, 2003, $13.99, pb,484pp, 157856512X
In the Scottish Lowlands of 1788, Rowena McKie goads her favorite son Jamie, the younger of twins, into claiming his father's blessing. With it come the rights as heir to the land and flocks of Glentrool. To escape brother Evan's wrath at the loss of his birthright, Rowena sends Jamie on a journey to visit her own brother, Lachlan McBride, with directions to choose either of his two daughters as a wife. The plain Leana has a woman's heart and mind, while her beautiful younger sister Rose lives the life of a carefree young girl. Though Rose knows she's not ready for marriage, Jamie is determined to choose her as his bride - even if this means breaking Leana's heart.
Readers who think this story sounds familiar would be right, but Higgs' novel is only inspired by the well-known Biblical tale. Leana and Rose are very much their own people, and their saga is made more poignant with the realization that this is I 8th century Scotland, not Biblical times, and Jamie can choose only one of them to marry. The moors and glens of the gorgeous Lowland setting come alive in the author's heartfelt descriptions and authentic dialogue. This enchanting novel is one of the most beautiful love stories I've read in years, and I recommend it unreservedly.
Sarah L. Johnson
FANNY
Erica Jong, W. W. Norton, 2003, $ l 4.95 /C$22.50, pb, 525pp, 0393324354 Pub. in the UK by Bloomsbury, 1997, £7.99, pb,54lpp,0747531560
Dear Reader, if the Use of 18 th Century Capitalization and Language is Tiresome to You, then turn away from Fanny, for Ms. Jong - author of Fear Of Flying, her more Infamous Tome - makes Thorough Use of her Master's Degree in the Era. Not only does she insist upon Relentless Capitalization, but on Page 124, the Lady lists 127 Indelicate Expressions for a Woman's Privates - in Alphabetical
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Order!
Undaunted, this Reader opened the Novel with Great Enthusiasm, for it promised Tragedy & Comedy, Pirates & Prostitution, Heroics on the High Seas, and other such Grand Adventures. Surely Fanny is More than a Mimic of Defoe; It must be a Parody of the Sweeping Sagas so Fashionable in 1980, the Year of Original Publication! Regard the Cliches - the Seducing Step-Father, a Damsel in Disguise, Lots of Lustful Louts, Amazing Coincidences, Secrets left Unrevealed for no Apparent Reason. And such Debauchery and Vice! Man on Woman, Woman on Woman, Man on Man, Group Delights - & never a Pesky Moral Thought intruding.
Ah, but where is the twinkle? Where is the wink? Alas, It is lost! The Author's True Purpose is Quickly Revealed. The Wise Witches are murdered by Superstitious Christians; the Homosexual Highwayman crusades against General Tyranny; and Fanny herself is Deflowered, Betrayed, & Abused by Bad White Men. Alack, alack! If the Author had only used Humor and Wit rather than Ponderous Preaching, Fanny might have been a Wildly Entertaining Read.
Lisa Ann Verge
FAITH AND HONOR
Robin Madericb, Blue Shutter Books, 2003, $12.95,pb,364pp,0972937919
Jouncing in a hired carriage on her return to Boston in 1775, Faith meets a mysterious stranger, Mr. Irons. Her friend Ezra Briggs is a solicitor at law and a Tory; Faith is a rebel. Mr. Irons is Ezra's friend and would like to be Faith's.
Author Maderich builds characterization from individual actions: Ezra polishes his spectacles. She sprinkles adjectives freely: "a pretty saltglazed stoneware plate." Her descriptive technique of adding one adjective each sentence to fill in the picture makes for vivid scenes. She describes the function of an object: Faith dusts powder "over the ruffied, lacy edge of her chemise" for comfort, not vanity. In an expected treat, she brings Dr. Joseph Warren to life: the hero of Breed's Hill whose namesake tavern is today a popular meeting place in Charlestown. She doesn't shrink from battle scenes. Her panorama of the long siege of Boston, with soldiers bleeding on fine furniture, is memorable.
Tension and intrigue arise from the interplay of key characters. When Faith finds out Irons is a British officer, a question of honor opposes her attraction for him. Her cause and his duty form the conflict. He is concerned her activities will cause her to be accused of treason to the Crown. Swept up in the birth pangs of a nation, the lovers lie to each other. As agents of opposing forces, they make sparks together.
Marcia
K. Matthews 16
A WICKED WAY TO BURN
Margaret Miles, Bantam, 1998, $5.50 /C$7.50, pb,309pp,0553578626
TOO SOON FOR FLOWERS
Margaret Miles, Bantam, I 99S' , $5.99/C$8.99, pb,290pp,0553578634
You're probably like me and when a new author starts a new series with a new character, you miss the first two or three and pick up the fourth one as the first one to read. Not this time. Here are the first two in a chronological sequence of mysteries taking place in colonial Massachusetts, and both are well worth reading. The town is Bracebridge, halfway between Boston and Worcester. Time: the fall of 1763 and the spring of 1764.
Reading two in succession, rare for me, only builds to the sense of community the author obviously intends. Young widow Charlotte Willett, who does most of the detective work, is plain in looks, but her inquisitive mind is far from simple. Her next-door neighbor, Richard Longfellow, is village selectman and of a scientific bent. His sister Diana, whose visits from Boston are not uncommon, is a flirtful sort, and rounding out the list of major players is the enigmatic Captain Montagu, whose "duties and obligations [to the Crown were] not commonly understood." He also seems to favor Diana.
The incident that's at the center of the first book is, by eyewitness account, that of spontaneous human combustion. Mrs. Willett is not so sure, and her instincts are quite correct. In the second novel, a young girl dies while being quarantined after being inoculated for smallpox, a deadly scourge at that time of the nation's history.
Oddly, the mystery is better handled in the first book, and matters of historical interest more capably in the second even at times to making certainly sections too 'talky' in regard to current events, and waxing philosophical on matters of relationships between the sexes and the nature of death.
While the first mystery is an excellent model of fair play detection, Miles allows the dead girl's secret to be suspected by the reader far too early in the second, and too much coincidence is allowed to enter in But by that time, we've also had a chance to grow even more comfortable and at home with the various and sundry folks in Bracebridge, and both books are very nearly equally enjoyable.
Steve Lewis
JOSEPH KNIGHT
James Robertson, Fourth Estate, 2003, £ I0.99, pb,384pp, 0007150245
Following the Battle of Culloden, John Wedderburn, son of a Scottish Jacobite baronet, escapes to Jamaica and in due course makes his fortune as a sugar planter, using slave labour. By and by he decides to Christianise and educate a personable young slave, Joseph Knight, to be his personal attendant to
ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
accompany him when he returns to Scotland to marry in 1773. In Scot land, however, Knight becomes increasingly self-assured , not least because his sexual powers attract female admirers and because his education is successful, and he soon asserts his independence by leaving Wedderburn's service and challenging his master's rights over him in the courts. The novel is primarily concerned with the case, which is a recorded historical event, and Knight's disappearance afterwards.
The case turned on the principle of propertyownership and became a cause celebre in the campaign for the abolition of slavery and it is subsumed here into a wide-ranging exploration of the racial, national, political and social attitudes of the day As a result, the personal and psychological relationship between Wedderburn and Knight is all but lost. Wedderburn's motivations are unclear and, given that his courageous behaviour precipitates the novel's action, it is remarkable that Knight's personality is not portrayed more fully. The significant fact that Wedderburn had himself been in Knight's situation as a runaway is left in the air. Hence the book, well-written and absorbing as it is, becomes more of a novel of ideas, a guide to the intellectual milieu of Edinburgh in the Enlightenment and prerevolutionary period , rather than a penetrating examination of the inner feelings of the main protagonists which , we are led to believe, is the main purpose of the book. Two other structural features should be noted. Firstly, the narrative constant ly jumps backwards and forwards in time, quite unnecessarily in my view , for a straightforward chronology would have carried the story perfectly well. Secondly there is a great deal of Scots dialogue Leo Gooch
LYDIA FIELDING
Susan Sallis, Corgi 2003, £5.99, pb, 399pp, 0552150177
Set in Exmoor and Bristol in the 1860s this is a very satisfying read. Lydia is a spirited girl who is intrigued by two men. There is Gus, rich and used to getting his own way , who covets her father ' s farm , and Wesley, back from the American wars with egalitarian ideals. Wesley loves Lydia but when his sister's scandalous behaviour causes bitterness in both families he and Lydia are separated.
Susan Sallis tackles more serious subjects than many saga writers - Methodism , incest and educational theories for instance. She weaves them into a convincing story. Her characters, both large and small, leap off the page as she brings them to life. It was difficult to put down.
Marina Oliver
THE HISTORICAL NOVELS REVIEW
BLUE HORI ZON
Wilbur Smith, Macmillan 2003, £18.99 , hb, 620pp, 0333761359. Pub in US by Thomas Dunne Books , $27 .95 , hb , 0312278241
Epic is the word to describe this novel , not because of the length but the scope of the story which concerns the lives of a new Courtney generation and the vastness and violence of Africa which are described with flair.
Jim Courtney is forced to flee the Cape Colony after rescuing Louisa from a Dutch ship transporting felons to Batavia. They trek northwards into the unmeasured , unknown interior, outwitting enemies both human and animal. There are battles large and small , on land and sea, against men and beasts and they are all enthralling.
In a radio interview in March, Wilbur Smith, commenting on the banning of his first book, said he had been accused of writing about sex, sacrilege and sadism and they had become his trademarks. There is plenty of violence in this book but it never teeters over the brink from what is acceptable. It was uncomfortable to read and, according to the author, to write. This is no sanitised version of life in an untamed land.
It takes a master storyteller to maintain the pace and tension of a journey taking months. The interest never flags, even when the focus switches to other family members and their concerns, to the coast and as far away as Oman. There has been deep research but the facts are pertinent to the story. A great read.
Marina Oliver
SEAFLOWE R
Julian Stockwin , Hodder & Stoughton, 2003, £14.99, hb, 345pp, 034079477 l. Pub in US by Scribner, $24 , hb , 0743214625
This is the third in a series following Thomas Kydd's progress from pressed man to Admiral during the Great Age of Sail. With his aristocratic friend Renzi , Kydd has sailed round the world in the frigate Artemis and been shipwrecked. This book begins with Kydd giving evidence at the court-martial following the disaster. Thereafter he and Renzi are sent to the Caribbean where they survive a hurricane and Kydd , sent to the dockyard at English Harbour while Renzi serves in the Port Admiral's office, contracts and recovers from yellow fever. Renzi uses his position to enable both men to join the topsail cutter Seaflower, Kydd as quartern1aster. Under a young and daring captain they find success in battle and earn prize money but this does not last. Kydd adds navigation to his seamanship skills and uses it to good purpose.
This volume is full of action and information and is a welcome addition to the genre.
Monica Maple
THE L OVEDAY SCANDALS
Kate Tremayne, Headline, 2003 , £ I 8.99 , hb, 342pp , 0747265690
As the fourth installment in the Loveday series , this novel was apparently written for those who enjoyed the first three books. These readers will find St. John Loveday banished to Virginia , his brother , Adam , at sea, and their father , Edward, attempting to manage smugglers and his unravelling marriage. Their cousin Japhet indulges in a high-stakes affair , jeopardizing his burgeoning friendship with Gwendolyn Druce Other members of the family despair over Lisette's increasingly erratic behaviour. In short, scandal abounds , threatening the good standing of the Loveday family.
The premise is interesting - the woes of a ship-building family in Cornwall during the 1790s - but despite sound historical research , too many characters people too few scenes, giving newcomers to the Lovedays little chance to care for them. Much of the backstory, presented in awkward dialogue , could have been left out. And instead of being selfcontained , the story ends abruptly. I would have preferred better pacing, more focus , and a satisfying conclusion.
Claire Morris
19TH CENTURY
THE WINTER QUEEN
Boris Akunin, Weidenfeld&Nicolson , 2003 , hb , £9.99 , 320pp , 0297829742. Pub in US by Random House , $19 95, hb , 140860494 It had to happen. For over ten years the fonner Soviet Union has been has been gripped in the James Bond cult, from the Kremlin gift shop to the bazaars of Kyrghyzstan. There had to be a Russian Bond.
There have been various pretenders but now a true successor has emerged, so we are told by the UK publishers. His name is Erast Fandorin , a detective in the Moscow CID in the 1870s. His creator, Boris Akunin has so far written four Fandorin stories which have sold over 8 million copies. The Winter Qu e en (published in Russia as A z az ee[) is the first to be translated into English. The next three are forthcoming
The obvious debt to Ian Fleming is the plot. It is absurd. Naturally it concerns an evil genius who conspires to take over the world (or perhaps it is a saintly genius conspiring to save an evil world - the novel is not without moral ambiguity). Our hero defeats the conspiracy through a series of impossible adventures in Russia and England (the evil/saintly genius has her base somewhere near Waterloo station). Repeatedly captured, he escapes bizarre forms of death by miracles of luck and daring , even though the conspiracy reaches into his own department. The most direct debt to Bond is in the final chapter , where Ernst's new bride is killed with an assassin's bomb - freeing him for the next amorous entanglement.
25 , AUG 2003
But Erast is no James Bond. Before the Casino Royale episode his boss has to teach him to play cards. He is distracted by the bargirls ' knees at his first visit to a night club and he envies other men ' s success with women. At the start of the novel he is young (20) and poor. Hi s whale-bone corsets cost half a month ' s salary This is his first trip outside Russia and the first time he has fired a gun. This is not the hero as a male fantasy but the hero as many men fear they really are , but hope to muddle through to glory nonetheless.
The book is translated into a slow measured E nglish , reminiscent of Conan Doyle. It fits the period. Akunin ' s Tsarist Moscow is very c redible, especially the protocol-ridden bureaucracy and the honour obsessed playboy ari s tocracy Victorian England is less convincing , but then Erast never pretends to understand it.
It is all great fun , but some of the story lines seem to get lost. What happened to Amelia and Count Zurov in London ? Perhaps the next book will tell me.
Edward James
WHEN DAYLIGHT COMES
Lynn Andrews , Headline , 2003 , £16.99 , hb , 2 81pp , 0747269084
Wealthy Jessica Brennan ' s life is turned upside down when her father ' s ships are lost, her mother dies , and her brother gambles away all that is left. Destitute, she starts a business selling feather trimmings to support herself and Tilly , a street waif
When I had sorted out the confusing connections between the fifteen names mentioned in the first nine-page chapter (seven of whose voices were u sed) , I could begin to concentrate on the story. But with the only specific clue to the period being the profusion of feathers used in decorating hats , my effort to establish a time was also distracting
The characters are interesting, the Liverpool background good , but could a destitute girl really earn enough in a year from selling hat trimmings to buy back a substantial family house , furnish it, and help out her brother? These stories may be fantasy but I prefer a bigger semblance ofreality.
Marina Oliver
WAY OF THE WORLD (US title : MR DARCY'S DAUGHTERS)
Elizabeth Aston , Orion, 2003 , hb , £12.99, 360pp , 0 75285 240 X Pub in US BY Scribner, $14, pb , 07432439
Although this novel contains some of the characters from Pride and Prejudice and draws on the family history, it is not , mercifully , a sequel. Darcy and his "dearest, loveliest Elizabeth " are far away in Constantinople and only appear in the conversation of others. The author has constructed the plot around the Darcy daughters , the main character being Camilla, a strong-minded young woman. The
story centres on the girls ' Season in London. In true comedic Regency style, plot and counterplot are crafted so that the girls' encounters with the opposite sex are far from straightforward and often farcical. The book is a romantic comedy after all. Despite being a little heavy-handed at times, the book has some memorable dialogue and the author has a good ear for the Regency idiom that Georgette Heyer made the trademark of romantic novels set during the period. (The use of "wind up", as in priming someone up to argument , is intriguing as I can find no reference to its use earlier than the 1970s - I'd be interested to hear if anyone knows of it appearing earlier than that.) I tried hard not to mind Colonel Fitzwilliam's change of character between Pride and Prejudice and this book. After all, despite some of the characters being familiar , the novel should be judged on its own merits. The author has cleverly distanced herself from Jane Austen's creation and created a new world in which her own characters define the story. The result is a lively romp and is sure to please readers who like Regencies of the sharp-witted variety rather than simply romances in muslin.
Geraldine Perriam
A SUMMER TO REMEMBER
Mary Balogh , Dell , 2003, $5.99 /C$8.99 , 416pp , pb , 04402366300
This Regency-era romance is fast paced and solidly written. The main characters are Kit Butler, a confirmed bachelor with a dangerous reputation who is intent on avoiding an arranged marriage, and Lauren Edgeworth , a young woman whose previous experience with love ended in humiliation when her fiance left her at the altar. The drama ensues when Kit determines that Lauren is the perfect foil for his father's plans. Will she fall for the sensitive male hiding behind the mask? Will he succumb to her irresistible combination of beauty and vulnerability ? Or will they go their separate ways as planned once the terms of their bargain have been fulfilled?
This is another enjoyable book by a bestselling author. My problem with it lies in the fact that some scenes and situations are virtually identical to those in another of her books which I reviewed previously. Is there anything wrong with that? That's up for her readers to decide. But for their sake, had she indulged in even a slight rework, the result might have been more pleasing.
Alice Logsdon
EMMABROWN
Clare Boylan, Little, Brown 2003 , £16.99, hb, 480pp , 0316725471
Charlotte Bronte died in 1855 having completed just 19 pages of a new novel, entitled Emma She had also begun another story, and one character, William Ellin, appeared in both fragments. These first drafts have now been
combined and completed, using some of Charlotte's own, unaltered paragraphs. The story begins with an apparently wealthy , respectable gentleman placing his little daughter , Matilda, in a small and financially struggling boarding school in Yorkshire Much is made of the plain , silent, richly dressed child - until the holidays, when it is discovered that the 'father' has disappeared and no further fees are forthcoming . When Matilda steadfastly refuses to say who she is and where she has come from, a kindly childless widow, Isabel Chalfont, takes her in and a local gentleman , William Ellin , begins the hunt for Matilda ' s real identity. Matilda then disappears. It would spoil the story to say any more, except to say that children did disappear in Victorian London; the truth, when it emerges , is drawn from real-life. If this real-life seems a touch too far for the shy , sheltered Charlotte Bronte to have contemplated, it should be remembered that her brother was a drug addict and alcoholic; two of her sisters died in a school where ill-treatment of children was the norm, and (as author Clare Boylan points out in her interview - page 6) Charlotte was no stranger to the downside of London. This is very much a Victorian novel in style ; characters pop up in unexpected places, just as they do in Dickens ' novels , and all the ends finally , and satisfyingly , join up. The story switches between a first person narrative by Isabel, and ' Matilda ' s' story , each entwined tale revealing their past histories, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Val Whitmarsh
COSETTE
Francois Ceresa , Macmillan 2003 , £10.99 , pb , 360pp,0333908759
This is a sequel to Victor Hugo ' s Les Miserables It is Paris, I 833. Jean Valjean has died and Marius is married to Cosette who has not got over Valjean ' s death and Marius does not know how to cope with the situation. With plenty of money he indulges in Society life. He meets the Marquis de Amedee and decides that his lifestyle is the one for him. From there it is all down hill until Marius finds himself in the same penal colony in which Valjean was imprisoned.
