Historical Novels Review, Issue 63 (February 2013)

A PUBLICATION OF THE HISTORICAL NOVEL SOCIETY

HISTORICAL NOVELS REVIEW Issue 63, February 2013

Language & Historical Fiction in celebration pride & prejudice’s bicentennial haunted triangles when the “other woman” is a first wife my heroines women & the crimean war forgotten author the work of ardyth kennelly going indie why quality matters in selfpublishing a victorian tragedy an interview with elizabeth laird ALSO IN THIS ISSUE editor’s message | historical fiction market news | history & film | new voices

Historical Novels R eview

ISSN: 1471-7492 | © 2013 The Historical Novel Society

Stuart MacAllister <hnsindie@yahoo.co.uk>

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pub lis h er

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Richard Lee Marine Cottage, The Strand Starcross, Devon EX6 8NY United Kingdom <richard@historicalnovelsociety.org>

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edit o r ial boa r d

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Managing Editor: Bethany Latham Houston Cole Library, Jacksonville State University 700 Pelham Road North Jacksonville, AL 36265-1602 USA <blatham@jsu.edu> Book Review Editor: Sarah Johnson 6868 Knollcrest Drive Charleston, IL 61920 USA <sljohnson2@eiu.edu>

Publisher Coverage: Bethany House; HarperCollins; Penguin Putnam; Random House (all imprints); university presses; and any North American presses not mentioned below

UK Review Coordinator: Richard Lee Marine Cottage, The Strand Starcross, Devon EX6 8NY United Kingdom <richard@historicalnovelsociety.org> Publisher coverage: UK children’s publishers

Features Coordinator: Lucinda Byatt 13 Park Road Edinburgh, EH6 4LE UK <mail@lucindabyatt.com>

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review s edit o r s , u k

Features Editor: Myfanwy Cook 47 Old Exeter Road Tavistock, Devon PL19 OJE UK <myfanwyc@btinternet.com>

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Claire Cowling <clairecowling@talktalk.net>

Publisher Coverage: Birlinn/Polygon; Bloomsbury; Constable & Robinson; Faber & Faber; The History Press; Macmillan (inc. Pan, Picador, Sidgwick & Jackson); Penguin (inc. Allen Lane, Hamish Hamilton, Michael Joseph, Viking); Short Books; Snowbooks; and Transworld (inc. Bantam Press, Black Swan, Corgi, Doubleday)

Alan Fisk Flat 25, Lancaster Court, Lancaster Avenue London SE27 9HU UK <alanfisk@yahoo.com>

Publisher Coverage: Creme de la Crime; Duckworth; HarperCollins UK (inc. Flamingo, Fourth Estate, Voyager); Orion Group (inc. Cassell, Gollancz, Phoenix, Weidenfeld & Nicolson); Piatkus; Picnic Publishing; Quaestor2000; Quercus; Severn House; and all small independent UK publishers not handled by other editors

Elizabeth Hawksley <elizabethhawksley@yahoo.co.uk>

Publisher Coverage: All UK children’s historicals

Edward James 2 Hayman Close Cheltenham, Gloucestershire GL53 9FD UK <edward654@btinternet.com>

Publisher Coverage: Arcadia; Atlantic Books; Canongate; Hodder Headline (inc. Coronet, Hodder & Stoughton, NEL, Sceptre); John Murray; and Robert Hale

Doug Kemp Tulip Lodge, Harrowden Road Wellingborough, Northamptonshire NN8 5BD UK <doug.kemp@lineone.net>

Publisher Coverage: Allison & Busby; Little, Brown & Co (inc. Abacus, Virago, Warner); Random House UK (inc. Arrow, Cape, Century, Chatto & Windus, Harvill, Heinemann, Hutchinson, Pimlico, Secker & Warburg, Vintage), Simon & Schuster (inc. Scribner)

Publisher Coverage: all self-published, subsidy, and electronically published novels.

re v i e ws e d i tors , u s a

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Jessica Brockmole 14413 Worthington Drive Granger, IN 46530 USA <jabrockmole@hotmail.com>

Publisher Coverage: Amazon Publishing, Hachette Book Group, Hyperion, W.W. Norton

Andrea Connell 10011 Beacon Pond Lane Burke, VA 22015 USA <connell1453@verizon.net>

Publisher Coverage: Bethany House, Henry Holt, Other Press, Overlook, Tyndale, and other US small presses

Jane Kessler University Library 119, University at Albany, SUNY 1400 Washington Avenue Albany, NY 12222 USA <jkessler@uamail.albany.edu>

Publisher Coverage: Algonquin; FSG; Five Star; IPG; Kensington; and Trafalgar Square

Ilysa Magnus 5430 Netherland Avenue #C41 Bronx, NY 10471 USA <goodlaw2@optonline.net>

Publisher Coverage: Dorchester; Grove/Atlantic; Minotaur Books; Picador USA; Poisoned Pen Press; Soho Press; St Martin’s Press; and Tor/Forge

Tamela McCann 5265 Village Terrace Nashville, TN 37211 USA <jjmmccann@aol.com>

Publisher Coverage: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and Simon & Schuster, including children’s divisions of both

Ann Pedtke 38-13 52nd Street Sunnyside, NY 11104 USA

Publisher coverage: US/Canadian children’s publishers (except S&S, HMH)

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confe re nce s

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The Society organizes annual conferences in the UK and biennial conferences in the US. Contact Richard Lee (UK) or Ann Chamberlin <annchamberlin@annchamberlin.com> (USA).

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m e m be rs h i p d e ta i l s

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Membership in the Historical Novel Society entitles members to all the year’s publications: four issues of Historical Novels Review, as well as exclusive membership benefits through the Society website. Back issues of Society magazines are also available. For current rates, contact: Lois Bennett 19, The Grange, Banbridge County Down BT32 3HW UK <lois@loisbennett.co.uk>

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e d i tori a l pol i cy

Georgine Olson 400 Dark Star Court Fairbanks, AK 99709 USA <georgine@mosquitonet.com>

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Reviews, articles, and letters may be edited for reasons of space, clarity, and grammatical correctness. We will endeavour to reflect the authors’ intent as closely as possible, and will contact the authors for approval of any major change. We welcome ideas for articles, but have specific requirements to consider. Before submitting material, please contact the editor to discuss whether the proposed article is appropriate for Historical Novels Review.

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copy ri g h t

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In all cases, the copyright remains with the authors of the articles. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the authors concerned.

THE HISTORICAL NOVEL SOCIETY was formed in 1997 to help promote historical fiction. All staff and contributors are volunteers and work unpaid. We are an open society — if you want to get involved, get in touch.

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Historical Novels R eview I ssu e 6 3 , Fe br ua ry 2013 | I SSN 1471-7492

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ed itor ia l r ich a rd le e

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histor ic a l fic tion market n ews s ar a h joh nson

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n ew voic e s p r of ile s of debut his torical f iction authors jenny b a r den, pa tr ic ia b racewell, kris tin g lees on & e n id s h ome r | my f anw y cook

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histor y & film lus t & gr e e d : d o uble indemnity | bethan y l a tha m

| features & interviews |

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LANG UAGE & HI STOR I CAL FICT I ON an exp loration of s t yle, idi o m & an achron is m | b y philip go o den

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in celebra ti o n t he bic e nte nnia l of pride & prejudice | b y a ma nda gra nge

12 haunted tri a ngl es whe n the “other woman ” is a f irs t w i f e | by elis abeth sto rrs

13 m y hero i nes wome n & the crim ean war | b y f rank cl a rk 14

f org otten au tho r t he wor k of ardy th ken n elly | by b .j . sedl o ck

15 g oin g i ndie wh y q u alit y matters | b y helen ho l l ick 16 a victorian tra gedy an int er v ie w with elizabeth laird | b y lucin da bya tt | reviews |

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book r e v ie ws e d ito rs’ c h oic e & m ore

HNS 2013 CONFERENCE ummertime on the beach in St. Petersburg, Florida is a fine time to gather with friends, enjoy sunsets over the ocean, and talk historical fiction. That’s right — the 2013 HNS conference is upon us and this year we are holding it at the Vinoy Renaissance Hotel right on the water. We are excited to offer a fantastic lineup of author talks and panels, editor and agent pitch sessions, manuscript critique services, the popular “Cold Reads,” and even pre-conference workshops.

We’ve planned a jam-packed schedule with plenty of activities from which to choose.

The activities kick off on Friday, June 21st, with two signature workshops conducted by award-winning publisher and editor, Charlotte Cook. Both Saturday and Sunday are full of sessions on everything from how to weave authenticity into your writing, to different paths to publication, to how to market your work once you get published. Agents and editors will meet with attendees throughout the conference and will speak on two panels about their experiences. Our guests of honor are bestselling author Steve Berry and acclaimed novelist Anne Perry, with C.W. Gortner as our special luncheon speaker. Saturday is our big day for book signings as well a costume pageant emceed by Gillian Bagwell (so start thinking about those costumes!), and for our brave souls, the popular “Sex Scene Readings,” hosted by Diana Gabaldon.

Of course, a conference highlight is meeting with old friends and making new ones. One of the suggestions many made for this year’s conference was to have more time for networking, and more space to do it in, and we’ve listened to you! Not only do we have an extended reception and an early conclusion of our Friday activities for casual meetings, but there are plenty of places to have a drink and talk business, both in the hotel and within walking distance.

It’s a lot to take in, but the one thing I can say is that every time I’ve gone to an HNS conference, I’ve come away refreshed, with renewed energy for my writing and new ideas to try out. I hope you can all come to Florida and experience the conference firsthand!

Details can be found on our website: http://hns-conference. org. I look forward to meeting you soon!

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VANITHA SANKARAN is a scientific writer by day and a novelist by night. After receiving her doctorate in biomedical engineering from Northwestern University, she realized that living with fictional historical figures is far more entertaining than being shut up in a laboratory. She is the author of Watermark: A Novel of the Middle Ages.

HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Columns | 1

H I STO R I C AL FICTION MAR K ET NE W S

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ould you like your latest publishing deal to appear here? Email me at sljohnson2@eiu.edu.

HNS Updates The HNS indie review team seeks new reviewers, particularly for e-books. Candidates should be avid historical fiction readers who can write clearly and concisely and keep to deadlines. To receive the guidelines, email Stuart MacAllister at hnsindie@ yahoo.co.uk with details on your interests, preferred formats, and writing/reviewing experience.

New publishing deals Sources include Publishers Marketplace, The Bookseller, Publishers Weekly, and author submissions.

Giller Prize-winning author Joseph Boyden’s The Orenda, chronicling the first contact between the Jesuits and the First Nations in the wilds of New France in the 17th century, sold to Gary Fisketjon at Knopf by Eric Simonoff of William Morris Endeavor. Canadian rights sold to Nicole Winstanley at Hamish Hamilton Canada.

The Wind Is Not a River by Brian Payton, about survival in combat plus a heart-rending love story, set on the Japaneseoccupied Aleutian islands off Alaska in 1943, sold to Lee Boudreaux of Ecco by Victoria Sanders of Victoria Sanders & Associates.

Heather Webb’s debut Becoming Josephine, about the transformation of Rose de Beauharnais from Creole socialite to neglected Parisian wife during the French Revolution to her emergence as Empress Josephine Bonaparte, sold to Denise Roy at Plume by Michelle Brower at Folio Literary Management.

Antonia Hodgson’s (editor-in-chief, Little Brown UK) The Devil in the Marshalsea, an 18th-c historical thriller in which a parson’s son finds himself in debtors’ prison and must solve a murder to escape, sold to Andrea Schulz at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for publication in Spring 2014 by Jo Unwin at Conville & Walsh.

Mary Hart Perry’s Seducing the Princess, inspired by the life of Queen Victoria’s youngest daughter, in which a princess becomes the target of a cruel plot to infiltrate the royal family, along with a second historical novel featuring her eldest sister, who matches wits with Jack the Ripper, sold to Mary Cummings at Diversion Books by Kevan Lyon of Marsal Lyon Literary 2 | Columns |

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Agency.

Lightfall by Jeanne Mackin, in which a young American expatriate in 1930s-40s France gets caught up in the local art world and discovers love and loss, sold to Ellen Edwards at NAL, in a two-book deal, for publication in Summer 2014.

NAL’s Ellen Edwards also acquired Elizabeth Loupas’ The Alchemist Prince, in which a young girl is chosen as the “mystical sister” to the alchemist Prince Francesco de’ Medici while assisting in his secret experiments and fighting her way through court intrigues, via Diana Fox at Fox Literary. UK rights were sold to Rosie de Courcy at Preface, by David Grossman and Books Crossing Borders on behalf of Fox Literary.

The Kashmir Shawl author Rosie Thomas’ next two books, covering the period 1885-1944 and telling the story of a family of stage illusionists and a Victorian music hall with a truly magnificent and original cast of characters, sold to Kate Elton at Harper UK by Jonathan Lloyd of Curtis Brown.

Kelly O’Connor McNees’ Island of the Doves, the story of a wife’s escape to Mackinac Island by steamship in 1835 and the wealthy fur-trader’s widow who offers safe haven from the monstrous husband who pursues her, sold again to Claire Zion at Berkley, by Marly Rusoff at Marly Rusoff & Associates.

David Gibbins’ Total War: Rome II, following the rise of Fabius Petronius Secundus, a fictional Roman legionary and centurion whose life closely shadows that of Scipio Africanus the Younger, conqueror of Carthage in 146 BC, sold to Jeremy Trevathan at Pan Macmillan, in a joint acquisition with Thomas Dunne Books, in a four-book deal, by Luigi Bonomi.

I Shall Be Near to You by Erin Lindsay McCabe, following a strong-willed young American woman who in 1861 disguises herself as a man to follow her new husband into the Union Army, sold to Christine Kopprasch at Crown, at auction, by Daniel Lazar at Writers House.

Valerie Martin’s The Ghost of the Mary Celeste, a historical novel about the intersection of human tragedy, the maritime mystery of the Mary Celeste, and the early fascination of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, sold to Alan Samson at Weidenfeld & Nicolson, at auction, by Peter Straus at Rogers, Coleridge & White on behalf of Molly Friedrich.

NYT bestselling author of The House at Tyneford Natasha Solomons’ The Gallery of Vanished Husbands, about one woman’s journey to find her passion, and to be seen, set in the art world of 1960s London, sold to Tara Singh at Plume by Jason Bartholomew at Hodder & Stoughton.

Egmont Press publisher Stella Paskins bought world English rights to TV producer Jane Hardstaff’s debut historical The Executioner’s Daughter, following Moss, a young Tudor girl whose father is the executioner at the Tower of London and who learns the value of freedom, via Gillie Russell at Aitken Alexander.

Judith Kinghorn’s second historical novel The Memory of

the man she loves, a military trauma surgeon, is increasingly consumed by the horrors of his work, sold to Amanda Bergeron at William Morrow for Winter 2014 publication by Kevan Lyon at Marsal Lyon Literary Agency.

The Tom Tyler series by English-born Canadian writer Maureen Jennings, set in rural England in the darkest days of the Second World War, sold to Titan Books, in a three-book deal, by Ron Eckel at Cooke Agency International, on behalf of McClelland & Stewart.

New and upcoming releases Roses Have Thorns by Sandra Byrd, fiction about Elin von Snakenborg, a historical Swedish noblewoman in the court of Elizabeth I, appears in April from Howard Books.

The classic Accursed Kings series by Maurice Druon, which reveals the drama and cruelty surrounding the unfortunate monarchs of 14th-century France and their consorts, is being reprinted by Harper Voyager (UK), beginning with The Iron King and The Strangled Queen in January and April.

Tom Taylor’s debut Brock’s Agent, a story of redemption for Upper Canada’s first secret agent, has been acquired by Sandstone Press in the UK for July 2013 publication. The third novel in this War of 1812 series, Brock’s Traitor, a story of smuggling and honour, will be published April 2013 by Hancock and Dean in Canada.

Laurie Graham’s The Liar’s Daughter, in which a girl investigates her mother’s claim to be the daughter of Horatio Nelson, appears this autumn from Quercus.

In late April, MIRA publishes Deanna Raybourn’s A Spear of Summer Grass, the story of Delilah Drummond, a scandalous flapper who journeys to Kenya in 1923 in search of adventure.

Jeff Shaara’s new US Civil War novel A Chain of Thunder, about the siege of Vicksburg, appears from Ballantine in May. Errata The Cross and the Dragon was authored by Kim Rendfeld; her surname was misspelled in our last issue.

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For additional forthcoming titles, see: http://historicalnovelsociety. org/guides/forthcoming-historical-novels.

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Lost Senses, set in 1911 and 1923, exploring memory, desire, and secrets in which an elderly countess from the Continent arrives on a Hampshire village estate and changes three people’s lives, sold to Ellen Edwards at NAL by Deborah Schneider of Gelfman Schneider, on behalf of Ali Gunn. Headline Review will publish in the UK this May. Anna Hope’s debut Wake, set over five days in 1920 and weaving the stories of three women around the journey of the Unknown Soldier from its excavation in Northern France to Armistice Day at Westminster Abbey, sold to Susan Kamil at Random House US and to Jane Lawson at Transworld, at auction, by Caroline Wood at Felicity Bryan Agency.

Granta editorial director Laura Barber acquired A Meal in Winter by French writer Hubert Mingarelli, in his Englishlanguage debut, for Portobello Books via Editions Stock for autumn 2013 publication. It tells the story of three SS officers, their Jewish prisoner, and a chilling choice.

Julia Gregson’s (East of the Sun, Jasmine Nights) next asyet-untitled novel, a sweeping family saga set in Bombay in the 1920s and moving to 1940s Oxfordshire about a halfIndian woman who is jilted by her British cavalry fiancé and is left unmarried and pregnant with no choice but to follow her beloved to England, sold to Heather Lazare at Touchstone, by Clare Alexander at Aitken Alexander.

Charles Belfoure’s The Paris Architect, the story of a gifted architect in World War II Paris who reluctantly begins a secret life devising ingenious hiding places for Jews throughout the city, sold to Shana Drehs at Sourcebooks Landmark, for publication in Fall 2013, by Susan Ginsburg at Writers House.

The Family Orchard author Nomi Eve’s Henna, about a girl betrothed to her cousin as a young child, and the romance and betrayal that accompany their journey into adulthood, set in Jewish Yemen on the eve of WWII, sold to Alexis Gargagliano at Scribner, for publication in 2014, by Amelia Atlas at ICM. YA librarian Mary McCoy’s Dead to Me, a debut mystery set in the glamorous yet treacherous world of Golden Age Hollywood and pitched as Veronica Mars meets Raymond Chandler, sold to Laura Schreiber at Disney-Hyperion by Madeleine Raffel in her first deal at Hannigan Salky Getzler.

Aus/NZ rights to Allison Rushby’s The Heiresses, pitched as Downton Abbey for the New Adult market, sold to Claire Craig at Pan Macmillan Australia, by Whitney Lee of The Fielding Agency on behalf of Sara Megibow at Nelson Literary Agency.

Naomi Wood’s Mrs. Hemingway, moving from bohemian 1920s Paris to 1960s Cold War America, narrated by Ernest Hemingway’s four wives: Hadley, Pauline, Martha and Mary, sold to Tara Singh at Penguin, at auction, by Claudia Ballard on behalf of Cathryn Summerhayes at William Morris Endeavor.

Jennifer Robson’s Out of All Knowing, in which a young woman defies convention and her aristocratic family’s wishes by becoming an ambulance driver during WWI, while and

SARAH JOHNSON, Book Review Editor of HNR, is a librarian, readers’ advisor, and author of reference books. She reviews for Booklist, CHOICE and Canada’s Globe and Mail and blogs about historical novels at readingthepast.com. Her latest book is Historical Fiction II: A Guide to the Genre.

HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Columns | 3

NEW VOICES Jenny Barden, Patricia Bracewell, Kristin Gleeson, and Enid Shomer provide behind-the-scenes glimpses of the inspiration for their debut novels.

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t started with a phone call,” Kristin Gleeson, author of Selkie Dreams (Knox Robinson, 2012) explained when describing what sparked her desire to write her debut novel. The call came from “a Tlingit elder from Alaska when I was working at a historical society in Philadelphia. He was trying to prove to the U.S. government that the Tlingits inhabited a section of Alaskan land that the government had declared uninhabited in 1905. In the process of helping the elder I learned more about the Tlingit view of missions and white settlements, something not contained in the archives where I worked.”

Gleeson continues: “...it was an effort to bring out their experiences that caused me to start the novel, Selkie Dreams, after I moved to Ireland. Drawing on my background as a musician and singer, I used the framework of the selkie myth (seals that take on human form) and the ancient folk song, The Silkie of Sule Skerrie, to tell the story of an Irish woman working among the Tlingit of Alaska as a mission teacher.” Gleeson’s novel, which blends historical fact with myth and legend, opens in Belfast in 1895, with a young woman haunted by her mother’s death, who embarks on an Alaskan adventure to escape an unwanted marriage.

The Silkie of Sule Skerrie is a song, Gleeson says, that she has “sung many times with the harp. [It] tells the story of a selkie man who comes ashore and spends the night with a lonely woman. She gives birth to a son, and the man appears and gives her a gold chain for the son. Years later, when the son is seven years old, the selkie comes again to claim him. Though she mourns her son and lover, she marries a hunter who, not long after their marriage, shoots two seals, one with a gold chain around its neck.”

Jenny Barden, co-ordinator of the Historical Novel Society UK Conference, 2012, and author of Mistress of the Sea (Ebury, 2012), “an epic Elizabethan adventure set at the time of Drake, pirates and privateers,” was not inspired by a telephone call, but by the painting of a Dutch artist. However, as Barden points out: “The inspiration for Mistress of the Sea has come from many sources,” and she traces its origins back to her childhood.

Barden explains she had “a fascination with myth and legend: stories of valour rooted in the past. I can see my love of Bernard Cornwell’s early Sharpe novels showing through in the urge to 4 | Columns |

HNR Issue 63, February 2013

write a rip-roaring adventure, though I read those stories long before I ever thought I would write a book myself, and then, when I did, I wanted to write a Sharpe-style adventure with a female protagonist and a romantic slant.

“Travels in South and Central America were also a key inspiration, particularly retracing the footsteps of Francis Drake in Panama, and trekking along the route of the Camino Real: the old Royal Road along which Spanish bullion from Peru was transported overland by mule train, and the focus of Drake’s successful raid on the ‘Silver Train’ as the convoys were called.

This episode in history would come to form the backdrop to Mistress of the Sea and the fictional story at its heart: the quest for vengeance that is transformed into a hunt for treasure which becomes a search for love. But the genesis of my publishing debut has been a process of evolution, and in truth the book has been reshaped several times in response to feedback from readers, my agent, my editor and others involved in its gestation.

“I began writing quite late in life, after seeing a painting of the 17th-century Dutch artist Carel Fabritius in the National Gallery, and my fascination with this started me delving into research which ignited a story in my mind. The result was my first bottom drawer novel, but it was enough to secure an agent, gain the interest of editors, and afflict me with the writing itch which has remained with me ever since. When I came across the little-known story of Drake’s first successful enterprise against the Spanish, I knew I had struck gold: a true David and Goliath story of bravery, endurance and triumph against near impossible odds, and one of enormous significance to England’s rise as a nation.

It’s been a joy to bring that story back to life in Mistress of the Sea and an even greater joy now to see the novel published.”

Patricia Bracewell was fascinated by a fact that she discovered online, which eventually led to her writing Shadow of the Crown (Viking/Penguin, 2013): “I first stumbled across a reference to Emma of Normandy some fifteen years ago on an internet bulletin board. Someone had posted there the bare details of Emma’s life: daughter of the Duke of Normandy, wife to two kings of England and mother of two kings.

“So why, I asked myself, had I never heard of her? I had been interested in English history all my life and could claim a passing familiarity with at least the names of all (I thought) of the English queens, but Emma was not among them. What piqued my interest the most was that she had been wed to two different kings. There must, I thought, be quite a story there, and I determined to learn more about her.

“Yet for several years I ignored Emma’s siren song. Much as I wanted to write a historical novel – and I wanted to very much

– I was terrified of the research that I knew would be involved.

I did not see how I could add “researcher” to my roles of wife, mother, and fledgling writer. But Emma wouldn’t go away. She burrowed into my subconscious. I began to read nonfiction titles that dealt with the 11th century, and while I had always been drawn to works of historical fiction, my reading took a decidedly early-medieval turn.

“Finally, I could resist Emma no longer, and I started to research in earnest, beginning with the book that she herself had commissioned around A.D. 1040, Encomium Emmae Reginae.

The Encomium made no reference to her years as Aethelred II’s queen, and I knew immediately that the story of that first marriage, when Emma was a very young bride in an unfriendly, foreign land, was the one I wanted to tell.”

Enid Shomer, a well-known American poet, was inspired to write her debut historical fiction novel, The Twelve Rooms of the Nile (Simon and Schuster, 2012), when she “…read an essay by William Styron about his cruise down the Nile which included outrageous quotes from Gustave Flaubert’s Nile

journal. I then read Flaubert’s journal as well as his Nile letters, and was hooked. Flaubert was both a great sensitive and the bad boy of 19th century French literature. He loved language and prostitutes with equal dedication and vigor.

“I’d written about half of my first chapter when I discovered that another unhappy genius, Florence Nightingale, toured the Nile at the same moment and kept a journal. I became convinced that this was no coincidence, that she and Flaubert shared a profound connection despite their striking differences. Why were they both in a state of despair and why was Egypt the ‘cure’ for that despair?

“However, for me, choosing the subject for a novel is not a rational calculation. Instead, it feels as if the subject has chosen me. I know there must be deep psychological resonances between myself and my material, but I don’t know what they are. What drew me to Nightingale and Flaubert with such force that I was willing to read hundreds of books, travel to obscure spots, and spend six years writing and rewriting? I can’t answer that, and I honestly believe that if I could have, I wouldn’t have needed to write the book.

“Only recently I recognized one of the triggers (which seem so obvious now!) between myself and this novel: like my characters, I traveled for a year in the Middle East. I was 21, and hoped the trip would clarify my life. Other parallels will occur to me as time passes, but they are merely curiosities after the fact. Knowing them wouldn’t have helped me write the book. When something grabs me, it’s a bit like falling in love. I can’t say why I’m in love; I just know that I am.”

Shomer’s novel, which has received rave reviews, is a clear example of how inspiration also requires passion to transform historical facts into engrossing historical fiction.

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MYFANWY COOK is captivated by the creativity of debut novelists in unearthing settings, plots, and characters. Please do email (myfanwyc@btinternet.com) or tweet (twitter.com/MyfanwyCook) about debut novelists who have captured your imagination.

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Left to right: Jenny Barden, Patricia Bracewell, Kristin Gleeson, and Enid Shomer

HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Columns | 5

aHISTORY & FILMe LUST & GREED: D OUBLE INDEMNITY

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hen one speaks of film noir (“black film”), it’s a genre that conjures immediate associations – highly stylized American films from the 1930s to 1950s, black and white, dramatic lighting focusing on harsh contrasts between shadow and light, and dark, crime-driven plotlines populated by hard-boiled private eyes and femme fatales. These plotlines often end badly for the protagonists, and it’s a fateful sort of journey; the viewer knows where the road will end, it’s just a matter of the scenery on the way there. This genre finds its roots in the hard-boiled detective novels of the 1930s, the work of authors such as Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. But the genre quickly outgrew these roots, and even critics who specialize in film noir disagree on the essential elements a film must possess to be so designated. Some offerings often classified as noir have not a detective to be found, near domestic plotlines, were filmed in color, and even have a “happy ending” of sorts (e.g.

Leave Her to Heaven, 1945).

The genre has also exceeded its original temporal boundaries – newer offerings such as 1974’s Chinatown and a spate of noirs in the 2000s (e.g. The Black Dahlia, Hollywoodland, et al.) harken back to the golden age but have added modern conventions, giving rise to the term “neo-noir.” The genre has even, arguably, made its way into the future with such dystopian noir offerings as Blade Runner (1972). Essentially, defining noir is a matter of style and tone – the viewer knows it the instant she sees it.

I love this genre, and had I word count enough and time, could wax poetic about dozens of films which fit within it. Since I should (must) restrain myself, I’ve chosen one film which I feel is an exceptional offering. It isn’t a typical hard-boiled detective story, and while it showcases most of the conventions of noir, it has a decidedly unconventional protagonist: an insurance salesman.

“Double indemnity” is a term used in life insurance policies, a clause requiring the company to pay double in cases of accidental death. Thus, the observant viewer can guess by the title of this 1944 film of the same name that someone is going to die, “accidentally” on purpose, leaving “loving relatives” with double the insurance payout. The opening credits feature the silhouette of a man, on crutches, hobbling towards the camera, until he completely fills the screen, rendering it dark. The viewer is then violently thrown into the opening scene: a car speeding down a dark roadway. The 6 | Columns |

HNR Issue 63, February 2013

car skids to a stop and its driver makes his way into the darkened offices of Pacific All Risk Insurance, where the desks are empty at this late hour. He sits, pulls up a Dictaphone, and the viewer finally sees his face, agleam with sweat, as he begins recording his confession: “I killed Dietrichson. Me, Walter Neff. Insurance salesman. 35. Unmarried...I did it for the money, I did it for the woman. I didn’t get the money, and I didn’t get the woman.” In this succinct opening, the viewer learns not only the entirety of the plot, but is treated to the two primary motivations in film noir: greed and lust. The voiceover is another mainstay of noir, allowing the protagonist (I hesitate to use the word “hero” for such morally bereft individuals) to tell his own tale. For Neff, it begins with a trip out to sunny Glendale to get a renewal on a car insurance policy. When he enters the large Spanish-style house, he finds that the policy owner, a Mr. Dietrichson, isn’t at home, though his (much younger) wife certainly is.

Walter Neff is played with amazing adroitness by Fred MacMurray, a surprising casting decision, as at the time MacMurray was known for playing “nice guys.” In this role, his hint of nice guy charm is subsumed beneath a slick worldliness. It’s personified in the way he lights his cigarettes (for this is the 1940s, and we must all be smoking or drinking – preferably both – all the time): using his thumbnail, he flicks the match into flame in a single, smooth movement.

Neff isn’t some nerd toiling over actuarial tables. He’s a salesman. He’s a player. And never is it more evident than in his first meeting with the lady of the house. As he waits in the foyer looking up, she stands on the balcony above, on full display, and she knows it. Clad only in a towel, she’s been sunbathing. Neff mentions his errand, the signature for the insurance renewal, and quips that he’d hate to think that Mrs. Dietrichson wasn’t “fully covered.” The looks exchanged between the two are unmistakable, and Phyllis (for Phyllis she is, as Neff learns from the name engraved on her anklet) goes to change while Neff makes himself comfortable in the living room.

The Dietrichsons’ living room, where much of the most important action in the film takes place, is a world away from the sunny exterior of the house, and is a typical noir environment: it’s still stuffy from last night’s cigar smoke, and one can feel the claustrophobia, though the room is large. Noir characters are always trapped by something, and the fact is reflected in their surroundings. Light slants through the blinds, making horizontal shadows across the furnishings and the inhabitants, a stylistic choice that became a mainstay of noir. Dust motes dance in the bars of light, and there’s an overall feeling of almost smoky obscurity to the scene, as well as confinement. It’s an illustration of the artistic concept of chiaroscuro (Italian for “light-dark”),

shown in bed together, Phyllis and Neff are on the couch in his apartment, she reapplying her lipstick while he languidly smokes a cigarette. The sex out of the way, they put Neff ’s plan into action – it involves Phyllis’s husband, a train, and an “accident.”

Oddly, the third figure which makes up the triangle really isn’t Phyllis’s rude and boorish husband, who’s almost a nonentity except as an impetus for the murder. Rather, it’s Neff ’s boss and friend, claims adjuster Barton Keys, played perfectly by a constantly cigar-smoking and shirt-sleeved Edward G. Robinson.

Keys can sniff out a false claim a mile away, and once on the scent, he’s as tireless as a blood-hound. Throughout the film, it’s clear that Neff doesn’t fear the police, only his “friend,” Keys.

Neff knows the trade, so he knows he’s planned the “perfect” murder, but he also knows Keys is the one man with the capacity to see through it. To Neff ’s advantage is the fact that, in this case, Keys is wearing blinders – his friendship with Neff leads him to suspect everyone but the salesman as Phyllis’s partner in crime, once his “little man” (his intuition) tells him it wasn’t an accident. As Keys remarks off-handedly to Neff, “Murder is never perfect. It always comes apart sooner or later. And with two people involved, it’s usually sooner rather than later.” How things “come apart” is one of the most riveting aspects of a noir film, and this one accomplishes it with aplomb. I won’t ruin it for you here, because if you haven’t seen it, you need to watch this movie. But the “come apart” is a staple of noir, for criminals are never allowed to benefit from their crimes – the Hays Code demanded that they reap the morally edifying and criminally punitive consequences of their very naughty actions.

Double Indemnity is directed by Billy Wilder, who had help from Raymond Chandler in writing the screenplay, so snappy dialogue and perfect pacing are a given. The suspense is palpable, and the characterization is spot-on. Though it wasn’t the filmmakers’ original intent, at almost 70 years remove, it has the added bonus for history lovers of providing a window into the past, the West Coast of the 1940s, from the architecture to the costuming to the “technology.” The film was nominated for no less than seven Academy Awards, and didn’t manage to win a single one. The story is based on a novella by James M. Cain, who himself based his work on the real-life murder of a husband by his wife and her lover in 1927 NYC (as a random aside, you can find another fictional treatment of this incident in A Wild Surge of Guilty Passion, Scribner, 2011).

So if you’re looking for an archetype that hits all the high points of the film noir genre, look no further than Double Indemnity. In its dark tone and the inevitability of its conclusion, it’s a thematically perfect example of this type of film – and a darn good movie.

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and noir films use it to excellent effect to highlight faces, to give a three-dimensionality and tone to what are essentially shades of grey. So there the viewer has it: a sunny exterior hiding desperation and darkness inside – just like the characters.

The camerawork on Phyllis is equally effective. She’s framed from high-heeled shoes to hemline as she descends the stairs, inviting the viewer to share in Neff ’s ogling of her gams.

Phyllis Dietrichson, as played by a very blond and badly bewigged Barbara Stanwyck, is obviously a femme fatale from the second she steps on screen. She aspires to the taste that comes with wealth, but her racy anklet and platinum hair smack unmistakably of sleaze. She and Neff banter back and forth, with Phyllis mentioning another insurance company with whom her husband has been speaking, and asking cynically if Neff can do just as well. Neff responds that he “never knocks the other guy’s merchandise,” but he can do better for her. Though ostensibly an insurance-related conversation, the double-entendre is obvious, and more like it fly thick and fast. The encounter ends with Neff agreeing to return when Phyllis’s husband is at home.

But of course, the next time Neff comes calling, somehow the husband isn’t home, and it’s the maid’s day off. Phyllis asks with sweet circumspection if she can get a life insurance policy on her husband without “bothering him at all,” but Neff is no fool. He knows her game, and pulls no punches: “You want to knock him off, don’t you? Got a husband that’s been around too long you want to turn into a little hard cash – just give me a call, you think I’ll help you collect.” Neff assures her he isn’t that crazy. “You’ll hang just as sure as 10 dimes’ll buy you a dollar.”

But as the viewer knows, Neff ’s fate is already sealed. And that’s another convention of noir this film showcases: the idea of fate like a train on a track, a train that can’t be stopped, speeding the “hero” to destruction. There are opportunities to veer onto different tracks, but protagonists are too greedy, libidinous, or stupid to take advantage of them. Neff and Phyllis repeatedly use the phrase “straight down the line” to describe how they’re joined together in this endeavour. So when she visits him at his apartment, as the rain pours down, they devise their plan to murder her husband, make it look like an accident, and collect the double indemnity payout of $100,000. Neff isn’t completely devoid of conscience; he evinces guilt at depriving Phyllis’s stepdaughter, Lola, of her only remaining parent. But even this sentiment seems motivated by less than pure underpinnings – in addition to being “a great little fighter for her weight,” Lola is a very attractive girl, a fact which obviously isn’t lost on Neff when he takes her out to dinner in an attempt to allay her suspicions about her step-mother. This film is somewhat atypical in offering a sort of shared blame, taking a bit of the burden off of the femme fatale, who often bears almost sole responsibility, like Eve, for tempting the “hero” to his dastardly acts. Neff admits that he’s been thinking for years about a play for money just like this, “long before I ran into Phyllis Dietrichson.” Phyllis is the archetypical femme fatale – a sociopathic manipulator wrapped in a package of seeming helplessness – but Neff immediately knows her for what she is. He chooses to throw his lot in with her anyway. So after a convenient fade out, since the Hays Code wouldn’t allow a man and woman not married to each other to be

BETHANY LATHAM is a professor, librarian, and Managing Editor of HNR. She has written a book, Elizabeth I in Film and Television (2011), and she also publishes in various scholarly and popular journals, as well as writing for EBSCO’s NoveList database. She also serves as Internet Editor and a regular reviewer for Reference Reviews.

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an exploration of style, idiom, and anachronism

the facts right is one of the principal jobs of the writer Getting of historical fiction. When did men start wearing cravats?

What was the weather like during the midsummer of 1602 in Wiltshire? Which train company ran the London to Cambridge service in the middle of the Victorian era? Accuracy about such details matters in a way that it used not to matter. Those in the know smile indulgently at Shakespeare’s errors, such as the anachronistic mingling of togas and doublets or the sound of a striking clock in Julius Caesar, or the Queen of Egypt’s command to play billiards in Antony and Cleopatra, but no one holds the playwright to account in the way that a contemporary writer would be held to account if he had Mark Antony glancing at his wristwatch.

This change of attitude isn’t simply because Shakespeare was a genius. It’s also because in the last three hundred years or so we have developed a historical perspective.

We know things ain’t what they used to be.

Or, if we want to express it in a more literary manner, we recall L.P. Hartley’s dictum: ‘The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.’ There are expectations that both the broad sweep and the factual details in historical fiction will be correct. And there is less excuse for making mistakes. It doesn’t take long to discover that cravats first appeared during the 17th century. That the weather in England wasn’t too hot in the early 1600s (the effect of a volcanic eruption in Peru). That the Great Eastern Company would convey you from London to Cambridge in Victoria’s time. We’ve got reference books. We have Google.

But something which is, arguably, even more important than the information gained through research and reading is the requirement to pick the right words. Not just the ones which keep the story flowing, but the ones which fit the period, the setting and the characters we’ve chosen. To an extent, this is a skill or accomplishment which is only shown up when it fails. I can’t be alone in wincing when I hear an out-of-place expression in a period drama. In fact, I know I am not alone. The language of Downton Abbey is pored over as carefully as if it were holy writ,

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not only in the UK but in the United States. Online sites like Word Routes (www.visualthesaurus.com/cm/wordroutes) will tell you how unlikely it is that Lord Grantham would say ‘Step on it’ as early as 1917. A recent repeat of one of the excellent Poirot whodunnits on ITV had Inspector Japp referring to something as being ‘bog standard’. Really? In the 1930s? All that care devoted to costumes and art-deco fittings and moustache trimmers but still the bubble of belief can be pricked with a single word.

Surprisingly, this kind of minor verbal slip matters more when one is dealing with the fairly recent past as opposed to the real olden days. This is because there will always be those who remember how things were done when they were a lot younger, remember which expressions were current, which ones were waiting to be born. Of course, one person’s recent past may be another’s ancient history. One of the qualifications for the Ellis Peters Historical Award is that any book submitted must be set at least 35 years before the current year.

In other words, you could write a mystery novel about skulduggery involving Mrs Thatcher’s rise to power and submit it for a historical prize commemorating a woman who wrote principally about a medieval monk. And, if you wrote a Thatcher thriller, there would most likely be a number of readers who would pick holes in your history, your politics and even the way you made your characters think and talk.

But no one alive has first-hand knowledge of styles of speech during the relief of Mafeking, let alone the battle of Hastings, and this can have a liberating effect on the writer. Research is still important, naturally. You can go quite a long way back by relying on the written record, on contemporary novels and plays and poetry, on newspapers and pamphlets, even manuscripts (although they will not be much help when it comes to the spoken word). But the sources shrink the further back you travel, until all that remains may be inscriptions carved in stone or graffiti scrawled on walls, items of limited use. So, paradoxically, a piece of fiction set in the distant past may give writers more freedom

by Philip Gooden

which is, arguably, even more important than the information gained through S omething... research and reading is the requirement to pick the right words.

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potential for mystery and the grotesque.

It’s worth pointing out that each of these novelists brings a modern sensibility to their material.

Apart from all the material on brothels and the sex business in The Crimson Petal, Faber provides a thoroughly co n t e mp o r a r y and unresolved ending to his book, an ending which I thought was exactly right – the narrative seems to float away from us – but which irritated some readers. And perhaps the father of these latter-day Victorian novelists is John Fowles who, in The French Lieutenant’s Woman (1969), not only provides a choice of endings in post-modern fashion but actually appears briefly as a god-like character in the story. In novels like these, the language conforms fairly closely to the style of the period, but there is often an ironic tinge to it, particularly when the narrative deals with subjects that would never have been openly discussed in print at the time.

How far back can the imitators go? Thackeray produced an imitation 18th-century novel in Henry Esmond (1852), a period which stood in the same relation to him as the early Victorians do to us. While I got through Esmond, I never finished reading John Barth’s Sot-Weed Factor (1961), a pastiche of an even earlier time, the late 17th century. Perhaps that era marks the limit since the attempt to reproduce even earlier linguistic styles will run up against problems of readability, at least for a general audience.

In the end, though, the linguistic style of most (all?) historical novelists is bound to reflect the age – not the age they are writing about, but the age they are writing in. A historical fiction written in the early 21st century, pastiche or otherwise, cannot avoid echoing contemporary concerns and reflecting the pattern of the writer’s own times.

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because there is less to contradict them, fewer written resources and absolutely no living and breathing ones.

Provided one avoids gross anachronisms in writing about events more than, say, three hundred years ago – ‘Permit me bring you up to speed, sire’ – then it is possible to employ language which is fairly contemporary. In fact, it is necessary to do so because the attempt to write like the Normans or even the Elizabethans would make a book unreadable or, more accurately, unread. The historical writer still needs to be careful over language but then that consideration applies – should apply – to any writer.

There are always going to be interesting little questions, though. Should you put the word ‘sadist’ into a bit of dialogue if the speaker is speaking before the time of the Marquis de Sade or even some time after him (the word wasn’t used in English until the late 19th century)? The practice of sadism is as old as humanity, or inhumanity, but what to call it if you don’t use the term itself? My feeling is that it is all right in a descriptive, nondialogue passage, as author’s ‘commentary’, but that an alternative expression should probably be found if the subject is being spoken about. Or take this fictitious sentence: ‘Mesmerised, he watched Swein riding towards the Normans, wielding his axe with huge swinging strokes.’ It would take an alert, perhaps pernickety, reader to register the fact that Mesmer wasn’t around during the Norman conquest, but even so a scrupulous writer might avoid putting down: ‘“I was mesmerised,” said Swein.’

There are two other courses for the writer of historical fiction, both of which avoid the slightly nervous approach to the past that employs largely contemporary language but is forever watchful of linguistic booby-traps and minefields. One is to abandon caution altogether and use current expressions on the grounds that this is the kind of thing the Romans would have said, in fact the kind of thing they did say after their own fashion, but which is now being given the 21st-century treatment: ‘“Bloody hell, Brutus,” said Caesar, observing his old friend’s strange manner, “What’s your problem?”’ This gets rid of the speech anachronism problem by flaunting it.

The other solution is to write a pastiche or caricature of the style of your chosen period. Arthur Conan Doyle tried this in the dialogue of his medieval romances, such as The White Company (1891). This means that a character is permitted remarks like: “You came in as the knight does in the jongleur’s romances, between dragon and damsel, with small time for the asking of questions.” This is as artificial and lurid as Technicolor and it’s not surprising that Doyle’s histories are almost forgotten now.

But imitation becomes more feasible the closer the approach to the 21st century. Confirming this, there has been a long vogue for Victorian pastiche. Charles Palliser’s monumental The Quincunx (1989) has a social range, a cast of characters and something of the style of Dickens. Michel Faber’s The Crimson Petal and the White (2002) again echoes the novelistic style of the period but is elegantly explicit about sex in a way that would have been impossible for any novelist publishing in the Victorian era and for many decades afterwards. Other writers, such as Sarah Waters (Fingersmith), A.S.Byatt (Possession) and D.J.Taylor (Kept), have immersed themselves in 19th-century England and mined its

PHILIP GOODEN writes nonfiction and fiction. Among his books on language are The Story of English, Idiomantics, and the award-winning Faux Pas. He blogs occasionally on language at www.philipgooden.com. The author of the Nick Revill mysteries, set in Shakespeare’s London, and a Victorian series (most recently The Ely Testament), he is also a member of the writing collective, the Medieval Murderers.

HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Features | 9

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the bicentennial of Pride and Prejudice

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marks the bicentennial of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, one of the most famous historical romances of all time. It seems incredible to think that it is two hundred years old because the characters and situations are still fresh and familiar to us today. Although we now drive around in cars instead of carriages, read by electric light instead of candlelight, and send each other emails instead of letters, we still suffer from the common cold, laugh at absurdities, and fall in love.

Pride and Prejudice wasn’t a historical novel when it was written, of course, but it gives readers today an insight into the lives of the gentry in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. It shows us how they behaved in public, how they interacted in private, and it demonstrates their values, as well as the practical conditions of their lives.

But its importance isn’t just because it’s a brilliant novel in its own right, or because it gives us insight into the past, or because it advanced the form of the novel. The importance of Pride and Prejudice spreads beyond the book itself. With its memorable characters, its humour and its intricate plot, as well as its spirited heroine and arrogant hero, it gave birth to one of historical fiction’s best-loved sub-genres, the Regency romance.

In writing Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen defined a whole new genre and set the pattern for the thousands of titles that were to follow. The genre has grown and changed to match the changes going on in the world around us – becoming darker or lighter according to the tastes of the time, and including more or less sex in keeping with current mores – but throughout all the changes, young ladies in long dresses spar with arrogant gentlemen in breeches and fall in love along the way.

I asked some of our best-loved Regency novelists about the ways in which Austen has influenced them. Lynne Connolly (the Richard and Rose series) says, “Although I leave the bedroom door open in my books and she doesn’t, Jane Austen taught me

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everything there is to know about sexual tension.”

Lynne is right. The tension between Lizzy and Darcy leaps off the page and crackles around their encounters like supercharged lightning.

Jo Beverley (the Malloren series) writes, “Jane Austen’s novels have enriched the mental database from which my fictional worlds grow, but I’m always aware that she was a contemporary writer addressing readers familiar with her world, whereas I am a historical one peering back through mists and sometimes confusion. At times I invent details that can’t be tracked down, whereas she often flits lightly over them in the assumption that everyone will know. Pride and Prejudice can easily be seen as the first romance novel, however, and I feel a strong connection because of that.”

Louise Allen (numerous Harlequin Regencies) finds that she has been influenced

by Jane Austen’s letters – “the tone of her voice, the things which interest her, the small details of life at the time, her absorption in people. As she wrote, ‘…my preference for Men & Women, always inclines me to attend more to the company than the sight.’ An excellent reminder to novelists to focus on character!”

Fenella Miller (The Duke’s Reform, Bride for a Duke) agrees: “Jane Austen started it all.”

These, and other, authors bring their own love for Jane, and their own experience of her, to their writing, and propel the genre forward for – we hope – another two hundred years.

But Pride and Prejudice wasn’t an instant sensation; in fact, it wasn’t called Pride and Prejudice at all when it first saw the light of day. It was first titled First Impressions, and Jane began writing it when she was in her twenties, although it didn’t see publication until she was almost forty. She wrote it for her own amusement and for the amusement of her circle, where it was a big hit. Her father was so impressed that he thought it ought to

by Amanda Grange

In writing... Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen defined a whole new genre and set a pattern for thousands of titles that were to follow.

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HNR Issue 63, February 2013

with Jacqueline Webb. For readers who enjoy “what if ” stories, there are the Variations by Abigail Reynolds. For those looking for something spicy, there is Mr Darcy Takes a Wife by Linda Berdoll or the series of novels by Sharon Lathan. There are time travel novels and paranormals, ghost stories and detective stories, spoofs and prequels. There are short stories, novels and series – in fact, everything anyone could want.

And novels are only the start of it. There are films and TV adaptations, now all available on DVD for those who want to watch them again and again. There are places to visit, such as the Jane Austen House Museum in Chawton which provides a fascinating day out for anyone interested in Jane Austen or the Regency period. The house is easy to reach, being only an hour from Waterloo station in London and then a short taxi ride, and it’s amazing to walk through the rooms where Jane Austen lived her life and wrote many of her novels. There are unique pieces on display, including her writing table, and the staff are knowledgeable and passionate about Jane Austen. And if you need some sustenance, there is a pub across the road, together with a tea shop.

There is also the Jane Austen Centre in Bath, which celebrates Bath’s most famous resident, and of course Bath itself, which will be forever associated with her novels. The Centre organises the Jane Austen Festival, which takes place in Bath every September and includes a large variety of events ranging from talks to balls to a costume parade. Anyone interested in the Regency period will find much to interest them: they can learn to dance, buy authentically-styled bonnets, and attend periodaccurate concerts. It attracts big names in the Austen world (for example, in 2012 the actor Adrian Lukis – best known for his role as Mr Wickham in the 1995 BBC Pride and Prejudice – gave a reading) and it brings together academics, writers, actors, costume makers, musicians and fans.

But it all started with Jane Austen writing her novels two hundred years ago, and in so doing, providing people who live in a world she could not have imagined – a world where people fly and walk on the moon – with characters and stories that still have resonances for us today.

And this, for me, is her genius. She crosses barriers of time and culture – and, in the future perhaps space! – bringing us all together as we laugh at Mr Collins, admire Elizabeth, and fall in love with Mr Darcy.

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be published and so, on 1 November 1797, he wrote to Thomas Cadell, a London publisher who had published Fanny Burney’s Camilla, offering to send “the work” to Cadell if Cadell was interested in seeing it. (Although the name of “the work” is not mentioned, it is generally believed that “the work” in question was First Impressions.)

Then came the reply that every author dreads: no! In fact, Cadell declined by return of post.

Nothing daunted, Jane Austen continued to write. She had a glimpse of success when Susan (later called Northanger Abbey) was accepted for publication in 1803, but this glimpse quickly faded when the publisher, Crosby, neglected to publish it, despite having paid £10 for it – not an inconsiderable sum at the time.

It was not until eight years later, in 1811, that Sense and Sensibility broke Jane’s duck and she made it into print. Even then, she could not find a publisher prepared to bear the risk, and she entered into a kind of printing partnership with the publisher, Thomas Egerton. Egerton paid all costs and was entitled to take a 10 percent commission on sales, but Jane Austen was to be liable for any losses. Jane was cautious and set aside a sum of money from her income in order to meet the possible loss but, luckily, Sense and Sensibility was a success. It found its way into some very elevated households. The Prince Regent’s daughter, Princess Charlotte, adored it, saying that she identified with Marianne Dashwood.

The success of the novel didn’t provide instant fame for Jane Austen, since it was published anonymously under the name of “A Lady”. But Jane was on her way.

After the success of Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice was finally published and the rest, as they say, is history. After a spell out of print following its initial success, Pride and Prejudice went on to become possibly the most famous and well-loved novel in the English language. Its first sentence – “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife” – is quoted everywhere, with slight variations to make it fit an endless succession of situations. And it is often quoted in the flourishing sub-genre of Jane Austen fiction. So popular are Jane’s books that readers want more, and a host of modern authors – including myself – are happy to supply them.

The first Austenesque novel (as prequels, sequels and every other kind of Austen-based novels are generally called) was Old Friends and New Fancies. It was a sequel to Jane Austen’s novels and it was written by Sybil Brinton. It was published in 1914 and was joined over the next hundred years by numerous other novels including Stephanie Barron’s mystery series and my own series of heroes’ diaries (Mr Darcy’s Diary, et al.), which retell Jane Austen’s novels from the heroes’ points of view.

For those who want sequels to Pride and Prejudice, there are many to choose from, including Mr Darcy Presents his Bride

by Helen Halstead and my own Pride and Pyramids, written

AMANDA GRANGE was born in Yorkshire and studied music at Nottingham University. She is the author of ten Regency romances and ten Austenesque novels, including her latest two novels, Pride and Pyramids and Dear Mr Darcy. For more information, please visit her website at www.amandagrange.com.

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when the “other woman” is a first wife

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the insane Bertha Rochester setting fire to Thornhill? Or the murdered Rebecca de Winter trapped in an underwater grave? For those of us who have read Jane Eyre or Rebecca, these personalities are as memorable as the male and female protagonists of those novels. And yet the reader mainly learns about them through the eyes or memories of other characters. They are the ‘other woman’ in a haunted love triangle.

There are similarities in the journeys of Jane Eyre and the young Mrs de Winter. In many ways, Du Maurier is paying homage to Bronte in the structure of her novel.

The ghost of a past relationship adds a complication to each heroine’s passage as well as an element of mystery that drives the narrative. As she deciphers the husband’s secret, she also tests her emotions, strengths and weaknesses. As a result Bronte and Du Maurier create unforgettable female characters.

Each heroine is a virgin attracted to a man twice her age, a man who is struggling with bitterness and guilt. Unequal in social status to the men, the girls struggle with doubts and are challenged by servants who consider them to be interlopers rather than suitable mistresses. Du Maurier adds to this sense of inferiority by denying the new Mrs de Winter a first name, thereby reinforcing the fact that Rebecca’s seems to fall from everybody’s lips. Furthermore, Rochester’s and Maxim’s reticence to clarify their feelings adds tension. Who do these men truly love? Their first-wives or their young brides?

Both Jane and Mrs de Winter also face living in a hostile environment within mansions that have their own distinct presence. Manderley and Thornhill Hall harbour secrets. It is only with their destruction that the hero can be freed from the past, and his new love able to establish her own domain.

Clues are provided piecemeal so that the protagonist becomes a detective whose judgment is impaired by insecurities.

Misunderstandings ensue until humiliation leads to revelation: Jane’s mortification at the altar and Mrs de Winter’s unsuspecting

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replication of Rebecca’s fancy dress provoke confessions. The truth is dark and unexpected. And resolution brings different endings. Rochester is redeemed but Maxim de Winter is exiled.

Their new wives, though, have come of age and are now stronger than their men.

I read Jane Eyre and Rebecca when I was a teenager. Decades later I wrote The Wedding Shroud (Pier 9/Murdoch Books, 2010), only to discover upon re-reading Bronte and Du Maurier that my own heroine’s situation mirrors that of Jane’s and Mrs de Winter’s. In effect, the powerful concept of a haunted triangle must have remained as a spectre in my mind.

The Wedding Shroud is the tale of a young Roman girl, Caecilia, who is forced to marry an older Etruscan nobleman, Mastarna, to seal a truce between two enemy cities. Just as in the classic novels, my character is introduced into an alien environment which both threatens and intrigues her. Caecilia also finds she must unravel the mystery of Mastarna’s dead wife, Seianta. This is where my novel diverges from the others.

Mastarna’s world is considered ‘sinful’ compared to the austere Rome. As Caecilia grapples with conflicting moralities, she is slowly seduced by her husband and the freedoms that the Etruscans offer her: independence, education and sexual freedom. Yet unlike Jane and Mrs de Winter, Caecilia unwittingly makes the same mistakes as her rival as she strives to discover her predecessor’s true character. Her quest to learn why Mastarna is tormented

by Seianta’s memory also helps Caecilia understand the world of the dead Etruscan girl. Hopefully readers will enjoy discovering the story of a bride and an ‘other woman’ in my love story about a haunted triangle.

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Elisabeth Storrs is an Australian author. Find more about The Wedding Shroud at www.elisabethstorrs.com. Her sequel, The Golden Dice, will be released in 2013.

by Elisabeth Storrs

The Ghost... of a past relationship adds a complication to each heroine’s passage as well as an element of mystery that dries the narrative.

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HNR Issue 63, February 2013

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women and the Crimean War

s a military historian, my research often uncovers stories with a high impact, drawn from violence and the suffering of not only men, but women, too. My favourite period in which many of my heroines dwell is the Crimean War. Mary Seacole is an outstanding example, and did as much in the Crimea as another magic-lamp lady, except that, dark skinned, she could scarce be seen for the flame of Florence’s candle. History has not been kind to Mary, the Jamaican nurse and entrepreneur who became celebrated in London in the 1850s for her service to British soldiers during the Crimean War. At the Siege of Sevastopol, Mrs Elizabeth Evans was allowed to travel with her husband’s regiment. She supported him in the trenches, shared a tent with her husband and several men. She repaired the Colours damaged at Alma. When the Battle of Inkerman began Mrs Evans was left in camp, with the drummer-boys, in charge of the sacred Colours. After Inkerman, violent winds tore down the tents, whirled away blankets, and flattened the hospital marquees. Domestic camp furniture from the officers’ tents was carried into the air, and the bass drum of the King’s Own was blown into the Russian lines nearly two miles away. Mrs Evans, who was sitting in her tent making a new bonnet, was knocked over, her tent disap­peared, and her bonnet with it. During the dreadful winter that followed she had a beautiful Scotch plaid shawl and shared her husband’s greatcoat to keep warm. She writes how, “Time after time I would remove his boots and rub his feet, which were utterly numb, and likely to come off from frostbite.”

Lady Alicia Blackwood, the wife of the Chaplin General, offered her help, and Miss Nightingale explained that, if she really wanted to help, in the barrack were “located some two hundred poor women in the most abject misery. They are the wives of the soldiers who were allowed to accompany their husbands … they are in rags, covered with vermin. My heart bleeds for them … If you will take the women as your charge, I will send an orderly who will show you their haunts.”

Lady Alicia was given the disagreeable task of dealing with the cellars beneath the hospital into which the sewers drained

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MY HEROINES

and where the discarded wives and children of the army lived in appalling squalor. Emaciated children scampered like rats in the shadows and women in labour lay on piles of rags, rotten with damp and dirt. Lady Alicia also discovered a dead baby wedged in a pipe to halt the flow of effluent from above.

The early days on campaign were not without humour. The 1st Battalion of the Royal Scots were ordered to throw up earthworks when the alarm was sounded that the Russians were coming. As the words “Loose ammunition!” were shouted out by Captain Neville, ordering the men to prepare their guns, Mrs Frances Driscoll rushed from her tent and grabbed her husband Patrick by the swallow-tails of his coat: “Arrah, Patsy, you’re going to be shot,” she screamed “and what shall I do, at all, at all.”

“Get out of that,” shouted Driscoll, as he struggled for his ammunition.

“Will you keep quiet, Driscoll, or I’ll put you in the guard room,” called out Captain Neville.

The laughter provoked by the anxious Irish wife defused the panic of the moment, which turned out to be a false alarm.

What amazes me is how these wonderful and heroic women haven’t featured more in historical fiction, but hopefully someone will champion their cause!

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References: 1. Lady Alicia Blackwood, A Narrative of Personal Experiences and Impressions during a Residence on the Bosphorus throughout the Crimean War, London: Hatchard, 1881.