I started reading this book with enthusiasm, captivated by the way in which it carried on quite naturally from where L es Miserables left off but the more I read the less I liked it. Characters appeared from L es Miserables in various guises and the suspension of credibility was severely tested. When I reached the last page I was left with two thoughts - either the printer had forgotten to attach the last chapter or the author intends taking it on to a sequel of the sequel.
A great beginning but a disappointing ending. If you loved Les Miserable, read this with an open mind.
Marilyn Sherlock
THE HISTORICAL NOVELS REVIEW
ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
SHARPE'S HAvoe
Bernard Cornwell, Harper Collins, 2002, £17.99, hb, 380pp, 0007120109, US ISBN 0060530464
ln Sharpe's J 9th outing he's stranded in Portugal in 1809, and French commander Marshal Soult is invading from the north. When the book begins Lieutenant Sharpe of the 95 th Rifles is peeing into a flowerbed; straightaway, this reviewer knew she was in for a good, no-nonsense adventure! Subsequently given the mission of retrieving a certain Miss Savage, Sharpe finds the task difficult as the girl is in the company of a shifty Englishman. Treacherous Frenchmen and spies abound, and much fighting is to be had. Sharpe's resourceful character shines through, and he's obviously the man to follow in a crisis.
Since this was my first Sharpe novel, brief details of his upbringing and back history were greatly appreciated. These were woven in seamlessly when the opportunity arose. The soldierly behaviour rings true, as do the details of various weaponry and battles. It's a rollicking, satisfying read, and a great way to pass a few hours.
S Garside-Neville
AN ECHO OF HOPE
Dianna Crawford, Tyndale House, 2003, $9.99, pb,325pp,0842360123
The romance of recently widowed Hope Underwood with her childhood friend Michael Flanagan offers suspense and fears of war. This recommended book is the third and final novel in Hear/Quest's Reardon Valley series, the previous titles being A Home in the Valley and Lady of the River. The setting, the early 1800s in Tennessee and the Deep South, permits an agrarian element that's central to the story. Daily life is reported from Sunday-to-Sunday. Young women of the sewing circle struggle with family responsibilities and rearing children as their husbands engage in military service. Readers in their late teens and adults who enjoy easy reading inspirational novels will be drawn to this book. Religious convictions guide Hope, her family, and indeed the community through life, as Biblical lessons are put into practice. All of the characters, including Michael, struggle with the power of forgiveness.
Jetta Culpepper
IAMMADAMEX
Gioia Diliberto, Scribner, 2003, $24 / C$38, hb, 256pp,0743211553
John Singer Sargent's most notorious portrait, Madame X., caused a furore when unveiled in 1884 at the Paris Salon. The subject was a notorious beauty whose provocative air and dress were considered decadent at the time, even in Paris. No worse was the woman herself, Virginie Gautreau, a Louisiana Creole born in New Orleans who fled to France with her mother and sister to escape the American Civil War. Because of her French heritage, Virginie
dared to wind her way into French society, going from hennaed hussy to Professional Beauty Her arrogant promiscuity made her unpopular yet intriguing, and rising portrait painter John Singer Sargent was determined to paint her. Or so Virginie insists. After the disappointing exhibition, Sargent kept the painting, although Virginie considered it hers because she was its subject. He insisted on anonymity in the title, whereas she as furious not to be named in its notoriety.
Although this is a novel which imagines the history of Madame X- both painting and sitter - it is so delightful and realistic with the flavor of Belle Epoque France that the reader is willingly captured. Written in the first person, there can be no doubt that the fiery nature and self-assured arrogance of Virginie Gautreau is real. We visualize her as she schemes and laments, always returning to that cool, pale pose that is Madame X.
Tess Allegra
THE TEA ROSE
Jennifer Donnelly, HarperCollins, 2003, hb, 544pp, 0007161174. Pub in Us by Thomas Dunne, $24.95, hb, 0312288352
Fiona Finnegan, clever and ambitious, is saving precious pennies from her pay as an East End tea packer so that she and her costerrnonger sweetheart, Joe, can start a grocery shop far from the poverty and squalor of 1880s Whitechapel. But Joe is lured away to a promising career in the West End. Fiona's father is murdered by his boss for union organizing. Her mother is killed by Jack the Ripper. Desolate, Fiona flees to an uncle in New York. There she makes her own success and finds a loving marriage. But a fierce determination to avenge her parents draws her back to London.
First the bad news. The Tea Rose is strewn with irritating anachronisms: £10, £20 and even £50 notes; wads of fivers; transatlantic telephone calls - in 1898! The dialogue is Hollywood cockney or American modem: Fiona "dates" a banker and hires "wait-staff' for her tearoom. There are mistakes such as making a Viscount a Duke's heir. What do copy-editors do for their money? There is some silly name-dropping: Gauguin, ToulouseLautrec, the Van Gogh brothers and Seurat all drinking in the same Paris bar. In New York, Fiona meets Mr Carnegie, Mr Frick, Mark Twain and the Prince of Wales at Delmonico's Although Donnelly lives in Brooklyn, her late 19C New York is flat and featureless. Edith Wharton would not recognize this "society". London, however, despite some wonky geography, is full of colour and vitality as are Fiona's family, friends and enemies.
The good news is that Fiona is a feisty , endearing heroine. Even better is Donnelly's superb control of suspense. Fiona's flight and the final scenes of the novel are exciting and genuinely scary. As for Fiona and Joe, her
teasing will-they, won't-they get together is neatly pulled off. She captures the precariousness of survival. A few pence brings shelter and food; a few pence lost means starvation on the streets. Despite the infuriating lapses, Donnelly is a good story-teller. The Tea Rose is a pacey page-turner, funny, sad and heart-warming.
Lynn Guest
A PROPER MISTRESS
Shannon Donnelly, Kensington Zebra, 2003 , $4.99/ C$6.99, pb , 221pp, 0821774107
If you are in the mood to pamper yourself, grab a hot cup of tea, a large bar of chocolate, and Shannon Donnelly's latest Regency romance. You'll feel relaxed in no time! Lovely Molly Sweet is in a bit of a pickle. A wonderful cook, Molly dreams of opening her own inn and restaurant. However, while Molly has plenty of business acumen and culinary skill, she is decidedly short on cash. So , the sensible Molly must toil away as the head cook in one of London's most famous brothels. At least, that is, until the madam she works for hatches a plan to net Molly all the money she needs to buy her own inn. Theodore Winslow is looking for a wife and only the most improper ladies need apply. For Theo has one goal in mind: he must protect his wild older brother , Terrance, from disinheritance even if he has to ruin his own reputation to do so. Surely, Theo's "marriage" to a common strumpet will convince his aristocratic father to settle his estate on Terrance. Yet, the woman that has been hand picked to "play" the role of his betrothed isn't quite what he expected.
Donnelly's delightful tale of mistaken identity will charm you from the very beginning. Welldeveloped, engaging characters, a fast-moving plot, and a deep knowledge of the Regency time period combine to make A Proper Mistress a sure bet.
Eva Fox Mate
CONFESSING A MURDER
Nicholas Drayson, Norton , 2002 , hb, $23.95 / C$34.99, 281 pp, 0393051293 Reviewed in Issue 20, May 2002.
BLACK POWDER, WHITE SMOKE
Loren D. Estleman, Forge , 2002, $24 95 / C$34.95, hb, 3 l 8pp, 076430 l 89X
By the mid 1880s the old west is dying. But the public still thirsts for crime stories, and Wild West theatricals such as Buffalo Bill's are very popular. This is the tale of what happens when a journalist and a theatrical entrepreneur try to get a piece of that action.
THE HISTORICAL NOVELS REVIEW
Honey Boutrille , a black New Orleans businessman, kills a white man who is threatening one of the ladies employed in his establishment. He takes to the river, knowing that the law will not work in his favor. Across the country, Twice Emerson, an outlaw and cold-blooded killer, murders a tong leader, ISSUE 25 , AUG 2003
necessitating a quick exit from the San Francisco Bay area. The stories of these two murders are picked up by the newspapers, inspiring two men to pursue the culprits, not for the bounty but for more personal reasons.
Ernest Torbert, the journalist (and aspiring novelist), wants to tell Boutrille's story. Casper Box, the theatrical entrepreneur, seeks Emerson in order to stage an outlaw extravaganza, and make one final stab at hitting the jackpot.
Estleman brings his characters to life amid backdrops that include New Orleans' seedy French Quarter, San Francisco's notorious Devil's Acre, and, finally, the boomtown atmosphere of Denver, Colorado. While the outcome might not be unpredictable, the story is solid and will surely delight readers. The grit and glitz conveyed by the edgy writing and colorful characters can be summed up in two words: Wild West.
Alice Logsdon
THE ADVOCATE
Marcello Fois, Harvill Press, 2003, £10.00, 118 pp. 1860469043
I have great admiration for somebody who can manage to pack their story into just over one hundred pages, and still find room for some lyrical descriptions of the beauties of the Sardinian landscape and the trials of the human condition. Marcello Fois manages and to cap it all has set his story in an unusual place (well, how many novels have you read that were set in Sardinia?)
Back in I 898 lawyer Bustianu is called upon to settle what seems initially a simple matter; handsome young Zenobi has stolen some lambs and insists he is innocent. Rather than face any kind of justice he turns outlaw and flees to the hills, but when his employer and the father of his sweetheart are found dead in his own olive grove the finger seems irrevocably pointed at Zenobi. It is going to take all Bustianu's legal agility to find out whodunit, but it is not going to be as easy as all that even ifhe can.
Fois paints a vivid picture of rural life in an isolated place that has just started to become part of the modern world. It is a place of peasants and their masters, of people born and bred on the island and those that are from the mainland or who have spent some part of their lives there. It is also a tale set in a place of great beauty and much attention is paid to inspired descriptions of the sun-baked landscape that ought to do something (even if perhaps the story does not) for the Sardinian tourist board. Sure to appeal to aficionados of literary and mainstream fiction alike, this is the first of a series featuring Bustianu.
Rachel A Hyde
THE BATTLE OF MILROY STATION
Robert H. Fowler, Forge, 2003, $25.95, hb, 320pp,076530659X
This enjoyable story revolves around a fictional Civil War battle in "an unnamed Southern state." Senator Andrew Jackson Mundy is being secretly courted by a powerful member of William McKinley's party to run as the VicePresidential candidate in the 1896 election; this, despite the fact Mundy is from the opposing party. Mundy's appearance on the ticket would be an attempt to draw in the Southern vote, as he is a Civil War hero wounded in the Battle of Milroy Station. It is the circumstances which surround that wounding that form the basis of the novel.
Despite being an entirely fictitious tale, Fowler succeeds admirably in bringing out details of this battle as if it had actually happened, and there was plenty of history on which to base his account. His characters are well developed, and his depiction of scenery and combat are outstanding. I would have like to have seen more detailed maps of the battle's progress, but that minor gripe is the only shortcoming of an otherwise fine story.
Mark F. Johnson
STONE HEART: A Novel of Sacagawea
Diane Glancy, Overlook, 2003, $21.95/C$33 (13.16), hb, 152pp, l 58567365X
This brief, poetic volume places, side by side, the thoughts of Sacagawea with the actual journal entries of Lewis and Clark made during the legendary expedition. The author floats inside Sacagawea's mind, showing us the dreams and memories of a young Native American woman who has been tom from her own Shoshoni people and sold to a FrenchCanadian trapper, where she is the second of two wives. Sacagawea struggles to stay alive and to keep her newborn baby alive on the long march, and her struggles are paralleled by the rough day-to-day of the expedition. As she gathers roots and berries or scrapes hides, she ponders the differences between White and Red, between male and female. The author followed the trail of Lewis and Clark as she wrote. Her dedication to a rediscovery of the most powerless-paradoxically, now the most famous-participant of that early nineteenth century journey shows in nearly every line.
Juliet Waldron
THE SILVERTON SCANDAL
Amanda Grange, Robert Hale, 2003, £17.99, hb,220pp, 0709073410
Regency romances never seem to lose their popularity and fans of Amanda Grange won't be disappointed in this one. The story is well plotted and we have no difficulty in believing that the strong-minded Eleanor Grantham would be driven to desperate measures in her efforts to protect her younger sister from a blackmailer. When she meets the mysterious Earl of Silverton, the scene is set for abduction,
espionage, treachery and murder.
The ingredients of the plot may seem familiar, even down to the appearance of a highwayman, but the author has given her tale a freshness which is original and appealine. Both hero and heroine are attractive characters and we follow their adventures with interest as the tale moves along at a cracking pace.
Amanda Grange is not afraid of dialogue and she uses it to good effect as she takes us into the privileged world of the rich in 1810. England is still at war with Napoleon and we are shown the darker undercurrents which lie beneath the elegance and luxury of the lives of so many members of the upper classes.
Margaret Crosland
MY DEAREST CECELIA
Diane Haeger, St. Martin's Press, 2003, $24.95/C$34.95, 305pp, hb, 031228200 I Built around a Civil War legend about William T. Sherman and a young southern belle, Ms. Haeger's latest novel recounts their passionate affair. While fans of romance will find it a three-hankie read, serious historians will dismiss it as mere fantasy.
In May 1837, Cecelia Stovall visits her brother at West Point. There she meets William Sherman, her brother's roommate. They dance, spar verbally, and meet secretly. When they are found out, her brother whisks her away. Eventually she is married off to a family benefactor. On three or four occasions she and Shennan meet, most significantly when Cecelia works as a spy for the North. In the end, Sherman spares her home, invoking a vow he made when they first met to "ever shield and protect" her. The note is extant, though the author's version differs from the text of the real one.
Ms. Haeger's prose is not overly inspiring at first, most notably her weak grasp of point-ofview, male characters expressing themselves in distinctly female voices, and overuse of southern dialect. This improved over the course of the novel but made the first few chapters a tough slog. The plot itself, while good and wellpaced, is, from what I have learned, based very little in historical fact. For instance, l have found no mention of Cecelia Stovall being a Union spy. On a more positive note, Ms. Haeger is skilled at creating a believable setting, evoking strong images of the heat of the South and plantation life, while her characters are generally well-drawn. An author's note detailing what was real and what was fictional might have helped.
Civil War buffs not overly worried about accuracy will likely enjoy this book. I found it a pleasant enough read after the first few chapters, but do not consider it a "keeper". Teresa Basinski Eckford
25, AUG 2003
I SHOULD BE EXTREMELY HAPPY IN YOUR COMPANY: A Novel of Lewis and Clark
Brian Hall, Viking , 2003 , $25.95/£15.56, hb , 419pp, 067003189
In 1804, an expedition set off up the Missouri to chart the north of the unknown territory the United States had recently acquired from France in the Louisiana Purchase. Aware that the astonishing success of this voyage of discovery overshadowed the personal stories of those involved, Brian Hall attempts to make good the deficiency. This is, if you like, a novel in four voices. The principals are the expedition leaders, Meriwether Lewis, a mercurial, melancholy loner, and his friend William Clark, Lewis's opposite in many ways - dependable, optimistic and gregarious. Against these are set the startling perspectives of their guideinterpreters, the trapper Charbonneau and his Indian wife Sacagawea.
Each character 'speaks' in a distinctive voice, true to culture and background. Lewis is President Jefferson's secretary, a Virginia gentleman , erudite and full of intellectual curiosity. Overcome by writer's block on opening his journal, he envies the less educated Clark's naive confidence in putting pen to paper - even the man's eccentric spelling has an unintentional poetic aptness ('the choler of the earth (Clark had meant color - he was describing how the ravines flooded during rains and washed soil into the river , turning it brown ; two days later a choleric gully nearly washed him and the Bird Woman into the Missouri and over the Great Falls.'). Most intriguing is the Sacagawea's voice , in which Hall 'translates' the Shoshone world-view into English. The difficulty this reader had in following Sacagawea ' s story demonstrates vividly that the gulf between European and Native Americans ran deeper than language.
Spiced with Clark ' s earnest enthusiasm and Lewis's wry, dry wit, this is an absorbing novel of ideas and adventure, of culture-clash and what we would now call male-bonding: 'this sharing of thoughts between them occurs with increasing frequency Pound the two men and cook them in a crucible, pour out William Meriwether Lewis Clark. '
Sarah Cuthbertson
SPEAK TO ME OF LOVE
Robin Lee Hatcher, Tyndale House, 2003, $9.99,pb , 250pp , 0842360980
Longtime fans of Robin Lee Hatcher will find her latest book a bit familiar , but in this case the familiarity leaves only contentment in its wake. The award-winning Hatcher has revamped and retitled her 1996 mainstream romance, Chances Are , and released it as an inspirational romance. Set in Wyoming in the late 1880s, Speak to Me of love tells the story of Faith Butler, a single mother of two who works as a Shakespearean actress with a travelling troupe. When Faith's daughter becomes too ill to travel, Faith and her
children find themselves left behind in the small town of Dead Horse. When she learns that wealthy recluse Drake Rutledge is looking for a live-in housekeeper, Faith loses no time in applying for the job.
Against his better judgment, the bitter Rutledge gives Faith the job but cautions her to keep her distance. Scarred both inside and out, the last thing Rutledge wants is to become involved with the lovely Christian woman and her welcoming family. However , he soon recognizes that the love he finds with Faith and her children is all part of God's glorious plan, and he embraces his future with joy Ms Hatcher has once again penned a warm, touching story that is sure to please.
Eva Fox Mate
SILVER CREEK
A.H Holt, Avalon, 2003, $19.95 , hb , 190pp , 0803496001
An old-fashioned western straight out of the Saturday morning serials , Silv e r Creek is packed with action revolving around a young cowboy's effort to clear his father's name. John Garrett exiled himself from his Arizona ranch for six years after an argument, but a trusted friend sends word that there ' s need back home On the way , trouble leaves him wounded and on the run. Nursed back to health by Andrea Blaine, a neighbor with reasons not to trust a Garrett , the two find themselves falling in love anyway. But there's murder to solve and justice to pursue before Andrea trumps his beloved horse in John ' s affections.
First time novelist Holt provides action and vivid detail to spark a conventional story. The sense of place is especially strong, although the time period is not. Silver Cr eek suffers from too much "tell," with mostly stock characters often repeating whole scenes of action and reaction. The novel was also ill-served by sloppy editing that could have helped provide more economy of thought , and even allowed an earlier draft's version of the heroine's name to slip in.