2. Major Frank Clark, Through Hell to Immortality.

3. Helen Rappaport, No Place for Ladies. The Untold Story of Women in the Crimean War, Aurum Press, 2007.

4. Mary Seacole, Wonderful Adventures of Mrs Seacole in Many Lands, London: James Blackwood, 1857.

Major Frank A. O. Clark is a military historian, who has researched and published works on subjects such as the Crimean War and jungle warfare.

by Major Frank Clark

As a military historian... my research often uncovers stories with a high impact, drawn from violence and the suffering of not only men, but women, too.

HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Features | 13

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Forgotten Author W hen a sequel regularly sells on the used book site www.

abebooks.com for over ten times the price of the first novel, the author’s work deserves attention. It’s not that Up Home is ten times better than Ardyth Kennelly’s first novel, The Peaceable Kingdom. The latter found a wide audience as a 1949 Literary Guild selection, while Up Home apparently sold far fewer copies and was never reprinted. So as PK fans discover, there’s more than one book about Linnea Ecklund and her family, and a high demand creates a short supply.

This is evidence that Kennelly is something of a forgotten historical novelist, long out of print and deserving resurrection.

Born in Oregon on the night the Titanic sank, Kennelly descended from Mormons on her mother’s side. Her grandmother was a Swedish convert and “plural wife,” and presumably served as a template for the character of Linnea. Kennelly published other historical novels, but none were as popular as The Peaceable Kingdom.

Polygamy has received both fictional (Big Love) and reality TV treatment (Sister Wives) recently in the U.S. media, so interest in the topic is still current. But even readers who have an aversion to polygamy as a lifestyle, philosophy, or religious belief will care about Linnea. She is the younger, second wife of tailor Olaf in Salt Lake City in the 1890s. First wife Sigrid envies Linnea for her warm personality and suspects that Olaf secretly favors her, while Linnea must endure Olaf ’s spending nearly all of his time at Sigrid’s house as a “cover.” The U.S. government has been arresting polygamists. She makes ends meet by midwifery and odd jobs such as sewing, while raising her five children nearly alone.

The book is a series of domestic tales; many of the chapters could stand alone as short stories. Linnea leaves the children alone while on an evening baby case, and they unpick the mattress ticking so they can hide their meager valuables from burglars.

Linnea, an enthusiastic housekeeper, must exercise tact as a Christmas dinner guest at a slovenly, novel-reading neighbor’s house. The Ecklund girls hope against hope for the latest fashion, toe slippers, so they can make an impression at the next Church conference. Kennelly makes me laugh aloud with imagery such as:

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the work of Ardyth Kennelly

“Even Gertrude forgot her new hat, Bertha her jealousy of it, and Stellie the mosquito bite with the top scratched off and warmly bleeding…which had kept her occupied in a simian side-crouch for the last two blocks.”

Linnea’s character is so wonderfully drawn that I wish I could have her for a friend. She has a talent for making others happy, reassuring the embarrassed husband of the Novel Reader by pointing out his wife’s good qualities. Linnea is tolerant, not fanatic, bending the Church rules against coffee because “Joseph Smith never meant the Scandinavians.” And readers be warned: DO NOT read the last two chapters in a public place. Linnea’s reaction to a family tragedy is one of the most moving, truest passages I’ve ever read.

Kennelly’s last novel was published in 1956. She had a second career late in life as a collage artist. A blog by a relative (www. blubabescreate.blogspot.com/2011/06/ art-of-collage.html) includes photographs of Kennelly surrounded by artwork, a few years before she died in 2005. The blog also has an image of a hand-written note from Kennelly, stating that the blogger is a descendent of characters in PK. Kennelly is still celebrated in Albany, Oregon where she grew up, and fans will be glad to know that her family plans to publish some recently discovered manuscripts. I hope publishers will take note, and bring Kennelly’s work back into print.

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References: 1, AbeBooks.com. AbeBooks Inc., 1996-2012. Web. Accessed multiple times during 2011-2012.

2. “Kennelly, Ardyth.” Current Biography (1953): Biography Reference Bank (H.W. Wilson). Web. 31 Aug. 2012.

3. Trotic, Nancy. “Party to celebrate late author Ardyth Kennelly Ullman.”

Albany Democrat-Herald. Albany Democrat-Herald. 13 April 2012. Web. 22 Oct. 2012.

B.J. Sedlock has been a librarian at Defiance College in Ohio since 1982, and is in charge of the college’s archives and digitization project. She has been a reviewer for the Historical Novels Review since 2003.

by B.J. Sedlock

Linnea’s character...

is so wonderfully drawn that I wish I could have her for a friend.

She has a talent for making others happy.

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HNR Issue 63, February 2013

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why quality matters in self-published fiction

he HNS is one of the rare venues willing to review Indie – selfTpublished – fiction. Many refuse to accept Indie books because, “We’ll be inundated with poorly written and badly produced rubbish.” And yes, that is an actual quote.

At the HNS, we take a more positive view. We encourage wellwritten, nicely produced, quality Indie Fiction, and we provide a venue for its review in our web presence.

Authors choose the Indie route for a variety of reasons: some were traditionally published but found their backlist dropped and new material turned down; others cannot find a publisher because their subject does not fit the norm – publishing houses are business concerns, and if a novel cannot be easily marketed (perhaps because it is a cross-over genre) then they are often not interested. Nor are publishers keen to take risks on diverse subject content, and sadly, the days of a publisher nurturing a potential author to blossom are long gone.

Some Indie books are (to be tactful) in need of a lot of work, but there are quite a few gems out there, and I am delighted that the HNS is helping to find them. The Indie Review team, based in the UK and the US, are strict on the rules for accepting submissions. If an author wishes to be taken seriously as a writer then, obviously, the writing has to be good. Having your work professionally edited is essential, for instance, and this is not limited simply to checking spelling and punctuation. Editing is about the technique of writing. A favourite aunt or a teacher friend is not a qualified, experienced editor. Anyone can build a house, but would a prospective buyer appreciate wonky windows and a sagging roof?

Editing is expensive, but think of it like this: to start a successful business you have to invest in the product you are intending to market. You are the business; your novel is the product. Do you want to offer Tesco Own Brand or Armani chic?

We only review novels that have been printed and produced to a mainstream standard – you do not find double-spacing or leftjustified text in books published by Harper Collins or Random

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Going Indie?

House. Would you be happy to purchase a new coat, for instance, with one sleeve longer than the other and the pockets upside down? Of course not, so why expect a reader to buy your book if it has not been formatted and printed correctly? And yes, sorry, but readers will notice. If something is worth doing, it is worth doing it properly.

The cover, too, should look professionally designed. Indie books do not, usually, have the advantage of a huge marketing campaign or sitting proud on a bookstore shelf. Potential readers only glimpse a small image on Facebook, Goodreads or Amazon. That cover has to grab your reader by the throat and not let go. It is tempting to use your talented daughter’s beautiful painting, but does it look good at thumbnail size?

Does it shout “quality!”?

Each quarter for the Indie Review, I and my US colleague have the pleasure of selecting our Editors’ Choice titles from the submitted Indie books. The fact that it is getting harder to choose because the standard is improving is wonderful – but take a look at the covers of some of my recent choices included on this page. I selected these novels because they were fabulous reads, looked – and felt – professionally produced, and were indistinguishable from mainstream published books.

If you want to be regarded as a good, worthreading author, then ensure your books are of the highest quality. Give your readers the full enjoyment of your hard work and leave them eager for your next book – and your next…

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If you wish to have your Indie novel reviewed, contact Stuart MacAllister via hnsindie@yahoo. co.uk for details.

Helen Hollick is the UK Indie Review Editor for the HNS and her e-book Discovering the Diamond, giving handy tips for Indie writers, is available on Kindle. Her historical novel, Ripples in the Sand, is also out on Kindle. seawitchvoyages.blogspot.co.uk and www.helenhollick.net

by Helen Hollick

If an author...

wishes to be taken seriously as a writer then, obviously, the writing has to be good.

HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Features | 15

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Elizabeth Laird on The Prince who Walked with Lions

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A Victorian Tragedy

n award-winning author of several novels, both historical A and not, for children and young adults, Elizabeth Laird has

Speedy’s mother-in-law, Cornelia Cotton, wrote a short memoir of his childhood in Britain, and Queen Victoria mentioned him travelled and worked in many countries, including Ethiopia affectionately in her diaries. Little is known of his time at Rugby, where, in the late 1960s, she remembers seeing Emperor Haile and I scoured the school records and in-school magazine to pick Selassie standing with a full grown lion beside him as part of the up what clues I could. Official reports say that he was popular royal entourage. Her book, The Prince who Walked with Lions and admired for his prowess in sport, but British schools at that (Macmillan Children’s, 2012) has already been selected by young time were notoriously tough. It can’t have been easy.”

Scottish readers for the shortlist of the I also asked Elizabeth whether historical Scottish Children’s Book of the Year Award, fiction can inspire young people to study to be announced in March. It tells the story history and also to become interested in of Prince Alemayehu, the young son of the historical subjects and topics that are not on defeated Emperor of Ethiopia (or Abyssinia the school curriculum. With a resounding as it then was), who was brought back to yes, she agreed that “The study of history Victorian Britain. The whole nation became is vital if we are to learn from the mistakes fascinated by Alemayehu and he “stole the of our forebears. The value of good fiction heart of Queen Victoria”. At eighteen, his is that it enables us to put on other pairs of death shocked and saddened many, including shoes and walk around in them for a while. the queen: the prince is buried in St George’s This is how we develop empathy, crucial chapel, Windsor, although efforts are now to the maturing process. Historical fiction being made to secure the return of his enables readers to imaginatively enter into remains to Ethiopia. the past and learn the lessons of history.

Laird’s highly evocative novel is a Once the imagination is fired up, learning wonderful read: she focuses on Alemayehu’s history becomes no longer a chore, but a life at his father’s mountain-top court in delight.”

Abyssinia and later on his school years Elisabeth certainly does not shy away in England. I began by asking about her from controversial and difficult situations research. involving extreme poverty and political “The British campaign in 1868 against marginalisation: her books Garbage King, the Emperor Tewodros of Ethiopia is well A Little Piece of Ground and Oranges in documented in official reports and personal memoirs. After his No Man’s Land are examples. She was keen to add that over defeat, the Emperor put his wife and child into the care of the the past two years, in collaboration with a colleague, she has British before he committed suicide. The young queen died during created a website www.ethiopianfolktales.com to preserve the the journey to the coast and little Prince Alemayehu established a three hundred stories she collected all over Ethiopia. Now, she strong friendship with the eccentric and dashing British captain, says, “we’re attempting to publish English readers for Ethiopian Charles Speedy, who was put in charge of him.” schoolchildren online too.”

Charles Speedy was “a great barndoor of a man” and he became When I asked her about future plans, she shied away, saying very attached to the young prince. Laird writes that “During “my fifth historical novel is in the pipeline, but I’d rather not talk Alemayehu’s early years away from Ethiopia, he was happy about it, in case the ideas fly away out of my head!” with the Speedy family and his plight aroused great sympathy in Britain. Crowds followed him wherever he went.” However, Lucinda Byatt translates historical nonfiction from Italian into Speedy’s subsequent posting abroad meant that Alemayehu English and teaches Italian Renaissance history. She writes and was sent to Rugby where he had to adapt to the totally alien reviews regularly for the Historical Novels Review and can be world of an English boarding school. Laird adds that, “Captain found blogging at textline.wordpress.com.

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The value...

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by Lucinda Byatt of good fiction is that it enables us to put on other pairs of shoes and walk around in them for a while. This is how we develop empathy, crucial to the maturing process.

HNR Issue 63, February 2013

Reviews Due to an ever-increasing number of books being reviewed and space constraints within HNR, some reviews are now published as online exclusives. To view these reviews and much more, please visit http://www.historicalnovelsociety.org.

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THE SWEET GIRL Annabel Lyon, Random House Canada, 2012, C$29.95, hb, 236pp, 9780307359445 / Atlantic, 2013, £12.99, hb, 256pp, 9780857899521 / Knopf, Jun. 2013, $24.95, hb, 256pp, 9780307962553 The Sweet Girl, Annabel Lyon’s follow up novel to her award winning 2011 novel, The Golden Mean, is a fast-moving, fascinating read even if, like me, you haven’t yet read the first book. Inspired by a fragment of the Greek philosopher Aristotle’s actual will (which serves as an introduction to the book), Lyon examines the life of Aristotle’s daughter, Pythias, a very modern girl constrained in a world still dominated primarily by the laws of men and the vagrancies of the gods.

Throughout her youth, Pythias’s famous father has taught her many answers to the natural and philosophical questions of the time despite a reluctance by society (or at least the male society of Aristotle’s colleagues) to accept that a female’s mind can comprehend in the same way as a male’s. When Aristotle dies, however, he leaves the 16-year-old Pythias with much factual knowledge but little actual protection in a time of both political and personal turmoil.

Lyon’s writing is smooth yet colourful and easily transports the reader back 2300 years to be enveloped in the world of Pythias. Lyon creates a character which is in many ways exceptional for her time whilst at the same time portraying a young girl with all the same wishes, anxieties and naiveties as any 16-year-old.

Lyon’s storytelling is also littered with fascinating period details, from helpful household hints (the many uses of thorny burnet, the Grecian equivalent of bubble wrap) to the social taboo of addressing a girl by her name in public or teaching her to swim. I look forward to enjoying more of the same from Lyon when I rectify my previous oversight and now read The Golden Mean without further delay.

Janice Parker

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SEMPER FIDELIS: A Novel of the Roman Empire Ruth Downie, Bloomsbury, 2013, $25.00, hb, 330pp, 9781608197095 Set in 2nd-century Roman Britain during Hadrian’s rule, this interesting read started out slow for a mystery but picked up speed about a quarter of the way through. After that, I had trouble putting it down at night. There are many twists, turns, and setbacks for the protagonist, Gaius Petreius Ruso, a Roman army medical officer, and for his wife Tilla, a native Briton. Upon his deployment to the 20th Legion at Eboracum, Ruso notices an unusually high number of suicides, mysterious deaths and injuries among the new Briton recruits piling up in the medical registry. His curiosity earns him the enmity of the decorated Centurion Geminus, commander of the 20th Legion, and leads to death plots against him and his wife.

The book was well researched, and the author did a fine job providing a feel for what 2nd-century Romans and Britons were like—as well as letting the readers sense their mutual suspicions. There were times, however, when I wished the author had made better use of “he said” and “she said” rather than their substitutes. From an issues standpoint, this book had more depth than most mysteries and perhaps should be classified as mainstream. All of the characters, major and minor, were very well drawn. Highly recommended.

Barry Webb

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AFTER ROME Morgan Llywelyn, Forge, 2013, $24.95/C$28.99, hb, 336pp, 9780765331236 The Romans have left Britannia. What remains on the island are disparate fragments of Roman British settlements and cities, roaming hordes of barbarians and local tribes – the confused remnants of a government that once ruled with authority and direction. In what direction does Britannia go now?

Llywelyn tells this story from the perspective of two cousins, Cadogan and Dinas. Cadogan is the disinherited son of the once-great magistrate of the once-great city of Viroconium, destroyed by the Saxons. He saves a small cadre of residents and leads them to his own fortress in the forest, a house he has built with his two hands after leaving his authoritarian father, Vintrex, as a young man.

There they build their own community with Cadogan as their unofficial head.

Dinas is the wanderer, never content to settle down, even with his soul mate. He wants to be a king. As he puts his dreams into action, he

welcomes disenfranchised men into his realm.

Through these two characters, Llywelyn creates the tapestry of the life of Britons after Rome abandoned it – still wedded in some respects to the old Roman, Christian ways but inexorably moving toward a melting pot of assimilated tribes. Even the once marauding Saxons are settling down, building towns and raising their children as Britons.

Llywelyn deftly captures the instability and brutality of life in post-Roman Britain in this wonderful book, moving in alternating chapters between the stories of the two cousins. Cadogan and Dinas are magnificent, thinking, feeling characters – Cadogan becoming what he never wanted to become, Dinas never seeming to become what he dreamed to become. As the once-ruling classes of Roman Britannia are killed or displaced, they are forced to face that life as they knew it will never exist again in their homeland.

Ilysa Magnus

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8th century

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SAXON: The Book of Dreams Tim Severin, Macmillan, 2012, £12.99, pb, 341pp, 9780230764422 The Saxon of the title is Sigwulf, a minor Saxon prince. The novel opens with the slaughter of his family in AD 780, but he escapes execution, instead exiled to the court of King Carolus (the future Charlemagne). Sigwulf is spared because he bears the Devil’s Mark, denoted by differently coloured eyes. Unfortunately, he also experiences disturbing prophetic dreams. Exiled with him is his crippled slave, Osric, his long-serving protector and guardian.

Sigwulf is befriended by Count Hroudland, Carolus’s nephew, and is quickly drawn into political intrigue at the highest level in which attempts are made on his life by an unknown assassin. What follows is a lively and carefully constructed plot, interweaving Carolus’ plans to defeat the Saracens with the main plotline, and keeping the reader guessing as to who the enemy within could be.

Severin’s battle/fight scenes are impeccable. He has a particular strength in bringing the landscapes of AD 780 to life, obviously drawing on his experiences as a seasoned explorer. Likewise, his characters are engaging and memorable. Sigwulf himself is a conflicted hero, often torn between loyalties, and Osric is equally intriguing. In his portrayal of Hroudland, however, Severin really excels. Hroudland can be arrogant, vain and selfserving, but the author balances this with a man who is also brave, talented and charismatic.

Book of Dreams is the first in the new Saxon HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 17

series, and I look forward to Sigwulf ’s next adventure. Highly recommended.

E.M. Powell

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12th century

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A WOMAN OF ANGKOR John Burgess, River Books, 2013, $14.95, pb, 500pp, 9786167339252.

Sray is the “Woman of Angkor.” It’s a simple name for a simply named novel about the momentous historical events in remote Angkor in the 12th century. Sray is a Khmer citizen in what the reader now knows as Cambodia under the reign of Suryavarman II. A devout Hindu follower, Sray and her husband, Nol, share a shameful secret which, if known in the wrong places, could result in their deaths. It haunts them for years, but both react in very different ways; Sray prays to “Bronze Uncle,” at first meeting only silence but later sensing his approval and protection. Nol believes the horror is behind him, especially as he has the good fortune to be restored to the king’s service as the “Parasol Master,” an artistic job that earns him great esteem in the life of the average poor Khmer people.

But Sray never forgets, and her deep religiosity, borne out of guilt, becomes real as she immerses herself in Scriptures and practices heartfelt charity toward those less fortunate. Nol says the right things at the right time and becomes a senior advisor to King Suryavaraman, a character depicted as a traitor who plots and plans for his own political glory. All begins to unravel when the king sets his sights on Sray, who flees the city to live in a Hindu temple that she will have redesigned and restored.

Nol must gradually see that ascendancy comes with compromising consequences that assure that justice will come full circle. These powerful personalities remember what brought them so far and has blessed their lives beyond their simple comprehension.

A Woman of Angkor is superb historical fiction that is delightful to read, a phenomenal tale of ancient Angkor told skillfully and with great imagination.

Viviane Crystal CROWNER’S CRUSADE Bernard Knight, Severn House, 2013, $28.95/£19.99, hb, 224pp, 9780727882219 In this prequel to the popular Crowner John series, readers get a glimpse into the back story of protagonist and medieval sleuth Sir John de Wolfe. In 1192, Sir John is one of the knights accompanying King Richard the Lionheart on the perilous journey back from the Holy Land. The voyage is long and fraught with danger; one by one the company dwindles until Richard himself is kidnapped by enemies. Back in England and feeling guilty about his inability to save his king, Sir John finds himself drawn into the political intrigue between the Lionheart’s friends and foes. When he 18 | Reviews |

HNR Issue 63, February 2013

discovers a member of Richard’s retinue murdered, Sir John becomes determined to find out who killed the man and why.

The Crowner books are historical whodunits, but this prequel is meant to be more of a historical adventure. The first third of the story follows Richard and his men on their travels; in the second Sir John catches up with his life in England; and in the final third we see him become the sleuth familiar to longtime readers. The book was written to address questions from fans about Sir John’s background and the history of the time period; this shows in the writing, which is jam-packed with exposition, but not to the point of being overdone.

For first-time readers (like this reviewer), the action may seem a bit slow at first, but the characters grow on you so quickly that you want to read more of their adventures. Crowner’s Crusade is a treat for fans of the series and just might attract some new readers too. Recommended.

Heather Domin THE PILLOW BOOK OF THE FLOWER SAMURAI Barbara Lazar, Headline Review, 2013, £7.99, pb, 560pp, 9780755389285 / Headline/ Trafalgar Square, June 2013, $24.95, hb, 480pp, 9780755389254 There’s nothing like fiction set in 12th-century

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Buddhist Japan to shake up one’s notions about feminine strength and bravery. Kozaishō, the narrator for Lazar’s well-researched epic, is an uncommon heroine who has little freedom and few choices but whose powerlessness increases her resolve. Born the fifth daughter to rural peasants, she is just a child when her impoverished father trades her away for more land. Even then, she knows her responsibility to honor her family.

The novel’s strongest attribute is its adherence to period values; it immerses readers in a foreign culture in which respect, dignity, and obedience are paramount. These aren’t always easy concepts for Western readers to grasp, but as Kozaishō pointedly states, “Submission is not surrender.”

Although she is quite young for a good part of the book, this is definitely an adult story, one with intensely rendered scenes of elegance and cruelty. It also defies expectations in another way. Kozaishō’s early rivalry with an older girl looks to move into Memoirs of a Geisha territory, but this doesn’t last very long. Tashiko becomes her best friend and more as they train as dancers at a remote shōen (estate) and later become Women-for-Play – prostitutes – under a brutal mistress’s supervision.

Thanks to favorable omens, Kozaishō gets tutored in the samurai arts, and she also becomes a talented storyteller whose pillow-talk to powerful clients reaps influential benefits. Her poems and

E D I TORS’ C H OICE

Patricia Bracewell, Viking, 2013, $27.95/C$29.50, hb, 416pp, 9780670026395 / HarperCollins UK, 2013, £14.99, hb, 9780007481736 In this, the first installment of a contemplated trilogy, debut author Bracewell deftly explores the formative years of Emma of Normandy’s life, from her marriage as second wife to Aethelred of England in 1002 to the birth of their first child in 1004 (who ultimately became Edward the Confessor) and Aethelred’s decision to name Edward his heir in early 1005, supplanting all of his six living sons.

Emma is but 15 when she arrives in England, a pawn in the political machinations of her brother, Richard, Duke of Normandy, who straddles the line between the English and the powerful Danes. Emma learns to tolerate Aethelred’s brutality, womanizing and apparent distaste for her, recognizing that, without a child – and preferably a boy – she is vulnerable to Aethelred’s will. As Aethelred, haunted by memories of the murder of his brother Edward, becomes less potent as a ruler, his people are overrun and devastated by Swein Forkbeard’s Danish hordes.

Harbingers, ghosts, ill omens – these are all part of the culture, and this book. Bracewell does not pretty up the brutality of Anglo-Saxon life.

Bracewell’s portrayal of Emma, from mere child to beloved queen, is a real tour de force.

Not merely are the characters fully fleshed out, but the story moves ahead apace. The historical research is solid and, although Bracewell admits to taking some license with it – as an example, Emma’s relationship with Athelstan – there is nothing jarring about it. Emma’s story, commissioned by her in 1040, stands as a monument to a woman who recognized her own historical significance, stature that is reinforced by the The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.

Frankly, I can’t wait until the second installment of Emma’s life is published. A five star debut!

Ilysa Magnus 8th Century — 12th Century

stories, included in the text, lend it an authentic feel. Kozaishō’s voice has a compelling intimacy, but as her universe widens, and she learns more about the Taira and Minamoto clan wars, it sometimes gets lost amid the larger political picture.

With her debut novel, Lazar creates a striking portrait of an unfamiliar time, and of a valiant woman determined to avenge a terrible wrong and overcome the odds stacked against her.

Sarah Johnson TEMPLE OF A THOUSAND FACES John Shors, NAL, 2013, $15.00, pb, 508pp, 9780451239174 In 1177 in Angkor, Khmer (now Cambodia), Prince Jayavar and his chief wife, Ajadevi, stand on a causeway gazing at the colossal multiterraced sandstone temple, its “five towers shaped like lotus buds” ascending in a tropical forest. Suddenly, after sailing up a Mekong River tributary, a large force from neighbouring Champa (central and south Vietnam) attacks Angkor. Following a fierce battle, Jayavar and Ajadevi are forced to flee into the jungle and hide at a secret location.

Assisted by his vile henchman, Po Rame, King Indravarman of the Cham rules Khmer with terror and engages in a massive hunt for Jayavar. Indravarman also takes on a number of concubines, including a stunning Khmer beauty named Voisanne. As a reward for bravery, he gives Voisanne to Asal, one of his officers, and Asal is immediately smitten with her. After some intense encounters with the jealous Rame, Asal begins to question his allegiance to Indravarman. Meanwhile, while evading Indravarman’s warriors, Jayavar regroups his Khmer force and seeks assistance from the Siamese to recapture his kingdom.

This novel differs somewhat from John Shors’ acclaimed Beneath a Marble Sky, which centered on the construction of the Taj Mahal. Here, while the equally impressive Angkor Wat temple features in the story, the plot deals primarily with the loves, betrayals, divided loyalties, and tales of survival that played a part in the struggle for reclaiming Khmer.

Furthermore, Shors’ impressive cast of characters includes some ordinary people, members of a fishing family, which enlivens his settings. Although he notes in the preface that “through necessity I’ve created many elements of this novel,” it reads very authentically, but the mention of slaves in the Hindu/Buddhist community is jarring. Written in Shors’ enjoyable style, with an eye for details of Khmer flora and fauna, this novel is destined to be a blockbuster. Highly recommended.

Waheed Rabbani

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SONG OF THE NIGHTINGALE Alys Clare, Severn House, 2012, $28.95/£19.99, hb, 240pp, 9780727881946 In the winter of 1211, England lies under the double burden of lean times and the interdict laid 12th Century — 15th Century

on the country by a pope at loggerheads with King John. Ordinary people are crying out for vengeance against the lawlessness that ensues—and it arrives in the form of clandestine and deadly justice. Sir Josse D’Acquin is reluctantly obliged to find these perpetrators working outside the law. In addition, he must struggle with his feelings towards the former abbess, Helewise, and his fears for his son, missing after he fled England to take refuge among the Cathars.

This is billed as a mystery, but it is gentle and easily resolved; the focus of the Hawkenlye series seems to have shifted towards the ongoing stories of the characters rather than the individual mysteries.

Despite this and the decidedly New Age overtones, I found the story engaging. While Clare provides enough background information to follow the main story lines, interested readers might prefer to go back to Fortune Like the Moon and pick up Josse and Helewise’s story from the beginning.

Susan Cook

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THE STRAW MEN P.C. Doherty, Crème de la Crime, 2013, $28.95/£19.99, hb, 224pp, 9781780290379 Set in 1381, Doherty’s twelfth in his Brother Athelstan series pits the insightful Dominican and Cranston, Lord Coroner, against both John of Gaunt’s Master of Secrets, Thibault, and the Upright Men, leaders of the Peasants’ Revolt.

From rebel ambushes to mysterious assassinations striking at the heart of Gaunt’s powerbase in the Tower, Athelstan witnesses key events that make no sense. Athelstan suspects everyone from a troop of mummers to his parishioners, and Thibault keeps more secrets than he tells. Can Athelstan identify the nimble murderer?

Doherty reveals his vast knowledge of medieval life. For example, one London street scene fills pages with vivid sensory description and an emphasis on the macabre. Bloody eel skins make the road slippery, boiled heads of traitors leer from the bridge, the smell of saltpeter gags, coffins proliferate now that a break in the hard frost allows burials, and an execution party makes its way to the gallows. If you were ever tempted to romanticize the medieval period, Doherty will cure you, taking all your senses back in time.

Judith Starkston

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WOLVES IN WINTER Lisa Hilton, Corvus, 2012, £12.99, pb, 338pp, 9781848874671 Hilton’s latest novel, Wolves in Winter, is the first of a trilogy set in Renaissance Italy. The scene is set by the subtitle on the front cover: “alchemy, poison, intrigue – in the Court of the Medici”, but

that’s just the half of it. Hilton has researched extensively into the period, and she conjures up a spellbinding tale of Mura, whose mother came from the far north and whose father, Samuel Benito, is a respected Arab bookseller in Toledo.

When her widowed father falls foul of the Spanish Inquisition, his young daughter escapes but is eventually sold into slavery and taken to Florence, where she becomes Mora, a lowly kitchen maid in the great palace of Piero de’ Medici, the weakest link in the line of great Medici bankers, the virtual rulers of Florence.

Mora’s struggle to regain some degree of independence eventually leads to her recognition by none other than the great Neoplatonist, Marsilio Ficino. These are the years of Savonarolan Florence and the great French invasion: the quest for knowledge leads across hazardous pathways, especially for an outsider, a girl, and moreover one reputed to have unearthly, demonic powers. After the Medici fall, Mora eventually finds herself in Forlì, where she shares the destiny of Caterina Sforza. Hilton’s research into Caterina Sforza’s nemesis, Cesare Borgia, provides a fascinating insight into the malevolent son of Pope Alexander VI. Minor slips (rowans would be difficult to find growing in Rome) do not mar this fascinating story in which violent political events come alive and are recounted with verve and skill. Florence will almost certainly feature in Mura’s subsequent adventures, but so might Rome or even Milan or Venice: Hilton’s next two books will certainly be on my reading list.