Eileen Charbonneau
WILDERNESS RU
Maria Hummel, St. Martin's Press , 2002 , $24.95 / C$34.95 , hb, 339pp, 0312287577
This coming-of-age story set just before and during the American Civil War is historical fiction at its best. Bel and Lawrence are cousins, raised in a rich family in Vermont. But their wealth cannot protect them from the realities of slavery and the war. Lawrence enlists and discovers that war really is hell , but learns to cope. Bel remains at home , living a pampered life, one she grows to resent after meeting Louis, a handsome young Canadian who joins up to fight for the North
Soon she begins to rebel against her mother. When her aunt and uncle give her a chance for freedom, she takes it, even if it means nursing in Washington. There she too learns the realities of war , made worse when she must
nurse her cousin after he is badly injured Louis' presence does mitigate the circumstances somewhat and they begin to snatch moments of privacy As in so many historical novels, romance does have a role in this one. Bel is a worthy heroine, attractive and intelligent, yet also impulsive and far from perfect. Louis is a little more perfect, yet still so engaging that it is difficult to fault the author for creating him thus. Their developing relationship adds a hopeful touch to a novel so centred on war Ms Hummel has crafted a heart-wrenching tale of love, friendship, family secrets and war. Her carefully chosen words draw images in the mind , effectively bringing the era to life , while her characters are both appealing and true to the period. The complicated family relationship s add an extra touch of realism My only quibble was that the sections detailing life in the trenches sometimes dominated the action for a little too long. Highly recommended for both its historical atmosphere and riveting storyline Teresa Basinski Eckford
THE INDISCREET MISS TIERNEY
Gillian Kaye, Robert Hale, 2003, £17.99, hb, 205pp, 0709071817
Forced by circumstance to become governess to the children of her widowed cousin, Lord Stanford , Albina Tierney finds herself attracted to him. The attraction is mutual , although Lord Stanford's former amour, Lady Deanna Morrow , is eager to see it founder as she has hopes of becoming Stanford ' s wife herself and makes plans accordingly In order to discourage Lady Morrow's attentions , Lord Stanford asks Albina to pretend to be engaged to him , but the plan has unforeseen consequences for all concerned. A kidnap , a chase to Brighton and a riding accident are all components of thi s lively, but unlikely plot.
Robert Hale are champions of light-hearted Regency fiction and I ' ve enjoyed several of their novels , but not this one , I'm afraid Susan I licks
THE COWBOY WITH THE TIFFANY GU
Aaron Latham , Simon & Schuster, 2003 , $26 , hb , 384pp , 0743228537
Mumsy hates guns. Percy does not. They go west , picking up a randy Harvey Girl on the way. Mumsy nurses an old flame who might be Percy's father. And some cattle Percy learns to be a cowboy. He breaks his Harvey Girl's nose , then laughs. She looks so funny, see? He kill s a woman and acquires her Tiffany gun , of title He shoots it often He ' s quite a shot. The ear off a horse The head off a turtle. And many people. The jokes never stop Even when he endures many cliched western calamities including snakebite . Twice.
There's a "good" Indian named Custer He dies , of course. Never fear , Mumsy gets a joke out of it. The ranch is saved, traitor found , western justice served. Percy ' s quest to lose his
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ISSUE 25 , AUG 2003
virginity is even achieved when the Harvey Girl plays hard to get and he yanks the dreaded "L" word from his gut. Oh, and our hero finds an ax embedded in a tombstone that's like the Holy Grail, because he himself has been inspired by Sir Percival. Imagine.
Short sentences are well-served in this vacuous novel. And maybe various bodily discharges. History isn't. Characterization isn't. I'd skip it. The movie, too.
Eileen Charbonneau
DEATH OF A MILL GIRL
Clyde Linsley, Berkley Prime Crime, 2002, $5.99/ C$8.99, pb, 283pp, 0425187136
Josiah Beede, war hero and protege of President Andrew Jackson, returns to his roots, spending time farn1ing the difficult New Hampshire soil and working as a lawyer. That is, until the violated body of a stunning girl who had worked in a cotton mill is found on bis land. The list of suspects includes a peddler, Beede's black former slave, his neighbors, and the people from the mill.
You can feel the prevailing thoughts and feelings of the times concerning race, religionthrough the slain girl and Beede's dead wife, both Catholics-and slavery. Having made Beede live in New Orleans and Washington allows the author to contrast the various ways of life in the U.S. in 1836. He also excels in visually translating the physical setting of the farms and the mill to the reader's mind. Both the strengths and weaknesses of the book lie in Beede himself. He is defined well enough to have made me suspect that he was a real historical person, but his outlandish na"ivete when it comes to women is at odds with the urban life he led. The mystery, while present and adequate, doesn't overshadow the story, which should please historical novel aficionados despite a few self-avowed discrepancies and anachronisms.
Nicole Leclerc
THE FIEND IN HUMAN
John MacLachlan Gray, Century 2003, £14.99, hb,342pp, 0712674985
London in 1852 is a city of crime and where there is crime there must be punishment. When a number of women are brutally murdered and William Ryan is arrested, the public demands that the fiend should hang. Hack journalist, Edmund Whitty, and balladeer, Henry Owler, make their livings writing about this type of sensational crime, but when Owler contacts the murderer hoping to secure his 'True Confession' suddenly their livelihoods look at risk. Ryan claims to be innocent. Owler and Whitty join forces to try to discover the truth, but nothing is as it seems. Together the men scour the seedier side of London life, visiting slums, pubs and brothels along the way. The more they investigate the more confused things become and to make matters worse the men are being hampered by
their own demons. Owler is struggling to support his daughter and escape the poverty trap and Whitty has succumbed to the gentleman's vices of drink and drugs. On top of everything else, it becomes increasingly clear that the real culprit is closer at hand than either had first imagined
The Fiend in Human is a cracking good detective story, strongly plotted and heavy on historical authenticity. John MacLachlan Gray's writing style and voice have been strongly influenced by novels from that period, although he never makes the mistake of straying into parody or pastiche. The dialogue, characters and motivations all sit comfortably in a mid! 9th century setting and the London backdrop is particularly well realised.
This is a joy from beginning to end and a must-read for any fans of historical detection fiction.
Sara Wilson
AT THE EDGE OF HONOR
Robert N. Macomber, Pineapple Press, 2002, $12.95, pb, 278pp, 156164272X
Peter Wake is a young volunteer naval officer whose background as a merchant marine has ill prepared him for the rigors of war. It is the American Civil War, and Wake engages the Confederate enemy on land and sea along the coast of southwest Florida. When the story opens, it is 1863, and be arrives at Key West to take command of the Rosalie, a small sloop. He quickly learns that his decisions in war can have capricious consequences, both horrifying and rewarding. Rapidly, he earns a reputation as a quick-thinking and resourceful commander. While in Key West, Peter falls in love with Linda, the daughter of a suspected Confederate sympathizer, which casts doubts on bis future, both personally and professionally.
Throughout the novel, the author draws stunning images of land and sea along the tropical coast of Florida, which is a haunting contrast to the unfolding events. Essentially, the main characters are well developed, although Peter and Linda's relationship sometimes becomes a romantic clicbe. Also, at times, the story stalls, but it compensates with abundant historical details. Overall though, it is a worthwhile novel if you're interested in 19 th century naval or Civil War lore , and it hints of promise for future sequels.
Gerald T. Burke
POINT OF HONOR
Robert N. Macomber, Pineapple Press, 2003, $19.95, hb, 327pp, 1561642703
Peter Wake's saga continues in this second novel of the American Civil War set primarily off the west coast of Florida and the Caribbean. The story opens in early 1864. Wake is given a well-deserved promotion and the command of a schooner. With the promotion comes more demanding and dangerous assignn1ents, which take him and his crew from the Dry Tortugas to
Cuba and Mexico, then the British Bahamas, and, finally, to the inlands of Florida to fight the Confederate Anny. As he moves from one adventure to another, Wake increasingly earns the loyalty of bis steadfast crew, including his crusty but worldly-wise bosun Sean Rork. While he impresses his superiors, he continues to inadvertently cultivate enemies. After a drunken brawl in Key West, he sails on another assignment that redeems him. Finally, Peter creates dissention when he decides to follow his heart with Linda.
As the story, begun in At the Edge of Honor, widens in this novel, it becomes richer. The characters are more complex and the action moves well. It is clear the author is significantly knowledgeable about the Florida coast, Caribbean waters, sailing, and local Civil War history. If you're a fan of 19 th centu ry naval history and/or the Civil War, this is a book for you. If not, this book could make you one.
Gerald T. Burke
FREEDOM LAND
Martin L. Marcus, Forge, 2003, $24.95/C$34.95, 347 pp, hb, 0765304821
This "Eastern" is a fictionalized account of the Native American leader Osceola and the Second Seminole War of 1835-42 in Florida. The Seminoles provide refuge to runaway slaves, the "Freedom Land" of the title, provoking the pro-slavery government into taking action against them. Osceola, also called Billy Powell, is not a hereditary chief, but proves to be an able military leader. The Seminoles and ex-slaves carry out many successful guerrilla skirmishes in the Florida swamps, which in the end cost one soldier's life for every two Seminoles later relocated West. Marcus uses poetic license to change some of the facts, such as giving Powell/Osceola blond hair and blue eyes, when George Catlin's famous life portrait shows otherwise. Or killing off another Seminole leader, Alligator, when in reality he survived Osceola by several years. Despite that, the book is an action-packed adventure story that will appeal to fans of many kinds of fiction: military, Native American, African American, and adventure. And it should prompt readers to find out more about the period, always a measure of a good historical novel. It is a shame the author died of ALS just before the book was published.
B.J. Sedlock
BLUE HAZE
Tricia McGill, Jaco byte Books (www.jacobytebooks.com), 2000, AU$21, pb, 298pp, 1740530047
When Isabella O'Shea is sent to the penal colony in what is now Sydney, Australia, she never dreamed it would be an improvement. In 1818, female convicts usually became bed warmers for their masters or prostitutes in the factories. However, Tiger Carstairs, a successful ex-convict, senses her potential and
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ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
insists upon having her assigned to him as a kitchen maid. Their immediate mutual attraction is alternately indulged and denied as they seek to make the most of their lives in the new land.
The Australia penal colony is an interesting backdrop for this traditional romance. McGill explores the class system of convicts, exconvicts, and freemen and the livelihood options available to women at that time. This provides fodder for many misunderstandings, crucial to any romance novel. Unfortunately, Bella's mistaken assumption that Tiger thinks disparaging of her becomes tiresome and drags on well past its obvious conclusion. Even Tiger says " ..let's not go over that boring path again " when being accused of snobbery for the umpteenth time.
As a romance novel, the requisite happy ending is barely reward enough for enduring these frequently unlikable characters. But the glimpse into the hardships of Australian life in the early 1800s may be worth the effort.
Suzanne J. Sprague
THE DISAPPEARANCE OF SHERLOCK HOLMES
Larry Millett , Viking, 2002, $23.95, hb, 340pp, 0670031402
This continuation of the Sherlock Holmes story will not please many Baker Street Irregulars, nor will it satisfy historical novel fans looking for period authenticity. The major mystery involves less than subtle clues left on purpose by a villain luring the famous detective for the purposes of melodramatic revenge. Millet's Holmes lacks not only the superficial trademarks of Holmes like the violin, the cocaine, and the deerstalker hat, but also the more essential character elements , such as dark moods , coldness and impatient superiority. Little is explained , and the solution of the mystery involves gunplay with gangsters more than cogitation about chemistry.
The portrayal of the Britain and the United States at the beginning of the last century offers some opportunity for creating interest, but for the most part this is confined to meticulous description of landmarks. The section involving Chicago uses the name of Bathhouse John Coughlin, an admittedly corrupt alderman, but never alleged to be anything like the psychopath rapist Millet described. The elephantine alderman seems to have been an unlikely candidate for the athletic and murderous escapades in which Millet has him tangling with Holmes.
Perhaps this objection is mean-spirited because the disarming author's note says the book "makes no great claims to historical accuracy." Endnotes do link events and places in the text in a way that should be done by more historical novelists. However, Millet offers no compelling reason to choose his new creation over a re-reading of Arthur Conan Doyle. James Hawking
GALVESTON
P.G. Nagle, Forge, 2002, $24.95 / C$34.95, hb, 378pp,0312876149
P.G. Nagle has devoted herself to chronicling the U.S. Civil War in the Southwest. While most Civil War histories and novels concentrate on the better known struggles around Richmond, Nagle prefers the largely unknown New Mexico and Texas actions. The important port city of Galveston, Texas, has been captured by Union forces in 1862, and Confederate artillery officer Jamie Russell becomes a key player in recapturing the city and in saving his sister and aunt who have been trapped inside. Nagle does her usual workmanlike job of interweaving fictional characters with historical figures in a setting that proves as dramatic as any in the combat surrounding Richmond. Readers may find reading Glorieta Pass and Guns of Valverde a rewarding prelude to Galveston.
John R. Vallely
LOVE'S PROOF
Catherine Palmer, Tyndale House , 2003 , $9.99 , pb,295pp,0842370323
This is an inspirational-cum-romantic suspensecum-Regency novel set in 1819 London Jane Fellowes is a member of a family descended from Sir Isaac Newton Their legacy from the great scientist is a chest that seems to have mysterious powers, such as causing madness or shocking those who touch it. Jane consults scientist Thomas Norcross in a quest to use the chest to prove the existence of God. When the chest is stolen , their search leads them into the East End and danger. Palmer based the story on real people from the period, and in an afterword explains what happened to them and to Newton's Box in real life.
Jane and Thomas feud at first and later fall in love, as good Regency romance characters are expected to do. Jane's religious doubts and desire for the proof of God's existence contrast with Thomas's initial disbelief in anything religious. There is a nice scene in which Jane and Thomas visit a circus troupe in the East End , and are impressed by the sideshow denizens' faith, despite their physical deformities. I question the historical accuracy of some of the author's plot points, but otherwise the book succeeds in all three genres.
B.J. Sedlock
SO NEAR SO FAR
C. Northcote Parkinson, McBooks Press , 2003, $13.95,pb,268pp, 1590130375
For Captain Richard Delancey, his triumph at taking a French prize is mingled with misfortune. Peace has been declared. Conflict has become personal in the form of Captain Charbonnier, who wants his ship back. Driven by financial need, Delancey forms a bold scheme to trick the madman. In the first chapter of So Near So Far, C. Northcote Parkinson proves a master story-teller. In Chapter 2, he
mixes the chemistry of romantic entanglements into something amusing and a pleasure to read This is good writing: periodic sentences that land squarely on point and build to paragraphs which progress to pages. Witty dialog reveals logic and emotion in the psychology of characters who socialize and win our sympathy The panorama extends from ladies in the drawing room, to the Lords of the Admiralty , to the shore action of a midshipman. The reader can gain valuable insight about war and espionage.
The author shares many a profound truth At a French staff meeting , a Colonel admits, "I seldom read history. After my years on the staff I know that the truth will never be told about anything, and if it were told , nobody would believe it." The dashing hero Delancey would agree with him. He falsifies his reports when expedient.
One quibble is that the arc of the story resolves the romantic subplot too soon, leaving the explosive conflict for the theatre of war. A classic of naval fiction has found its way into reprint.
Marcia K. Matthews
THE CRIME OF FATHER AMARO
E9a de Queiroz, trans. from the Portuguese by Margaret Juli Costa, New Directions , 2003 , $14.95 , pb,480pp,0811215326
Pub. in the UK by Carcamet Press , 2002 , £5.95, 220pp,pb, 1857546849
The novelist Jose Maria E9a de Queiroz is often compared to Dickens , a Dickens refined , without sentimentalism. Born in a small Portuguese fishing town in 1845, the son of a retired judge and a nineteen-year-old unmarried girl, E9a de Queiroz went on to become a lawyer, a diplomat, and the founder of the Realist-Naturalist school in Portugal. The Crime of Father Amaro is only the first novel in a literary production that comprised short stories, chronicles, letters , essays , and literary criticism.
It is the unsparing portrait of a stagnant society, a novel filled with a host of fascinating secondary characters, unforgettably described. It is mordantly funny, tragic , and , above all , humane. It tells the destructive love story of Amaro Vieira, a Catholic priest and a "handsome, strapping lad," and lovely Amelia. Their relationship is set against the backdrop of Leiria, a small Portuguese city, bursting with narrow-mindedness and hypocrisy. E9a spares no one; he rails against priests , who believe "the main cause of poverty is immorality ," against superstition and provincialism. His eye for detail is striking, whether describing the physical beauty of the Portuguese countryside, the psychology of a character, or the distended bellies of poor children. It's impossible not to wince when Amaro fumes , "Do they imagine that as soon as an old bishop says to a strong, young man ' Thou shalt be chaste' that his blood suddenly grows cold?" Juli Costa ' s brilliant
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translation preserves E<;:a's sharp, ironic prose and the elegant flavor of his humor. I hope Ms. Juli Costa will do the English-speaking world a tremendous favor and translate E<;:a's other novels. His is a literary production not to be missed
Adelaida Lower
BLOOD FOR BLOOD
S.K. Rizzolo, Poisoned Pen Press, 2003, $24.95, hb,250pp, 1590580540
In this second installment of this Regency series (The Rose in the Wheel, Issue 19), S.K. Rizzolo reminds us of how difficult it was to be an English woman without substantial means and how caste-driven English society was in 1812. The engaging main characters, Penelope Wolfe and John Chase, a Bow Street Runner, help move this story along apace.
As a young footman lay dying in the garden of the house in which Penelope is employed as a lady 's companion, he utters an apocalyptic passage from the Bible which Penelope overhears. Being of an analytical nature, Penelope becomes involved in seeking out the murderer with her friend, Chase, who is doing the police work. They soon discover that the footman had been leading a double life. The case becomes more convoluted than either initially imagines
Penelope is endearing, bright and capable. A woman with a fascinating past and a difficult present, she is caught between two worldsthat of the sedate, married mother of little Sarah and a woman deserted by her husband but still legally bound to him. While Penelope's choices and those of other women in the book are severely limited by the onerous class distinctions in English life, she certainly makes the best of it. The denouement of the book might not be as successful as I would have liked, but overall, it is a very enjoyable followup to the first book in the series.
Ilysa Magnus
GHOST WARRIOR
Lucia St. Clair Robson, Forge, 2002, $27.95/£16.76, hb, 496pp, 0312871864 , Tor, 2003,$6.99,pb, 608pp, 0812576098
This is the story of Lozen, an Apache woman, shaman, healer, horse thief and warrior who had the unique distinction of being allowed to fight alongside Geronimo, Victoria , and Cochise in the struggle against both the forces of the United States and Mexico. Lozen has been called the Apache Joan of Arc because of her visions warning of an approaching enemy, thus allowing the Apaches to prepare to fight or hide. While there are similarities between these two women, I personally found the comparison a little tenuous.
The story is based around two characters, Lozen and Rafe Collins, a white civilian working for the US Army, whose paths cross on many occasions. Over the years they develop a mutual trust and respect for each other, which
deepens with their shared experiences, and fate throws them together. However, this is definitely not a love story. It is essentially a story of two sharply contrasting cultures neither of which has any understanding of the other.
The book is well researched and while it describes the genocide practised by both the Mexican and US authorities, the author a lso details the savage reprisals carried out by the Apaches. There is a great deal of violence, but those looking for a 'shoot 'em up' western will be disappointed. However, if you want a novel which gives you a unique insight into a part of Native American history, then this book is for you.
Mike Ashworth
LISTEN TO THE MOCKINGBIRD
Penny Rudolph, Zumaya , 2002, $15, pb, 279pp, 1894869737
Rife with incident, this 1860s New Mexico-set novel follows Matty Summerhayes from abused army wife to convict to horse rancher. She must overcome obstacles from a plot to steal her land for its fabled gold mine to Union and Confederate fighting over the course of the Civil War, to flash floods and bubonic plague.
The galloping story is a page-turner , but sometimes suffers from too much "tell" and cliched shortcuts at the expense of the verisimilitude that comes with well placed detail. ("I was knitting some mindless articlea scarf, I th ink. ")
The weakest link is the narrator herself. Matty's growth into self-sufficiency was less than convincing and almost seemed an accident of plot. When her former slave returns to help Matty run the ranch, Winona's story, spirit and resourcefulness make her mistress suffer by comparison. Even as Matty's husband's abuse and the forces against her mount, it 's hard to conjure interest in a woman whose dog and horse have to die before she realizes she's in big trouble.
Eileen Charbonneau
MORE THAN A DREAM
Lauraine Snelling, Bethany House, 2003, $12.99,pb,320pp,0764223194
Lauraine Snelling sent readers back to North Dakota with the third book in the Return to Red River series. She continues the tale of the Bjorklund family as they deal with the 1897 Red River flood Thorliff Bjorklund is finally achieving his lifelong dream by writing articles for the Minneapolis Tribune and Harper's Magazine. When the flood destroys his hometown, Thorliffreturns home to help family and friends cope and recover. Snelling continues to please her fans and new readers of inspirational fiction. For those interested in reading from the beginning, look for A Dream to Follow, also published by Bethany House. For an introduction to the Bjorklund clan, start with An Untamed land.
Melissa Galyon
THE HISTORICAL NOVELS REVIEW
WYNDHAM'S BRIDE
Mary Street, Robert Hale, 2003, £17.99, hb, 224pp, 0709073747
Emily Wyndham's family is in financial straits, their only hope resting in a marriage between Emily and her cousin Henry which she views with misgivings. Then Sir Charles Wyndham, whom she has met only once, asks for her hand. Not only will he accept her without a dowry, he will pay off her family's debts. Sir Charles could have any woman he wants, so why has he settled upon her? Emily accepts while making clear her suspicions. As the story unfolds, she learns what is behind Henry's determination to inherit the family home - and why Sir Charles is determined to prevent it.
This is Mary Street's tenth book and clearly she has found the right tone for her market. The story has mystery and romance and you're never in doubt about the happy ending.
Janet Mary Tomson
THE VALIANT SAlLORS
V. A. Stuart, McBooks , 2003, $14.95, pb , 266pp, 1590130391
The tyrannical, venal, sadistic, and antisocial ship's captain is such a common figure in historical fiction about the age of the "iron men and wooden walls" that is has become a cliche. Overused or not , the interplay between courageous and noble junior officer and Blighlike sailing ship commander remains as arresting as ever. First Lieutenant Phillip Hazard of H.M.S. Trojan is confronted with an insane Captain North as he sails to Sevastapol for the Crimean War. Hazard's black sheep older brother and a bewitching member of the Russian nobility keep our hero's attention from focusing exclusively on dealing with the rigors of war and the strain of coping with a psychotic commanding officer. In this first book of a series, Stuart has done a fine bit of writing on an era of naval history which is largely forgotten today.
John R. Vallely
THE BRA VE CAPT Al S
V.A. Stuart , McBooks Press , 2003, $14.95, pb, 235pp, 1590130405
V. A. Stuart's series on the Crimean War continues with this second volume of the adventures of Lieutenant Phillip Hazard. Freed from the difficulties of dealing with an insane commanding officer in Valiant Sailors , Hazard must now prove himself as a Royal Navy liaison officer with Lord Raglan's British Army besieging the Russian fortress of Sevastapol. Unlikely as it may seem, Hazard finds himself caught up in that most famous of cavalry assaults-the Charge of the Light Brigade Sophia Narishkin , a married Russian noblewoman, and Hazard are two young lovers caught up in the violence of the Crimean War in a rather unlikely love story that is carried over from the first book in the series Although the author tends to overdo the historical twists and ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
turns of the political and military aspects of the conflict, the protagonists and the dramatic events which surround them make for an entertaining tale.
John R. Vallely
THE SERGEANT'S LADY
Miles Hood Swarthout, Forge, 2003 , $25.95/C$35.95, hb, 302pp, 0765305062
This Western is set in the waning days of the wars against the Apaches in Arizona Territory . Cavalry Sgt. Swing's detail is assigned to set up a heliograph station on a mountain, using mirrors and sunlight to signal the whereabouts of any Apaches they see. When making trips to a nearby ranch for water and supplies, Swing becomes interested in the rancher's feisty sister, who is as fearless an Indian fighter as any cavalryman. And Swing and his men need all the help they can get when a seemingly friendly visit by Apache women and children turns nasty.
Swarthout based this novel on a short story his father published in the 1950s. The author's screenwriting experience (The Shootist) stands him in good stead. He paints excellent word pictures, and the story moves at a rapid pace through the short chapters. The character development is many cuts above most genre novels. Minor characters such as Swing's men and the Apaches are all distinct individuals. Swarthout imparts much interesting information about Apache and cavalry life without forcefeeding the reader. An outstanding Western, worthy of many re-reads.
B.J. Sedlock
THE AMERICAN BOY
Andrew Taylor, Flamingo, 2003, £17.99, hb, 485pp, 0-00-710961 X
Edgar Allen Poe, at a small private school in London, is the American boy, but it is the events connected with his friend Charlie Frant's family, related by their tutor Thomas Shield, which form the plot of this book. Thomas, suffering from his less than heroic experiences at Waterloo, is trying to rebuild his life amid the problems of violent death and overwhelming love.
There are murders and mysteries of identification , some originating in America, which move from the stews of Seven Dials to the houses of wealthy bankers m London and rural Gloucestershire
Andrew Taylor gets better with every book. This is a beautifully written, compelling, psychological thriller I found difficult to put down. The slums, the Regency merchant society, the country estate in winter, are all observed with clever detail, and the emotions of Thomas as he loves but is helpless to aid Charlie's widowed mother , powerfully drawn. Highly recommended.
Marina Oliver
POPPY SILK
Michael Taylor, Hodder & Stoughton , 2003, £18.99, hb, 538pp, 034081828X
Poppy Silk is the oldest daughter of a navvy , an itinerant labourer working on the railroads of England's Black Country. With her parents and siblings, she lives in destitution in Blowers Green, a shanty town on the outskirts of Dudley, though yearns for something better. Through Robert Crawford, a sympathetic young engineer, she learns to read and write. Robert, in turn, finds himself drawn against his will to the attractive and delightful Poppy. But is their love strong enough to overcome society's certain disapproval, and can she hold on to her virtue in an environment where heavy drink and loose morals are a way of life? Poppy Silk is a superior saga that happily avoids the usual melodrama, and in Poppy the author has created an appealing heroine who I couldn't help but root for. As a consequence, I've already ordered several of Michael Taylor's other novels.
Sarah L. Johnson
CONFEDERATE MONEY
Paul Varnes, Pineapple Press , 2003, $18.95, hb, 269pp, 1561642711
Young Henry Fern vows revenge against the Yankees who wounded him and killed his stepfather during an 1861 raid on Florida's Cedar Key salt works. Helped by the narrator , Ben, he kills some Yankee soldiers, and then they set out on a quest that lasts the whole war. Foreseeing the eventual defeat of the South , Henry tries to convert $40,000 in Confederate paper money he took from horse thieves into property or specie. The author creates tension by regularly reporting the falling worth of the paper money , rather like a timer on a potential bomb.
Lovers of character-driven stories will be disappointed in this book. None of the characters is emotionally involving. Henry is almost too good to be true: he is a crack shot, can forge any signature undetectably , relatives and the followers he picks up during their journeys go along with his ideas and pronouncements without question, and despite being a civilian, he dictates military strategy to an army captain. We do get inside Ben's head , being the narrator, but he doesn't change much during the course of the story. He just reports on what Henry does. Another quibble: Henry and Ben travel with almost unbelievable ease between and through the Union and Confederate armies, helped by their medical knowledge and Henry's pass-forging skills. Given the extreme popularity of anything to do with the U.S. Civil War, the weak characterizations may not be a problem for the many readers who prefer plot-driven adventure stories to character studies. And they will enjoy learning about lesser-known aspects of the war, such as Florida's participation, Sherman's "white slave" trains, and how some people survived economically. The author based many
events in the book on stories pas sed down through his family.
B.J. Sedlock
THE GREATER THE HONOR
William H White, Tiller, 2003, $29.95, hb , 287pp, 1888671440
Sailing novels of Lord Nelson's age are of deserved popularity, from Horatio Hornblower to the late lamented O'Brian's Aubrey and Maturin. William H. White's attempt to do the same to American victories against the Barbary pirates , the "shores of Tripoli" of the Marines' hymn, is , however , a disappointment.
A youthful midshipman on his first tour, Oliver Baldwin, is a poor choice for first-person narrator, leading to vastly more telling than showing throughout. Dialogue, usually a good choice for enlivening a tale , here is far overused, constantly resorted to in order to tell us things Oliver is in no position to see. The technical sailing information, which more skillful writers weave in with sugar coating that makes us greedy for more, is dumped on us like quarts of cod liver oil in speeches of the "As you know , Oliver--" type.
Poor characterization made me think it must have been drawn , however clumsily, from life Notes assure me otherwise. Events, too , are poorly chosen for drama , ill prepared to heighten tension and then constantly diffused by what must be meant as humor When a battle scene, for example, is set off from the start as a bout of "festivities," well, I have lost any investment I had in wanting to see what happens.
What was vital to this tale--and was completely missing--is some understanding of what the pirates were up to What honor is there to be victorious over an adversary portrayed as only faceless and stupid from the start? The reader is offered no better understanding or even closeness to the action than the soulless video game action over present-day Baghdad Ann Chamberlin
HAWK'S VALLEY
Arvid Lloyd Williams , Evergreen, 2003, $15.95,288p~p~096334807-8
This novel opens as a reporter comes to interview Hawk Owen about life in frontier Minnesota. Hawk begins his narrative with an account of a day in August, I 861. That day , he began life on his own after a terrible quarrel with his father, John. Leaving his parents and younger brother , Jake, behind , Hawk falls in with a Metis trade caravan on the way to St. Paul. Traveling with these men and women, Hawk learns many of the skills that will help him survive. He also earns the friendship and trust of his companions.
Meanwhile, back at home , trouble with a band of rogue Indians leaves his mother dead , his father missing and Jake with a thirst for vengeance. Jake sets out to seek justice , not knowing that his father is alive and off on his
own path. As these three men wind their separate ways across the Minnesota territory, it becomes clear who will survive, who will fail, and why. It is also inevitable that they will cross paths again at some point. In fact, the string of coincidences that leads them together is unbelievable.
This action-packed novel is the first in a planned series. The author's love for the landscape and history of his region of the country is evident throughout. Though the pacing of the events is often rushed, there are some very compelling battle scenes. There are, further, some structural problems with this novel, such as when the narrative ends without reference to the reporter in the first chapter. Still, this is a good effort that will be of interest to people who enjoy frontier tales.
Alice Logsdon
19120TH CENTURY
THE VISITOR
Anita Burgh, Orion Books, 2003, £17.99, hb, 370pp, 0-75284-725-2
Set in Devon at the time of the Boer War an attractive young girl, Phoebe Drewitt, escapes from her brutal father and her miserable life on Dartmoor. Cold and wet she is rescued by Kendall Bartholomew whose motives for educating her and teaching her how to behave puzzle the reader almost as much as they puzzle Phoebe. She escapes from one disastrous situation to another until she is eventually befriended by kind-hearted Dulcie, the wife of Arnold Randolph-Smythe whose deceit and lechery causes misery and hatred amongst all who are unfortunate enough to become involved in his life.
The characters are well portrayed and I got to know them well. Innocence, money and debauchery are skilfully woven into the story. Anita Burgh is a good story-teller who describes the countryside scenery and the houses vividly.
Although The Visitor is described as an historical novel it makes little reference to the Boer War except that Phoebe's brother, Dick, is a soldier fighting in the war, nor does it give any insight into other historical matters of the time. The actual story could be set in any period of time and is not dependent on that particular period.
Throughout the story there was always the hint of a happy ending and although I turned the pages, anxious to find out what eventually did happen to Phoebe I was disappointed not to be given greater details about the war that was actually taking place. The novel is actually an historical romance on the 'local girl makes good' theme.
Jane Hill
THE HISTORICAL NOVELS REVIEW
ANOTHER KIND OF LIFE
Catherine Dunne, Picador 2003, £10.99, pb, 479pp, 0330413082.
Set during a rapidly changing Ireland between 1886-1906 with a background of political tension, the story of the fight for Home Rule is seen through the eyes of two Catholic families of different social classes. One lives in Dublin the other in Belfast.
The three daughters of the O'Connors of Dublin are comfortably middle class. In contrast, Mary and Celia McCurry work in the linen mills of Belfast with an uncertain future. Inevitably, their stories are linked and unfold in ways none of them could have imagined.
The central character is Eleanor, the youngest O'Connor girl whose personal journal is the kingpin around which the other lives revolve.
The bibliography indicates a well-researched narrative and Catherine Dunne writes perceptively. The novel evolves by telling the individual stories of a character's life; events quickly follow, sometimes told from a different aspect with little change in words or outlook. Similar names and the past intruding on the present occasionally interrupt the flow of the story.
The Victorian realism is there but would have wished more joy into their lives.
Gwen Sly
20TH CENTURY
THE MADAM
Julianna Baggott, Atria Books, 2003, $24 /C$38, hb,288pp,074345457X
Yes, The Madam does refer to the world's oldest profession, and yes, Alma, the titular madam, does arrive at it in one of the usual ways (poverty), but there is little of the stereotypical or salacious. Living in West Virginia in the 1920s, Alma, her husband, and their three children have a hardscrabble, Depression-era life. Henry and Alma take off to Florida to chase a dream of riches, leaving their oldest in their house and the two youngest in the orphanage. Only Alma returns, Henry preferring to continue chasing the dream. Joining forces with the discarded, junkie mistress of the local rumrunner and the giantess who falls in love with her, Alma decides that her only option is to open a whorehouse.
Baggott's great-grandmother was a madam, and her grandmother (Lettie in the novel) was raised among her prostitutes. The author reveals, with honesty and sympathy, the day-today life of a madam: the fending off and buying off of the local sheriff, Alma's efforts to keep Lettie's life normal. It is this latter concern that drives the end of the novel, and Alma's solution, while drastic, is as understandable as her decision to become a madam.
Baggott has written a beautiful tribute to the women in her family.
Ellen Keith
0 CE TWO HE ROES
Calvin Baker, Viking, 2003, $23.95 / $36, hb, 275pp,067003l64X
It would be too easy to say Once Two Heroes is a novel about bigotry. Calvin Baker wrestles with many themes: the nature of man, the dangers of blood lust and blind fealty, the varied perception of good and evil, and the difficulties of returning soldiers to civilization.
Mather Rose is an African-American raised in Paris. Lewis Hampton is a white man from a small Mississippi town. In Europe during WWII, both men fight an explicit evil. Upon return to the U.S., Mather petitions Washington D.C. for the Medal of Honor, the one award promised to him but not yet bestowed. Passing through Mississippi after having been denied, Mather is confronted by Lewis' bigoted brother. Mather kills him in a sudden violent act that may or may not be self-defense. Upon hearing the news, Lewis - who can read the medals upon Mather's chest - makes a horrific decision. This act is justified, so Lewis tells himself, because 'a Negro in uniform killing a Southerner is an act of war.' To be a man, Lewis must 'set the world to rights,' defend his 'country,' and find his way 'back into the fellowship of man.'
Baker is an intense writer. The narrative is marred by self-conscious literary prose, but this fault disappears in the action scenes, which are vivid and powerful. Once Two Heroes depicts the chilling way in which any ordinary man can rationalize brutality.
Lisa Ann Verge
SALTIDLL
Judith Barnes, St. Martin's Press, 2002, $24.95/C$34.95, hb, 376pp, 0312290187
Set against the world of horse ranching in mid 20 th century British Columbia, this debut novel revolves around people as real as those we live with. Harris, a mysterious African American, Grey, an Irish emigrant, and Elsa, Grey's unconventional daughter, can all express their feelings for their horses, but have trouble doing likewise for each other. Although Harris appears out of a shrouded past, Grey turns him from a guest to an employee when he discovers Harris's gift with horses. Later, when he begins to care for Harris above his own son, he tries to make him more than an employee. But Harris is fighting nightmares and memories from his past. Meanwhile, Elsa, talented markswoman, artist, and horse handler, struggles to adulthood amid her desires and her family's expectations. Although complex, this novel is easy to read and effortless to admire. The author's prose is in tum lyrical and earthy, while her depiction of a horse ranch circa 1950 is marvelously detailed. I enjoyed her descriptions of British Columbia, including a Vancouver of bygone days. She draws the reader into her themes of despair, loyalty, self-respect, love, and dealing with the past. While the story is not laid out in linear progression, it is a delight to meander
25, AUG 2003
into the characters' pasts and then back again. With its mixture of raw intensity and bleakness, and its superb characterization, I think Salthill will be remembered.
Claire
Morris
A GREATER GLORY
James Scott Bell, Bethany House, 2003, $12.99, pb,30lpp,0764226452
Kit Shannon returns in a new series, The Trials of Kit Shannon, which is highly recommended for fans of the Shannon Saga (City of Angels, Angels Flight, Angel of Mercy). As a lawyer, an atypical profession held by a woman in early 1900s Los Angeles, Kit must defend a society lady with a dark past. The trial proves to be a unique confrontation between two female lawyers. The author enriches the plot by drawing from the setting in a time when spiritualists were popular and the magician, Harry Houdini, entertained crowds. A greater legal challenge arrives when the life of Kit's fiance, Ted Fox, becomes at risk. His career as a pilot has grown with the expansion of air travel, but then he's arrested for treason. The suspense entering Kit's life rivals that of a thriller novel. This well written and inspirational story will intrigue readers through the last page.
Jetta Culpepper
THE MOON AT MlDNIGHT
Charlotte Bingham, Bantam 2003, £5.99, pb, 544pp, 0553813994
The third book in the Bexham series features the original characters and the new generation as they face the challenges of 1962. The Cuban crisis, the cultural changes of the sixties and a direct threat to their own idyllic existence from the dreaded developer.
A car crash irrevocably influences the lives of three teenagers and splits their families wrecking the close friendships forged during wartime and the aftermath.
Charlotte Bingham portrays the characters with great sympathy and sets them firmly in the sixties. There is tragedy, humour and warmth. If you like a good realistic story you will enjoy this.