Lucinda Byatt THE LAIRD’S CHOICE Amanda Scott, Forever, 2012, $7.99, pb, 400pp, 9781455514359 Fifteenth-century Scotland is the setting for the first in Scott’s new Lairds of the Loch series.

Andrena is a noblewoman with powers: to see into the hearts and minds of people. Animals seem to want to protect her. But her abilities do not work on the Scottish prisoner who finds his way onto her father’s land after escaping almost two years of brutal captivity.

Magnus Gallbraith is an affable mountain of a man who keeps his own counsel. He accepts marriage to Andrena with her father’s stipulation that he take on his wife’s name. Soon he and Andrena are off to visit the King of Scotland with news of an assassination plot while their marriage finds a new birth in love.

Atmosphere abounds in this colorful romance.

But the action of the opening pages soon slows.

The ping-pong point of view shifts and the dialogue tend tedious. This reader was left wishing for a more grand passion and conflicts to match the splendid scenery.

Eileen Charbonneau

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E D I TORS’ C H OI C E

THE SIGN OF THE WEEPING VIRGIN

Alana White, Five Star, 2013, $25.95, hb, 384pp, 9781432826239 If you love Italian history mixed with mystery, then The Sign of the Weeping Virgin is perfect! Author Alana White uses real historical figures in this splendid novel, setting the right mood for a story that feels incredibly real. In 15th-century Florence at a time when the city was in danger from Turkish invasion, political enemies, and the Church, Guid’Antonio Vespucci and his nephew Amerigo become entangled in discovering the mystery behind a weeping painting of the Virgin and the disappearance of a pious woman.

Sponsoring the investigation is Lorenzo de Medici, despised by both the Church and his political enemies.

Clues are everywhere; the mystery dances through the pages as Guid’Antonio discovers, thanks to the great Leonardo da Vinci, how it is that the Virgin sheds tears… but who is making her do so? Is the event related to the young woman who was kidnapped by the Turks and then sold into slavery?

This is a fascinating story enveloped in breathtaking descriptions of Florence during the Renaissance – paradise for art history aficionados. This book was a real treat for me: art, history and mystery are all meshed into this beautifully written novel. Although I have to admit that I found the beginning to be rather slow, once the mystery picked up the pace, events unraveled, and I just could not put it down. Loved it!

Lucy Bertoldi THE EYES OF VENICE Alessandro Barbero, Europa, 2012, $18.00, pb, 489pp, 9781609450823 I am a lover of Venice, and so when I heard about this book, I jumped on the opportunity to read and review it! The Eyes of Venice takes place in the 16th century, where magic and splendor blend with lurid slums, danger, and poverty.

The lives of two newlyweds, Michele and Bianca, are suddenly interrupted when Michele is wrongly accused of a crime and persecuted.

Michele is subjected to years of life at sea, working in slave conditions on galleys. Sailing from Venice to the Ottoman Empire and back, his sole goal is to redeem his name and return to his love. His escapade is filled with hardship and brutality but also resiliency and tenacity.

Left alone to fend for herself, Bianca’s life is far worse. Poor to the core, her only legitimate options are limited to the hard life of laundress, beggar, and servant, living from day to day at constant risk of dying from illness, starvation, or the bitter, damp cold. Venice at its ugliest brings infestation, disease, dirt, vulgarity, and violence; danger lurks everywhere. As well, anything could happen under the siege of ruthless employers. A glimmer of hope finally shines Bianca’s way when she is hired by a highly ranked patrician noblewoman.

This book is a true gem. It grabbed me immediately, especially Bianca’s side of the story.

The tumultuous series of dramatic events kept me hooked until the very end. Barbero brilliantly creates a mesmerizing odyssey, and translator Gregory Conti also does a terrific job in bringing out the essence of the author’s meaning to light up 20 | Reviews |

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this story effectively.

The Eyes of Venice will transport you to a place and time like no other. I was completely swept away by this!

Lucy Bertoldi THE FORGOTTEN QUEEN D.L. Bogdan, Kensington, 2013, $15.00, pb, 324pp, 9780758271389 The Tudors were a fiery, memorable family.

Headstrong, passionate, often foolhardy, restless… this describes the forgotten Tudor, Queen Margaret of Scotland. She was Henry VIII’s older sister, but more importantly, she was the mother of King James V of Scotland, the father of Mary, Queen of Scots. She tried to set into motion peace between England in Scotland, which would finally be realized with her great-grandson James.

Margaret leaves England at an early age to wed the King of Scotland. Though they have a loving relationship, Margaret can never understand why he must always have a mistress. She sees this as a personal affront, but when he dies a few years into their marriage, leaving her a pregnant widow, she misses him dearly. Through several regents, Margaret tries to hold Scotland together. She realizes much too late that her second husband, the Earl of Angus, is greedy and grasping, and by then Scotland is in an uproar.

Margaret lived a long life, having many children. Only two survived infancy, the future King James V and the neglected Lady Margaret Douglas. Bogdan’s Margaret is impetuous, selfish, passionate, lonely, and full of regrets. Yet she never stops dreaming, or hoping for the best for her

adopted homeland of Scotland.

This is an excellent, fast-paced story. Margaret is a fully developed character who was at times infuriating, and at others pitiful. The love Margaret must have felt for her country comes through in Bogdan’s lovely descriptions of the country and in Margaret’s feelings about it. Highly recommended.

Cynthia McArthur THE HERETICS Rory Clements, John Murray, 2013, £17.99, hb, 480pp, 9781848544338 This is the fifth novel in Clements’ John Shakespeare series. For the uninitiated, John Shakespeare is Will Shakespeare’s fictional elder brother who works as an ‘intelligencer’ (i.e., spy) for the Elizabethan spymaster Francis Walsingham and his successors. The Heretics is set in the 1590s, so Walsingham is now dead and John works for Sir Robert Cecil.

As with the previous novels, the plot concerns a conspiracy against the state which John frustrates.

This time it is a plot to assassinate the Queen, and the conspirators are a network of Catholics, including certain priests who brainwash vulnerable young women by ‘exorcising’ their demons and sending them on suicide missions. Exactly who are the heretics of the title is unclear for, as Clements is careful to point out, although the conspirators are religiously motivated, Catholicism itself was neither illegal nor heretical in Elizabethan England. But why cavil at a good story for the sake of its title?

John has become much more self-confident and ruthless than in the earlier novels, and there is less internal angst and less emphasis on the squalour of Elizabethan life. The conspiracy seems far-fetched, but perhaps no more so than many of the real life conspiracies of the time. A well-crafted story and an entertaining read.

Edward James CHILD OF VENGEANCE David Kirk, Doubleday, 2013, $25.95, hb, 336pp, 9780385536639 / Simon & Schuster, 2013, £12.99, hb, 432pp, 9781471102400 Bennosuke is a lonely 13-year-old with a skin condition who lives in the village of Miyamoto and dreams of becoming a samurai warrior like his father, the long-absent Munisai. The boy has been left in the care of his uncle, gentle monk Dorinbo, and seems destined for a life of religious contemplation until Munisai returns home.

When Bennosuke learns the tragic circumstances surrounding the death of his mother, he is faced with challenges about his own identity even as he is given the opportunity to realize his dream.

The samurai culture is always intriguing with its code of rigid personal discipline and the issues of saving face, honor, purity and death — in particular seppuku, ritual suicide. Author David Kirk has assurance in his writing, which leads the reader to trust its authenticity and bodes well for his successful future as a historical novelist. The internal dilemmas of both the father and son are 16th Century

deftly handled, and the descriptions of life in old Japan meld seamlessly into the story. The dialogue also has a modern simplicity that does not detract from the feudal background.

Although young adult readers who are inured to images of rolling heads and spilling entrails will probably take its graphic violence in their stride, it could be confronting for others. Also, for anyone unfamiliar with late 16th-century Japanese history, a few author’s notes on the real people and political background would have been a useful addition.

The escapades and brutal battles in the second half of the book tend to blur after a while and don’t quite fulfill the promise of the earlier chapters, but as an introduction to the history and culture of the samurai, this novel is an excellent place to start.

There is also a sequel on its way.

Marina Maxwell THE HERESY OF DR DEE Phil Rickman, Corvus, 2012, £14.99 hb, 446pp, 9781848872769 The second book in Rickman’s John Dee series takes Dee to his father’s home in Wales. Set against the aftermath of Amy Robsart’s death, which left Robert Dudley free to marry Elizabeth I, it opens with Dee trying to discover the secrets of scrying and discovering, despite his reputation, that he does not have the Sight. Told by Cecil to leave London out of the reach of the Queen until the mystery of Amy’s death is resolved, Dee decides to go to Wales in search of a shewstone which will help him to scry. He and Dudley join the company of a London judge who is on his way to Presteigne to try a Welsh brigand accused of causing death by witchcraft.

Some elements of the convoluted subplot are weak, but I was drawn in to the Elizabethan world of realpolitik and of religion and magic in village life. A leisurely read, this novel could have benefited from better proofreading, but that aside it is an excellent sequel to The Bones of Avalon, which you do not need to have read to enjoy Heresy. jay Dixon WITCH HAMMER M.L. Trow, Crème de la Crime, 2012, $28.95/£19.99, hb, 224pp, 9781780290294 The third book in M.L. Trow’s Kit Marlowe series finds the young playwright joining up with a group of actors called Lord Strange’s Men, a motley crew (including a young unknown named William Shakespeare) seeking fame and fortune on the stage. While travelling between performances, Lord Strange takes ill under mysterious circumstances; a poppet is found in his image, causing some of the group to suspect the Dark Arts are at work. When another member of the troupe is found murdered, they fear they may have something even more sinister than a murderer in their midst. Marlowe puts his skills to work to find out who or what is behind the macabre killings.

Witch Hammer is marketed as a murder mystery tinged with the supernatural; however, neither of these elements kicks in until over a third of the way 16th Century — 17th Century

through the novel. For a whodunit, the plot moves extremely slowly, and the universal omniscient style makes it difficult to establish an emotional connection with the characters. Those who stick with it will be treated to some truly creepy scenes, and aficionados of Elizabethan England will appreciate the intricate world-building and attention to historical detail; but other readers — particularly mystery fans — may prefer less detail and more action.

Heather Domin

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PEREGRINE Mary Ellen Barnes, Fireship, 2012, $19.95, pb, 395pp, 9781611792409 Peregrine is the story of Frances Latham, who was the eldest child of King Charles I’s falconer.

She grows up watching falcons, their freedom and beauty, and though her father doesn’t allow her to raise or train them, her uncle does. When her father finds out, he vows to keep her on a short leash, but eventually he allows her a season in London, where she meets the handsome Will; after her father’s refusal of her hand, they elope.

Though Frances is estranged from her father, she and Will live happily in London with their growing family until the plague, when Will tragically dies and leaves Frances alone with no choice but to return home with her family. After a while she remarries, and she, her husband, and her once again growing family make the grueling and dangerous voyage to the colonies in America.

There Frances’s family becomes an integral part of society. Throughout her long life she encounters both hardships and happiness and leaves a lasting legacy in her 11 children. Frances never loses her love for the freedom of falconry and in the colonies, finds a measure of freedom for herself.

Frances was an amazing woman, and this story illustrates the trials of not only colonial life for a woman but for the budding society of the colonies in general. In a time when Puritanism and witchcraft filled people’s heads, Frances kept her feet firmly on the ground. The facts are finely researched, and the storytelling is steady, perhaps at times a little slow, but very thorough. It was clear that the author enjoyed researching and writing Frances’s story. As the majority of this novel takes place in the colonies, I would recommend this book especially to people interested in the American colonial period.

Cynthia McArthur MARBECK AND THE DOUBLE-DEALER John Pilkington, Severn House, 2013, $27.95/£19.99, hb, 192pp, 9780727882392 Martin Marbeck is a spy for Queen Elizabeth in the year 1600. He travels under various pseudonyms with one mission that very quickly changes to what he initially believes is a different mission but is actually very much related to the

first. The reader learns that there is a traitor spy or double-dealer (or “mole” as named today) who is not only selling England’s vital national secrets but has also caused the death of several spies in the queen’s service. Add to that he has to find out the possibility of another attack from Spain. How does one discover if one is constantly being fed misinformation interwoven with bits of truth?

So Marbeck’s frustrating travels and dealings with questionable and worthy men continue: men who dally with vital information and make mistakes because of weaknesses taken to soothe their anxieties, and so forth. His character is one that brooks no nonsense from liars, and yet he is rivetingly cunning in getting the truth from even the savviest characters/spies. One can’t tell how he knows where to go next and when to backtrack with the clues that are so slowly revealed. Other clues are not so obvious to the reader but definitely clear to the highly intuitive and logical Marbeck. Marbeck and the Double Dealer is a superb historical mystery that concludes with an unexpected solution that leaves open many more dangerous doors.

Viviane Crystal A PLAGUE OF LIES Judith Rock, Berkley, 2012, $15, pb, 345pp, 9780425253106 Right at the opening, this novel takes Hemingway’s advice to show “how the weather was” by vividly portraying a Paris rainstorm. Charles du Lac is a Jesuit scholastic and teacher a school named after Louis XIV, a king whom he does not admire because previous experience as a soldier has made du Lac something of a pacifist. He comes to Versailles to deliver a relic as a present for Mme. Maintenon, the king’s wife, and becomes entangled in solving crimes that appear to be centered on a fictional illegitimate daughter of the king.

Both the splendor and the squalor of Versailles are portrayed. Mirrors bring daylight indoors, and aristocrats relieve themselves in corners between free meals. The first body is found in a hallway, and then the murders move outdoors among magnificent gardens and ingenious fountains.

Dance is a specialty of the school and features prominently in all three books of this series, but du Lac takes time out from preparing a ballet to investigate what may or may not be a plot against the king. The background is of more interest than the mystery.

James Hawking ROYALIST REBEL Anita Seymour, Claymore Press, 2012, £9.99, pb, 474pp, 9781781590683 Elizabeth Murray, an actual historic person, was the eldest daughter of a fiercely Royalist Scottish family. Her father was a courtier, and her mother passed messages to Royalist spies. In this novel set between 1643 and 1651, we follow Elizabeth’s development from a 17-year-old beauty through marriage and motherhood during the trials and dangers of the Civil War. Her beloved home, Ham House, is occupied by Parliament’s soldiers, and HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 21

the family lives under constant suspicion. However, Elizabeth’s charms win over Cromwell as well as her rich first husband and also Earl Lauderdale, her second and her great love.

This is a novel without much plot. Instead, it is a well-drawn picture of the Royalists’ struggle to exist and serve the king under Parliamentary rule.

Because Elizabeth, confined to Ham House, is the narrator, the battles must take place off‑stage so they are reported by gossip and rumour. The king’s execution is the only event she witnesses (which seems unlikely), but it makes dramatic sense. Seymour is excellent on the stress and the depredations as normal life disintegrates. No one can be trusted. Domestic and social details are convincingly in period; so are Elizabeth’s snobbery and arrogance. She is reputed to be a beauty with great charm, but in her first‑person narrative she comes across as self-centred and snappish.

In this long novel, Seymour has created a threedimensional character although one who is hard to like. Highly recommended for Civil War buffs.

Lynn Guest THE GILDED LILY Deborah Swift, Macmillan, 2012, £7.99, pb, 471pp, 9780330543439 / St. Martin’s Griffin, 2012, $15.99, pb, 480pp, 9781250001900 Two teenage sisters, Ella and Sadie, escape from rural poverty to seek a living in Restoration London. We think we know what follows: they will be exploited by rich men who will abuse their innocence, bodices will be ripped, but the girls will win through in the end. This, after all, is how the English novel began.

To a large extent this is what The Gilded Lily delivers, although the bodice ripping only comes near the end and until then most of the exploitation is economic, by landlords, sweat shop owners and factory managers. The girls do little to exploit their own sexuality; Ella’s tentative attempts to seduce her boss at the Gilded Lily beauty parlour comes to nothing.

This is an intricate and fascinating tale of low life in the capital city of a country still shattered from 20 years of almost constant war and of the unquenched vitality of the generation that in a single lifetime turned it into the richest nation on earth. Deborah Swift is an expert on Restoration costume and seemingly everything else about the economic and social life of 17th-century England.

The heart of the story is the relationship between the two sisters: divided they fall (almost), and reunited they survive. Even if Restoration romances are not your usual fare, I think you will enjoy this.

Edward James THE MIDWIFE’S TALE Sam Thomas, Minotaur, 2012, $24.99/C$28.99, hb, 310pp, 9781250010766 In June 1644, York midwife, widow, and gentlewoman Bridget Hodgson’s “gossip” Esther Cooper is accused of poisoning her strict, abusive and — literally — puritanical husband, Stephen.

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examination allows Esther to “plead her belly” long enough to find out who really committed the crime, this considered treason in a world of civil war against authority, wife against husband, servant against master. As the world became more urban, the place for a bastard child was less welcoming, society feeling it could make more demands on personally morality because of this. I did feel, however, the threat of a workhouse must be an anachronism.

Our author’s credits include research into early-modern midwifery practices, including the enticing will of the original Bridget Hodgson. This is interesting and pretty well done. It also focuses much of the action and the sleuthing. Interesting characters set the stage for a mystery series. I especially liked the focus on the “gossips,” a woman’s friends who attend her in childbirth and worm out all the gossip as to which maidservants might be with I found the siege, and the larger world surrounding the action, less well drawn, likewise religion and the broader civil conflict. Lapses such as the maid doing laundry on the Sabbath, the workhouse, the word “sofa,” etc., pulled me out. I’d call this a mixed review; the novel is readable and good on the midwifery but drops the ball on some other aspects of the craft.

Ann Chamberlin

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LOVERS Daniel Arsand (trans. Howard Curtis), Europa, 2012, $15.00, pb, 144pp, 9781609450717 Lovers is a short novel set in prerevolutionary France (1749) that illuminates a relationship between Balthazar de Créon, a nobleman, and a 15-year-old shepherd boy, Sébastien. The two first meet when Sébastien saves Balthazar’s life after he is thrown from a horse. Stunned by the beauty of the young boy, and his talent for healing, Balthazar dedicates all his energy into training the young man as a physician. Balthazar’s motivations, however, are clearly twofold as he struggles to control his desire for his young pupil. Through Balthazar’s kindness, Sébastien finds himself transported into a completely different life, a life his mentor and admirer have made for possible for him. Very soon the two become romantically involved, causing a scandal at court. Flaunting his apathy at the king’s displeasure, Balthazar soon finds himself in a situation where he must choose between his love and his life.

Lovers is an exceptionally well written novel, managing to convey a great deal of action and

E D I TORS’ CH OICE

Rose Tremain, Chatto & Windus, 2012, hb, 341pp, £18.99, 9780701185206 / Norton, 2013, $26.95, hb, 373pp, 9780393079579 This is a sequel to Tremain’s 1989 novel, Restoration, which was a memoir of Sir Robert Merivel, physician, bon-viveur, friend of Charles II and a man who often had cause to reflect upon the unpredictable vicissitudes of life.

Having fallen out of favour with his monarch in this first book, Merivel has been given back his Norfolk property, Bidnold Manor. Time has advanced by 17 years to the early 1680s. His daughter Margaret is growing up to be a vivacious and attractive lady. But life is perhaps just a little too comfortable and unchallenging for Merivel. He gets Charles’s permission to go to Versailles and there seek a position as a court physician to King Louis. Although he is unsuccessful in this, he does meet an unhappily married intelligent Swiss lady, Louise, with whom he starts a passionate affair.

Back in England, though, Margaret develops typhus, and Charles II visits Bidnold to attempt the King’s Cure; he stays there for some time, and, after her recovery, invites Margaret back to his court as a ladyin-waiting to his new amour, Louise de Kérouaille, Duchess of Portsmouth. Merivel feels bereft and goes to Switzerland to stay with his Louise, where he finds happiness and the beginnings of peace and stability, until news reaches him of Charles II’s failing health.

Merivel is a wonderfully likable man. Compassionate, impulsive, licentious but thoroughly decent, his character develops from the opening book. Although he a fun-loving man, his essential outlook is negative, often expecting the worst to happen as the essence of the human condition. The narrative is superb, and the context of late 17th-century England feels genuine and authentic.

Doug Kemp

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imagery with an astonishing economy of words.

At times historical fiction can be exceedingly heavy, as the author feels the need to fill the text with explanations and descriptions to facilitate a better understanding of the times. Arsand has mastered the art of writing the past without writing it like it is the past. One steps into Balthazar and Sébastien’s world and is enveloped into its reality with ease.

Despite there being substantially less “meat” to this book, one does not walk away from reading it feeling hungry. The story itself is tastefully done, and the characters are flawed enough to seem very real. Sadly, as is often the case in stories of forbidden love, one in the pair stands to lose more than the other. An interesting study of character and love, and an enjoyable, short read.

Hanne Pearce THE PRINCE’S LADY: Bresciano and the Baroness Sam Benady & Mary Chiappe, Two Pillars, 2012, £9.99, pb, 248pp, 97819664019 The lesson that I learnt from reading this book is that one should never, ever, judge a book by its cover. The novel’s cover illustration, although well executed, is not enticing, and I found it most offputting. However, having prepared myself for a dire read I was delighted to discover a well-plotted story, which was highly engrossing. The two authors had managed to blend their writing styles seamlessly, and the result was a plausible and highly entertaining novel.

The novel, which is the fourth in the series, is set in Gibraltar and Spain during 1791. It centres on the mysterious disappearance of the mistress of Prince Edward, George the III’s fourth son. Giovanni Bresciano, acting in the role of detective on behalf of the acting governor, is a likeable character. In fact all the characters are believable, and dovetail perfectly into the story, from Mr Whitmore with his artistic aspirations to Bresciano’s seriously ill and elderly father. However, for me, Coniglio, the prince’s major-domo, was particularly memorable because of his anger and arrogance, which made him both obnoxious and pitiable.

It was refreshing to read a novel with a different setting, and the descriptions were both interesting and in harmony with the content. The authors have created a vivid sense of time and place. This novel is well worth reading, and so don’t be put off by the cover!

Myfanwy Cook THE PATRIOT’S FATE Alaric Bond, Fireship, 2012, $19.95, pb, 318pp, 9781611792386 It is 1798, and Ireland is rising up against her British masters. Two friends, Crowley and King — the one Irish and the other British — find themselves on opposite sides of the upcoming conflict, though neither knows it. Crowley wants no part of the war but nevertheless ends up aboard a French ship and under the leadership of a zealous patriot. King is eager to see the rebellion thwarted, though his part will require him to risk 18th Century

his life and the lives of everyone aboard to do so.

Though separated by chance, these two men will be tragically and inextricably drawn into the same battle The Patriot’s Fate is Bond’s fifth installment in his Fighting Sail series. Though many nautical novels set in the 18th and 19th centuries claim to have taken up the mantles of both O’Brian and Forester, this one actually comes close. It’s thoughtful and, like O’Brian, doesn’t leap from one broadside to the next but instead gets the reader inside the head of his characters as they grapple with conflicting loyalties, oaths, friendships, and painful decisions.

There were parts of the novel that were slow for me, and I probably would have benefited from reading the prior books in the series, but I was rewarded by a very powerful and climactic ending. Fans of the Age of Fighting Sail should enjoy this book.

Justin M. Lindsay I, HOGARTH Michael Dean, Overlook, 2013, $26.95/C$28.50, hb, 272pp, 9781468303421 / Duckworth, 2012, £14.99, hb, 272pp, 9780715643860 Renowned artist William Hogarth, whose paintings and engravings illustrated the unfortunate and decadent lives of 18th-century London residents, is born in the London of 1697 amidst a loud and destructive storm, a portent of his early childhood. His devoted but quixotic father, Richard, is thrown into debtor’s prison, having been chiseled by unscrupulous book and printing thieves. Life is brutal for an innocent, cheated man, but William and his mother keep the family going by selling a patent nostrum financed through a kind moneylender who sees talent in the Hogarth children. The sisters become milliners, and William, who loves drawing, is apprenticed to Ellis Gamble, a silverplate engraver.

Working hard at his craft — when he isn’t aching for beautiful women — William befriends a fellow apprentice, John, son of renowned artist Sir James Thornhill, who becomes a mentor. Hogarth’s nature is one of optimism despite circumstances, but he also has a sharp wit which he uses against political menaces of his day. Painting the rich and famous keeps him solvent, but he gravitates toward portraits of everyday life among London’s poor and decadent, as shown in some of his most famous etchings: Rake’s Progress and Gin Lane. His fight for the rights of artists includes the Engraving Copyright Act, fueled by the rampant piracy of art and books. His lively, outgoing, nature and artistic innovations win him admiration in every level of society.

Reading this novel is a trip through time, except here it’s Hogarth who has traveled to tell us his story. Author Michael Dean becomes Hogarth, with a gift for turning mere facts into a flowing historical narrative, blending characters and the squalor of a time which also produced beauty and social reform.

Tess Heckel THE STOCKHOLM OCTAVO

Karen Engelmann, Two Roads, 2012, £18.99, hb, 410pp, 9781444742701 / Ecco, 2012, $26.99, hb, 432pp, 9780061995347 The Stockholm Octavo is set in 18th-century Stockholm against the background of the last years of Sweden’s Golden Age and the spread of revolution throughout Europe. Its hero, Emil Larsson, wants this era to last forever, but of course nothing will remain as it was – a significant theme in this work.

Emil is a drinker, card player and contented bachelor until informed that his position at the office of Excise and Customs depends on finding a wife. He turns to Mrs Sparrow, proprietor of a gaming house for the nobility, an exclusive club which even hosts King Gustav III. A fortuneteller, she also offers to lay out an Octavo for Emil.

The Octavo is a form of cartomancy which can divine the future if only he can discover the eight individuals it enigmatically reveals. To make events more interesting, Mrs Sparrow wins a mysterious fan in a straightforward card game. This links the Octavo with Larsson’s future, and gathering the eight people into his life becomes not just about finding a marriage partner but crucial to pulling Sweden back from chaos.

This novel is beautifully written. Every sentence is measured. The narrative is intriguing and filled with fascinating characters such as the ruthless Uzanne, a noblewoman who plots murder, and Johanna, her protégée. Uzanne is a teacher of the language of fans, which she puts to use in her most dastardly plot, aimed to destroy King Gustav himself. Tension constantly increases with the cutthroat rivalry of the female conspirators, the terrifying and amusing situations into which Larsson is placed, and the revelations concerning the Octavo and its characters’ positions in Larsson’s personal fate.

The Stockholm Octavo is an engaging novel through which an important and significant moment in history is animated through a set of unusual characters and the deployment of a fabulously original plot.

Carol McGrath THE DEAD SHALL NOT REST Tessa Harris, Kensington, 2013, $15.00/C$16.95, pb, 338pp, 9780758266996 In this second mystery featuring Dr. Thomas Silkstone, the Philadelphian anatomist living in 1780s London investigates the murder of a castrato singer whose larynx has been torn from his body.

Although another castrato is arrested, Thomas suspects that Dr. John Hunter, a surgeon who employs grave robbers to supply him with human organs for his collection of exotic specimens, is responsible. Meanwhile, Thomas’ fiancée Lydia rescues an eight-foot-tall giant, Charles Byrne, from a freak show and brings him to London.

Thomas soon realizes that Charles is dying, and he and his friends are determined to keep him out of the clutches of Hunter, who plans to dissect Charles’ body.

Thomas is an attractive, engaging protagonist, HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 23

and the story of Charles, Hunter, and Charles’ companion, the dwarf Count Josef Boruwlaski-all historical figures--is compelling. The excellent glossary provides fascinating information about them, and about details of 18th- century medical history. Highly recommended.

Vicki Kondelik THE DUCHESS OF DRURY LANE Freda Lightfoot, Severn House, 2013, $28.95/£19.99, hb, 256pp, 9780727882462 Dorothy Jordan, Drury Lane’s most notable comedic actress, grew up in Ireland where she had few career choices, being the illegitimate daughter of an actress. Fortunately she possessed a clear voice that could carry even in the worst theaters, and the ability to sense the mood of the audience and set the tone accordingly. After an eventful launch in her homeland, it became necessary to move on and try her talents elsewhere.

Moving to England proved successful, for not only did she rise to be one of the highest paid actresses at Drury Lane, but she also caught the eye of Prince William, the Duke of Clarence. Having been through one stagnant relationship, she cautiously accepted the duke, whom she knew from the start could not offer a respectable marriage, but in turn gave more love and support than she’d ever known.

They settled down together happily and found that despite their love for one another, the malicious gossipmongers were relentless and the royal family was not in the least supportive of William’s lifestyle — the country needed more heirs, not the children of an actress. As their relationship began to unravel and with monetary issues always at hand, Dora found herself clinging to her career and hoping that the great love of her life would not abandon their family.

Dorothy is immediately likable, and the story offers a panoramic view of the theater world, the royal family and society, from the perspective of a woman loved for her roles but not her personal life. With a host of fleshed out characters, this fastpaced, biographical novel is pleasure to read and a great addition to historical fiction centered on royal personages.

Arleigh Johnson THE PURCHASE Linda Spalding, McClelland & Stewart, 2012, C$29.99, hb, 352pp, 9780771079351 / Knopf, Aug. 2013, $25.95, hb, 320pp, 9780307908414 In the winter of 1798, Daniel Dickinson and his young family are cast out by the elders of their tightknit Quaker community in Pennsylvania and must move to the frontier wilderness of Virginia.

His excommunication has been prompted by his marriage to a 15- year-old orphan, Ruth Boyd, who came to care for his children during his late wife’s illness and whom he feels he cannot send back to the almshouse.