Marina Oliver
THE NEWSBOYS' LODGING HOUSE
Jon Boorstin, Viking, 2003, $24.95/C$37.50, 340pp,hb,0670031151
This novel fictionalizes what might have happened during philosopher William James's "missing months." In his early thirties , suicidal, overwhelmed by the problem of evil, James suffers a nervous breakdown. Taking refuge in a book about a newsboy 's ascent from rags to riches, written by that champion of positive thinking, Horatio Alger, James decides to investigate the real thing. This son of Boston Brahmins arrives, almost penniless, in the slums of New York. He makes his way to the newsboys' lodging house, where his
adventures-and a confrontation with the brutality and evil thriving in the city-begins. The narration , alternating between James and an orphaned newsboy he hopes to rescue, is wonderfully period- and class- correct. The hypocrisy of the rich, police and judicial corruption, and the struggle of the masses, packed into cholera and rat ridden neighborhoods, is powerfully evoked. Other historical figures, such as Anthony Comstock, Horatio Alger, and the Vanderbilts, assist the plot. The philosopher, retreating to leisure and privilege, has regained his sanity, but-at least in this novel---emerges as a less admirable character than his charity cases.
Juliet Waldron
THE MARINE
James Brady, Thomas Dunne, 2003, $24.95, hb, 320pp,0312291426
"Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph." So James Brady's forward to this war novel begins, with Thomas Paine's words read by George Washington to his fighting troops in 1776. These words resonate throughout this memorable war novel celebrating the United States Marine Corps career of Colonel James ("Ollie") Cromwell.
Frank honesty fills every page about his part in WWII and the Korean War. Ollie Cromwell "accidentally" becomes a notable boxer at the University of Notre Dame, a skill highlighting the training that will initiate his Marine career and attract the attention of officers who guide his promotions. His true mettle is tested in battles on islands in the Guadalcanal area and later in the first hundred days of the Korean War. Most fascinating are the ways Brady weaves together the plans of military strategists and the actual implementation that yields success but also a heavy loss of life. Readers will be stunned by the failure of equipment intended for different wartime conditions, the paralysis of soldiers' ability to mourn the dead, weather and tropical conditions trying to the heartiest individual, and the lack of understanding American politicians and military officers demonstrate in the face of ruthless enemy attacks. What resounds louder than any weakness, however, is how Ollie and his peers learn from mistakes, creatively adapt to all conditions with brilliant maneuvers, keep a realistic perspective in the face of those who know "squat" about war, face reeling feelings after losing friends, and accept that war is truly a necessary hell enabling citizens to love and live in security from all tyranny.
Gritty, complex, powerful, and stoic, Ollie Cromwell and these wars will linger long after the last page has been turned.
Viviane Crystal
STAINED GLASS ROSE
D.A. Brockett, Western Reflections, 2002, $14.95,pb, 143pp, 1890437611
Stained Glass Rose is a fictionalized account of a crime that took place in Grand Junction, Colorado, in 1937. Intrigued by many unresolved issues surrounding the murder of a twenty-two year old housekeeper in a brothel, D.A. Brockett began her research intending to write a historical account. However, finding the material too skimpy for nonfiction, she decided to fill in the gaps with created details. The result is a short and sweet story that focuses not on the murder victim, Mari, but on Rose, a young woman of strict Italian Catholic upbringing, abused by an alcoholic father, who is befriended by Mari just before her death.
The story is interesting enough to carry this short novel. The book is carefully plotted, and the mystery unfolds plausibly, but the characters are nearly cliches and the dialogue never quite rings true. The narrative style of the writing would be better suited to nonfiction. In fact, the best part of the book is the afterword, where the author first explains how her curiosity was aroused by a tombstone on a cemetery tour, and then recounts the known details of the actual crime. It is easy to see why she found the story intriguing, but Stained Glass Rose itself fails to intrigue.
Sue Asher
HER RIGHTFUL INHERITANCE
Benita Brown, Headline, 2003, £6.99, pb, 406pp, 0747267758
Newcastle in the early 1900s: orphan Loma Cunningham has been raised by her rich grandmother. Whilst cousin Rose is a cherished and spoiled child, Loma has been brought up in comfort, but without love as she is the product of a mixed marriage and her grandmother holds deep prejudices. Loma looks for affection elsewhere. Edwin Randall, a bookseller studying to be a doctor, provides comfortable friendship, but it's dangerous Maurice Haldane who captures Lorna's heart.
Meanwhile, impoverished Irene witnesses a brutal incident and thinks she is to blame. She meets Randall who is tending the sick in her neighbourhood, and aspires to a better future under his protective wing. But Randall seems to be more taken with Loma.
The stage is set for an ultimately heartwarming tale. Unlike some sagas, all the main characters here are well drawn, with their motivations clearly set down. Elsewhere, the baddies often have totally black hearts, and the goodies are angelic beyond belief, but Brown writes more subtly than that, which makes for a satisfying read.
S Garside-Neville
THE HISTORICAL NOVELS REVIEW
ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
THE RISING OF THE MOON
Emile Capouya, Lyons Press, 2003, $16.95, hb, I l 9pp, 15857 56649
The title is from a traditional Irish song calling for rebellion "at the rising of the moon." This is a literary novel with a lovely cover, and the contents live up to it with depth, passion, and intelligent dialogue from the characters. The setting is post-World War II, but the world of the sailor overtakes the political climate so completely that the story's place in time is almost unimportant. The narrative is filled with sailing jargon: "The officer in the stem sheets did not mean to ship salt water needlessly, and he was sculling to good purpose." Now, I know that stem means the back of the craft, and sculling I think means a kind of rowing, but nuances are lost on this landlubbing reader. Consequently, some of the action was hard to follow.
Comments on the peculiarities of sea life versus that of the land, however, are riveting. "Scandinavians in general regarded their seamen as men with a profession, with a calling, just as Americans regarded theirs as social outcasts. And, "Seamen, even if they were officers, were generally not welcome as tourists The first row of bars on the waterfront was what I had seen in three circumnavigations of the globe." Now, those are the kind of observations that stay with you. Sailors also exist at the whim of events in their time. The young stranded sailor, Mike, has a bit of Don Quixote in his makeup, with all that invites. This is a thoughtful action story for seafarers, and the rest of us.
Mary K. Bird-Guilliams
LIZA
Irene Carr, Hodder & Stoughton, 2003, £ 18.99, hb,327pp, 0340820353
Liza, returning destitute from Germany and a job as a lady's maid, is persuaded by the spoilt Cecily to change identities for a month. Liza is desperate for money, Cecily wants to be with her lover until she comes of age and can claim her inheritance. Their earlier lives are told and all the people, the jealousies and enmities of the past come together in an intricately-woven plot. This was a satisfying read, even if some of the encounters were a little convenient and coincidental. Liza is an attractive heroine, and the backgrounds, whether on board ships, in rented rooms or wealthy households, convincingly real.
Marina Oliver
SOLDIERS OF SALAMIS
Javier Cercas, Bloomsbury 2003, (trans. Anne McLean),£14. 99,hb,213pp, 0747563152 At the centre of this novel lies an anecdote. It is a novel or as Cercas himself decides, 'it is a tale cut from the cloth of reality.'
It is the story of a story which Cercas hears, it is a biography, an investigation. It is an historical novel with all the seams showing. A
complex work.
The anecdote tells of the founder of the Spanish Falange, Rafael Sanchez Mazas, who escapes from a firing squad at the end of the Spanish Civil war. Most importantly it tells of a Republican soldier who finds him and doesn't give him up. Cercas creates a novel around these hazy ingredients. In the margins he explores Mazas, the civil war, himself and embarks on a search for the unknown republican soldier. It is unique that these marginal notes are part of his novel. Readers cannot fail to be impressed by the breathtaking construction of this book.
Emily Retter
THE MONEY DRAGON
Pam Chun, Sourcebooks, 2002, $14/C$2 l.95, pb,292pp, 1570718660
According to author Pam Chun, in late 19th and early 20th century China, a man's status was heightened through his accumulation of wives, sons, and property. Lau Ah Leong is determined to acquire these trappings of prestige at all costs. After surviving a povertystricken childhood in China, he leaves his homeland for the Hawaiian Islands, where, despite facing innumerable obstacles, he is determined to succeed. After a tumultuous beginning, Ah Leong eventually establishes himself as a prosperous businessman with all the wealth he could imagine. And this is where his troubles begin. The story of the Ah Leong family explodes with soap operatic drama and political and cultural struggles.
The Money Dragon is the true story of the author's great-grandfather. As such, the story is imbued with great enthusiasm for its subject. The plot is gripping, and the narrative is a lively blend of history and storytelling. Although I found the writing to be a bit choppy and repetitive at times, it did not diminish my enjoyment of this captivating and enlightening story. Keep in mind, though, that the historical perspective is understandably biased, given the author's personal connection to the people and events of this era.
Andrea Connell
THE LUSITANIA MURDERS
Max Allan Collins, Berkley Prime Crime, 2002,$6.99/C$9.99, pb, 254pp, 0425186881
The author William Huntington Wright, traveling under his alias of S.S. Van Dine, is undercover as a journalist on the last voyage of the Lusitania to discover if it is carrying munitions for the British. Along the way, he interviews the likes of Alfred Vanderbilt, Charles Forham and Elbert Hubbard. As expected, murders and espionage soon become all-too-common occurrences, and Van Dine, with the help of a female Pinkerton agent, is rapidly engaged in the investigation. The Lusitania Murders, judging by its author's notes, is well-researched but lacking in a tightness and suspense that would keep the
reader flipping pages. I expected far more from Collins than this quite standard, run-of- the-mill mystery.
Wendy Zollo
THE LAST GIRL
Stephan Collishaw, Sceptre, 2003, £14.99, hb, 310pp, 0340826916. Pub in US by St Martin's Press, hb, $24.95, 0312312989
Another Holocaust book? No, The Last Girl is more than that. It's about individuals coping with dreadful memories, the sort no human being should ever have. It's about one old man living with the choices he'd made and had forced upon him, as did every Lithuanian contending with the foul aftermath of Hitler's Jewish Pogrom, and the Communist government's anti-Jewish attitudes. It might be the 1990s but Lithuania still wrestles with the consequences.
Daumantas, an angry ex-poet in Vilnius, struggles to live in a country that is falling apart in the vacuum left by communism. Once a wellrespected poet, he's not written for years. He's trying to remember and forget. He was a Jew who had to live without the girl he loved because he was Jewish. He survived because he buried his Jewish roots, bis culture, and his memories. Somehow he has to dig up the past, accept what he did and forgive himself. It sounds a dread, harsh book. It isn't. Duamantas is a fighter and he battles his way though, sometimes hilariously. The writing isn't heavy. There's humour to lighten the tone. Life is far from a rose garden but people still laugh. And the reader finishes the book seeing a light at the end of the tunnel for Daumantas, a way through his pain so that he can look at the rebuilding of Vilnius and say: 'I fear all the memories are being plastered over. They are painting over the cuts and bruises of the city. It may well be pretty when they finish but will it have a soul?'
Collishaw writes with commendable restraint about a subject that could have been treated in an over-emotional, sock-the-reader style. The Last Girl is a better book for that restraint.
Patrika Salmon
THE NAVIGATION LOG
Martin Corrick, Random House, 2003, $24.95/C$37.95, hb, 304pp, 0375508120 Tom and William, identical twins, are born on the very day WWI ends in 1918. They are reared by a philandering father, who's also a postmaster and lay preacher, and a detached, cool and artistic mother. A fascinating tale could flourish between the two, but Corrick never picks up the pieces. Betty and Marigold, the eternally spying gossiping neighbors, are a basket of endless wit and outrageous statements and are truly the delight of the novel. Regrettably, when the twins come of age and leave home, this entertaining twosome is heard from no more. Tom, off to fight the war, is mad
TIIE IIISTORICAL NOVELS REVIEW
ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
for airplanes and flying; William's an aspiring poet caught up in his mentor's mad world as their school is closed, and they and their students set off on a pilgrimage.
At times clever and witty, The Navigation Log is a pleasant read , yet Corrick never clarifies his characters' motivations, leaving the reader searching for ways to tie up every one of the many tangled ends left behind. An average read at best.
Wendy Zollo
A STAR TO STEER BY
Maggie Craig, Headline, 2003, £18.99, hb, 312pp, 0747268568
Craig's excellent new book begins as many others with the heroine being abused by a drunken father, but thankfully moves swiftly on to a far more interesting story. Forced to enter service with the Tait family, Ellie Douglas is at first drawn by the charm of what appears to her to be a magical world. Gradually, she begins to realise that all is not as it seems and forms a bond with Evander, the ill-treated son of the family. The pair become good friends, giving each other strength and purpose but unfortunately their relationship is discovered and he is driven from his home Years pass and Ellie grows up, making a huge sacrifice for her brother and the girl he loves. It is only when she has accomplished one of her dearest dreams that her first love returns to her life.
This is a charming and refreshing book. wasn't tempted to skip a page!
Linda Sole
TWISTED STRANDS
Margaret Dickinson, Pan 2003, £6.93, 452pp, 0330490508
Set amid the Nottingham lace works during WWI, this run of the mill saga is the sequel to Tangled Threads.
We follow the heroine, Bridie from her bleak childhood on her grandmother's farm where she is held responsible for her own illegitimacy and her mother's death. When she goes to Nottingham to live with her childless aunt, Evelyn she finds that her father's strict, nonconformist family resent the disgrace of her bastardy. She takes up nursing and matures as she faces reality.
This is a competent book that keeps hold of its characters. Not a lot of history but a good feeling of women finding their way in a man's world as their men go to war.
Mairead McKerracher
FrRES IN THE DARK
Louise Doughty, Simon & Schuster 2003, £16.99, hb,48lpp , 0743220870
This is the first of a series of novels based on the history of the Romany people and of the author's own family ancestry. It begins in 1927 in rural Bohemia, with the birth of a son to the leader of a tribe of coppersmith gypsies. It was the custom to have three names: one for the
authorities, the despised gadje or white folks; another to be known to the rest of the tribe; and the third the real name known only by the mother and child. We shall call him Emil.
Informative, written with love, rich in authentic and, later, harrowing detail, the novel follows Emil's story from the Depression of the 1930s to the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia, the horror of the concentration camps, then the Prague uprising of May 1945. The early sections, in particular, are a compassionate and colourful portrayal of Romany life, the traditions, dignity, and strong family and tribal ties that bind a proud and passionate people about whom so little is known. An estimated over six thousand gypsies perished in Bohemia and Moravia during the war. Emil survives but has to come to terms with the destruction of his people and the old ways, and the complex emotions to which this gives rise.
To say that, for me, Emil did not stand out in the early sections and only later did the story become his , is to quibble. This is a fascinating book and I look forward to reading the next in the series.
Janet Hancock
WEGENER'S JIGSAW
Clare Dudman , Sceptre, 2003, £14.99, hb , 404pp, 0340823046
'Let me tell you about ice,' says the Preface (what a wonderful first line!). The reader learns about ice and much more. This is primarily the story of Alfred Wegener, Arctic explorer, scientific theorist, balloonist, soldier, husband, father, a man who is now largely forgotten or unknown. He developed the theory of Continental Drift, the precursor to Plate Tectonics - quite an achievement, particularly since it was ridiculed by many at the time. Wegener was both scientist and explorer, involved in expeditions across the Arctic ice at the beginning of the twentieth century. His extraordinary story is beautifully told, the Arctic passages rivalling those of the Antarctic by Cherry-Garrard, Shackleton and Scott. The writing is lyrical, real and so immediate that the reader forgets that it is not Wegener himself who is writing.
The horrors of the trenches and Wegener's fear are also chronicled as well as his astonished, curious and emotional response to his children as infants. There are marvellous insights into Wegener's character, such as his obsession with delousing on an expedition in Greenland. He can tolerate many discomforts but lice horrify him. The author gives a moving history of the emotional attachment between Wegener and his wife, Else. There is dignity in the story of their relationship and its tragic sequel. The absence of hyper-emotion and psychobabble that seems to accompany most modem tragedies deserves special mention. Else and Alfred's story is all the more powerful because their devotion is conveyed with such restraint. Wegener 's scientific thinking and
discussion with his peers is well-written and accessible to the layperson. The author has clearly drawn on her scientific training and experience. Those who view scientists as onedimensional should read this book for both author and subject prove how unfounded the assertion is. Anyone, reader or writer, who values superb writing should also read this book.
Geraldine Perriam
THE MASTER BUTCHERS SI GI G CLUB
Louise Erdrich, Flamingo, 2003, £10.99, pb, 388pp, 0-007-136374. Pub in US by HarperCollins, $25.95, hb, 0066209773
After the defeat of Germany in the Great War, Fidelis Waldvogel , ex-soldier and American butcher's apprentice, emigrates to America carrying only a suitcase of his father's sausages, his own precious knives and a head full of recipes and ambition. He peddles his way as far as Argus, North Dakota where he runs out of sausages and has to settle. Eventually, he is able to bring over his wife Eva, widow of hi s best friend, and her son. They start their own butcher 's shop, three sons are born, Fidelis starts his singing club with the village men. Existence is precarious but not unhappy Then back to Argus comes Delphine, the supposed daughter of the local drunk and a mystery mother She and her half-Indian partner are fairground acrobats who are tired of the road and trapped in their own peculiar relationship. Delphine's arrival alters the life of everyone in Argus.
This is not a novel of plot but of mood , characters and incident. It is a sort of love story, a sort of family saga, a sort of murder mystery, a sort of social history . Argus and its citizens struggle through the seasons, droughts , Prohibition, the Depression and the War. New Americans bicker and strive and expand while the original Americans are forgotten in their own land The sense of the novel is circular: the seasons shift, pregnancies balance deaths. A butcher slaughters so that he may live. Fidelis , off the boat from Germany, passes through Ellis Island in 1922; in 1954 , he dies in a passport queue returning from his first visit back to Germany. Two sons, one Gemrnnbom, serve in the American army; two sons, American-born, fight for Hitler One returns to the land of his birth. as a P.O.W
The sense of atmosphere is marvellous : heat and cold, dust and rain, the stench of the slaughter-shed, the endless flat plains, wind and, most important, Argus and its so very real population. The reader is sucked in. Less successful is the crucial relationship between Fidelis and Delphine. She is a fully believable character but he is too withdrawn, too shadowy to make their passion convincing. It does not help that Erdrich's usually spare prose goes into overdrive describing emotions that I simply could not credit.
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knew Erdrich's reputation and her fascination with her own German-Native American roots, but had never read her. Now I will eagerly seek out her other novels.
Lynn Guest
CONQUERORS OF THE SKY
Thomas Fleming, Forge, 2003, $27.95/$C38.95, hb, 54pp, 0765303221
A hundred years ago Orville and Wilbur Wright invented the airplane and discovered the wonders of flight. Thomas Fleming's novel combines the history of aviation with the struggles of a fictional aircraft company, Buchanan Aircraft. The chief airplane designer, Frank Buchanan, takes the story from the biplane all the way to the Stealth fighters of today. Frank is a World War I flying ace but realizes that designing airplanes is his dream in life.
The story is not only about the evolution of the airplane but also the desires and sorrows of the people associated with Buchanan Aircraft. The airplane executives and their families go through many joys and heartaches of love and family. Fleming's characters are vivid and complex, showing the harsh reality of the corporate world.