In addition, Daniel, a firm abolitionist, soon finds himself the owner of a young slave boy, Onesimus. He is the main ‘purchase’ alluded to 24 | Reviews |

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in the title, but this is only one of many decisions which comes at a price, both for Daniel’s family and himself. Originally believing he can save Simus, Daniel now must work the boy in order to pay off the cost of buying him. A pacifist, he must purchase his land with warrants paid out to surviving Revolutionary War soldiers. Having married Ruth, he finds he has only contempt for her, leaving his older children free to disrespect her also. How can he raise a family with the Quaker principles he holds so dear if he can so easily be separated from them himself?

Whilst Spalding’s writing is beautiful and her storytelling captivating, it is also relentless in its intensity, leaving readers little time to pause and gather themselves. Some of the scenes in which Daniel and his family are establishing their new homestead are reminiscent of Shandi Mitchell’s Under This Unbroken Sky, but without the bursts of familial joy that make that equally harrowing adventure such a satisfying read. In Spalding’s work there can be no doubt that life is hard, working the land is hard, and moral and social decisions are hard, but the occasional ray of sunshine, both literally and figuratively, might go a long way to relieving the bleakness of it all.

Janice Parker SEVEN LOCKS Christine Wade, Atria, 2013, $15.00, pb, 352pp, 9781451674705 In 1769, after an argument with his wife, an angry farmer stalks off into the Catskill Mountains with his dog, Wolf, to go hunting. He is never seen again, leaving his wife alone to run their farm and raise their son and daughter. Neither task is easy, and both are complicated by the tongue-wagging ladies of the village as they speculate upon the fate of the missing husband. Did he simply run away from a shrewish wife? Had he taken up with another woman somewhere in another village? Did his wife murder him?

In time, the wife comes to accept the reality that her husband will not be returning to her. She struggles to understand and raise her children at a time when tension between the American colonies and the British Crown is rapidly approaching a boiling point. Once escalating events finally boil over into war, it still seems inconceivable that her bucolic mountain home would be affected by the war’s calamities. But affected it is, in violent and dramatic ways that utterly alter her life and that of her son and daughter.

Written from a feminine perspective, Seven Locks combines history with legend to provide a vivid illustration of what the American Revolution meant for the civilian population and for women in particular. It is an interesting look at a part of the wartime history that is often given shortshrift by historians focused on battles and military strategies.

John Kachuba

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TO WHISPER HER NAME Tamera Alexander, Zondervan, 2012, $14.99, pb, 480pp, 9780310291060 Alexander’s latest romance is set on the Belle Meade stud farm near Nashville just after the end of the Civil War. Ridley Cooper comes to the plantation to learn horsemanship before heading out to the Rockies to start his own farm; he conceals the fact that, although a Southerner, he fought on the Union side against slavery. He meets Olivia Aberdeen who, embittered by her late husband’s cruel treatment and his betrayal of the Confederacy, has accepted a post as companion at Belle Meade despite her fear of horses.

Smooth, sparkling dialogue and likable characters make this novel a pleasant read, and Alexander provides plenty of plausible conflicts to draw the reader onward. Olivia’s and Ridley’s spiritual growth is sketched with a skillful hand, and their relationship proceeds agreeably from the initial physical attraction to a true partnership based on respect, commitment, and friendship.

The historical elements are convincing, my only objection being costume-based. The running gag about Olivia’s bustle is improbable, as the bustle was not in fashion as early as 1866, and it is difficult to reconcile the scenes where Olivia climbs out of a carriage window and, later, down a trellis with the crinoline and crotchless underwear of the era. These cavils do not detract from my overall enjoyment of the story.

Jane Steen ONCE AGAIN A BRIDE Jane Ashford, Sourcebooks Casablanca, 2013, $6.99/£4.99, pb, 416pp, 9781402276729 During the British Regency, Charlotte Rutherford Wylde has been married off at age 18 to Henry Wylde, a man 30 years her senior. Rather than treasuring and protecting her, Henry treats his young wife as “troublesome baggage,” critical of everything she does. Henry collects ancient Roman artifacts, and Charlotte remarks that much of the house is like a museum. Indeed, Henry’s frequent evening absences lead Charlotte to think she is one of his museum pieces to be put on the shelf.

After Henry is killed mysteriously by footpads, Charlotte and her maid Lucy fall under the protection of Henry’s nephew Alexander and his family of sisters. Ethan, Alexander’s footman, falls in love with Lucy, as all parties are involved with the Bow Street Runners during the investigation of Henry’s murder. More than one surprising twist at the end is revealed as Alexander and Charlotte find their mutual distrust and animosity turning gradually to something much more enduring – love.

Jane Ashford’s characters are true to their times, yet they radiate the freshness of today. After 10 years, we finally hear again from the bestselling author of 18 delightful Regency novels.

Liz Allenby THE TYPEWRITER GIRL Alison Atlee, Gallery, 2013, $15.00/C$17.00, pb, 18th Century — 19th Century

384pp, 9781451673258 Betsey Dobson is a vibrant, unconventional flower in a garden of hothouse heroines. The cover of this book, which depicts a demurelooking young woman gazing out over the pier, is misleading, however. Betsey is no shrinking violet.

Her colorful mouth lends humor to her antics and misadventures and may shock some readers with the inclusion of some four-letter words in her vocabulary.

Betsey lives in the Victorian era, when women tried to marry young and marry well, and those who deviated from societal norms were looked upon with suspicion and distrust. If a woman could not rely on support from her family, she might have to curry favors or take a lover to survive. Although competent as a typewriter girl, Betsey is woefully underqualified when offered the opportunity to be an excursions manager at Idensea, an English seaside resort. She finds an unlikely ally in Mr. Jones, the resort’s builder. Betsey must risk it all to prove her value at the resort before her past becomes her undoing. If she succeeds, she will finally achieve the self-supporting lifestyle she desires.

Readers will love visiting the glorious setting of Idensea, with beautiful architecture and delightful excursions, like the Sultan’s Road, that could rival Blackpool or Brighton in its charm. The Typewriter Girl takes the reader to visit this small community on the brink of change and places within that idyllic setting the story of a remarkable young woman determined to forge her own destiny.

Lauren Miller

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MARIA AND THE ADMIRAL Rachel Billington, Orion, 2012, £18.99, hb, 350pp, 9781409111399 “We all have a story at our core that we may disown or admit. It is often about love.”

In 1822, Maria Graham is a travel writer, illustrator, and English ship captain’s widow.

Although the latter status gains her entry into society, she takes greater pride in her intellect. After her husband dies while they’re rounding Cape Horn, she settles in at his intended destination of Valparaiso, Chile, exhilarated at the thought of beginning anew. She’s confident her future will involve Admiral Lord Cochrane, the Napoleonic war hero who helped win Chile its independence.

Cochrane has a wife back home, but Maria sees herself as his ideal companion, and her lofty tone is entertainingly witty. “When society tutted that I had ‘set my cap’ at Lord Cochrane,” she writes, “I cocked a snook at them – I never wore anything but a turban.” The novel presents her recollections about their affair and her interactions with native Chileans (she prefers the company of foreigners to other expats), as well as her observations on South America’s volatile politics and gorgeous scenery.

The changing colors of the majestic Andes are beautifully described.

Indeed, one could imagine this novel was the real woman’s authentic memoir – it adopts a period-appropriate formality – if not for the fact that this fictional Maria, supposedly writing from beyond the grave, sometimes breaks in to address modern audiences directly. Free from the constraints of 19th-century morality, she expands

E D I TORS’ C H OI C E

Lynn Austin, Bethany House, 2012, $14.99, pb, 412pp, 9780764208973 All Things New is a captivating novel about Reconstruction in the South. The story focuses on three women: Josephine Weatherly, her mother Eugenia, and their former slave, Lizzie. Their once-prosperous Virginia plantation, White Oak, is now in ruins, and Josephine’s brother, Daniel, returns from war filled with bitterness and violence, unable to re-establish the plantation. Josephine tries to help her family change, but new challenges every day only make her resentful towards God. Eugenia refuses to acclimate to her new situation and will not accept the changes. For Lizzie, life is just as difficult as she copes with choices and an uncertain future.

Alexander Chandler, a Yankee with the Freedman’s Bureau, attempts to help by opening a school in town for Negroes and creating a sharecropping system to benefit both plantation owners and former slaves alike.

But Alexander and the freed slaves only find hostility and violence as Southerners, in despair, turn from their faith in God. As always, Lynn Austin enchants. The struggle each character endures is heart-rending and real. I especially appreciated her attention to historical detail and the way each subplot interwove into the main storyline, connecting everyone. With romance, faith, drama, and history, this story has it all. Highly recommended.

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upon her published journals, which are silent on the true nature of her relationship with Cochrane.

Readers who can adjust to this conceit should enjoy her travelogue, which later sees her accompanying Cochrane to Brazil, a country she finds vulgar because its economy depends on slavery. Maria Graham never let society’s rules sway her opinions or desires, and with insightful skill, Billington has brought her adventurous heroine back into the limelight.

Sarah Johnson TO SEDUCE AN EARL Lori Brighton, Montlake Romance, 2012, $12.95, pb, 364pp, 9781612187112 Grace Brisbane will do anything to help her dying mother and destitute family, even if it means going to the infamous Lavender Hills, a brothel catering to an exclusive female clientele, in an effort to prepare herself for marriage with the worldly Lord Roderick. Instead she falls for her tutor at Lavender Hills, the attractive and mysterious Alex.

Alex Weston was blackmailed by the conniving Lady Lavender when he was a young boy and is kept at Lavender Hills as a virtual prisoner. When he meets Grace, though, he begins to feel a hope he didn’t know existed and dares to think of a future outside of the brothel.

This book grabbed me from the very first line and drew me in with a charming first chapter full of comical misunderstanding between the bored Alex, who just wants to cut to the chase with his newest “client,” and the bookish and naïve Grace.

Brighton does an excellent job of painting Grace as an innocent without the cloyingness that often clings to such a character in historical romances.

And Alex comes with family secrets that stretch back to the Crimean War. An enjoyable Victorian romance.

Jessica Brockmole PHILIDA Andre Brink, Harvill Secker, 2012, £14.99, hb, 310pp, 9781846557040 / Vintage, 2013, $15.00, pb, 320pp, 9780345805034 Philida is a knitting girl, a slave in the household of Cornelis Brink whose job is to knit clothes for the family. She has four children by her master’s son, Frans, but, in 1832, Frans has been ordered to marry the daughter of a prominent Cape family whose fortune is needed to bail out the Brink farm. Philida and her children will be sold on to a new owner. With talk of liberation for slaves being imminent, Philida lodges a formal complaint against Frans, stating that he has reneged on his promise to manumit her. This is the beginning of Philida’s journey into freedom and independence, though there will be much danger and heartbreak on the way.

The novel grips from the outset. The complex tensions between the Brink family and its slaves are explored with great subtlety and compassion and are illustrated not only through the relationship between Philida and Frans, which is one of genuine love until it is compromised by Frans’ cowardice, HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 25

but through the figure of Ouma Petronella, the freed slave who is Cornelis’s birth mother. In the second half of the novel, once the slaves have gained their freedom, there is exultation, yes, but also fear on both sides of the consequences of unravelling the relationship between them knitted together over generations of common dependency on the land.

When the voices of Philida, Frans and Cornelis, which narrate the first half of the book, give way to a self-consciously authorial voice in the second half, we are reminded that, as Brink explains in his afterword, this fiction is closely based on his own family’s history and that the roots of the Rainbow Nation are not as black and white as we might think.

Sarah Bower

in the factories. She soon joins the battle for the empowerment of women working in the factories, facing resistance not only from the employers but also the embryonic union movement who see women’s rights as unimportant. When her dearest friend Rose is found murdered in a back alley, Nicola vows to find her murderer. Setting herself up as bait, she plunges deep into a dark world where a deadly stalker has her in his sights.

This is an interesting combination of historical romance, murder mystery and social struggle in industrial Australia. The characters are all well rounded and credible, while the plot is convincing.

The dénouement is satisfying, if a little predictable.

Fans of historical romance will enjoy this wellwritten story.

Mike Ashworth

DARK PASSAGE Frances Burke, Hale, 2012, £19.99, hb, 224pp, 9780719806674 During the 1890s Depression in Australia, Nicola Redmond’s father commits suicide, unable to face financial ruin, leaving her and her mother to face a life of poverty. Nicola is determined that she will not descend to the degrading life of a prostitute. Instead she begins to forge a new life as a schoolteacher for the children of workingclass families working in dreadful conditions

PORTRAITS OF AN ARTIST Mary F. Burns, Sand Hill Review Press, 2013, $17.95, pb, 316pp, 9781937818128 Portraits of an Artist is a novel about portraitist John Singer Sargent. Spanning 1882-1885, it follows Sargent’s intimate circle of friends through Europe. Sargent painted some of his most famous work during this period, including Madame X. The story is told from multiple points of view, including that of some of Sargent’s models, male and female lovers, and members of his family.

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Cathy Marie Buchanan, Riverhead, 2013, $26.95, hb, 368pp, 9781594486241 Cathy Marie Buchanan (The Day the Falls Stood Still) delivers a stunning novel of 19th-century Paris that will live in readers’ memories long after they have closed the book. Buchanan imagines the life of Marie Van Goethem, the young model for Edgar Degas’ famed statue Little Dancer Aged Fourteen, and brings to light the seedier side of Paris.

The story is told by two of the three Van Goethem sisters in alternating chapters. The girls are left to raise themselves after their father passes away. Seventeenyear-old Antoinette takes on the role of mother to her two younger siblings while the girls’ widowed mother spends her evenings with an absinthe bottle.

Antoinette, once a student at the Paris Opera ballet, works as an extra in a stage adaptation of Zola’s L’Assommoir. She arranges for her sisters, Marie and Charlotte, to enroll in the dance school to hopefully spare them the life of a laundress.

Marie is nervous, unsure of herself, and desperate to rise above the fate that might befall a girl in her social class. Shortly after Marie begins at the ballet school, she catches the eye of Edgar Degas and begins modeling for him. She also catches the eye of a patron of the opera and must make difficult decisions about the direction her life may take. Antoinette falls in love with an unsavory man, and quickly her life begins to revolve around him. She, too, must make hard choices that will affect her family.

This novel is a story of struggle, survival, family, and a test of how far one would go when faced with dire circumstances. I especially loved Buchanan’s descriptions of the ballet; I felt like I was granted behind-the-scenes access, her details were so vivid. This was a novel that was well worth staying up late into the night to finish, and I recommend it without reserve.

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Burns’ narrators introduce the reader to the society of painters and writers in Paris, Venice and Florence. Her use of historical details is impressive, and she relies heavily on primary source materials to inform the text, which often calls to mind one of Henry James’s novels about expatriates in Europe.

However, the narrators tend to lack distinctive voices and often strike the same foreboding note of scandal yet to come. The author’s fidelity to the historical record detracts from the fictional aspect.

A subplot about the daughter of Sargent’s closest friend is invented, and the author doesn’t quite successfully integrate this story into the rest of the work. Overall, Portraits is an interesting novel about a fascinating group of people.

Michaela MacColl THE BRIDEGROOM WORE PLAID Grace Burrowes, Sourcebooks Casablanca, 2012, $7.99, pb, 384pp, 9781402268663 Ian MacGregor, Earl of Balfour, is in a bind. He can’t afford to maintain his estate, so he needs to find a bride with suitable means. Queen Victoria’s summer trips to Scotland have lured many an eligible lady to the Highlands, and Ian finds himself matched with Eugenia Daniels, a wealthy young woman whose father, a baron, wants a title of higher rank for his daughter. Eugenia is lovely, but Ian’s head is turned by Eugenia’s escort Augusta Merrick, a spinster cousin whose background is more than a bit uncertain. Is Ian willing to give up his family estate in pursuit of love?

Burrowes’s latest keeps with her established formula of entertaining love stories featuring witty dialogue and characters with close family ties. The relationship between the MacGregors is warm and caring, and readers will root for this generous, kindhearted clan as they find love with their English visitors. The lone criticism? The novel is overpopulated with characters, and it takes almost half the novel to figure out who they are and why they’re there. Nevertheless, Burrowes’s growing number of fans will appreciate this lively Victorian romance.

Nanette Donohue LADY EVE’S INDISCRETION Grace Burrowes, Sourcebooks Casablanca, 2013, $7.99/£5.99, pb, 416pp, 9781402263804 This is book seven in the series featuring the Windham family, set in the late Regency period. When Lady Eve was 16 she committed an indiscretion which she immediately regretted.

Escaping the inevitable consequences, she falls from her horse, suffering injuries that leave her crippled.

In two years, Eve completely recovers from her physical injuries but remains emotionally scarred.

A chance meeting with an inebriated Marquis of Deene, Lucas Denning, results in compromising the couple. With marriage now impossible due to her indiscretion, Eve enters into a fake engagement with Lucas unaware that Lucas considers her a perfect marchioness.

In Eve, Burrowes has created a spunky, courageous heroine, and Lucas is an attractive, 19th Century

likeable hero. However, there are too many subplots to distract and confuse the reader. These are resolved quickly, but not always satisfactorily, at the end of the novel by an exciting but implausible horse race.

Audrey Braver A DREAM FOR TOMORROW Melody Carlson, Harvest House, 2013, $13.99, pb, 304pp, 9780736949739 This is the second book in the Home on the Oregon Trail series. Although there is a slight feeling at first of being late to the party, the author is quick to catch you up. Elizabeth Martin, a Godfearing widow with two children, has left Kentucky to make a new home in Oregon. Her wagon train is being guided by Eli Kincade, a handsome loner who captured Elizabeth’s heart in book one.

However, they both know that she is looking for hearth and home while he is a wanderer who values his independence. There are troubles enough on the journey without tempting heartbreak. The story centers on the adventures of the Oregon Trail.

Fans of pioneer fiction will enjoy the familiar yet exciting terrain. Elizabeth is a courageous woman who meets each challenge with strength but with realistic periods of strain. Her faith permeates the narrative, suitable for the genre and the storyline.

This was a sweet, enjoyable story. I would have liked to have seen more of the hero, but I suspect his strengths were showcased in book one. This series is recommended for fans of inspirational historical fiction, or anyone looking for a cozy, heart-warming read.

Sue Asher MRS. LINCOLN’S DRESSMAKER Jennifer Chiaverini, Dutton, 2013, $26.95, hb, 357pp, 9780525953616 Elizabeth (Lizzie) Keckley rose out of slavery to become the dressmaker for both Mrs. Jefferson Davis and Mrs. Abraham Lincoln. Her life gets a fictional treatment by this author of the popular Elm Creek Quilts series. Lizzie’s story begins just before the Civil War. To stay in her tight-knit community and continue her thriving dressmaking business, she passes up the chance to travel South with Mrs. Jefferson Davis. Through her connections with the wives and daughters of the Washington elite, she becomes known to Mrs. Lincoln, who insists she accept the job of a combination of dressmaker, hairstylist, and confidante.

From then on Lizzie’s life revolves around the First Family and, after the assassination, Mrs. Lincoln in her devastating grief. Mrs. Keckley decides to write her own life story in 1868, and the revelations within cause a breach with the Lincoln family that lasts the rest of their lives. Only in her impoverished old age is Lizzie’s manuscript rediscovered and appreciated as an historical document.

Although the life of Elizabeth Keckley is full of drama and incident, this retelling suffers from a disappointing lack of intimacy, both in her own and the Lincolns’ lives. Many incidents, both historical 19th Century

and personal, are presented as a flat retelling instead of in-the-moment scenes. Occasional anachronisms (“friendly fire”) and clichés might pull the reader further out of the narrative. Details of the crafting of Mrs. Lincoln’s dresses (which had to fit like wallpaper), Lizzie’s feeding of information from the White House to her church members, and the reconciliation quilt she lovingly constructs are among the exceptional moments when the story of this remarkable woman comes to vibrant life.

Eileen Charbonneau OVER THE EDGE Mary Connealy, Bethany House, 2012, $14.99, pb, 332pp, 9780764209130 The horrors of the Civil War and a Confederate prison camp reawaken Seth Kincaid’s emotional scars from a childhood fire. He also suffers from gaps in his memory, which explains why he doesn’t recognize the woman who tries to shoot him. A decade after the war, Callie wonders if her husband is still alive. With her father dead, her brother gone, a son to raise, and nowhere to live, she heads for the Kincaid ranch in Colorado. If Seth’s alive, can she trust him not to disappear again?

While a stagecoach robbery reunites them, an unexpected addition to the Kincaid family and Seth’s craziness threaten to tear asunder the few threads that still bind them. Then Callie is kidnapped and only he can save her, but that requires his return to the cave where the fire

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happened.

Third in The Kincaid Brothers series, Over the Edge is fast-paced and humorous at times, poignant at others. Callie’s strength and rugged determination and Seth’s internal struggle with inner demons enrich the depth of these characters. The numerous subplots of the story may overwhelm newcomers to this inspirational series, but Connealy neatly weaves the threads to a satisfying and enjoyable conclusion.

Cindy Vallar SATURN Jacek Dehnel (trans. Antonia Lloyd-Jones), Dedalus, 2012, £9.99, pb, 252pp, 9781907650697 This novel is a fictionalised version of the personal life of the great Spanish painter Francisco Goya. It is told through three narrators: Goya himself, his son Javier, and his grandson, Mariano.

The main thrust of the story is that Goya’s horrific series of paintings depicting witches, Satanic rites, monstrous devils and suchlike, and collectively known as the Black Paintings, were in fact painted by his son as a way of expressing his feelings about his father.

The novel depicts the deeply flawed relationship between the three generations of Goyas and in particular that between father and son. The narrative structure works very well and is always clear to follow, and the historical context is explained by a helpful concise summary at the end.

I am not sure I would have liked Goya very

E D I TORS’ CH OICE

Megan Chance, Amazon, 2012, $14.95, pb, 440pp, 9781612184845 This beautifully written, lyrical literary novel engages with the themes of the despoliation of the Pacific Northwest’s native culture and 19th-century concerns about race, degeneration and miscegenation.

It is 1875 in Washington Territory. Leonie, raised as an ethnologist by her father and married, by his dying wish, at seventeen to the much older Junius, is torn between the scientific values embraced by her husband and father and her instinctual connection with the spiritual values of the native peoples they study. Her discovery of a mummified woman in a riverbank and the arrival of Junius’s grown son, Daniel, disrupt a life dedicated to science and bereft of the children for which she longs.

The finely drawn depiction of the Pacific Northwest as a place where rank fertility combines with constant rain, cold, and danger sets the scene beautifully for the struggle between passion and rationality, science and the sacred. The use of Chinook words, stories and imagery bolsters the sense of isolation and otherworldliness as a counterpoint to the scientific and mercantile values of the settlers, but while the spirit world always impinges on the story, Bone River stays firmly grounded in the reality of Leonie’s life.

Chance has a great many interesting things to say about the connection between science, the sacred, and the building of the American marketplace in the space occupied by much older societies. She keeps the reader just ahead of Leonie’s perception of the truth, leading up to a page-turning finish. Recommended.

Jane Steen HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 27

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THE LAST RUNAWAY

E D I TORS’ C H OI C E

Tracy Chevalier, Dutton, 2013, $26.95, hb, 320pp, 9780525952992 / HarperCollins, 2013, £14.99, hb, 352pp, 9780007350346 A young Quaker woman, Honor Bright, has left her civilized home of Bridport in England for the wild, untamed wilderness of Ohio. The year is 1850, and after being slighted by her fiancé, Honor decides to join her sister, Grace, who is going to America to marry. After a perilous sea voyage, Honor sadly loses her sister to yellow fever. Alone in a strange land, she comes into her would-be brother-in-law’s community without any idea what to do next. It becomes clear that Honor cannot live with her sister’s intended and his widowed sister-in-law for very long, but she is unsure if she would survive a return voyage to England.

Trying to set down roots with the Quakers, Honor soon learns that her new home is directly in the path of the Underground Railroad. Laws in America still uphold slavery, despite the growing sentiment against it. Honor is unable to quell her beliefs that slavery is wrong, and, despite repeated warnings, she helps running slaves to move on to their next destination.

Eventually, however, this causes a rift between her and her community, causing her to question everything she has ever known.

As in her other books, Tracy Chevalier manages to transport the reader into the past with remarkable realism. The worlds of her characters seem small at the onset, but as one peels away the layers, they surprise with their depth. Honor’s story is peppered with the delicate realities of a woman’s life in the times: of gardens, quilts, bonnets, and a helplessness that had to be overcome to survive. The rugged and lack-lustre world of Ohio as it seems to Honor in the beginning gradually fills with color and characters that both anger and warm the heart.

The Last Runaway is a fresh look into the history of slavery and the Quaker lifestyle. Highly recommended.

Hanne Pearce much as he is portrayed here. He was given to outbursts of rage both against his family and the world in general, and was constantly unfaithful to his long‑suffering wife. He never thought his son would amount to much and regularly criticised and put him down. In examining their relationship, the author builds up an atmosphere of psychological tension.

The author himself (who is Polish), apart from being a writer, is also a painter, and his intimate knowledge of the visual arts is very apparent.

One very telling insight is that Goya could paint faultlessly such things as gold braid, sashes, faces, breasts under muslin and the neck of a plucked guinea fowl, but every horse he painted was “like an oversized dog”.

Credit must be given to Antonia Lloyd-Jones, who is a full-time translator of Polish literature and who has produced effortless and fluent prose from what I sense is a challenging original text.

Ray Taylor CHECKMATE, MY LORD Tracey Devlyn, Sourcebooks, 2013, $6.99, pb, 394pp, 9781402258251 In 1804, after the death of her husband, Catherine Ashcroft tries to lead a quiet English life in the country with her young daughter, but she is soon drawn into a world of intrigue and danger.

Catherine is convinced that several letters her 28 | Reviews |

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husband sent her before his death are coded with secret messages. She elicits the help of handsome Sebastian Danvers, Earl of Somerton, to help uncover the truth. Unbeknownst to Catherine, Sebastian is a spymaster trying to solve mysteries of his own, which include her husband’s past.

As the plot thickens, so does the sexual tension between Catherine and Sebastian.

This is Devlyn’s second romance thriller, and like her first, it comes with an exciting plot, steamy love scenes, and twists and turns throughout. While a bit formulaic, the characters in the story are dynamic and interesting, making it a satisfactory read. My favorite was Catherine’s daughter, Sophie, whose sweet temperament melts even steely Sebastian’s heart. Overall, an entertaining story.

Rebecca Cochran THE EMPEROR’S CONSPIRACY Michelle Diener, Gallery, 2012, $15.00, pb, 336pp, 1451684436 Born to a life of hardship in the Rookeries of Regency London, Charlotte Raven makes a miraculous escape when she is adopted by a member of the ton. She is raised in the ways of the aristocracy but never manages to sever her ties to the dark underworld of her childhood. When she meets Lord Edward Durnham, an agent of the Crown investigating the alarming removal of gold from England’s shores, the two become entwined

in a perilous plot rooted in real-life history.

The Emperor’s Conspiracy shines as a mystery.

Diener is a competent writer who should be applauded for her ability to weave the particulars of this historical conspiracy with the fictional characters presented in the novel. However, problems arise with the hasty romance between Charlotte and Edward. The chemistry between them is practically nonexistent, and the added complication of Charlotte’s one-time lover turned crime boss further convolutes the story.

Additionally, the characters evoke little sympathy. Notwithstanding the first chapter, Charlotte’s traumatic childhood is divulged through brief, conversational mentions that belittle the difficult life she had to endure. Even more unsympathetic is Edward, who is the epitome of the strong, silent type; he is so upstanding he borders on priggish. And yet he throws caution to the wind several times, which is in complete contrast to his personality. While the heartrending reasons for his being so generally frigid are eventually revealed at the end, the reader may find it hard to empathize.

The novel would have truly excelled had these characters been relegated to solving the mystery only. It is the core of the story and is done well.

Consequently, mystery and historical fiction lovers will find this story appealing if they can ignore the romantic subplot.

Caroline Wilson FLIGHT OF FANCY Laurie Alice Eakes, Revell, 2012, $14.99/£8.99, pb, 368pp, 9780800734671 A wickedly tantalizing first chapter brings disaster to the engagement of Whittaker and Cassandra, whom we first met in the entertaining first novel (A Necessary Deception) of Eakes’ inspirational Regency era series. Now featured in book two, the couple is forced apart as they succumb to their fear that their forbidden premarital desire for one another is the reason that Cassandra is physically scarred for life. Cassandra finds comfort with her ballooning adventures, while Whittaker, a struggling mill owner, is blackmailed to be on both sides of rebellions headed by the dangerous Luddites.

Cassandra and her wild sister Honore visit Whittaker Hall with the assurances that Whittaker would be absent, but small things begin to occur that make Whittaker fear for Cassandra’s safety, and he is unable to stay away. To make matters worse, distant cousins arrive who cause suspense and hints of romance to collide, making for an exciting resolution to Cassandra’s doubts for her future.

This series focuses on romance and faith equally, with an enjoyable dose of mystery as each novel focuses on one of the sisters. Honore’s story, A Reluctant Courtship, will be released in the autumn of 2013.

Marie Burton LOVELIER THAN DAYLIGHT 19th Century

Rosslyn Elliott, Thomas Nelson, 2012, $15.99, pb, 357pp, 9781595547873 Residents of the highly religious town of Westerville, Ohio, were proud of the part they played in the abolition movement, including their involvement in the Underground Railroad. Thus, in 1875, when an outsider tried to establish a saloon in their midst, the citizens embraced the temperance movement with equal fervor.

The resulting confrontation between those who believed they had the right to choose that their town be liquor-free, and those who believed that free enterprise should triumph, quickly became violent. When national newspapers picked up the story, they salaciously dubbed the conflict the “Westerville Whiskey Wars.”

In this concluding book of The Saddler’s Legacy, a series loosely based on the Hanby family of Westerville, Susanna Hanby’s sister, Rachel, has fled her alcoholic husband and abandoned her six children in an orphanage. Susanna, an ardent teetotaler whose dislike of the devil’s brew is fanned into fiery hatred by her brother-in-law’s abuses, desperately seeks to rescue the children before it is too late. The white knight who rides in to help Susanna is the most unlikely hero… Johann Giere, the wealthy heir to a German-American brewery.

At heart, Lovelier than Daylight is the story of young woman’s struggle to learn that righteousness without love brings as much destruction as a wagonload of whiskey. The conflict between two cultural forces has modern relevance, and it is the author’s great achievement that she exposes the hypocrisy on both sides, as well as validating the truth in both arguments. Well-written and thought-provoking, this is sure to be a favorite with readers of inspirational fiction.

Nancy J. Attwell THE SILVER THREAD Kylie Fitzpatrick, Head of Zeus, 2012, £17.99, hb, 486pp, 9781908800121 Inspired by a real historical artefact, The Rajan Quilt, sewn by women convicts on their way to Australia, this novel moves from Ireland to the penal colony of Australia to England. It is 1841, and Rhia Mahoney has travelled to London after a huge fire destroys her family business and leaves her father badly injured. Her woes are added to by the mysterious death of her merchant trader uncle, but did he really commit suicide? Full of twists and turns, yet never losing credibility, the book does not slacken in pace from beginning to end.

The research is meticulous, and the characterisation is very strong. The heroine Rhia, although independently minded and intelligent, is of her time and not too modern that she seems out of place. The parts aboard the ship are in particular beautifully rendered until we can almost smell the fetid atmosphere for ourselves and get a sense of what life must have been like for these women facing an unknown destiny far away from everything they have ever known. We also see Rhia’s inner thoughts as she writes a diary addressed to her dead grandmother in an attempt 19th Century

to make sense of the world around her. There are many other facets to the plot: the opium trade, the penal system, pattern design, Quakers, the linen trade and the effect of the advent of machines upon the hand workers, all of which adds up to a satisfying, thoughtful and absorbing book. This is Fitzpatrick’s third novel, and I will be looking forward to the next.

Ann Northfield THE WICKED WEDDING OF MISS ELLIE VYNE Jayne Fresina, Sourcebooks, 2013, $6.99/£4.99, pb, 416pp, 9781402266003 This Regency romance opens in masquerade: James Hartley, dressed as a notorious highwayman, doesn’t realize the “Marie Antoinette” he kisses is the “Ellie Phant” he taunted as a youth. But he does determine to marry her, if he can ever catch her.

The book is fast and witty, true to genre without straying into cliché. Of course Ellie Vyne is “wicked” compared to her status-obsessed peers, but she has reasons other than simple rebelliousness. And James is the classic rake — stinking rich and a good leg in breeches — but he has his flaws, as well as a cheeky valet to puncture his ego.

James pursues Ellie (not realizing he’s already kissed her in Chapter One) to recover the famous Hartley Diamonds, which after a chain of events have ended up in her hands. Fine, except that the whole intrigue depends on Ellie — always described in pleasingly womanlike terms — having impersonated a grown man for several hours in close company. I’d like to have seen how she pulled that off, but we’re never given a scene with Ellie as the “Count de Bonneville.”

Setting aside such quibbles, constant intrigue (amnesia, blackmail, and yet more false identities) keeps the tone light and adds an air of innocent danger to the love story — right up until the last chapters, which tie up all the loose ends by way of mention and rush right through the wedding.

Twenty more pages, or perhaps a false mustache in the punch bowl, might have done the trick.

Richard Bourgeois THE ANNALS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES Paul D Gilbert, Hale, 2012, £19.99, hb, 224pp, 9780709093466 This is Paul Gilbert’s third book of Sherlock Holmes pastiche, consisting of three long short stories (or novellas as he terms them) narrated, like the originals, by his famous assistant, Dr Watson. Gilbert is very good at this. He writes stately Victorian prose, with long, carefully crafted sentences which beautifully convey Conan Doyle’s mix of artificiality and realism; absurd stories set in a real world, where one almost smells the coal smoke of the stream trains and hears the hiss of the gas lamps.

Personally I feel uncomfortable with pastiche, especially when it involves slavishly imitating a long-dead author. But, just as Conan Doyle failed to kill off Sherlock Holmes in his lifetime, being forced by his public and his publishers to resurrect

him after his duel with Moriarty, so Holmes stubbornly refuses to die even after Doyle’s own death. I am not a Holmes fan, but if I were I am not certain whether I would be outraged or in love with this last instalment of his adventures.

Edward James A GENTLEMAN NEVER TELLS Juliana Gray, Berkley Sensation, 2012, $7.99/ C$8.99, pb, 310pp, 9780425251072 The hero and heroine of this jauntily-paced, romantic novel set in 1890 have a history. Elizabeth Harewood and Lord Roland Penhallow, darlings of the London social scene, were once lovers.

Unfortunately, his career as spy and her greedy relations tore them apart. Now, years later, Lilibet is married to another man and has a son. That much is standard fare in many historical romances. What separates this story from lesser titles are the dark edges of reality with which author Juliana Gray deftly colors her tale of forbidden love, making it far more than conventional fare, and relatable to women today.

From the beginning, the reader learns of the horrific situation in which Lilibet finds herself.

She is the chattel of a too-powerful man. Lilibet does all she can to remove herself and her son from the cruel Somerton. Scandal, revealing her hiding place, is one thing she can’t afford. Even as Roland rejoices at finding her again, the danger looms of Somerton finding them and carrying out his threat — death at the hands of the man who once vowed before God to protect her. Readers will root for Lilibet to the very end of this gripping tale.

Kathryn Johnson ANOTHER SMALL KINGDOM James Green, Accent, 2012, £7.99, pb, 353pp, 9781908262899 Boston, 1802. Lawyer Macleod is a man full of hate, a dangerous man who finds himself caught up in a web of intrigue. But that is the least of it, and just the starting point of Another Small Kingdom, which is the first of five books about the history and development of the American Secret Services.

The characters are excellently drawn and the writing wonderful, but I have to admit that I didn’t have a clue what was going on half the time – fitting, perhaps, for a novel about government, rulers, fights over territories between countries, spies, agents and the man who would be king.

Very clever plots and counterplots kept me on my toes, and it was an enjoyable read. I will certainly look forward to the next in the series, as this novel evoked a sense of time and place beautifully, and of the little man being in the wrong place at the wrong time and pulled against his will into a much bigger picture. Marvellous.

Katy O’Dowd SARAH THORNHILL Kate Grenville, Canongate, 2012, £7.99, pb, 310 pp, 9780857862563 / Grove, 2012, $25.00, hb, 352pp, 9780802120243 As she did in the first book of this trilogy, The Secret River, Kate Grenville delves into her family HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 29

history to recreate Sarah Thornhill. Sarah is the youngest child of William Thornhill, the central character in The Secret River, who was shipped to Australia as a convict and eventually made a decent life for his family.

Sarah grows up in ignorant bliss of the troubles that took place between her father and the local Aboriginals, her eyes firmly set on the handsome Jack Langland. The lovers’ happy future seems certain until Sarah’s father refuses to allow her to wed the half-black Jack.

Jack returns to sea, and a devastated Sarah eventually marries Irish immigrant, John Daunt.

The author sharply evokes the hardship of life on a new settlement, the marriage taking unexpected turns for both Sarah and the reader and building to the heart-breaking moment when Sarah discovers the true reason for her father’s refusal of marriage to Jack.

The only very minor gripe I had was with the end of the story. Whilst Sarah’s journey to New Zealand, in an attempt to make amends for the sins of her family, worked for the story, it did not work too well for me in terms of character.

Despite this, I felt Kate Grenville captured the voice of the headstrong, passionate and illiterate Sarah perfectly. This is a tender portrait of a young woman caught up in the turbulent period of the birth of a nation and, coupled with the author’s stunning prose, I would highly recommend Sarah Thornhill.

Liza Perrat UNENDING DEVOTION Jody Hedlund, Bethany House, 2012, $14.99, pb, 374pp, 9780764208348 This inspirational romance is set in the lumber camps of Central Michigan in 1883. Lily Young’s search for her sister Edith leads her to the shanty towns that house the lumberjacks and the brothels that service them. Protected by the friendly photographer, Oren, for whom she works, Lily believes she can cope with shanty boys like handsome Connell McCormick. But Connell turns out to be the boss’s son, and his attraction to Lily doesn’t mean he agrees with her views on cleaning out the brothels and saving the beautiful pine forests from total destruction.

It’s always good to see a Midwest setting, and Hedlund’s vivid descriptions make full use of an underexplored slice of American history, reminding the reader that the swift progress of settlement created sizeable moral problems that had nothing to do with Western gunfights and cattle rustling. I enjoyed the settings in this novel very much.

I had some trouble liking the main characters.

We are told Lily is lively and has a great sense of humor, but little of either characteristic shows up, and she comes across as both earnest and foolhardy, a strange combination. Connell’s subordination to his father, his hesitation to fight the villain, Carr, and the way his desire for Lily renders him speechless make him appear weak, particularly compared to Lily’s other suitor, Stuart.

While I commend Hedlund for not giving us the 30 | Reviews |

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conventional alpha male, I find Connell’s softer side — and the overwhelmingly physical nature of his attraction to Lily — a little off-putting.

Some dramatic moments seem contrived; why, for example, in a location so well supplied with prostitutes, should so many men want to rape Lily?

And the prostitute Frankie seems to exist merely to further the plot.

And yet my overall impression was of an enjoyable and well-written story, sure to delight Hedlund’s fans.

Jane Steen WHEN JOHNNY CAME MARCHING HOME William Heffernan, Akashic, 2012, $24.95, hb, 319pp, 9781617751271 Billed as an historical mystery, Heffernan’s latest explores how three boys met the challenges of a catastrophic war and the changes it wrought on each of them. Johnny Harris, Jubal Foster, and Abel Johnson, childhood friends in bucolic Jerusalem’s Landing, Vermont, are young adults when the Civil War breaks out in 1861. Signing up and marching out together, they believe it will be a grand and exciting adventure. The reality is much darker and grimmer than they could have imagined. By war’s end, Abel is dead and the two left are ruined men, physically or mentally crippled, leading different lives from what they had envisioned.

Moving back and forth in time, the well-paced narrative involves the reader with powerfully vivid descriptions of horrendous battles like the Wilderness and Gettysburg, of terrible raids on civilians, and of great physical and mental anguish suffered by the soldiers. Continually faced with stunningly graphic violence, the boys and their companion, the free black, Josiah, attempt to navigate the dangerous arena of the conflict.

Upon the survivors’ return home, Johnny has clearly become a cruel psychopath. When his murdered body is found in a village barn, suspects abound, from a domineering lumberman to a shifty former soldier to Abel’s stepmother. The one-armed Jubal, working as his father’s deputy town constable, investigates his former comrade’s murder, and his probing questions break open old wounds and set in motion events that will lead to the truth of Johnny’s death. In the process, Jubal rekindles his romance with Rebecca, Abel’s sister, who has secrets of her own. Heffernan skillfully presents a realistic and evocative tale of war and its lingering effects.

Michael I. Shoop TWICE A BRIDE Mona Hodgson, WaterBrook, 2012, $13.99/ C$16.99/£8.99, pb, 320pp, 9780307730329 Willow Peterson is a young, attractive, kindhearted, and devout widow making a life for herself in 1898 Cripple Creek, Colorado. She suffered depression after her husband’s death, to such an extent that she was institutionalized. The experience has left her with a deep empathy for those on society’s margins. She hopes to support

herself through her art, something that seems reasonable since she’s a supremely talented painter and there’s an unmarried photographer, new in town, looking to hire a talented portrait painter.

This is the fourth book in a series about the motherless Sinclair sisters, who are all happily hitched at this point and supportive of Willow, whose brother the preacher is married to one of them. The Sinclair sisters’ stories are briefly recapped for forgetful or new readers.

Will Willow and her new boss fall in love despite his antipathy for religion? Might he come around and find faith? What about the Sinclair sisters’ father, who has returned from Paris with an eight-year-old girl in tow?

Readers unfamiliar with the Sinclair sisters may want to begin at the beginning of this series, although the author summarizes. Hodgson also does a fine job of setting the historical stage. I had a difficult time, however, believing some of the characters’ responses. The heroines felt a bit mean-spirited. Even so, readers looking to escape into turn-of-the-century Colorado with an inspirational romance should enjoy Twice a Bride.

Kristen Hannum THE EXHIBITIONISTS Russell James, Golden Guides, 2012, £12.99, pb, 334pp, 9781780950112 The Exhibitionists is an interesting fictional account of the lives of several famous Victorian artists: Turner, Holman Hunt, Rossetti, Millais and Hayden. These historical characters are interwoven with the lives of three fictional children.

The story begins in 1843 with Turner painting Parliament as it burns. On the same night a baby is tossed into the Thames in a basket, another child is abandoned at a baby farm, and a third is conceived out of wedlock.

James has created a cast of characters that the reader cares about and set them in a vividly described, historically accurate setting. The poverty and unhappiness experienced by many in this era is brought to life. This book is well written and impeccably researched.

However, the eccentric narrative style James adopts — he jumps from scene to scene and character to character, often mid-page — made this book, in my opinion, a somewhat confusing read.

Fenella J Miller A WORLD ELSEWHERE Wayne Johnston, Jonathan Cape, 2012, £17.99, hb, 294pp, 9780224096607 / Vintage Canada, 2012, C$22.00, pb, 320pp, 9780307399915 Two young men meet at Princeton University in the late 1890s: one, the articulate Landish Druken, son of a wealthy Newfoundland sealing skipper; the other the sophisticated Padgett Vanderluyden, son of a multimillionaire. Both are loners. Landish is trying to write a novel, but each morning, he burns what he’s written. Van intends to build a mansion where he can be isolated from the world and invites Landish to live there. Landish declines, and the friendship is severed. Still determined 19th Century

to write, Landish returns to Newfoundland but refuses to work in his father’s sealskin business.

He is disinherited and spirals into poverty and drunkenness. Landish adopts the orphaned baby son of his father’s first mate and, somehow, relying on charity handouts and the occasional rough job, he supports them both. He brings up Deacon unconventionally but with tenderness and compassion.

Landish is a master of the Joycean phrase; when food is short they eat ‘sham chowder’ and ‘lack of lamb’. He tells Deacon about ‘Parodies Lost’. (A World Elsewhere could be described as Finnegan’s Wake meets Citizen Kane.) When poverty finally overwhelms him, he begs his erstwhile friend for help. Van takes them in at Vanderland. Here, Landish and Deacon enter a world of deception and hidden violence where the bond of love and trust between them will be tested to the utmost.

Wayne Johnston’s work is always interesting, and this book is no exception. However, I’m not convinced by Landish’s baby-care. Wayne Johnston’s careful research obviously doesn’t cover the sheer drudgery of infant care: the endless washing of dirty nappies, colic, the miseries of teething, etc are quite unknown.

A World Elsewhere is a story of redemption and the power of love, but it’s also about loneliness, the insidious effect of wealth, and difficult moral choices.

Elizabeth Hawksley BLOCKADE RUNNER David Kent-Lemon, Claymore, 2012, £9.99/$14.95, pb, 320pp, 9781781590645 Shipping clerk Tom Wells impresses his employers in 1861 London so much that they entrust him with the administration of their blockade-running trade to the Confederacy, operating out of Nassau in the Bahamas. It isn’t just a desk job. Tom has to make many voyages on the blockade-running ships back and forth to the Carolinas. The trade is highly profitable but also highly dangerous, and it nearly costs him his life.

His home base in Nassau is safe from shot and shell, but not from disastrous personal entanglements. He also has, if not a girl in every port, one in North Carolina whom he had met when she visited London.

I must admit that in the middle of this novel I was feeling that it was starting to sag, but then the strands of the plot snapped together to bring a decisive, if not entirely happy, ending. Like most historical novels that I review these days, Blockade Runner has a dozen or so misspellings, and a couple of bits of anachronistic dialogue, but the several instances of ships being “under weigh” deserve six strokes of the bosun’s cane.

Alan Fisk THE WIDOW’S REDEEMER Philippa Jane Keyworth, Madison Street, 2013, $13.95, pb, 302pp, 9780983671930 In October 1815, after two years of a miserable, abusive marriage, Lettice Burton suddenly finds herself a penniless young widow. Her mother-in19th Century

law, a recent widow herself, takes Letty to London for the season where a friend introduces her to Viscount Beauford. A previous encounter with the Viscount has predisposed Letty to dislike him.

However, frequently being in Beauford’s company changes her opinion, and Letty realizes she is in love with him. Then her mother-in-law’s finances take a turn for the worse. The two women give up the season and flee to the country, where Letty takes a position as governess and where, after several months, she encounters Beauford once again.

Keyworth has a clean, intelligent writing style.

The narrative unfolds in a logical manner. Her characters are well-developed and likeable. This is well-written and nicely plotted, a quick and satisfying read reminiscent of Jane Austen.

Audrey Braver DEATH’S ICY HAND Robert Kresge, ABQ Press, 2012, $15.95, pb, 292pp, 9780983871262 It is the winter of 1872, and a Russian grand duke and his large entourage are visiting the Wyoming Territory aboard a royal train. Their companions include Buffalo Bill Cody and George Armstrong Custer.

From the opening pages, we know a murder is planned, but soon it becomes a case of multiple murders. And as marshal Monday Malone and his partner and love interest, Kate Shaw, set out to solve the crimes, Kate inevitably places her own life in jeopardy.

The complicated storyline includes a cast of unpleasant characters, numerous false identities, and foreign political intrigue. When a murder is solved halfway through the book, a new set of murders propels the story forward. Along with all the physical action, the author heavily contrasts the immoral decadence of old world nobility with the strong upstanding virtues offered by the values of the American West.

As in the previous works, the book suffers from a too-modern vocabulary, an excessive penchant for clichés, and a misplaced fondness for one-word sentences. Death’s Icy Hand is the third book in the Warbonnet series.

Veronika Pelka HOSTILE SHORES: An Alan Lewrie Naval Adventure Dewey Lambdin, St. Martin’s, 2013, $25.99, hb, 368pp, 9780312595722 Captain Alan Lewrie leaves his post in the Bahamas for London with word of the victory at Trafalgar and the death of Admiral Nelson on the lips of every Englishman. He soon receives new orders that take him to Cape Town, South Africa, to take the city from the Dutch. Still more twists in the Admiralty and Parliament then send him to South America, where he must take on the Spanish. Through it all, he struggles to keep his crew with him and to juggle the women in his life.

Lambdin is thoroughly enamored with his hero, Captain Lewrie. If you need proof, then note that this is the 19th installment of the series. I didn’t

like the man at all. There is little to recommend him. The promotional literature describes him as a captain who would make Captain Aubrey brush.

I agree. He’s a womanizer, he’s petty, and he’s prone to long reminiscences of his previous adventures.

True, he’s brave and audacious. But those traits rarely bear fruit. There is little in the way of adventure in this novel. Though Lewrie does find himself involved in an infantry assault in South Africa, the reader is only on hand for one naval engagement, and that is at the tail end of the story. The bulk of the novel is dedicated to Lewrie talking of old feats with his comrades, enjoying his liquor, and chasing women. There is also little in the way of story or plot. Rather, it is a tour that zig-zags across the Atlantic prompted by events abroad, a tour of the happenings of 1805-1806, and little more. I might feel different if I had read the previous eighteen novels. He does seem to have a decent fan base, so perhaps his earlier work was more compelling.

Justin M. Lindsay UTOPIAN MAN Lisa Lang, Allen & Unwin/Trafalgar Square, 2012 (c2010), $16.95/C$18.95/AU$23.99, pb, 248pp, 9781742373348 Lang’s award-winning debut is a delight, as a novel, as biography, and as history. Based on the life of Edward Cole, Utopian Man is the story of a hard-working freethinker in late 19th-century Australia who built a bookstore empire out of his earnings from a lemonade stand.

Cole immigrated to Australia from England, thinking to make his fortune in the gold fields.

Violence and racism sent him fleeing to Melbourne, though, where he peddled a variety of wares and educated himself at the public library. Inspired to give others a path to knowledge and to build a real community out of the increasingly diverse population—in politics, ethnicity, and social strata—he began selling books, eventually opening the wildly successful Cole’s Book Arcade. Visitors could read for hours without being pressured to purchase; entertainment of every sort was to be had, from music to games to funhouse mirrors.

The novel explores Cole’s personal life, including the dark secret from his days in the gold fields as well as his philosophies of religion and diversity. He married late, after finally deciding to advertise for a wife in the newspaper. Eliza replied, and they had a happy marriage with a lively bunch of children.

His life was not all success, however: family tragedy and increasing pressure from local politicians with visions of empire rather than unity both weighed on him over the years. Cole finally has to come to terms with what he sees as his failures, and Lang excels in these darker moments just as she does in the lighter ones.

Helene Williams GIDEON’S CALL Peter Leavell, Worthy, 2012, $14.99, pb, 368pp, 9781617951176 The Battle of Port Royal, which took place on HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 31

November 7, 1861, was a pivotal Union victory during the Civil War. The successful capture of Fort Walker and Fort Beauregard led to a naval blockade of Port Royal Sound. Afterward, 10,000 slaves remained behind as their masters fled.

Leavell crafts a plausible inspirational story about these people. He combines fictional characters with historical figures including Lincoln, Secretary Chase, Sojourner Truth, author Edward Pierce, abolitionist Laura Towne, and others who provide realism. The story centers on Tad, a fictitious slave owned by Dr. Jenkins on his South Carolina plantation. Tad is taught to read by Collin, the doctor’s son. As Collin’s friend, his life is carefree and unrestrictive, but one day, Tad learns the harsh reality of enslavement after Collin lies to him. As he is whipped, he glares at Collin, calling him Judas. Gideon’s Call follows Tad on his quest for freedom and land ownership as he eventually becomes a leader for his race.

Gideon’s Call makes reference to the Emancipation Proclamation, Fugitive Slave Act, Freedmen’s Bureau, Port Royal Experiment, 54th Massachusetts Black Regiment and Uncle Tom’s Cabin, which enhance and lend credence to the novel. A satisfying and historically rich read.

Wisteria Leigh A NOTORIOUS COUNTESS CONFESSES Julie Anne Long, Avon, 2012, $5.99, pb, 374pp, 9780062118028 Evie Duggan’s reputation among the ton is legendary. Raised in poverty, she rose to great heights as an actress and a courtesan, and her hand in marriage was won in a card game by a count, giving her a title. But the count has died, and scandal follows Evie wherever she goes — even the small town of Pennyroyal Green. Evie just wants to escape her reputation and live a quiet life, but there’s no chance of that happening when the town gossips won’t leave her alone. Pennyroyal Green’s vicar, the handsome (and wholesome) Adam Sylvaine, can’t help but notice Evie, and once he gets to know her, he realizes what a kindhearted and gentle woman she really is. Attraction quickly turns to love, but will the residents of Pennyroyal Green accept a fallen woman as the vicar’s wife?

The seventh book in Long’s Pennyroyal Green series is a classic mismatch romance with ample charm and a delightful love story. Readers who are unfamiliar with the series may find some of the ongoing plot threads involving secondary characters somewhat distracting, but the majority of the novel stands alone well enough. Evie’s quest to redeem herself and to help others see beyond her beauty and her scandalous reputation is enjoyable, and Adam is a refreshing break from the standard alpha-male hero so common in Regency romances.

Nanette Donohue HONORABLE LIES Robert N. Macomber, Pineapple Press, 2012, $21.95, hb, 358pp, 9781561645312 American naval intelligence officer Peter Wake embarks on a secret mission to Cuba to rescue two members of his network of operatives, captured 32 | Reviews |

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and held in a Spanish dungeon. Complicating matters, his nemesis in Spanish counterintelligence is in Havana and has a pretty good idea what Wake is up to. But the American has allies, a team of local agents he calls “Los Aficionados” and his delightfully lethal sidekick, an Irishman called Rork with a marlinspike in place of a hand and wits equally sharp.

The details of life in Havana under Spanish rule in 1888 are well-drawn, and Wake’s foes are believable and competent. Unfortunately “Los Aficionados” seem incomplete as characters — there are simply too many of them to keep track of except by specialty (locksmith, explosives man, etc.), and Lt. Commander Wake is not the sort of narrator to spend extra words on backstory. The author’s choice to present the novel in first person is an interesting one: apparently Macomber wrote the first several books of the “Honor” series in third person before switching to the device of “memoirs found in a trunk.” This gives us a detached, calmly competent delivery in the best tradition of the American professional warrior. It works just fine when Wake describes a fight or a chase — which is, to be fair, most of the book — but all else comes through colorlessly, a matter-of-fact recounting by a man who doesn’t realize he’s supposed to be narrating a novel.

Richard Bourgeois TWO SINFUL SECRETS Laurel McKee, Forever, 2012, $7.99, pb, 384pp, 9781455505487 Lady Sophia Huntington has been ostracized by her family and widowed after a brief marriage.

Forced to fend for herself, Sophia makes her way around the gambling palaces of Europe, using her feminine wiles to survive. After a terrifying incident in Baden Baden, she makes her way to Paris, where she encounters Dominic St. Claire, a man from her past—and a sworn enemy of the Huntington family. Their attraction is undeniable, but can they look past their family feud and make romance bloom beyond something merely physical?

The second novel in McKee’s Scandalous St. Claires series is a surprisingly spicy romance, with love scenes that are hotter than standard fare.

Sophia and Dominic’s relationship progresses at a fast clip, and there’s little doubt throughout the book that they will end up working through their (minor) differences. The Victorian-era Parisian setting, combined with the reconciliation of two feuding families and a charming couple make this an enjoyable read.

Nanette Donohue THE BIRTHDAY SCANDAL Leigh Michaels, Montlake, 2012, $12.95, pb, 354pp, 9781611094329 Popular Regency romances are rarely steeped in rich historical detail. What they do best is to entertain with perky heroines, witty dialogue, dashing playboy heroes, to-die-for period costumes, secrets and misunderstandings, light humor, and just the right spice of sensuality—all cleverly set

against a pleasant backdrop of period atmosphere.

Many authors attempt this literary game, but few attain the proficiency Leigh Michaels achieves in her latest novel.

In The Birthday Scandal, veteran author Michaels presents three siblings from the Arden clan: Emily, Lucien, and Isabel—each suffering from a trauma of the heart. Emily faces disgrace in the wake of a broken engagement. Lucien is—well, having too much fun to settle down. And Isabel’s husband has vanished following a disastrous wedding night.

Their uncle, the wealthy Duke of Weybridge, calls the trio to his birthday ball. Confined to a wheelchair, his health ostensibly failing, he intends to improve on their lives in ways that none of them will foresee until the very end of the novel. Lovers of this genre will rejoice in following Michaels’ characters through the ensuing high jinks, in search of a happy ending for all.

Kathryn Johnson A HIDDEN TRUTH Judith Miller, Bethany House, 2012, $14.99, pb, 352pp, 9781441260413 I had never heard of the Amana Colony until I read this first book in Judith Miller’s Home to Amana series, but I am now thoroughly intrigued by this piece of American history. In the mid-19th century, the Community of True Inspiration, or the Inspirationalists, established communal living in seven villages on a large tract of land in Iowa.

A board of elders made rules, assigned work, and meted out punishments, all for the economic and spiritual good of the community as a whole.

In 1892, 22-year-old Dovie Cates, an outsider, comes to the village of East Amana in hopes of learning more about her own mother’s past. She shares a room with her cousin, Karlina Richter, and the two young women quickly become friends. In truth, the plot in this book is thin and the pace slow.

Karlina loves looking after her sheep, and Dovie learns how to help in the Küche, the communal kitchen which serves meals to about forty village residents. Both girls go skating, help a neighbor, and fall in love. What is lacking in tension is made up for in smooth descriptions that make the dayto-day village life seem real. If a reader is seeking excitement, then this is not the book for you; but Miller is a good writer, and those who enjoy a gentle read about a simpler time will certainly enjoy A Hidden Truth.

Nancy J. Attwell TEN MILE VALLEY Wayne D. Overholser, Five Star, 2013, $25.95, hb, 212pp, 9781432826123 During the late 1800s, the Kelton family decides to sell its property and move to eastern Oregon.

Eighteen-year-old Mark Kelton survives an attack on his family while on the way to Oregon. An unknown assailant kills his parents. Bronco Curtis discovers Mark wandering the land, lost, and helps him. As he grows older, Curtis teaches him to ride and shoot. They become partners and acquire land in the Ten Mile Valley to raise cattle. Mark 19th Century

continues to look for the murderers who killed his parents and left him an orphan.

Overholser is known for his solid knowledge of the 19th-century West, particularly in Oregon and Colorado. His estate has made this novel available from his unpublished works. I’ve read several of his previous books and found this one does not disappoint.

Jeff Westerhoff TO LOVE AND CHERISH Tracie Peterson and Judith Miller, Bethany House, 2012, $14.99, pb, 332pp, 9780764208874 Melinda Colson has marriage on the brain. Evan Tarlow does not. When a devastating hurricane hits Bridal Veil Island — Evan’s home and the center of Melinda’s dreams — will the ensuing challenges bring the weary lovers together or tear them apart? When Melinda uncovers a dangerous plot, can she trust Evan to help?

Veteran writing team Tracie Peterson and Judith Miller bring the world of Bridal Veil — a fictional island just off the coast of Georgia — to brilliant life in this inspirational tale of love, forgiveness, and faiths set in the late 1890s. Melinda’s independence is often questioned, while Evan battles to maintain control. Women readers in particular will find this situation relatable. Delightfully enigmatic characters fill the island, sharing wit and wisdom — and the power of faith — with our troubled heroine.