Fleming's story is interesting and enjoyable, even for those not knowing much about aviation. I highly recommend Conquerors of the Sky, for it exhibits how dreams can be sacrificed for ambition; it is also a celebration of the centennial anniversary of flight.
Kathy King
FACING THE LIGHT
Adele Geras, Orion, 2003, £12.99, hb, 416pp, 0752851543
An extended family gathers to celebrate the 75 th birthday of its formidable matriarch, Leonora Simmonds. She is the daughter of the famous Edwardian painter, Ethan Walsh, whose pictures are kept at Willow Court, the family home in Wiltshire. During a long weekend of preparations and celebrations this family learns the truth about past tragedies and for some there are life-changing revelations.
Most of this story is set in the present-day but interwoven throughout the narrative are interludes which show past events in the lives of Leonora and her family.
Adele Geras bas created the atmosphere of a beautiful English Country house in late summer and has given her readers a setting and a story in which to lose themselves.
Jeanne Fielder
SWEETBITTER
Reginald Gibbons, Louisiana State Univ Press, 2003,$18.95,pb,420pp,0807128716
Originally published in 1994 and brought back into print as part of the Voices of the South series, Reginald Gibbons' heart-rending story of forbidden love deserves a wide readership. Set in 1896-1916 East Texas, it follows the
trials of Reuben Sweetbitter, a mixed-blood Choctaw, and his deep and abiding devotion to Martha Clarke. Their love survives her family's horror, lynch-mob racism, dangers from without and within, and even the harsh landscape.
A deft and lyrical storyteller, Gibbons weaves Choctaw myth with the growing passion of his protagonists. He sometimes chooses to tell his story out of sequence, a problematic choice that may leave readers more confused than intrigued. And his ending suddenly slips into a "would" and "might" scenario so unsatisfying for those looking for the inevitability of plot resolution. But despite its flaws, Sweetbitter is well worth the effort for its compelling story, well told. Highly recommended.
Eileen Charbonneau
CRABWALK
Gunter Grass, Faber & Faber 2003 (trans. Krishna Winston), £16.99, hb, 234pp, 0571216501 (First published by Steidl Verlag 2002). Pub in US by Harcourt, $25, hb, 0151007640
'Not long ago a documentary was shown on television, but it still seems as though nothing can top the Titanic, as if the Wilhelm Gustloff had never existed, as if there were no room for another maritime disaster.'
That, it would seem is the catalyst for penning this extraordinary novel which catalogues a slice of German history as viewed through the eyes of one of the few survivors of the WWII maritime disaster.
The Wilhelm Gustloff was a former cruise ship turned refugee carrier sunk by a Soviet submarine in January 1945. Some 9,000 people, most of them women and children fleeing from the advancing Red Army went down in the Baltic Sea making it the worst maritime disaster of all time.
Like Grass's previous novel, My Century, Crabwalk crawls into the minds of ordinary men, women and children and gives an insight into the suffering of the German people. A fascinating read.
Sarah Crabtree
A SPARKLE OF SALT
Evelyn Hood, Time Warner 2003, £17.99, bb, 342 pp, 0316860840
This novel, set in the Scottish fishing village of Buckie, is a follow-up to The Shimmer of Herring, which first introduced the Lowrie family. After the end of World War 1, James, returning to an embittered wife, Stella, and their three daughters, has to fight to keep his steam drifter, the Fidelity Bethany, James's sister, is gradually managing to gain financial independence and Innes and his wife, Zelda, are busy raising their large family.
Years later, James and Bethany battle over her son, Adam - she wanting him to find a life
far from Buckie lest the dark family secret be revealed, and James seeing him as the next successor to the Fidelity and a fisherman's life.
Adam is more interested in Etta, lnnes's foster daughter, but soon he must choose between pleasing his mother or following the man he knows to be his father.
Evelyn Hood, with her ever-distinctive style and complete knowledge of the subject, transports the reader to another era and way of life. She has the ability to make her characters come alive and has woven each one into a story that bolds one's attention. Although the 'secret' is very obvious from the outset, it in no way detracts from the novel - in fact, the reader is kept guessing as to when it will finally be revealed. An extremely good read, coming to a satisfying conclusion.
Vivienne Bass.
TROUBLED WATERS
Dean Hughes, Bookcraft, 2002, $22.95, hb, 419pp, 1570088616
Troubled Waters is Volume 2 of the Hearts of the Children series and it continues the story of a Latter-day Saint family during the 1960s, an era of great political and social change. This time the focus is on Alexander and Bea Thomas's grandchildren and is set under the shadow of the Vietnam War, the Berlin Wall and the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King.
Gene is on a mission in Germany, where be grapples with his faith and role in the church. Kathy is away at college juggling the demands of her faith with her increasing interest in the civil liberty and anti-war movements. Then • Diane is tom between her studies and the two men who love her. And Hans makes plans to help a friend escape from East Germany, plans that have tragic consequences.
This novel gives a clear insight in to the lives of the Latter-day Saints, their beliefs and their support systems during a testing period of radical social upheaval. It is an engaging piece of writing that describes the religion without preaching to its readers.
It also contains a large amount of interesting social history details - food, restaurants, clothes, cars, and books are all mentioned by name and brand - helping to recreate 1960s America as authentically as possible.
Sara Wilson
THE LOST GARDEN
Helen Humphreys, Bloomsbury 2003, £14.99, hb, 182pp, 07475626lX. Pub in Us by WW Norton & Co, $23.95, hb, 0393051838
In 1941 as London is being destroyed by the blitz, Gwen Davis, a young horticulturist is sent to Devon to restore the neglected garden of a manor estate and grow food for the home front. In the peaceful countryside, Gwen has her own war to fight as she struggles with her crippling shyness and attempts to weld together a team of land army girls.
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Gwen meets two people who will change her life forever, Jane, a free spirit whose fiance is missing in action and Raley, a Canadian officer waiting for a posting. She stumbles on a lost garden, which she tries to restore to its original beauty. These elements combine to enable her to eventually find the capacity to love, even in the middle of pain.
This is a haunting, beautifully written book. The characters are well rounded although nothing much happens and the war seems far away. Although not my usual choice of reading I enjoyed this updated adult version of the old classic, The Secret Garden.
Mary Tucker
GINNY APP LEY ARD
Elizabeth Jeffrey, Piatkus 2002, £18.99, hb, 376pp, 0850181225
Ginny Appleyard eagerly awaits the return of her childhood sweetheart at the end of his season aboard the yacht, Aurora, but her hopes that he will proposed are dashed when he tells her he will be going to London to realise his dream of success as an artist.
When Ginny's father dies after a tragic accident, Nathan comes home to attend the funeral and she finds comfort in his arms. But when he returns to London, she learns that he is to marry Isabel Armitage, daughter of the Aurora's owner. More heartache is in store for Ginny when she realises she is expecting Nathan's child.
Set in a small town on the Essex coast during the 30s, this heart-warming story had me hooked from page one. Elizabeth Jeffrey skilfully evokes the pre-war period, peopled with believable characters and situations played out against the background of real-life events: the death of George V, the abdication crisis and the onset of WW2.
It will, I'm sure, be enjoyed by anyone who lived throughout the 30s and for younger readers, would be an excellent introduction for that period in history.
Jo Coles
WAR CRIMES FOR THE HOME
Liz Jensen, Bloomsbury 2003, £6.99, pb, 225pp, 074756146X
This book is brilliant but sickening. Be warned, it is disturbing. Jensen shines a cold artificial light upon human nature and unflinchingly describes what she sees. Her characters and story are sensitively conceived but brutally dissected. The honesty and clarity with which she sets life upon the page is painful; her intensity hurts.
It is a story of a woman's war, of women's lives completely shaped by war. In WWII Britain, Gloria and her sister have their own battles to face. Their lives are concerned with survival, grime and risk.
It is also a story of remembering, forgiveness and of letting go. As Gloria sits in an old people's home she remembers her war and is THE HlSTORICAL NOVELS REVIEW
haunted by dark secrets in her past that fight to come to the surface. Jensen conceives a narrative flitting from present to past slowly and skilfully unfolding a picture that paints in the dark shadows of Gloria's mind. As her relatives probe her memories and she struggles to suppress them Jensen reveals a gutwrenching history.
Gloria's story is both funny and tragic. Her 'war crimes' are at once awful, surreal and mundane.
Emily Retter
DEVIL'S MIDNIGHT
Yuri Kapralov, Akashic Books, 2003, $22.95, 292 pp, hb, 1888451114
Set between 1919 and 1920 in the last months of the Russian Civil War, Devil's Midnight follows three figures: Alexey Lebedev, a tutor turned soldier (against his will) in the Red Army; Yuri Skatchko, a colonel in the White Army; and Nata Tai, a beautiful, mad actress with her own agenda. For all that Russia is so large, these three encounter each other over and over again, in Kiev, Odessa, Sumy, etc., straining all credibility. Nata is alternately in love with Yuri and Alexey or in love with her own plan of vengeance for her father's death. Yuri is in love with both ata and Alexey's sister Lucy, and Alexey is in love with Nata while remaining a cipher. Characters are not the author's strong suit--all three failed to come to life.
Kapralov successfully conveys the sense of chaos of the war, jumping from place to place with varying wins and losses of the White Army. His sympathy, or at least his point of view, lies with the Whites, with only a brief chapter from the point of view of Trotsky, of course portrayed as a madman. But no one fares very well in this book, as apparently all Russians were fueled by alcohol, cocaine, and morphine during the war; I wondered why no one had overdosed yet on all the drugs and still managed to walk, talk, and fight. There is a subplot involving Satanists that did not involve me. If it was Kapralov's intent to show that anarchy ruled during the war, he succeeded, but failed on all other counts.
Ellen Keith
MIDDLEMERE
Judith Lennox, Macmillan 2003, £14.99, hb, 502pp 033390057X
The Cole family is evicted from Middlemere by the landlord, Osborne Daubeny then Romy's father dies. She, her mother and brother Jam just about survive and then Romy, through a chance meeting, begins to work in the Trelawney Hotel. The new tenants are Caleb and his mother. All three families have secrets and problems that gradually become intertwined.
This is a feel good novel of one strong, determined girl fighting her way out of poverty, supporting her family through various trials and
coming to terms with a new and different life. My only grouse is an occasional historical inaccuracy such as young, slim girls wearing corsets; not in the late 1950s, surely. However, the characters are real and varied, thoroughly believable and the twists in the plot are satisfying.
Marina Oliver
GRASS FOR MY PILLOW
Saiichi Maruya, tr. Dennis Keene, Columbia University Press, 2002, $24.50/ £17.50, hb, 338pp, 0231126581
Shokichi Hamada is a clerk in a Japanese university. Twenty years earlier, at the outbreak of the Pacific War (World War Two to the Europeans), Hamada took the decision to resist the draft, his friend having been forced to commit suicide along with his entire unit when faced with military defeat. Draft resistance was of course a criminal offence punishable by death, and changing his identity and working first as a radio repair man then a sand artist, Hamada moved from island to island, avoiding discovery.
Japan was on the brink of change. At the end of the war the army was disbanded, and the culture of militarism set aside. Old values died hard, however, and individual attitudes to his past were always hard to predict.
The catalyst for Hamada comes with the death of the woman who had shared his fugitive state. Now married with the prospect of promotion, the past begins to catch up with him as again the spectre of Japan's military heritage comes to the fore. Once more he finds himself faced with difficult choices.
This thoughtful book gives a wonderful insight into Japanese life, both the greater cultural beliefs that shape the society as a whole and the minutiae that preoccupy each individual. Entertaining, informative and compassionate, this is a very worthwhile read. A tribute must also be paid to the translator. Janet Mary Tomson
THE MIDWIFE'S TALE
Gretchen Moran Laskas, The Dial Press, 2003, $23.95/£13.29, 243pp, hb, 0385335512 Elizabeth Whitely comes of a long line of midwives in Kettle Valley, West Virginia. Growing up after WW I, she prepares to carry on the family tradition, until she finds a small red ledger beside the larger black ones that record each birth in the district. As the story unfolds, the secret of that little book is revealed alongside Elizabeth's own eventual tragedies her barrenness and the love she has for a man who never returns it, even after she moves in with him to raise his daughter after the death of his wife. It is this daughter whose miraculous gift holds the power to change Elizabeth's life.
This is a heart-warming tale, told without sentimentality and shot through with folkwisdom and not a little mythmaking. The Appalachian setting is beautifully realized and
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the characters so real, you feel you know them as well as if they were your own neighbours and kin.
Sarah Cuthbertson
THE BEST-KEPT SECRET
Mary de Laszlo, Robert Hale , 2003, £17.99, hb, 253pp, 0709074255
Cornelia Temple is eighteen and about to leave sc hool. Although it is the early I 960s, her sheltered upbringing at St Euphemia's Catholic boarding school has left her ill equipped to enter the world, so her parents decide to send her to finishing school in Paris, a city believed by her friends to be a hotbed of vice and the centre of the White Slave Trade Escorted by her worldly Aunt Flavia and staying with a French family, Cornelia begins to lose her naivety. Aided by her new friends and most especially by the attractive Laurent, Cornelia learns about all about love and life
The B est-Kept Secret is a channing little story about a more innocent age. It manages to be by turns funny, touching and tender. The sophisticated setting lends the plot the required risque element that nicely offsets the inexperience of the English girls, but it 's a shame that the hero comes across as occasionally manipulative and unappealing
Sara Wilson
THE SEDUCTION OF SILE CE
Bern Le Hunte, HarperSanFrancisco , 2003, $25.95/C$39.95, hb, 399pp, 006052 l 97X
This literary saga follows the troubled lives of four generations of Indian women. The unhappy marriage of rigidly-traditional Jyoti Ma to the dreamer Aakash ends when Aakash leaves their llimalayan estate, Prakriti , to seek spiritual enlightenment. Their daughter, Tulsi Devi , is sent to convent school - only to have a brief affair lead to a loveless marriage to a man many years her senior. Their strong-minded daughter Rohini marries an Englishman, an act that divides the family and estranges her from her puritanical father. Seeking enlightenment, Rohini communes with the spirit of her grandfather Aakash - to the dismay of her daughter Saakshi. But a return to Prakriti brings the family and their emotions - full circle, reconciling past and present - and future. This book is lyrically written and emotionally compelling. What it is not is a historical novel or saga. The author's interest is not historical fact or detail, but emotional truth and spiritual growth. Although it covers five generations in India , the historical detail is so vague that I spent the first half of the book thinking it began in the late Victorian period (references to "the Queen" didn ' t help) , and that the war briefly mentioned was the Great War. Then , on page 252, "the war was over, the British were leaving India , India was divided , and Gandhi was dead." The information that it was actually now at least 1948 was a major jolt. There also seemed to be an awful lot of vivid
childbirth scenes.
So if you're looking for an "Oprah pick" and an emotional wallow , this book will not disappoint. If you're lookin g for a historical novel in the M.M . Kaye tradition, The Seduction of Silence isn't it.
India Edghill
0 THE EDGE
Peter Lovesey, Soho Press, 2002, $ I 2 , pb, 204pp, 156473099
When Rose Bell and Antonia Ashton meet outside of Swan & Edgar's in 1946, it is indeed a life-changing moment. Rosie and Antonia were WAAFs stationed at Kettlesham Heath in 1940 when they last saw each other. Now, with the end of the war, Rose is married to a former RAF commander and Antonia to a wealthy manufacturer of kitchen appliances. During their talk over tea, they learn that neither woman is happy in her marriage. Rose's husband is a womanizer, and Antonia has a lover but can't afford to divorce because she would lose all of Hector's many millions. Antonia listens knowingly as Rose states that she would like to be rid of her husband but her vicar father would never forgive a divorce.
Post-war Britain, the many changes to life as her citizens knew it, the bombed out neighborhoods, the differences between the haves and the have-nots: all are all characters in this short, entertaining novel. The pair, with a lot of orchestrating from Antonia, set out to solve their dilemmas. Needless to say, problems they do not foresee crop up, and the women have to scramble to cover their tracks. First published in 1989, this black comedy has lost none of its dubious charm.
Lorraine
Gelly
HOT CHOCOLATE AT HANSELMANN'S
Rosetta Loy (trans. Gregory Conti), Univ of Nebraska Press , 2003 (cl995), $16.95, pb , 183pp , 0803280068
Although the "hot chocolate" arrives only in the final chapters, what come before are emotional and sometimes shocking events in an Italian family during World War II. Lorenza, a writer, recalls her childhood in quick, unconnected glimpses of memory when her family entertained Arturo Cohen, her father's university colleague who seems taken with her mother , Isabella. They enjoy outings and varied discussions, and even the staunch Isabella blushes at Arturo's risque teasing. When Arturo stops coming, young Lorenza and her sister question their father, who explains that their guest has gone for good. "Arturo is Jewish, even though only his father is Jewish ... he is considered Jewish all the same " They soon learn of the Racial Manifesto that strips Italian Jews of their rights and their jobs. Arturo decides to go to Switzerland, eventually visiting Chesa Silvascina, where Isabella's mother lives and her sister, Margot, passes her time breaking male hearts with her beauty. When Margot
meets Arturo, her life changes
The novel addresses the persecutions of Italian Jews but also its effect on the lives of one Catholic family who welcomed a quiet, non-practicing Jew into their homes and their hearts , eventually to great consequence. Due to the random nature of memory, events and points of view often shift from one page to the next, but the astute reader perseveres and sees the many threads woven to reveal the family ties and attitudes toward the larger problem, represented by one man's dilemma. This novel is barely 200 pages, yet one learns more about Lorenza's family here than another writer could cover in a saga of many volumes.
Tess Allegra
FIRE IN THE ROCK
Joe Martin, Ballantine, 2003, $ l 3.95/C$2 l, pb, 243pp,0345456912
It is 1956 in this coming-of-age story, and Bo Fisher, a white preacher's kid, begins an idyllic summer with his best friend Pollo, who is black. The girl in their life , Mae Maude , seems to their sixteen-year-old minds to be the essence of beauty. The three of them travel everywhere in Bo's pickup truck. Pollo rides in back, of course not because they want him to, but because no one would understand if they let him ride in front. They enjoy the adventures of adolescence together until an event takes place that changes the course of their friendship. Fire in the Rock is a novel about racial prejudice Sometimes classified as a young adult novel, it is just as appealing to adults. What makes this story outstanding is the love , humor and loyalty displayed by good friends and community members in hard times. This is shown in an offhand manner through the actions of the characters. This is a truly wonderful, basically lighthearted novel.
Nan Curnutt
TRACES OF DREAMS
Tricia McGill, Jacobyte Books (www.jacobytebooks.com), 2002, AU$2 I, pb , 320pp, 1741001048
This time-spun family saga is filled with life's harsh realities. Alicia Martin falls for Arthur Bell, a soldier leaving London to fight in the Great War Desperately in love, the couple yield to their passions with predictable results: an unwed pregnancy. Inevitably, Arthur is killed in the trenches , and Alicia must rear the boy herself. To raise her spirits her sociable sister, Fiona, brings home one Mathew Reede , whom Alicia resists furiously until he rescues her from near rape by a local scruff. Feeling protective, Mathew persuades her to move with son Arty to a home that's not much better than the hovel she left. Mathew's eventual marriage proposal is reluctantly accepted, but with Alicia's strange proviso: no sex Yet life takes Alicia by surprise when she actually enjoys Mathew's simple goodnight kiss. Passions are stirred, her resistance is broken, and soon they
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have a child of their own, an event that repeats year after year until ten Reede children crowd their small house of poverty. There is enough love to go around, excepting the jealous, unforgiving Arty.