Faith is a major theme in this novel. Tragedy often breeds doubt, which can only be overcome by faith — a struggle faced by many characters, especially Melinda. Haunting memories slowly reveal the back story of our two heroes, providing useful insight into certain personality conflicts. A captivating read, To Love and Cherish is a must for any fan of historical Christian fiction. I only wish it didn’t have to end!

Shaylin Montgomery THE MISSING ITALIAN GIRL Barbara Corrado Pope, Pegasus Crime, 2013, $25, hb, 320pp, 9781605984087 Although the book is billed as third in the Bernard Martin mystery series, the lead character is Bernard’s wife, Clarie. In late 19th-century Paris, Clarie, a teacher at the prestigious girls’ school, the Lycée Lamartine, faces an appeal from charwoman Francesca: help her daughters, Angela and Maura.

Bernard, an advocate for the rights of the working man, shows less compassion for the rights of downtrodden working women, so Clarie must aid Francesca and her family surreptitiously.

The mystery itself—two murders and accusations of anarchism—is less compelling than the description of multiple Parises. Clarie lives in a deceptive Paris, one where she has a career, but those who proclaim their allegiance to equality are blind to women’s rights. Francesca and her daughters live in squalid Paris, where the poor are exploited and treated as less than human. Bernard lives in a suspicious Paris where his defense of unionized workers means that they 19th Century

are automatically assumed to be anarchists. In the end, I was less interested in whodunit and why than where Clarie and her husband would go from here. If this is an anomaly in the Bernard Martin series—Clarie as protagonist—let there be more anomalies.

Ellen Keith THE STREETS Anthony Quinn, Jonathan Cape, 2012, £14.99, 272pp, hb, 9780224069911 London 1882, and the young David Wildeblood starts work on Henry Marchmont’s staff as researcher/journalist on the weekly publication The Labouring Classes of London. Wildeblood has been given the increasingly impoverished area known as Somers Town, located between the rail stations of Euston and St Pancras in north London, to investigate the conditions of the poor who live there. Marchmont is based very closely upon the real Henry Mayhew, who was an indefatigable reporter on the conditions of London’s poorer classes. Wildeblood, who has a few secrets of his own, is an articulate and intrepid defender of the poor in his patch. He begins to uncover a network of shady practices by wealthy and uncaring landlords and soon finds himself drawn into a dangerous pursuit of justice. He has a loyal ally in Jo, a costermonger in the area, and slowly develops the trust of Jo’s attractive sister, Roma.

There is a series of violent confrontations as the novel reaches its conclusion. The writing is capable if not of the quality of the best literary fiction. There a few thumping coincidences, clichés, and occasional overuse of selected words – “rebarbative” appears to be a big favourite of the writer. Nevertheless, it is an entertaining read, which rumbles along quite pleasantly.

Doug Kemp THE LADY MOST WILLING: A Novel in Three Parts Julia Quinn, Eloisa James, and Connie Brockway, Avon, 2012, $7.99/C$9.50, pb, 384pp, 9780062107381 What do you get when three Great Ladies of Romance unite their talents in one book? Pure enjoyment! A follow-up to the authors’ The Lady Most Likely, this novel in three parts is remarkable in that the authors, each with a distinct style and voice, make the story flow. The reader is swept from one section to another without being jolted when another writer takes over the tale.

Laird Taren Ferguson, afraid he will die without securing the clan’s future, needs to encourage his lackadaisical heirs, Oakley and Rocheforte, into the holy state of matrimony. So, taking matters in hand, Taren kidnaps four lovely women from a local ball. Oops. Make that four lovely ladies and one infuriated Duke of the Realm. Marilla Chisholm, her older sister, Fiona, and Cecily Tarleton have money by the boatload and grand marriage prospects. Lovely Miss Catriona Burns is a poor, local lass — an obvious mistake.

What happens when eight people are thrown

together, and Cupid is hovering nearby with his arrows at the ready? Read The Lady Most Willing and discover love and laughter on every page.

Highly recommended!

Monica Spence SWIMMING WITH SERPENTS Sharman Burson Ramsey, Mercer Univ. Press, 2012, $26.00, hb, 307pp, 9780881463910 As an Alabama native who’s visited Horseshoe Bend and knows descendants of William Weatherford, I was interested in this novel about the Creek War of 1813-1814. Unfortunately, I was to be disappointed.

Shakespeare-quoting Choctaw “half-breed” Lysistrata Cassandra Rendel (sister of Lancelot Arthur Rendel) tirelessly pursues her “star-crossed” love, Cade Kincaid. After tricking him into marriage, the two are separated when he runs off to save Fort Mims (near present-day Mobile, AL) from the Red Sticks. Plot devices prevent him, and the massacre of the fort’s inhabitants (at least 250 men, women, and children) is the stuff of history.

To ask if he and his love survive to be reunited and live happily ever after would be rhetorical.

If editing was performed, it’s not evident: there are multiple typos as well as simple mistakes (e.g., a character mounting a horse, then a repeat of the same action a few sentences later). The prose and dialogue are regrettable. The result is an uneven mix of tiresome family genealogy, Disney movie (the heroine has multiple animal “friends” who assist her), and clumsy romance.

Fictional characters are interspersed with historical ones, but none are convincingly drawn. Love scenes are painful and awkward, but thankfully few. If there’s an area where the novel succeeds, it’s portraying the melding of European and Native American society – William Weatherford (aka Red Eagle) was of mixed Creek, Scots, and French background, as were many who fought in this conflict. They intermarried seamlessly and lived almost dually; Weatherford owned a plantation, slaves, and racehorses he was renowned for breeding. Yet he took up the war club (as well as Spanish firearms) and led a massacre that included some of his own brother’s family. This was a Native American civil war which morphed into a fight against American encroachment and loss of Creek lands and traditions, and the novel does successfully drive this point home.

Bethany Latham SINS OF A VIRGIN Anna Randol, Avon, 2012, $7.99, pb, 384pp, 9780062025791 At age 14, Madeline Valdan was rescued from prison – and certain death – and trained as a spy.

Ten years later, the Napoleonic wars are over, and Madeline has only a paltry pension, the skills she learned as a spy, and her beauty. She decides that her best course of action is to invest the money she has into becoming London’s most sought-after woman – then auctioning off her virginity to the highest bidder. She attracts enough attention that her plan HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 33

could work, but she needs to ensure that the winner has the means to pay. Enter Gabriel Huntford, a Bow Street Runner (and the illegitimate son of a noble), whom Madeline engages to investigate her potential suitors. Huntford has an ulterior motive: his sister was brutally murdered seven years ago, and several of the suspects are on Madeline’s list of bidders. What begins as a business arrangement turns to love, and Madeline has to decide whether to call off the auction and follow her heart, or to go through with her plan and ensure her financial security.

Randol blends suspense, action, and romance effectively in this story of two intelligent people with hidden pasts. Madeline’s ten years of experience as a spy comes into play several times during the book, and she bests Huntford at investigation a couple of times. The “virginity auction” plot device extends the sexual tension between Madeline and Huntford, which is a refreshing break from current trends in romance. Randol’s second novel delivers on its unique premise, and then some.

Nanette Donohue A STUDY IN SEDUCTION Nina Rowan, Forever, 2012, $5.99, pb, 384pp, 9781455509546 Lydia Kellaway is a mathematical genius whose scholarly explorations of complex theorems have earned her the respect of her contemporaries.

What she truly wants, however, is a locket that her grandmother pawned, a cherished reminder of her deceased parents. Lydia discovers the identity of the locket’s buyer, and attempts to retrieve her property, only to find herself in a battle of wits with Alexander Hall, Viscount Norwood. What begins as an affair of the mind rapidly becomes an affair of the heart, and it soon becomes apparent that both parties have something to hide. Meanwhile, Lydia’s precocious teenage sister, Jane, is embroiled in a correspondence with a mysterious man who seems to know things about the Kellaway family -- things that Lydia would rather keep secret. Rowan’s debut is an engaging mid-Victorian romance with a razorsharp heroine and a hero who is her intellectual, though not her social, equal. The secondary characters, including Norwood’s crotchety father, are entertaining and well-drawn. Though the plot twist at the end is slightly predictable, the enjoyable love story makes up for it.

Nanette Donohue LIGHT FALLING ON BAMBOO Lawrence Scott, Tindal Street/Trafalgar Square, 2012, $19.95/£12.99, hb, 472pp, 9781906994396 My mother-in-law asked me recently what to call fictionalized biographies of famous historical figures. Historical novels, I said, thinking of the book I was reading at the time: Light Falling on Bamboo, about a famous painter, Michel Jean Cazabon, and his complicated French/Caribbean life at a time just after slavery but long before most people really believed in equality.

The novel begins in 1848, when Cazabon returns from Paris to his native Trinidad in time 34 | Reviews |

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to be at his mother’s side when she dies. His siblings resent that he’s Mama’s favorite—with the exception of his devoted half-sister and previous lover, Josie, who had been one of his father’s slaves.

Readers walk with Cazabon through five decades of flirtations, romances, and betrayals with the island and its women. He must deal with the racist English elite, his own mixed-race relations, his Creole heritage, his white French wife, and his own conscience. Is he making a living by erasing the ugliness of poverty from his landscape paintings and the ugliness of brutality from his portraits?

And yet, he tells himself, “Art does not preach a sermon.” This question of complicity and art’s purpose is at the heart of Light Falling on Bamboo.

Scott reveals his own past through painting, or rather writing, Cazabon’s life with vivid colors and rich imagery layered with moral ambiguity. It’s good to know that Scott was born on a sugar plantation in Trinidad and was a Benedictine monk for a time.

He understands the story he’s telling here, about the contradictions in Cazabon’s heart—between women, duties, and cultures. Recommended.

Kristen Hannum A STUDY IN REVENGE Kieran Shields, Crown, 2013, $25.00, hb, 384pp, 9780307985767 1893, Portland, Maine. Deputy Marshal Archie Lean is called to investigate a burned body and strange occult symbols in an abandoned house.

Even stranger is the fact that the body turns out to be that of a known thief, one who was certainly murdered — but by gunshot, not fire, the body already autopsied and buried. To find out how and why he ended up out of his grave, Lean enlists the help of half-Abenaki private consulting detective Perceval Grey. The investigation leads them on a trail of stolen family heirlooms, thaumaturgical societies with insidious leaders, and that alchemical Holy Grail — the Philosopher’s Stone.

This mystery/thriller is the sequel to Shields’s The Truth of All Things, and that novel should be read first for understanding of plotting and especially character relationships; a great deal of this book is taken up with exposition to fill the gaps for those (like myself ) who haven’t read the first offering. Shields has created a Holmesian duo — Grey is the detached, brilliant and slightly condescending consulting detective, and Lean a less plodding version of Watson. The villain also has a decidedly Moriarty-like feel, as does his relationship with Grey.

Shields has obviously done his research, and this allows him to adeptly evoke setting, although he also occasionally lapses into irrelevant historical trivia. The fantastical elements (Rosicrucian symbols and alchemy) are treated with enough skepticism by the protagonists to prevent the story from devolving into melodrama. The pace is steady with well-placed action scenes, the dialogue convincing, and the characterization competent.

Overall, a well-executed addition to this genre, and a detective duo worth following into the next book in the series.

Bethany Latham

THE RIPPER SECRET Jack Steel, Simon & Schuster, 2012, £6.99, pb, 481pp, 9781849837538 Jerusalem, 1870. In an illegal excavation, Charles Warren locates and removes a priceless artefact from its ancient hiding place. Years later, he is still in possession of this unsalable treasure.

In London in 1888, Warren, a professional soldier who knows nothing of police work, is now in an unenviable situation as Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis. London East End’s increasing population seethes with poverty and disease.

Every imaginable crime is commonplace, apart from murder. Amongst the citizenry whose lives are always on the brink of disaster, the taking of a fellow being’s life is almost unknown. So the first bloody killing sends shock through the whole community, and Commissioner Warren’s nightmare begins. This is the start of four months’ escalating horror as each enormity demonstrates the cold skill of a monstrous perpetrator who leaves no clues beside his vilely mutilated victims: the tough but vulnerable prostitutes of Whitechapel.

The demonic creature is nothing but a name: Jack the Ripper.

Warren is tormented by the Ripper, who knows about the long-ago theft and will continue his murderous pursuit until his demands are met, thus ruining the commissioner and his family. Of course we know that the killing ceased, but how did this come about? The novel provides an interesting, original explanation.

The strengths of The Ripper Secret are in its account of life in Whitechapel, giving an impression of rough camaraderie, and the surprisingly good work of the police: the constables, who are first on scenes of horror, and, amongst the inspectors especially, the intelligent, resourceful but frustrated Abbeline.

Nancy Henshaw THE PIGEON PIE MYSTERY Julia Stuart, Doubleday, 2012, $24.95, hb, 313pp, 9780385535564 Princess “Mink” is left destitute after the sudden death of her father — a displaced Maharaja — in a scandalous situation. Queen Victoria intervenes and offers Mink a “Grace-and-Favor” home (where impoverished aristocrats live at the government’s expense) at Hampton Court.

Mink and her Indian maid, Pookie, reluctantly move into the palace, a place rumored to be haunted. Pookie fears the ghosts, while Mink fears having to curb her spending habits. Mink soon meets the eccentric inhabitants of the court, including the lecherous Major-General Bagshot.

At a group picnic, Bagshot dies after eating a pigeon pie prepared by Pookie. The humble maid is now the number one suspect in his murder.

Mink refuses to allow her maid and friend to hang and sets about investigating who might have killed Bagshot — a man few people liked.

The joy of this novel is in the kooky characters and the subtle — and not so subtle — humor. I laughed out loud several times. Every person at 19th Century

C

BETRAYAL

E D I TORS’ C H OI C E

Julian Stockwin, Hodder and Stoughton, 2012, £18.99, hb, 362pp, 9781444712001 / McBooks, 2012, $24.00, hb, 320pp, 9781590136553 The repossession of Buenos Aires has been stained with such deliberate acts of treachery and perfidy as are not to be instanced in the annals of history’. So wrote Commodore Sir Home Riggs Popham from the River Plate on HMS Diadem in 1806.

Betrayal tells the story of the British invasion of South America in the early 19th century. The fleet was anchored off Cape Colony with very little to do.

Rumours abounded that the Spanish colonies in South America were restless and keen to free themselves from their Spanish masters while the Spanish fleet was engaged elsewhere, and a vast treasure of silver was reputed to be there for the taking. Commodore Popham took it upon himself to ‘obey’ an old order from London and lead an invasion on the Viceroyalty of Buenos Aires on the River Plate.

This is an incident from the Napoleonic era of which I had never heard before, and therefore I settled down to learn something new. The whole enterprise was full of incident before ending in disaster, and Julian Stockwin tells it well. Vivid descriptions of life on board ship, getting those ships up limited navigable channels to avoid the many bars and mud flats of the River Plate, and the politics of the various factions of those on land all keep the reader glued to the pages. A book to be enjoyed.

Marilyn Sherlock Hampton Court has a reason to want Bagshot dead, and surprises abound. Stuart has a way with sly phrases and wry absurdities. The historical setting and history behind Hampton Court and the Grace-and-Favor homes add to the novel’s quirky layers. Mink and Pookie are characters you will root for.

Diane Scott Lewis DEATH ON A PALE HORSE Donald Thomas, Pegasus, 2013, $25.95, hb, 352pp, 9781605983943 Donald Thomas’ sixth novel about the adventures of famed detective Sherlock Holmes does not disappoint. Capturing the tone and essence of the original stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Thomas pits the Holmes genius against mastercriminal Colonel Hunter Moran’s penchant for evil.

Assisted by his faithful companion and biographer, Dr. Watson, Holmes begins to piece together seemingly random assaults against Britain’s foreign holdings. Holmes’ brother, Mycroft, placed deep into the British spy network, helps him figure out there is, indeed, an international conspiracy to bring about war in Europe. This conspiracy includes Holmes’ nemesis, Professor Moriarty, who has joined forces with Col. Moran.

To ensure everyone knows Moran is an evil man, he has the “Mark of the Beast” burned into his skin by one of his wronged victims. He is, indeed, satanic. He watches coldly from his pale horse as a British armored column is annihilated by Zulu tribesmen carrying only spears and shields. He observes as the heir to the French throne is left dead in the dust. Like the director on opening 19th Century — 20th Century

night, Moran sets the play into motion and then enjoys the show.

Though Moran seems to have thought of everything, Holmes is like a dog on the hunt.

He will not give up. With each escalating event, Holmes becomes more and more determined to bring this hideous man to justice.

A rollicking good story, well executed.

Anne Clinard Barnhill THE LOST CASEBOOKS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES: Three Volumes of Detection and Suspense Donald Thomas, Pegasus Books, 2012, $35.00, hb, 873pp, 9781605983523 Few fictional characters continue to populate new novels after the demise of their creatorauthors. Arthur Conan Doyle attempted (twice) to end the career of his star character, Sherlock Holmes. Once, by arranging his hero’s plunge off the Reichenbach Falls while struggling with his arch enemy, Professor Moriarty. And later, when the author himself died. Both times he failed; the reading public simply wouldn’t allow Holmes to stop investigating. New stories featuring the great fictional detective have continued to appear in book, film, electronic and theatrical forms.

Author Donald Thomas adds to the collection now, by claiming to have uncovered eighteen “lost” accounts penned by Watson. Although the stories’ pacing may feel somewhat slow to today’s reader, and the threats tame in this post-9/11 era of heightened anxiety—the relaxed rhythm of the stories seduces and draws us back into more relaxed times, when real books were meant to be savored at

length on a rainy day before a roaring fire. That was how I first met Holmes, and that’s how I prefer to read his stories today—never on a bus or on the run—always seated with a cup of tea on a cloudy day or moonless night, when the imagination is free to conjure up the creak of carriage wheels and pungent whiff of pipe smoke.

The best of Thomas’s stories rival the originals.

Personal favorites are “The Case of the Crown Jewels,” “The Case of the Talking Corpse,” and “The Queen of the Night.” As a bonus, in addition to the eighteen new stories, readers are treated to a “Letter to Posterity from John H. Watson, MD.” Lovers of mysteries and Victorian adventure will enjoy stepping again into the gaslight miasma of old London.

Kathryn Johnson FLORA’S WISH Kathleen Y’Barbo, Harvest House, 2013, $13.99, pb, 352pp, 9780736952101 Flora Brimm needs a husband. An obscure clause in her grandfather’s will states that Flora will inherit the family home only if she can produce an heir before her 30th birthday. At 28, she’s cutting it close. Will Tucker seems like the perfect solution.

Lucas McMinn is a Pinkerton agent investigating a notorious conman: Will Tucker. When Lucas sees Flora with Will, he believes the two are a team.

Will Lucas discover the truth in time to save Flora from Will’s schemes? Will Flora abandon her plan in favor of God’s in time to save herself?

The first novel in the Secret Lives of Will Tucker series, Flora’s Wish is a wonderful piece of historical fiction. Set in the late 1800s, the novel explores the inner workings of the Pinkerton Detective Agency. Honesty is a dominant theme throughout the book. Flora and Lucas keep many secrets from one another, secrets that often cause a great deal of trouble.

In this love letter to the American South, Flora travels from Eureka Springs to St. Louis to Natchez to New Orleans and back, with each destination described in beautiful detail. An intriguing mystery and enjoyable romance, Kathleen Y’Barbo’s Flora’s Wish is a highly entertaining read.

Shaylin Montgomery

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THE LOSS OF THE MARION Linda Abbott, Flanker Press, 2012, $19.95/ C$19.95, pb, 224pp, 9781771170086 The Marion is one of many Newfoundland fishing schooners bound for the Grand Banks in 1915; each bears its skipper’s reputation. When Nellie Myles’s husband signs up to serve with a hotheaded skipper involved in a feud, she has a “bad feeling” and, worse, she sees a “token.” A simulacrum of her husband appears on a foggy dock — when there is no fog.

Nelly’s intuition proves correct. The Marion fails to arrive at its first stop, less than 40 nautical HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 35

miles away, in decent weather. The days pass slowly for the fishing community until the remains of the ship are found. There are no survivors.

Nellie is convinced that an altercation between two skippers somehow caused her husband’s death.

A housebound wife and mother, inexperienced with travel, unaccustomed to dealing with professional men, she sets out to investigate the events that led up to the sinking. The results are unexpected and, at times, confusing and, once Nellie accepts what happened, she must tell her community the truth.

The author’s matter-of-fact, sometimes blocky prose suits her stubborn and resourceful subject.

Although The Loss of the Marion is based on maritime history, it is Abbott’s portrait of an unusual woman and the way of life seen through her windows that rings true. Highly recommended.

Jeanne Greene AMBER ROAD Boyd Anderson, Bantam Australia, 2013, AU$32.95, pb, 592pp, 9781742759395 Singapore has long been a strategic British colony but, as 1941 dawns, its residents are illprepared for what is about to happen. Among them is 17-year-old Victoria Khoo, a member of the elite Chinese merchant class that has always been fiercely loyal to Britain. Victoria lives in a mansion on exclusive Amber Road and thinks of herself as English. Obsessed with status and etiquette, she dreams of marrying her neighbour, Sebastian Boustead.

Sebastian becomes engaged to an English girl, Elizabeth, but Victoria is undeterred in her ambition to have him. As the Japanese invade, Victoria must use all her wiles just to survive.

A publisher’s media statement describes this book “to rival Gone with the Wind”, but the plot is unashamedly the same: a way of life changed forever; a woman who loses everything but is determined to regain both her family estate and a man who is wrong for her. Victoria has many of the recognisable characteristics of Scarlett O’Hara but is more shallow and naïve. There are aspects of Ashley and Melanie Wilkes in Sebastian and Elizabeth, and the enterprising Aussie soldier, Joseph Spencer, has all the raffish qualities of Rhett Butler. There are other nods to GWTW throughout; bizarrely, there’s even a Japanese officer named Ohara. And frankly, my dears, there are no surprises at the conclusion.

This derivative treatment distracted me too much to give the novel a high recommendation, but it is unlikely to bother those who are unfamiliar with GWTW, and there is still much to enjoy in its epic scope. The narrative is enhanced by the personal memoirs of Victoria’s likeable brother, George, and the rich detail on life in Singapore and Malaya under Japanese occupation and the growing threat of Communism will reward readers unfamiliar with historical events in this region.

Marina Maxwell CURSIVE Alex Wyndham Baker, Cutting Edge, 2012, 36 | Reviews |

HNR Issue 63, February 2013

$15.95/C$17.95, pb, 415pp, 9781908122216 In 1933, young Ralph Talbot leaves England for East Africa as a way to prove himself to his prospective father-in-law with a year-long posting at “the Company.” Before he leaves, his fiancée, Lillian, gives him a black Mabie Todd Blackbird ink pen, which he uses to chronicle his twomonth voyage, full of little mysteries and new experiences, and the subsequent months settling into life in exotic and tempestuous Lamu, all told through very detailed letters to Lillian. The reader doesn’t only follow Ralph on his journey, though.

In interspersing chapters, the reader follows that Mabie Todd pen some sixty years later, as it passes from hand to hand in a series of disconnected stories.

Although Ralph’s journey and the people and places he encounters are fascinating, his letters are at times too wordy to be engaging, the lengthy descriptions making them feel less like real letters.

In the narrative sections, the descriptions of scenery are quite lovely and more fitting. I wish that we got a better sense of Lillian and her responses, even indirectly, as Ralph’s whole drive throughout the book hinged upon Lil and their hoped-for future. The pen’s journey was also hard to get into, as the various hands it passed through belonged to characters not generally redeeming or likeable, at least to this reader. Their stories felt too disjointed,

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with only the pen providing the narrative continuity. That said, the last two chapters were really gorgeous and brought the novel full circle. A pity that it took so long to get there.

Jessica Brockmole MISS DIMPLE SUSPECTS Mignon Ballard, Minotaur, 2013, $24.99/ C$28.99, hb, 272pp, 9781250009678 A mystery is brewing in Elderberry, Georgia, and Dimple Kilpatrick is hot on the trail. When Mae Martha Hawthorne is brutally murdered, her Japanese companion quickly becomes the prime suspect. But Dimple isn’t convinced. With the clock ticking, can Dimple and her team of crimesolving teachers find the real killer in time to save Suzy? Is this crime connected to the disappearance of little Cassie Greeson nearly 25 years earlier?

Mignon Ballard’s latest Miss Dimple mystery, Miss Dimple Suspects, will keep readers on their toes from the opening paragraph to the last page. Set amidst the chaos of World War II, Ballard paints an endearing portrait of life on the home front. When Dimple and her cohorts are not solving crime, they are rationing food, writing to loved ones overseas, and preparing for yet another Christmas at war.

At times, the novel jumps around a bit too much, playing with the concept of time and space in a rather confusing manner. But Ballard’s plot is still

E D I TORS’ CH OICE

Melanie Benjamin, Delacorte, 2013, $26.00/C$31.00/£17.99, hb, 416pp, 9780345528674 Anne Morrow leads a charmed, privileged life, and all her dreams seem to come true when she marries America’s aviator hero, Charles Lindbergh, in 1929.

Forty-five years later, she relives intimate memories of their troubled yet enduring marriage.

Our modern obsession with celebrity pales into insignificance compared to the Great Depression, when a whole nation looked to idols to heal its wounds.

People would stop at nothing to grasp the essence of “Lucky Lindy” and his wife, invading their privacy in the crazed belief that just to touch them or their child would somehow ease their desperation. When the couple is forced to endure the most horrific family tragedy in full public glare, there is still no escape – if anything, it is much worse. But Charles remains stoic and controlled, with an unflinching belief in his own invincibility that torments the grieving Anne. Later, as war clouds gather, his apparent support of Nazism sees Charles shunned and despised while Anne struggles to restore her own identity beyond the roles of compliant wife and mother. A final stunning revelation tests her love as nothing has before, while it makes Charles accept that “there are punishments for those who dared to dream big, or fly so high.”

Author Melanie Benjamin has produced an exquisite work of insight, sympathy and skill.

Like a graceful flight in itself, you soar to the illusory heights of fame only to be plunged back to earthly despair. It is Anne’s long and difficult journey in negotiating these highs and lows that ultimately proves she is the real hero.

This novel is a superb example of how well-crafted historical fiction can bring people and events from the past to life in a vivid and believable way that nonfiction can never quite achieve. In a word – magnificent.

Marina Maxwell 20th Century

engaging, with a thrilling climax. The citizens of Elderberry are also endearing, from the obnoxious Emmaline Brumlow to the spirited Willie Elrod.

Miss Dimple Suspects is a must-read for any fan of historical suspense.

Shaylin Montgomery PARLOR GAMES Maryka Biaggio, Doubleday, 2013, $25.95/ C$29.95, hb, 352pp, 9780385536226 Mae West once quipped that “good girls go to heaven, but bad girls go everywhere,” and this other May (Dugas) sure is one bad girl who goes everywhere.

In 1917, while on trial in her hometown of Menominee, Michigan, in a civil case for money owing to a former female companion, May tells her life story in flashback. The novel opens strongly with promise of an enjoyable romp as she dupes the gullible and wangles her way out of scrapes while dodging a Pinkerton man on her trail. From brothels in Chicago and San Francisco under various aliases she weaves her fraudulent way across the world: Shanghai, Tokyo, London, Monte Carlo.

But en route, the tale begins to flag. Suckering money out of her victims is May’s main goal, but she is too contradictory. She proves herself exceedingly smart at financial wheeling and dealing with a fondness for the racy life yet falls into domestic boredom with dull or controlling men, not least her Dutch baron husband.

Although the dialogue really sparkles in places, the narrative is let down by flat passages of description. Given that seduction is May’s prime weapon, the bedroom scenes seem rather too coy, and you have to reach your own conclusions about her sexuality. The dreaded Pinkerton man also pops up on more than one occasion to scuttle her chances of true love.

If May had a couple of redeeming features or even a touch more wit, eventually I might have warmed to her, but by the conclusion of the interminable trial, I couldn’t care less whether or not she received her just deserts. And don’t get suckered in either, like I did, by the novel’s cover, as this action takes place in a very different era and many decades before the fashion styles shown.

Marina Maxwell BE STILL MY SOUL Joanne Bischof, Multnomah, 2012, $14.99/ C$17.99, pb, 352pp, 9781601424211 When a stolen kiss leads to a shotgun wedding, 17-year-old Lonnie Sawyer trades an abusive father for an angry husband. Gideon O’Riley, a handsome, swaggering, bluegrass musician with an eye for the girls and fists ever ready for a fight, is stunned by his sudden marriage to a shy and unappealing girl he scarcely knows. Gideon soon decides that he and Lonnie must leave their home in Rocky Knob, Virginia, and seek a new life in the town of Stuart. As the two teenagers struggle to come to terms with a marriage that neither of them wants, they both fall back on destructive habits 20th Century

that drive them further apart.

Set in the Appalachian Mountains at the turn of the 20th century, it is not surprising that craggy scenery, moonshine, and homespun faith all play an important part in the plot. The unusual twist is that the hero is sullen, angry, and prone to violence, yet still likeable enough that the reader roots for him to repent and leave his past behind. Interesting and well-written, this debut novel solidly launches Bischof into the inspirational fiction market.

Nancy J. Attwell VENGEANCE Benjamin Black, Holt, 2012, $26.00, hb, 304pp, 9780805094398 / Mantle, 2012, £17.99, hb, 326pp, 9780330545815 Benjamin Black, pseudonym for Irish writer John Banville, has written number five in a series of crime noir novels featuring Detective Inspector Hackett and Dr. Quirke, a pathologist at the Hospital of the Holy Family in Dublin. Dr. Quirke is not without his own problems. He struggles with alcohol abuse and a shattered relationship with his daughter, Phoebe. She has only recently found out that he is her biological father and not her uncle as she had been led to believe for so many years.