This novel spans decades and two world wars, portraying the gritty truth of deprivation in London's poorer classes, yet the reader is amazed at their strength and courage. However insightful, there is little humor to balance the misery. The well-meaning story is so compressed it becomes difficult to keep track of the ensuing generations. The sudden switch in part two to daughter Sara's story would have been better as a springboard to a sequel. Kudos for the effort if not the format.
Tess Allegra
SHADOW BOXER
Eddie Muller, Scribner, 2003, $24/ C$38, hb, 258pp,0743214447
There's only one thing wrong with this throwback to the 1940s era of sports-based pulp fiction. Well, make it two. While Billy Nichols, who tells the story, is a crack San Francisco sportswriter nicknamed Mr. Boxing, there is not much in this book about either boxers or the fight game. What it's really about is the continuation of the murder case begun in Muller's first novel, The Distance. It may be that the man Nichols brought to justice in the early book is not entirely guilty. The dead woman was the wife of boxer Hack Escalante, and not so incidentally she was the also the one Nichols was having a secret affair with.
It's a complicated tale, and if this is a new trend in detective fiction, it ought to stop right now. Without having read the first book, it's impossible to know exactly who is who, and why or why not, and to whom. As detective fiction, it's spinach, and I hate spinach.
As a writer of historical fiction, Muller has San Francisco and its seedy (and not-so-seedy) environs down cold. As a writer of hard-boiled pulp fiction, Muller certainly gives you your full money's worth. Or even double, considering Nichols' single paragraph longerthan-one-page rant on pages 152-153. Boiled down, it's a long improvised version, with several choruses, of the old adage, No good deed ever goes unpunished.
It's a classic piece, verging on Raymond Chandler territory, and while better than average, the story surrounding it is missing a vital ingredient, a self-contained coherency. It's too bad. It could have been a contender.
Steve Lewis
BRUISED HIBISCUS
Elizabeth Nunez, Ballantine Books, 2002 (c2000), $13.95 / C$21, pb , 286pp, pb, 0345451090
Set in Trinidad in the 1950s, Bruised Hibiscus explores themes that sti II resonate today-- race and gender. Rosa, a white woman married to a Trinidadian, and Zuela, a South American
married to a Chinese store owner, were each affected by something they witnessed together when they were twelve. Both are now affected by the murders of a woman by her husband and another by her lover. According to public opinion, these women must have done something to deserve their murders, and so superstition takes hold, coloring the lives of Rosa and Zuela.
The novel fascinated me with its interplay of the disadvantages of race and gender, underlaid with the beliefs of this other culture. Rosa was driven by lust, not love , to marry her husband, and while she is a woman, and by implication, inferior , she is also white, which in another way gives her the upper hand over her husband, who is black. He is alternately contemptuous and afraid of her. Zuela was "adopted" by the Chinaman (the only way she thinks of him) who then married her when be made her pregnant at thirteen. At twenty-nine, she has ten children and is determined to save them from the Chinaman's opium addiction. At times it felt like Nunez had a larger, longer novel in her, as she did not fully explain the conflict between whites in Trinidad and the native Trinidadians, or between the two protagonists. I was more interested in Zuela' s story, but still this remained an involving tale.
Ellen Keith
THE YOUNG WAN
Brendan O'Carroll, Viking, 2003, $23.95 / C$36, hb,208pp,0670031143
It's the night before Agnes Reddin's wedding to "Redser" Browne, a ceremony that Agnes knows might never take place. She spends a sleepless night reflecting on the circumstances leading up this situation: her parents' own controversial courtship and wedding, her father's labor union activism, her grandfather's stubbornness, the violent act that changed their lives , and the necessity that Agnes take charge of her sister and her mother.
Although this is the fourth in the Agnes Browne series (prequel to book one, The Mammy), don't expect facts of Agnes' early life to closely follow the details her author has already sketched. Such an oversight is easily forgiven, though. How was O'Carroll to know as he wrote his first novel that he'd ever need to recount Agnes' life as a young wan?
The characters are well-drawn and likable. Working-class Dublin from the 1920s to the mid-l 950s comes alive but is dramatized in scenes that are sometimes unsatisfyingly brief. In spite of foreshadowing that is often overstated, O'Carroll resolves the story effectively. Overall, The Young Wan is an entertaining book that's worth the read.
Janette King
SILENT SURRENDER
Katherine O'Neal, Bantam , 2003, $6.50/ C$9.99, pb,384pp,0553581244
If you are in the market for a smart, sassy
romance with plenty of action thrown in, Katherine O'Neal's newest release is sure to fit the bill. Spencer Sloane is a man with a mission, a powerful silent movie director determined to have his former lover, Liana Wycliffe, star in his next picture---even if Liana grows to hate him in the process. After all, the former World War I flying ace is not a man who accustomed to defeat. After being jilted during the war by the pilot she knew only as "Ace," Liana vowed she would never trust anyone again. Yet, when she winds up working in close quarters with "Ace" four years later, Liana finds it difficult to deny the explosive passion that simmers between them. When secrets from the past and present threaten the movie's future and the lives of both Sloane and Liana, they find that trusting each other and the special love they share may be the only course that will keep them breathing. Set predominantly Ill Tahiti in 1920, Silent Surrender is a well-researched, thoroughly enjoyable read. O'Neal's winning combination of fast-paced thrills and a tender love story make it a book any reader will find hard to put down.
Eva Fox Mate
FLYING WITH THE ANGELS
Victor Pemberton, Headline, 2003 , £18.99, hb, 376pp, 0755302346
It is 1947 and, although the war is over, life remains difficult for the Angel family. Jobs, fuel, money and housing are all still in short supply and the family has to take risks in order to survive.
Lizzie Angel is the backbone of her large family. Her mother relies on her help with the younger children and her father values her good sense and sunny nature. But troubles are just around the comer and Frank Angel is about to walk straight into the middle of them. Meanwhile Lizzie's fiance, Rob, comes to believe that Australia could offer them a better life. Lizzie has a tough choice to make - Rob or her family.
Flying with the Angels is a pleasant saga, albeit one that makes few demands. Victor Pemberton delivers a solid perfonnance that is entertaining and readable. The characters, setting and period are well realised, making this novel a welcome addition to the genre.
Sara Wilson
NO GRAVES AS YET
Anne Perry, Ballantine, 2003, $25.95 / C$39.95, hb ,352pp,0345456521
Pub in the UK by Headline, 2003, £14.99, pb , 288pp,0755302842
The prolific Perry does it again - here, with the first installment of an anticipated five book series focusing on a British family in 1914 dealing with the emotions and realities of the coming war and that family's tribulations through 1918.
The four Reavley children suffer a terrible
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tragedy when their parents, John and Alys, are killed in a car crash. Immediately before his death, John Reavley reveals to his son, Matthew, a captain in the intelligence service, that he is in possession of a letter-the contents of which, if disclosed, will have devastating effects upon the world in general and Britain in particular. The Reavley sons, a professor at Cambridge and an ordained minister, determine early on that their parents' murder is directly Ii nked to that letter. What the letter contains and how it resulted in their parents' death is the driving force behind their investigation.
Along the way, Perry takes us on an evocative journey through an England recently reeling from the brutality of the Boer War and facing the horror of an imminent worldwide conflagration. As usual, Perry's characters are fully fleshed out, and the reader becomes attached to them. The growing fear that war cannot be avoided is palpable, and how each character deals with his or her own particular reality is the stuff at which Perry excels.
Ilysa Magnus
CHILDREN OF THE STORM
Elizabeth Peters, Constable 2003, £16.99, hb, 334pp, I 841197203. Pub in US by William Morrow, $25.95, hb, 0066214769
The Great War has ended at last. No longer must archaeologist Amelia Peabody and her husband, Emerson fear for the life of their son, Ramses, now free from his obligations to British Intelligence. The advent of peace brings new beginnings in Luxor with additions to the family and fresh wonders to be discovered beneath the Egyptian sands.
Nevertheless, evil still casts its shadow over this land. Antiquities are stolen, the suspected thief is brutally killed, Ramses has a strange encounter with a woman in the guise of the goddess Hathor and the family realise that old scores are not yet settled. Through the investigations of the indomitable Amelia, however, all is resolved though not without a terrifying climax.
Not having read any of these books before now T found it hard to remember who everyone was. A cast list at the beginning would have been helpful. The book might have been better had it not been so long. Most readers would be able to guess who the villain was well before the end and I thought that Peters was taking liberties with conflicting viewpoints.
Although I liked Elizabeth Peters' writing style and the subtle jokes I'm afraid this book would not make me want to read the others in the series.
Diane Johnstone
THE HUMAN POOL
Chris Petit, Atria, 2002, $25 / C$39, hb, 337pp, 0743417062
Pub. in the UK by Scribner, 2003, £6.99, pb, 0743231198
If you enjoy assembling really big jigsaw
puzzles with really small pieces, you may enjoy this book. Told entirely first person by a parade of characters, the story hopscotches back and forth between WWII and the present as well as between characters. A given scene may be related by three or four characters, each with his or her own thoughts and perceptions. This technique caused the story to drag and found me making excuses not to pick up the book.
The plot revolves around high-level conspiracies and money laundering during WWII. The author paints Allen Dulles, who worked for the OSS during WWII and later became director of the CIA, as a master spy with more than his country's interests at heart. During secret meetings with high-level Nazis, Dulles becomes involved in laundering German wealth and other decidedly anti-Semitic activities. Petit blends in non-historical characters on both sides to tell the story. These characters survive the war and continue to conspire and commit atrocities in their quest for wealth and power. As the plot focuses on the present, the characters and events become entirely fictitious.
While this puzzle initially held a promise of shocking revelations, upon completion the image was all smoke and mirrors with no substance.
Mark F. Johnson
WINTRY NIGHT
Li Qiao, Columbia Univ Press, 2002, $24, pb, 29lpp,0231122012
"The way it is? Everyone comes into the world naked. Then why are some born to be called 'master' and others born to be called 'dog'?" So speaks Liu Ahan, the young soldier who represents the resilient Taiwanese spirit beset by physical, cultural, and political challenges of the twentieth century.
Written over five years, Qiao's first and third volumes in a series are included in this one book spanning Taiwan's history from the late 19 th to the end of Japanese occupation during World War II. Wintry Night is the title of the entire collection and the title of the first volume, which sensitively and enticingly presents the Peng family's tribulations and gratifications as they attempt to settle into what is to become Hakka territory in central Taiwan around the city of Miao-Ii. The Lone Lamp, the third volume, concerns sheer survival for these same people and their descendants as first manipulative, corrupt overlords and then the devastating Japanese takeover threatens their very livelihood.
The highlights of this novel are the physical and cultural obstacles the Hakka and aboriginal people have dauntingly surmounted and their growing awareness of a proud national identity. The reader cannot help but be drawn into the family struggles, alternately cheering on and resisting the consistently unfair and horrifically cruel battles endured by those who attempt to live a life of integrity and endurance. The
second volume, The Deserted Village, which has not been included in this text, recounts the anti-Japanese activities of Liu Ahan and ends with his death shortly after being released from a Japanese prison. Including this aspect of Asian history too often underplayed or even ignored, this novel is classic historical fiction presented in a very real and intriguingly perceptive style. A masterpiece!
Viviane Crystal
THE BLUE MOON CIRCUS
Michael Raleigh, Sourcebooks Landmark, 2003,$22 / C$34.95,hb,342pp, 1402200153 After a flood destroys Lewis Tully's circus in 1919, he vows his circus career is over. However, his lifelong love of the circus prevails and in 1926, he is persuaded to try again. This is where the real story begins. As Lewis and his best friend Shelby start gathering acts and animals, friendships are renewed and new allegiances are forged as the group works cohesively to develop a mud show intended to entertain small town folks. Rope walkers, Roosevelt's Rough Riders, an aging mystical magician, strong men, animal trainers, costumers, and an orphaned nine year old boy, among others, develop relationships that are stronger and more complex than those of many families.
A novel written about the circus could easily be sullied by stock side-show characters. Raleigh avoids this trap by providing a cast of well-developed, dynamic personalities whose sometimes stilted interactions defy circus stereotypes. Many are friends from previous shows, and it is this back story that makes this novel a page turner.
Circus jargon and fascinating historical tidbits about the operations of the circus are woven smoothly into the story. For example, after a camel is purchased from a shady dealer, Lewis and Shelby discover a brand alerting them that tl1is is a psychotic beast once owned by the United States Army as part of an experiment to use camels in the desert. Exchanges with rival circuses demonstrate the fierce competition between shows.
Step right up and join the Blue Moon Circus. Once you start reading, you will feel like one of the roustabouts and will root for Lewis and his circus to make it this time.
Suzanne J. Sprague
SOMEWHERE, SOMEDAY
Eileen Ramsay, Hodder & Stoughton, 2003, £14.99,hb,39lpp, 0340825723
This is the best book I've read this year and I recommend it unhesitatingly. It is two love stories intertwined. In the present Holly Noble inherits a cache of paintings by her beloved aunt, famous artist Tony Noble, about which she knew nothing. The subject of all the pictures is Tony's lover, the world-renowned tenor, Blaise Fougere and the paintings depict their love, which was hidden from the world.
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Holly sets out to arrange an exhibition of these paintings and finds herself blocked at every turn by Blaise's arrogant nephew, Taylor Hartman, who refuses to believe his uncle loved Tony. As the pictures are hung, Tony and Blaise's story is gradually revealed. Slowly, Holly and Taylor come to understand one another; their love story is as turbulent and difficult as was that of their respective aunt and uncle. The back story runs from 193 7 to 1990, and the contemporary story from I 998 to 1990.
The writing is beautiful and, as is appropriate in the love story of singer and an artist, the prose sings and is full of vibrant colour. Both stories touch on great happiness and great tragedy. A thoroughly enjoyable read - my tip for next year's Romantic Novel of the Year.
Pamela Cleaver
TWELVE SECONDS TO LIVE
Douglas Reeman, McBooks Press, 2003, $15.95, tpb, 348pp, 1590130448
Pub. in the UK by Arrow, 2003, £6.99, pb, 400pp,0099414872
Douglas Reeman is as fine a writer on warships and the crews that liv e and die on them as one can find in popular fiction. His latest World War II novel centers around the officers and men of the small ships of the Royal Navy's coastal forces as they cope with combating German mines and motor torpedo boats in the English Channel while simultaneously attempting to retain their equilibrium after years of wartime stress. Eac h of the main and secondary characters carries his and her share of emotional baggage from the war, and each must carry on with their duties and their personal lives no matter the cost. Reeman never disappoints when it comes to drama on the seas. His portrayal of the human costs of combating the "Beast" (German mines) add to the drama and tension of the story.
John R. Vallely
THE LAST CITADEL
David L. Robbins, Bantam, 2003, $24.95 / C$37 .95, hb, 432pp, 0553801775, to be pub in UK in Nov 2003 by Orion, hb, £17.99, 432pp , 0752853090
Sixty years ago around the Russian city of Kursk, history's largest and most brutal battle was taking place. Two million soldiers and thousands of planes, tanks, and other vehicles all came together in an orgy of bloodletting that will likely, hopefully, never be seen again. This battle, more than any other in the war, was the turning point against the Nazis. This was where the Soviets turned the tide and went on the offensive. It was the beginning of the end for Germany.
This is Robbins at his best: superior character development , impeccable attention to detail, and a series of tightly woven plots that all pull together like purse strings at the end. The ability to view the individual battles through the
eyes of those involved, while still maintammg the cohesion of the overall campaign, is a hallmark of this fme writer. The story rolls along at the brisk pace of the Russian T-34 tanks, while delivering the awesome punch of the German Tigers. The true gem of this novel is Robbins' choice of central characters: not your run-of-the-mill so ldiers, but a Spanish bullfighter in SS uniform, a father/son tank crew, a female pilot, and a high ranking SS colonel who just happens to be a top Soviet spy. It doesn't get better than this.
Mark F. Johnson
LEGACY
Leonard Schonberg, Sunstone, 2002, $22.95, pb,336pp,0865343578
Legacy recounts the story of three generations of women who must overcome great challenges, with varying degrees of success. Hannah migrates to the US with her father just before WWI. Her daughter Pearl nurses men, including her own husband, through WWII, while Sarah must fight to save her marriage while making a key decision about her career. The action moves from New York City to Montana and back.
The author clearly bas a good story to tell, yet it's buried beneath poor writing technique. Much of the prose is awkward, overblown and interrupted by information dumps. In addition, the point of view often jumps indiscriminately and includes jarring, chapter-long flashbacks. A thorough edit could have allowed the story to shine through. By far the biggest problem, however, is that the lead female characters are all too good to be true: beautiful, intelligent, graceful and talented with nary a flaw between them. Many of the secondary characters were thus afflicted as well, making it difficult to truly identify with them. Appealing characters are necessary to a good book; perfect ones are not.
That said, I cannot say the novel is not worth reading. The author effectively conveys his settings, especially Montana, and the story moves along at a good pace. Some of his descriptions are especially picturesque, such as when Hannah and her father first see Butte from the train. In some places the writing is quite lyrical, and the plot is sound and paced evenly. Despite its weaknesses, this family saga provides an interesting overview of the twentieth century and might prove a pleasant diversion for readers willing to overlook its flaws.
Teresa Basinski Eckford
ALL HE EVER WANTED
Anita Shreve, Little, Brown, £12.99, hb , 280 pp, 0316861146, pub in US by Little Brown, $25.95, hb, 0316782262
You know you're in the hands of a skilled author when you don 't want to put a book down, and once you force yourself, you keep pondering the many layers of the story and thinking about the characters while you 're
doing the tasks that have taken you away from their world.
All He Ever Wanted is just such a book and Anita Shreve is an author of the highest calibre - a literary storyteller, and that's a commodity as rare as hen's teeth. In December 1899, English professor Nicholas Van Tassel encounters Etna Bliss in the aftermath of a hotel fire. Struck immediately by her presence, he rebuilds his life around a single goal - to marry her. A proud and orderly man, Van Tassel is ill equipped to deal with the ferocity of his passion, but he is determined to have Etna, no matter what the cost. Travelling on a train to Florida, many years later, he unwinds his memories of the years of bis relationship with Etna, and struggles to understand what happened and why.
Shreve's writing style, chameleon-like, becomes that of a pompous Edwardian gentleman filled with self-importance and prejudice, but that is part of the alchemy that rivets the reader to the page. Van Tassel is frightening, repulsive, yet pitiable. Even when watching the most questionable of his actions the reader can feel a reluctant spark of compassion for him and anxiety on behalf of his enigmatic wife with her hidden past. Anita Shreve skilfully recreates the claustrophobic of a New Hampshire college community at the tum of the last century, and the intellectuals who inhabit it, the sharp, the not so sharp and the eccentric. Van Tassel's striving to wed Etna and become college dean are crafted with such unbearable tension, that it's almost like watching two trains racing towards each other. The outcome is inevitable, you want to look away, knowing something is going to happen, but you can't.
This is not a comfortable novel, but it is riveting, unusual, and thought provoking. I am still wondering if the name Etna Bliss is ironic shorthand for Eternal Bliss, or whether, judging the effect she has on Van Tassel, it has volcanic connotations. That's what l mean. I keep thinking about the characters even though I've finished reading the novel. Highly recommended.
Susan Hicks
633 SQUADRON
Frederick E. Smith, Cassell, 2003, £6.99, $9.95 / C$ I 5.95, pb, 222pp, 0304366218
This is a welcome re-issue of an excellent World War Two war novel. Therefore, not surprisingly perhaps, it is primarily an anti-war story. Bomber Command suffered horrendous casualties throughout the war in terms of deaths and wounds both physical and psychological. The author writes with both a passion and a knowledge based upon his experiences in the RAF during the war.
The squadron fly into Sutton Craddock, somewhere in North Yorkshire, England, in order to prepare in secret for a 'specia l job'. The dangerous mission involves retraining to
ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
fly the fabulously fast and elegant Mosquito light bomber and to undertake potentially lethal training in the highlands of Scotland.
Events principally unfold through the eyes of the Station Intelligence Officer, Adams, the squadron leader, Grenville and aircrew of the unit. We learn something about the working of a wartime airfield, about bow the maintenance, intelligence and aircrew work to place the aircraft over the target at the right moment.
Frederick E. Smith has written a novel about individual motivation at a time of terrible fear. The air crews cope by suppressing thoughts of both what they have experienced and what they know must follow. For some this denial is helped along with bouts of drunken revelry.
He also gives us a sympathetic insight into the lives of higher command - committed to the necessary evil of war. They too struggle against their feelings of revulsion at what they must do to help attain victory. The story is given wider appeal as there are strong supporting roles for female characters and here it reads as a much more modem novel.
This is a classic story. Kipling once said that a soldier's lot generally comprised, 95% boredom , 3% pleasure and 2% sheer terror. Frederick E Smith still maintains that for aircrew that latter figure was much higher.
Paul Brunyee
ALL HONEST MEN
Claude and Michele Stanush , The Permanent Press,2003 , $28 , hb,320pp , 1579620841
Back in the 1970s the father half of this fatherdaughter writing team became a close friend of Willis Newton , leader of one of the most successful gang of outlaws of the 1920s. Based on this association , Claude co-wrote the screenplay for Th e N e wton Boys , a 1998 movie developed from Th e Newton Boy s: Portrait of an Outlaw Gang by Willis Newton, Joe Newton and Claude Stanush , an oral autobiography published in 1994
Not having seen the earlier book, I don't know what's in the new book that wasn't in the old one. This one's presented as a fictional memoir, told as if in the words of Willis Newton himself, in a southwestern vernacular that's as keen and precise as the blue in a western summer sky.
The mastermind behind the biggest train robbery in US history, that of the Chicago Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway in 1924 , Willis died in 1979, never apologizing for his past. He claimed he and his brothers were simply businessmen , and contemptuous of thugs like Al Capone.
It's entertaining reading Bonnie and Clyde without the bloodshed or not as much but having to stick to the facts , there aren't the twists and turns of the plot there'd be in an entirely fictional piece of work. In the process, though , the Stanushes give us an intimate, down-to-earth picture of life in the western United States in the early 1900s, from fields
bursting with cotton in the Texas flatlands to the streets of a swinging and sinful Chicago, bursting with crime.
There's some suspense at the end, however, as things go bad after the train robbery. Will the brothers survive the resulting manhunt? Read and find out as surprisingly enough , while widely known in their time, hardly anybody remembers the Newton gang today.
Steve Lewis
THE LOST ARMY OF CAMBYSES
Paul Sussman , St. Martin ' s Press , 2002 , $24.95 /C$34.95, 359pp, hb, 0312301537
Despite their strained relationship , Dr. Tara Mullray is on her way to visit her archaeologist father in Egypt, but when she arrives , she discovers that he's dead. Meanwhile , other bodies are uncovered , making Inspector Yusuf Khalifa of the Luxor police very suspicious. As Tara and Inspector Khalifa strive to stay alive while solving the crimes , mystery is heaped upon mystery , including one that is 2500 years old.
From a history standpoint, the book is very disappointing , being mainly a modem story. There are some details worthy of note on fanatical viewpoints , a topic of interest in today ' s world. Still, mysteries and adventure stories set in Egypt are fairly common, and this one really doesn't have any spectacular quality to make it stand out from others.
Despite that , the adventure is interesting and even "edge of your seat" at times. There are interesting twists to keep the reader riveted. Any fan of Egypt and archaeology might get a kick out the setting, with the usual props such as burial chambers , antiquities, and the like A worthy first attempt , this novel is an easy read likely to appeal to mystery and adventure fans of any time period.
Alycia Harris
FREUD'S ALPHABET
Jonathan Tel, Scribner, 2003, £10.99, hb , l 77pp, 0743239164. Pub in US by Counterpoint Press, $24 , hb , 1582432198 In 1939 , the dying Sigmund Freud flees Vienna and settles in Hampstead, together with his famous psychiatrist ' s couch and his statuettes of Greek and Egyptian gods , and sets about analysing his new city. There is no story as such , except that from time to time Freud's doctor and translator, Ernest Jones, administers morphine to his dying patient. Instead , the book , with its chapters headed alphabetically (G for Gschnas , H for Hamlet , I for Id) offers an impressionistic view of London as it prepares for war in twenty-six acutely observed vignettes, some ordinary (a postman on his rounds), some bizarre (Freud and Jones at the Hampstead Fun Fair).
Tel has obviously done his homework and north London readers might well enjoy the reminders of how Hampstead used to be (the late-lamented John Barnes department store, for
example). The book is obviously deeply symbolic, but it isn't always clear what of. I thought some of Freud's postulations , for example on the English use of irony , were way off the mark and said more about Freud than about the subjects under discussion - but possibly that was the intention. An engagingly written book.
Elizabeth Hawksley
MORENGA
Uwe Timm, New Directions, 2003 (cl983) , $25.95 , hb , 340pp,0811215148
German Southwest Africa m 1904-1907 provides the principal setting for this recently translated 1983 novel about the suppression of the Herero and Hottentot rebellions. Wellselected fragments of German military documents convey some of the horror of dehumanizing philosophy. A particularly gruesome position paper poses genocide or enslavement as the only possible outcomes for the natives. The rebels prove to be clever and courageous with a skilled leader named Morenga , but the relentless power of the German military delivers masses of men, weapons, and even camels to crush this desert revolt.
In spite of the grim setting, the novel has many skilled comic characterizations. The colonizers include a trader who notices that the natives are a poor market for European-made goods because they make every pot and button last a lifetime. Veterinary Lieutenant Gottschalk , whose diaries narrate some of the book, shows the locals how to save their cows' lives with steel dentures. Language makes up a major theme of the book , with Gottschalk and a friend trying to learn the Nama language with its complex clicking consonants: one learning for the beauty of the language and the other picking out the most practical expressions. German characters are frequently described by which dialect they are employing. I am in no position to judge Breon Mitchell ' s translation for accuracy, but I recently attended a reading given by him and the author , and Timm seemed to approve of the translation. It reads smoothly while moving from shock to humor and back again with well-selected words and phrases.
James Hawking
FRANKIE AND ST ANKIE
Barbara Trapido , Bloomsbury 2003 , £16.99 , hb , 307pp, 074756034X
Dinah is growing up in 1950s South Africa, a country of radical politics where racism is learned in the cradle. Dinah's family is liberal and dissenting which often leads to conflict with her peers.
In contrast to her robust sister, Lisa, Dinah is a fussy eater who suffers from asthma. Nevertheless she is one of life's survivors who can stand up for herself whether faced with the sadistic schoolmistress , Mrs VaughanWilliams , the prejudices of the white
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ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
community or even the humiliation of university initiation ceremonies.
The story follows Dinah throughout her childhood, adolescence and early womanhood set against a backdrop of intolerance and spiralling violence. Her growing social conscience eventually forces Dinah to accept voluntary exile with the man she loves rather than remain in a country of oppression.
Barbara Trapido has conjured up a tale of light and darkness - or even black and whitewhere humour and wit counterpoint moments of extreme pathos. This brilliant writer brings the 1950s, childhood pleasures and pains, political turmoil and inherent racism sharply into focus.
The author has employed an unusual prose style, reporting in the present tense. The strangeness this initially creates soon dissipates and the reader is then sucked into the heart of the heroine's life
Hugely enjoyable and highly recommended.
Sara Wilson
THE BOOK OF SALT
Monique Truong, Chatto & Windus 2003, £12.99, hb, 26lpp, 0701175222. Pub in US by Houghton Mifflin, $24, hb, 0618204002
Paris 1934. The Vietnamese narrator 'Bin' leaves his homeland, then a French colony, and gets a job in Paris as cook to Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas, famous for their avant-garde salon. The novel goes back and forth between Bin's time as cook in the governor-general's house in Saigon; his childhood memories of his brutal father and submissive mother; his stolen affair with Sweet Sunday Man, one of Stein's guests; and his life with Stein and Toklas.
Exiled from his own language, Bin becomes a lost soul. Even in Vietnam, his native language has been devalued by the French co loni sts. In Paris, he has learnt little French. He survives by defining the world around him through food, initially the Vietnamese cooking of his childhood, and then through the famous Alice B. Toklas cookbook.
As befits the twin subjects of food and exile, the book is, on the one hand, lyrical and sensuous, and on the other full of linguistic inaccuracies - '(he) had no patience for her' is one of many examples The meanings of words slip about does Bin really mean 'disinterested' - or should it be 'uninterested'? The recipes, however, are meticulously and succulently described. An intriguing debut. Elizabeth Hawksley
EASTER ISLAND
Jennifer Vanderbes, The Dial Press, 2003, $22.95 / C$34.95, hb, 304pp , 038533673X. Pub m UK by Little Brown, £10.99, pb, 03 ' 167253821
This is a tale of two women: Elsa Pendleton, an English woman who travels to Easter Island with her anthropologist husband and mentally disabled sister in 1913, and modem- day Greer
Farraday, an American botanist, who travels to the island for research purposes after the death of her husband. As Elsa's husband studies the island's colossal moai statues, she becomes fascinated with the rongorongo, ancient tablets filled with hieroglyphics, and begins attempting to translate them in hopes of discovering more about the island's history. Elsa's efforts in this regard are more to fill an empty marriage, whereas Greer's own research project is an attempt to get her life back on track after learning that her husband plagiarized her own research before his death and took credit for it without so much as a shred of remorse
Add to the above mix Elsa's former lover, whose identity is not divulged until much later in the book, and a German naval squadron fleeing the British across the South Pacific after World War I is declared. Why , considering the poverty of the island, would a German squadron anchor there for any period of time, as reported in at least one historical account? And, once there, why did they go to such great lengths to keep the news of the war a secret to the island's inhabitants? The answers to these questions and numerous others remain unanswered at the close of this novel , although, as a result of excellent historical research and a very fertile imagination, Vanderbes gives a number of viable possibilities. Her skillful interweaving of the fictional with the factual is nothing short of impressive.
Pat Maynard
STONER
John Williams, Vintage, this edition 2003, £6.99,pb , 278pp, 0099445093
William Stoner is an only child born into a humble farming family in central Missouri. In 1910 his father scrapes together the money to send him to university to study agriculture. The young man soon falls under the influence of Professor Archer Sloane, who shows him the beauty of the English language and literature. Stoner abandons his plans to return to farming and remains at university, where he becomes a teacher.
Outwardly, Stoner's life and career are undistinguished. He teaches , reads , writes , falls in love and marries. To his bitter regret, his wife turns out to be very different from the woman he thought he loved and their daughter is caught in the middle of their unhappy relationship. At work he seeks to escape by embarking on a bittersweet love affair with another teacher.
Stoner is a powerful and moving story of an unassuming life. Great depths of intensity and emotion seethe just beneath the surface of the characters and, although little of this passion is spoken aloud, it is revealed in every gesture and every thought.
Above all, this is a serious novel that manages to make even the most mundane events seem dramatic. John Williams is a gifted writer and the clarity of his prose is a joy to read.
Although Stoner was first published thirty years ago, it remains as compelling and relevant today.
Sara Wilson
PLAIN LANGUAGE
Barbara Wright, Touchstone, 2003, $13, pb , 34lpp,0743230205
Virginia Mendenhall graduates from a Quaker college and proceeds to social work in Philadelphia and later an Appalachian mining town. Her life seems complete, yet her memory often wanders back to an accidental meeting with Alfred Bowen, with whom she shares a sense of adventure, challenge, and some frank communication by mail. Alfred asks her to marry him , and Virginia moves to Colorado to share the farming of a most unprofitable territory.
Three notable elements grace this novel. The first is the honest , clean description of a land that is harshly unyielding to its resident farmers yet which seems to cast a relentless spell of endurance and promise to anyone willing to forge a future through trial and determination. The second element involves character sketches that are forthright, humorous, intelligent, and fiercely proud. The love match grows and grows despite the presence of past ghosts and present misunderstandings. Virginia and Alfred are portrayed with depth and dignity. The third element that is most unusual is the graceful way other characters, family and friends, appear only after there is a sense of this newlywed couple's evo lving relationship through striving to survive the harsh reality of the Depression and to discover who they are together as well as individually. Helping a disabled relative adjust to a new lifestyle , Virginia and Alfred mature and become a dynamic presence in their new hometown , without precluding the strong Quaker background beliefs that Virginia begins to newly appreciate. Her unexpected gift will warm the coldest heart.
For a tremendous appreciation of the quarrels, compromises , and loving resolutions these hearty Westerners share, Ms. Wright deserves the highest praise. This writer continuously displays a remarkable gift of insight into people within what must be described as a beautifully crafted novel. Viviane Crystal
MULTI-PERIOD
WHERE THE RIVER NARROWS
Aimee Laberge , HarperFlamingo Canada, C$34.95,299pp,hb,0002254956
In the Mi'kmaq language, the name of the Canadian province of Quebec translates as "where the river narrows." It's here, near the northern village of Chicoutimi in the early days of the 20 th century, that coureur du bois Antonio Tremblay lives with his two wives, dividing his time between them. These are
THE IIlSTORICAL NOVELS
ISSUE 25, AUG 2003
respectable Marie-Ange, who would have preferred to serve God instead of a husband, and Marie Kapesh, an Indian "wood-wife" who gives him a second family, one he clearly prefers. Marie-Joseph, the plain elder daughter of Marie-Ange, devotes her life to the care of her sister, Marie-Reine, who marries and raises seven children. Their stories are framed by that of Marie-Reine's granddaughter, Lucie, tracing her own and Quebec's history in modem London while trying to save her own marriage.
The simultaneousness of both past and present, a frequent theme in modem Canadian literature, floats gently through this novel. The personal experiences of early male and female settlers appear periodically, though their presence isn't forced. A certain nostalgia for Quebec's early history is ever-present, though for some, the pull of the province's religious past proves difficult to escape. In Laberge's hands Quebec's separateness becomes palpable and haunting, as shown in its people's discomfort with fighting Canada's wars on the side of Britain, a country that had tried to strip them of their own identity.
In some respects the ending is left ambiguous, and I would have liked to know more about Catherine, the wood-wife's mysterious daughter, who appears only occasionally and at a distance. This thread is frustratingly left unexplained. Still, this is a beautiful book, from the gorgeous photograph on the dust jacket to the exquisite prose contained within its pages.
Sarah L. Johnson
MOZART AND ME
Joyce T. Stafford, Frederic C. Beil, 2002, $29.95, 714pp,hb, 1929490054
Psychotherapist Grace Harmon is unhappy with her life. She is estranged from her husband and son, her work is growing tiresome, and she feels depressed. Her only remaining passion, her obsession, is for the music of Mozart. When she admits this obsession to her teacher, instead of analyzing it, he offers to send her back in time to meet her idol. Through her adventures in 18th century Vienna, she uncovers the "real" Mozart and attempts to work out her own problems.
I wish I can say that I enjoyed this massive doorstopper of a book, if only to justify all the time I spent reading it. Unfortunately, the only redeeming features I can come up with are the beautiful binding and the thick creamy paper!
This book is pedantic; I might as well have been listening to a dry, jargon-filled college lecture on psychoanalysis. The characters are disagreeable and cold, especially the arrogant, self-obsessed, and self-aggrandizing Grace. Mozart is used as fodder for Grace's own selfexploration, and as such, he exhibits a simple, stereotypic personality. The time travel concept, consisting of the "magician" teacher who can automatically "transport" Grace wherever she desires to go, is ludicrously simplistic. I never
did understand why a pen arrives mangled in the past, but a water bottle arrives intact! The plot leaves gaping holes and jumps around constantly, culminating in a conclusion that concludes nothing at all.
From a historical fiction point of view, the obvious lack of research is disconcerting and contributes to the unbelievability of this story. Although there is a great deal of "telling" about Mozart's compositions and operas, the story is devoid of historical period feel, other than cursory descriptions of clothing and furnishings. The lack of references to research materials doesn't help either. If I were you, I wouldn't waste my time or money on this one.
Andrea Connell
THE B LESSING STONE
Barbara Wood , St. Martin's Press, 2003, $25.95 / C$35.95, hb, 450pp, 031227534X. Pub. in the UK by Severn House, 2003, £18.99, hb, 464pp,0727859587
The web site for this novel (www.theblessingstone.com) contains a note from its editor, perplexed that Wood, a bestselling author in Europe, has never achieved prominence in the USA. Her epic novels aren't written on the same scale as Michener's or Rutherfurd's, but her characters are more interesting, her storytelling more fluid, her research just as good, plus her writing has a spiritual flavor that the others lack. In short, I can't explain it either.
Wood's latest effort retells the entire history of the world through eight episodes, all linked via a mysterious blue stone. The stone becomes a talisman for Tall One, a young woman in prehistoric Africa, who alone of her tribe has the ability to rely on reason over instinct. The subsequent stories tell of matriarchal tribes of the ancient Near East, Goddess-worshippers in the Jordan River Valley, early Christian martyrs in first century Rome , abbey life in late AngloSaxon England, a young woman's adventures in 16th century Germany and Asia, passion and revenge in l 720 Martinique, and wagons west on the I 9th century American frontier. To Wood's credit, the stories are all unique, some light, some dark, some more realistic than others. Standouts are her portrayals of Amelia, a Roman matron ignored by her husband after an adulterous affair, and her Martinique episode, with its delightfully ironic twist at the end. There are some obvious "history in the maki ng" moments, such as when her prehistoric characters realize at last that men play a role in the procreation of children. Overall, though, I found it engrossing. Since it's clear that Wood has more great stories to tell, I hope they find a ready audience.
Sarah L. Johnson
THE IDSTORICAL NOVELS REVIEW