This story takes place in Dublin in the 1950s and begins with a suicide, not murder. The Delahaye and Clancy families have been in business together for nearly 50 years; one is Catholic, the other Protestant, and that’s not the only difference.

The Clancys have always taken a back seat to the Delahayes, and resentment runs deep through the Clancy family. When Victor Delahaye takes his boat out for the day, he insists that Jack Clancy’s son go with him. Davy Clancy can only look on in horror as Victor pulls a gun and shoots himself.

Inspector Hackett asks Quirke to go with him to tell the family. Quirke’s curiosity gets the better of him, and soon he is entangled in the lives of these two families and their idiosyncrasies. But murder is lurking in the background, and soon another family member is dead. There is a plethora of characters/ suspects in both families, and Quirke must follow them to the conclusion.

This book was well written, because it’s John Banville, after all, but I thought it was a bit boring. I have read the earlier books and would recommend the reader start there. Dr. Quirke’s character seemed much fresher and held more promise in the beginning.

Susan Zabolotny SUMMERSET ABBEY T. J. Brown, Gallery, 2012, $15, pb, 289pp, 9781451698985 In the first of a series set in England before World War I, Prudence Tate, an orphan, shares the loving home that Sir Philip Braxton provides for his two daughters in London. But Sir Philip dies, leaving a will that appoints his elder brother, the Earl of Summerset, as guardian for Rowena, 23, and Victoria, 18, and makes no provision for Prudence, 20.

When the young women arrive at the Braxton

estate, Summerset Abbey, their lives change overnight. Raised in an enlightened environment, all three have goals and values at odds with those of the manipulative Lady Summerset, whose first priority is arranging an advantageous marriage for her own daughter and, secondly, her nieces.

Prudence is relegated to servant status while the others are groomed to meet potential husbands.

Summerset Abbey teems with secrets. Insecurity and anxiety lead to Rowena’s sense of failure, Prudence’s loss of self-esteem, and Victoria’s obsession with privacy. As each seeks to compensate in predictable ways, rivalries develop. Friendships are tested and seem to fall apart.

If this sounds melodramatic, it is. Do not expect depth of characterization, historical relevance, or the insight into prewar society that is sometimes found in this genre. Summerset Abbey is for readers who enjoy the interconnected stories of young women in an era vaguely different from their own. Summerset Abbey #2: A Bloom in Winter is expected in March 2013.

Jeanne Greene TARGET LANCER Max Allan Collins, St. Martin’s, 2012, $25.99, hb, 320pp, 9781429947060 The novel opens with Nathan Heller, Chicago native, private investigator and owner of the A-1 Detective Agency, providing security for a man making a money drop. Heller is no stranger to doing a little security work on the side, but what makes this job particularly notable is that the money drop is for Jimmy Hoffa. At the drop site Heller runs into an old acquaintance, Jack Ruby, and Jack’s friend Lee. Before he knows it, Heller is hired by the Secret Service to help investigate a potential assassination attempt on President Kennedy during his upcoming visit to the Windy City.

Interestingly, this book does not take place in Dallas, as one might expect. Rather, it deals with a real attempt that was made against the President just one month before his fateful trip there. Collins has gone to great lengths to research the topic and include real players. Besides Hoffa, Ruby, and Oswald, famous fan dancer Sally Rand makes an appearance, as does Robert Kennedy.

Collins has also included an African-American Secret Service agent who struggles with racial discrimination within the agency. This character is based on Abraham Bolden, who was the first African-American Secret Service agent assigned to protect the President – which gives the reader a sense of the racial tensionTarget Lancer is Collins’s fourteenth Nathan Heller novel, but one need not have read the previous books in this series to enjoy this story; it easily stands on its own. It will appeal to hardboiled detective fans and Kennedy buffs.

Recommended.

Janice Derr THE DARK EARTH AND THE LIGHT SKY Nick Dear, Faber & Faber, 2012, £9.99, pb, 94pp, HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 37

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SIEGE 13

Tamas Dobozy, Milkweed Editions, 2013, $16.00, pb, 300pp, 9781571310972 For six weeks in the winter of 1944-45, the Soviet Army assaulted Budapest, defended by the German and Hungarian armies. Over 800,000 civilians were trapped in the city as it fell. Somewhere in each of the stories in Siege 13, this event rises like a nightmare, often evoked in a cascade of horrible details, a verbal montage, as if the whole people endured a psychotic break.

All the stories are good, gripping, and powerfully written, some set in Budapest but most in Toronto, where an exile community struggles with the new world and forces themselves over and over to reimagine the old. Part of the great craft in these stories is that each expands steadily wider and more various, and then in the very last sentences resolves into an unexpected singularity.

In “Rosewood Queens,” a woman goes from shop to shop, buying only the queens out of chess sets, trying to recapture a lost self, simultaneously making worthless the chess sets she leaves behind. “Portraits of Hungarian Assassins” describes a rootless young man who wanders around implanting false memories in archives and then bringing them to life. The protagonist of “The Encirclement,” a lecturer, is stalked from place to place by a fellow survivor of the Siege, who berates him steadily with accusations of treachery and murder: finally they’re both redeemed by a startling act of empathy. All of these stories come together to create a wonderful book: Bravo, Tamas Dobozy.

Cecelia Holland 9780571290758 The enigmatic story of tormented British writer and poet, Edward Thomas, is given a new lease of life in this powerful and emotive play by Nick Dear, which premiered in November 2012 at the Almeida Theatre, London.

Effortlessly weaving into the narrative the important primary evidence written by and to those who knew and loved Edward Thomas best, this book charts the literary and personal challenges which faced this struggling and self-effacing writer, while living in the shadow of the expectations which pervaded notions of masculinity in the prelude to, and during, World War I. It becomes extremely clear that the personal dichotomy he faced in finding his place in British society and making peace with himself was all too apparent to him and his wife, Helen, from the moment he met the aspiring poet, Robert Frost. While Frost went on to (publicly) be declared and loved as a poet of the American people, a very different fate awaited Edward Thomas.

Although this book is written as a play, it is such an easy read that one becomes absorbed in the story and the structure of the narrative is barely a noticeable feature at all. It would be a great pity for a story which highlights such problematic facets of changing life and duty to both oneself and one’s country in the early 20th century to be ignored by readers purely on the grounds of narrative format.

Whether familiar or unfamiliar with reading, rather than watching, plays, if you are a fan of World War I, biography or literary perspectives on masters of the written word, then I encourage you 38 | Reviews |

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to read Nick Dear’s work.

Claire Cowling

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COME RAIN, COME SHINE Anne Doughty, Severn House, 2012, $28.95/£19.99, hb, 256pp, 9780727881762 Ireland in the early 1960s: Savvy, sophisticated Clare Hamilton returns from France to her native Armagh to marry Andrew, her childhood sweetheart, and run his ancestral home as a B&B. Business goes well for a time but falls off with the rise of package holidays abroad and sectarian violence in nearby Ulster, leaving Clare and Andrew finding it difficult to make ends meet. Clare is the creative, upbeat, come-rain, come-shine heroine, while Andrew is pleasant but struggles to create a successful law practice and really wants to be a farmer.

This is the fourth novel in Doughty’s Hamilton sequence and covers the time period 1960 to 1966. Come Rain, Come Shine is a smooth read with likeable characters. Armagh and the places Clare and Andrew visit are beautifully evoked — the author’s familiarity with the landscape comes through. Doughty captures the classic Irish phrasing and culture so much it made me smile.

But I felt that for the time period, Clare and Andrew had more luxury-related problems than the general population at a time when unemployment was rife. Andrew refuses a lordship but wants to farm, loses his law partnership, and gets cheap office rent in Armagh. I wished for a bit more conflict and deeper antagonists with higher stakes, particularly in the time when the North of Ireland was riddled with dissent and violence between Catholics and Protestants.

Geri C. Gibbons

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Marina Endicott, Windmill, 2012, £7.99, pb, 530pp, 9780099558637 Canadian writer Marina Endicott’s novel is set in Canada around the time of the First World War. It tells the story of three young sisters’ struggle – the eldest is only 16 admitting to 18 – to make it in vaudeville after their father’s death leaves them with nothing to live on but their looks and not particularly outstanding talents.

Theirs is an insecure, rootless world, travelling from town to town to perform in draughty and tumbledown theatres, where work is hard to come by and there’s no such thing as a fair wage or job security. It’s a world of sexual exploitation, hunger, booze and despair, but also of friendship, art and love.

Vaudeville people are different; we are constantly reminded of the divide between them, the “nomads”, and the audience, the “citizens”. The performers are set apart; they have the “taint of vaudeville” upon them.

With her own background in the theatre, Endicott is the perfect guide into their world. It’s a tribute to the powerful, interior quality of her writing that you are fully immersed in that world. Her descriptions are so exact you feel as if it’s you standing in the wings waiting to go on, her characters so fully realised you share their thoughts and emotions, and you care what happens to them.

The vaudeville is more than just an atmospheric setting. It is “real life and ordinary beauty”.

Real life is what the girls have to do to survive, the damage they sustain, the separations and disappointments they endure. The beauty is in the love that keeps them going, love of one another, their mother, lovers, art. The Little Shadows is an enthralling and insightful book, beautifully written, and highly recommended.

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THE REICHSBANK ROBBERY Colin Roderick Fulton, Claymore, 2013, £8.99, pb, 371pp,.9781781590782 This visually evocative novel, set towards the end of the Second World War, tells of Sturmbannführer (Major) Friedrich Schonewille, an accountant working for the SS, who collects revenues from concentration camps. Full of insecurities and hate, indifferent to Nazi philosophy, he enjoys the power his position brings.

Aware that the Third Reich is failing, he enriches himself by looting from concentration camp detainees but wants more. Driven, he recruits his pilot half-brother, Peter, and father, Helmuth Wenck, in a plan to rob the Reichsbank in Berlin.

He has always felt inferior to both men and needs the security offered by his wife, Sophia, a Swedish Jewess rescued from a detention camp. He gives her a false identity so that she can escape with him to hotter climes after the robbery.

Stress takes its toll after Himmler is tricked into authorising an aircraft for their use. Bombing raids play havoc with transport systems, the Allied forces and Russians advance on Germany, and the underlings they recruit cannot be trusted.

When twenty-one 1,000‑pound bombs hit the Reichsbank, leaving a shell of a building, the money is placed on flatbed trucks and sent to the rail station. From then on the frustrations and tensions increase as they successfully steal the cargo,

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eventually taking flight. When they reach the end of the line, Sophia shocks the men by committing an unexpected act. Given her emotional passivity throughout the book, the ending did not seem credible. Factually accurate plot details are interspersed throughout, but others describe aircraft specifications and maintenance, thereby slowing the pace. Definitely one for the boys.

Janet Williamson FRANKIE’S LETTER Dolores Gordon-Smith, Severn House, 2013, $28.95/£19.99, hb, 224pp, 9780727882172 With his dying breath, an American journalist whispers to Anthony Brooke that there is a gentleman traitor in England feeding vital war information to the Germans. Brooke, a British spy operating undercover in 1915 Germany, makes a dramatic escape from Kiel and reports to his spymaster in London. The dead man’s cryptic final words about Frankie’s letter and ‘star anger’ become a trail of clues that Brooke must follow to find the traitor.

In his hunt for the truth, Brooke travels to the country seat of newspaper magnate Patrick Sherston and is dazzled by the attractions of Sherston’s wife, Josette, while at the same time drawn to the honest bravery of Sherston’s niece, Tara O’Bryan. But Tara’s mother has links with the Sons of Hibernia, a group of Irish activists suspected of connections with Germany, and she is

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Sebastian Faulks, Holt, 2012, $25.00/C$32.00, hb, 304pp, 9780805097306 / Hutchinson, 2012, £18.99, hb, 304pp, 9780091936808 How do the choices we make radically change our lives, in terms of our overall trajectory, our relationships, our beliefs? In Faulks’ (Charlotte Gray, Birdsong) excellent new novel, readers get not one, but five sets of characters whose lives are all permanently altered by a choice. Although none of the characters is repeated throughout the “novel in five parts,” the struggle with identity and selfhood ties the stories together.

The book begins with Geoffrey, teaching at an English boy’s prep school on the eve of World War II. His traumatic experiences during the war change him, and he struggles to deal with the person he had to become in order to survive. Billy is the second protagonist, forever changed by the choice his parents made to send him to the workhouse in Victorian London, when he was only 7 years old. The third story is set in Italy in the near future — 2029 — where we meet Elena, who is very interested in science, and scanning the human brain, to try to determine what it is that makes us human. She has the most difficulty in living with her choices, as she, out of all the characters in the novel, is the one who has to deal with the scientific answer to family problems and unrequited love.

The shortest, but no less powerful, story is about Jeanne, an illiterate and very religious servant in a small town in France in 1822. The final, and longest, tale searingly documents Anya’s struggle to balance music and love in 1970s New York and Los Angeles. Faulks’s creation of five different worlds leaves the reader pondering how happy the characters, and we, would be, had other choices been made.

Helene Williams 20th Century

Brooke’s prime suspect until he finds she has been murdered. Events move quickly, and Brooke faces challenge upon challenge, scotching a German plot to kill the royal family, posing as a diamond prospector and putting his life on the line as bait to flush out the real traitor.

Frankie’s Letter is a treat in terms of convincing period detail and old-fashioned English manners.

Dolores Gordon-Smith keeps her plot twisting and turning, throwing Brooke into fresh danger until the truth is finally revealed. The subject matter is serious and well grounded in fascinating historical detail, but Frankie’s Letter is above all a cozy, fireside read that would appeal to lovers of Agatha Christie.

Kate Braithwaite VILLA TRISTE Lucretia Grindle, Grand Central, 2013, $14.99, pb, 640pp, 9781455505371 / Pan, 2011, £7.99, pb, 400pp, 9780330509497 In modern-day Florence, Italy, Inspector Alessandro Pallioti has his hands full investigating a series of execution-style murders. The victims, all elderly men, were recently awarded medals for their partisan activities during World War II. The motive for these murders is unclear. There is no evidence to indicate a suspect.

Among one of the victim’s effects, Pallioti finds a red leather book, a type of diary popular with elegant women, an unusual object for an elderly bachelor to have in his safe. Pallioti’s curiosity is piqued. The book belonged to a young nurse from a prominent Florentine family. It records life in occupied Florence, including her family’s partisan activities. They transport allied prisoners, Jews, and others through Nazi lines to Switzerland. Towards the end of the war when the allies are fighting their way to northern Italy, the family’s efforts continue despite the lack of food and essential supplies. Pallioti realizes this book holds clues to his investigation.

Grindle writes with a clean, efficient style. The plot moves extremely fast, and her characters are well-developed. They are intriguing and likeable, and their motivations are understandable. The author empathetically portrays life in a Nazioccupied city and the growing desperation of the citizens as supplies and options dwindle. This book was hard to put down.

Audrey Braver PAINTER OF SILENCE Georgina Harding, Bloomsbury USA, 2012, $26.00, hb, 312pp, 9781608197705 / Bloomsbury, 2012, £7.99, pb, 320pp, 9781408830420 Romania under Communist tyranny is the setting for Georgina Harding’s novel of subtle pathos, showing the transformation of society as seen through the eyes of a deaf-mute artist, Augustin. The story, which takes place in 1950s Romania, is moved along by flashbacks to the days before Communism. Augustin, born to a servant girl on the lavish estate of a privileged family in the decades between World War I and World War HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 39

II, bonds from infancy with Safta, the daughter of the family. As the two grow up side by side, a deep friendship is forged that will endure in the face of loss and tragedy.

The happiness of Augustin’s and Safta’s childhood stands in stark contrast to life in the bleak totalitarian regime. A single tragic decision on Safta’s part seems to mark the end of her tranquil country life as war overtakes Europe. The author deftly weaves together the points of view of Augustin, Safta, and other characters, as the summers of old Romania are swallowed by the winter of Stalin’s regime. Augustin captures the history of the family and of his country in his art, using images which say what words cannot express.

The novel, written in hauntingly expressive prose, shows how the Communist regime sought to strip individuals not only of their private property but also of their families, their beliefs, their dignity, and their very souls.

Elena Maria Vidal MISS DREAMSVILLE AND THE COLLIER COUNTY WOMEN’S LITERARY SOCIETY Amy Hill Hearth, Atria, 2012, $15.00, hb, 359 pp, 9781451675238 This story is told in the first person by 80-yearold Dora Witherspoon as she takes us back to Collier County, Florida, and the year 1962. She’s a 30-year-old divorced postal worker, healer of snapping turtles, and a bit of an outcast who’s about to experience a life-changing event when Mrs. Jacqueline Hart, recently arrived from Boston, stops by to pick up her mail. Jackie is determined to make her transition to the South a meaningful one and quickly forms the Collier County Women’s Literary Society. Besides Dora and Jackie, this group of outsiders is comprised of Mrs. Bailey White, recently released from a lengthy prison term for the murder of her husband; Plain Jane, a spinster who makes her living writing magazine articles about sex; Miss Lansbury, the unassuming librarian; Priscilla Harmon, a young black servant with a passion for learning, and Bobbie-Lee, who’s sure his homosexuality is a secret known only to himself.

Although Jackie thinks of herself as not being very good at anything, she jumps at the chance to host a late-night radio show called Miss Dreamsville. Only the station manager knows her true identity as Miss Dreamsville’s sultry voice and romantic music mesmerize the citizens of this sleepy little town. Her true identity will rock the town in a most unexpected way.

A scary encounter with the Klan brings solidarity to the group, and one by one they reveal the deepest part of themselves to each other.

These revelations give them the courage to make the changes they had only dreamed of before Miss Dreamsville came into their lives.

Hearth has done very well with her first work of fiction. The characters are endearing, and she has a good understanding of the American South in the 1960s. I recommend it.

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Susan Zabolotny THE BOY I LOVE Marion Husband, Accent, 2012, £7.99, pb, 247pp, 9781908262721 The protagonist of this novel set in the aftermath of WW1, Paul Harris, has returned from the war, but his inner problems have only been increased by the experience. He marries his dead brother’s girlfriend, partly to save her from shame because she is pregnant and partly in an attempt to be “normal”. Paul is gay, and this is not easy in the 1920s, particularly as homosexuality is of course still illegal: “the love that dare not speak its name”.

Paul has been having an affair with a teacher, Adam, who finds Paul a job teaching at the same school. Paul is, however, not cut out for this job, and the children take advantage of his perceived weaknesses. The subplot about the job serves to illustrate key themes of the novel: bullying in its various forms, the effect upon the victims, and also the problem faced by many of the returning soldiers of how to find a place in the world, damaged as they have been, mentally and/or physically by their experiences. The sex can be quite graphic at times, so be warned if this is something that offends you.

This novel has won prizes, and it is compelling in many ways. It is character- and idea-driven rather than being action-packed, and the characters are particularly vivid and real. Although perhaps not the most loveable or nicest of people, they certainly

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remain in the mind after the book is closed as being fully fleshed and human.

Ann Northfield ALL THE BEAUTY OF THE SUN Marion Husband, Accent, 2012, £7.99, pb, 275pp, 9781908262011 A superbly written book, this is a poignant and very readable novel. The rich, colourful and complex characters bring this story of homosexuality in post-First World War Britain to life. It is the second in a trilogy, the first being The Boy I Love and the third Paper Moon. The story is well researched and has lots of detail and emotion. It moves on at a cracking pace and keeps the reader’s interest so much that it could easily be read in one or two sessions.

The themes are dealt with sensitively, and plotlines are juggled well. The story of Paul Harris develops as he returns from Tangiers, where he has been living with Patrick, his sergeant in the war.

Unsure whether he has made the correct decision, he has returned to London to show his paintings in an art gallery. He is an ex-convict and, if his homosexuality is exposed, he will be in danger.

Other characters interweave with Paul: Edmund, whom he is drawn to; Lawrence, the gallery owner; Ann, the artist’s model; Matthew, with his many years in hospital; and Joseph, who is a love rival for Ann. With beautifully written multiple narratives, the characters deal with their changed lives in the

E D I TORS’ CH OICE

Hélène Grémillon, Penguin, 2012, $15,00/C$16.00, pb, 245pp, 9780143121565 / Gallic, 2012, £7.99, pb, 262pp, 9781908313294 A beautiful, intricate book, The Confidant is held together with delicate threads and secrets. I scarcely know how to review it without inadvertently giving one away.

In 1975, after the unexpected death of her mother, Camille finds a thick letter from an unknown man named Louis amongst the condolence cards. But it isn’t a message of sympathy; rather, it’s a tale of youthful love and impending war, told in serial, with a new installment arriving in her mailbox every Tuesday.

In 1933, as Hitler gains power in Germany, in a little village outside of Paris Louis falls in love with his schoolmate Annie, a quiet girl who loves to paint.

This childish love persists for years, as Hitler moves across Germany and closer to Paris. Annie, on the cusp of adulthood, befriends a wealthy, barren couple in the village and begins to pull away from Louis. It is only after receiving a desperate letter from Paris that Louis learns the depth of what Annie has fallen into with that friendship. And Camille is left with an oldfashioned mystery, attempting to track down the characters from the scatters of clues sifted through the letters, attempting to figure out why Louis has sent these letters to her.

It’s a story of enduring emotions—love, jealousy, revenge—and the lengths that we will go to in their name. A love story, a thriller, a war novel, The Confidant is hard to put down. And, when you do, you’ll want to flip back to the beginning and read again to see what clues you may have missed the first time. This gripping little story with its flawed, yet memorable characters is highly recommended.

Jessica Brockmole 20th Century

years after the First World War. Twists and turns along the way make the book a compelling read. It keeps its reader’s attention and is difficult to put down once started: an excellent book which does not shy away from the realities of life. Although it is part of a trilogy, it reads just as well as a standalone novel and will have the reader searching out the other two books.

Barbara Goldie PAPER MOON Marion Husband, Accent, 2012, £7.99, pb, 336pp, 9781908262745 The novel is set just after the end of World War Two, and the author captures well that sense of desolation of rationing, bomb-sites and worldweariness. Bobby Harris was burnt and disfigured when his RAF aircraft was shot down in 1940.

Healed physically but not mentally, he hides himself away in his family home in Thorp after the death of his grandfather and tries to come to terms with his past. Hugh Morgan meets and falls in love with Nina, who was once Bobby’s lover but who can’t bear to see his once-beautiful face so disfigured.

This is the third book in the trilogy that opens with The Boy I Love, so for that reason I wouldn’t recommend reading it unless you’ve read the previous two. It relies heavily on what has happened before, and I wasn’t sure whether the characters I read about were established or whether I was meeting them for the first time. Similarly I wasn’t sure whether the many flashbacks of which the novel is composed were new to readers or not. Not much actually “happens”’. People fall in love, argue, and misunderstand each other’s motives, and their relationships (heterosexual, homosexual, and familial) are so complicated I was soon lost. Old jealousies, hatreds and resentments surface. This is hardly the author’s fault if this is not a standalone novel, but I began to feel that its structure was unnecessarily complex. The all-important flashbacks that all the characters had took us back to the First World War, the Second and all times in between seemingly at random. And it felt at times that Paper Moon was no more than a wrapping-up exercise. Towards the end it resembled a Births, Marriages and Deaths column.

However, the writing is intelligent, and the emotions heartfelt. I only wish I’d started at the beginning.

Sally Zigmond HARDCASTLE’S FRUSTRATION Graham Ison, Severn House, 2012, $27.95/£19.99, hb, 192pp, 9780727881717 Detective Ernest Hardcastle is in charge of all detectives in London while World War I is raging across Europe. All fit men are serving in the military, and the ones who are left behind are either ill or incompetent, at least in Hardcastle’s brusque opinion. So it’s with great annoyance that he has to undertake to solve the murder of a man found floating in the Thames.

Ronald Parker died from a shot to the head 20th Century

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FEVER

E D I TORS’ CH OICE

Mary Beth Keane, Scribner, 2013, $26/C$29.99, hb, 320pp, 9781451693416 I always know when an historical novel is exceptionally well done because it pushes me to learn more about the subject on my own, and such was the case with Mary Beth Keane’s excellent novel about Typhoid Mary, Fever. Upon closing this book, I immediately needed to know more about Mary Mallon and her tragic circumstances brought so brilliantly to life more than a hundred years later.

In 1906, Irish immigrant Mallon was traced as the potential source of typhoid outbreaks, though she herself had never been ill with the disease. Taken forcibly by health officials, Mary was what was known as an asymptomatic carrier; many of the families for whom she cooked became victims of the disease, though fewer than the horrific numbers often attributed to her. Mary was kept in confinement on North Brother Island in New York for more than three years until a lawyer won her freedom based on her agreement not to work as a cook again. Headstrong Mary agreed and tried to return to life as she knew it, but her unmarried lover had strayed, and her inability to cook took its toll on her spirit. Unable to resist, Mary eventually returned to the world she loved best, and therein lay her ultimate downfall.

Fever is so well written and does such a brilliant job of getting inside the head of Mary Mallon that I was hooked within the first few pages. Keane takes the facts and spins a probable life in such a way that one cannot help but cheer Mary on despite the knowledge that she carried potential death with her at all times. Looking back on Typhoid Mary a century later, Keane has given her the justice that eluded her during her lifetime. Highly recommended.

Tamela McCann before he was stuffed in a bag and dropped, without any heavy weights attached, into the river. As is customary in these types of cases, everyone first questioned says they know of no reason for such a ghastly death. It turns out Ronald is an interesting fellow who was trying to get to Holland in spite of the fact he wasn’t physically fit for military service.

His wife takes his death with questionable ease, and his mistress is quite busy with many gents of questionable character. Quite soon, we discover that some of these characters are associated with secret work as spies for the Crown, but that doesn’t prepare the reader for the murderer’s identity or the motivation for the murder.

What’s fascinating, as well, are Hardcastle’s oldfashioned sleuthing skills and dialogue, which are clever, amusing, and grumpy. The reader doesn’t really mind because Hardcastle comes across as someone who will solve the crime, no matter what he has to say or do to accomplish his job. Great historical mystery!

Viviane Crystal A WAY WITH MURDER R.J. Jagger, Pegasus Crime, 2012, $25.95/C$31.50, hb, 338pp, 9781605983639 “Secret St. Rain.” That’s how a character introduces herself on the first page of this wannabe hardboiled mystery set in Denver in 1952. Subsequent characters are named London, Alabama, and January. With names like that, this

could read more as a pastiche than homage to this particular genre. Secret St. Rain has come to hire PI Bryson Wilde. She was the witness to a murder and fears for her life. Simultaneous narratives find reporter Waverly Paige investigating the same murder; lawyer London Marshall hiring Wilde to save her life (she’s also an amateur archaeologist); and mysterious Dayton River hired to abduct a waitress—an assignment he flubs when he encounters tattooed January James. Seriously.

This is a book to be read in one sitting so the reader doesn’t have time to digest or question it.

From that perspective, I found it entertaining.

Poke too hard at it, and the whole thing falls apart.

The whole book spans just five days from July 21 to July 26, 1952. These days are so crammed with incidents (love, murder, kidnapping) that they give Jack Bauer’s 24 hours a run for their money. So, in the end, I think this is a pastiche. At least Mickey Spillane took himself seriously.

Ellen Keith THE DAUGHTERS OF MARS Thomas Keneally, Sceptre, 2012, £18.99, hb, 520pp, 9780340951873 / Atria, 2013, $26.00, hb, 544pp, 9781476734613 The First World War has become a staple of recent fiction. Thomas Keneally, in this epic novel told from an Australian perspective, enables readers to see events through fresh eyes. Centring on a group of Australian volunteer nurses – in HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 41

particular, siblings Sally and Naomi Durance – the action moves from the Dardanelles to Lemnos, North Africa, and finally the Western Front, where Australians played a key role in the ultimate victory.

With a journalist’s eye for minutiae, the author tells – yes, tells – of the horror, privation, heartbreak, muddle in high places, of those years.

I did not find the book easy to read; the wealth of detail and authorial viewpoint made it seem like a historical account, the multiplicity of fictional characters often submerged by the narrative. That said, there were some affecting sequences: the sinking of the hospital ship Archimedes, based on the Marquette in the eastern Mediterranean; Matron Mitchie’s devotion to her hitherto unrevealed son; and Naomi’s betrothal to Ian Kiernan, a Quaker serving in the Medical Corps.

When the exhausted survivors and this reader eventually glimpse the end of the war, how is the author to round everything off? I’m not sure that his solution works; in effect it has alternative endings, neither of which satisfies.

The author has an abiding interest in Australians caught up in the darkness of European history.

His novel The People’s Train (HNR 51, February 2010) deals with Russian Bolsheviks in Brisbane during the years leading to the fall of the Tsar. For sheer authenticity and authority, this new novel could appeal to readers interested in the Australian experience of the Great War. Janet Hancock CHANGO’S BEADS AND TWO-TONE SHOES William Kennedy, Simon & Schuster, 2012, £8.99, pb, 328pp, 9781416526872 / Penguin, 2012, $16.00, pb, 336pp, 9780143122043 This is the eighth novel in prolific American author William Kennedy’s Albany Cycle, which began way back in 1975 with Legs. Often compared to James Joyce’s portrayal of Dublin, Kennedy’s intricate details of his hometown in New York State make the place so familiar to the reader that it is as if you could open your front door and step straight out onto them.

However, with a brief prologue featuring Bing Crosby in 1935, over half of this book is set on the mean streets of Havana during 1957 when Batista ruled with a corrupt fist, rebels were a revolution away from taking over, and Ernest Hemingway was propping up the bars. The main character here is Daniel Quinn, a young American journalist in search of a story, in search of history and in search of love. At first he thinks Hemingway may hold the answer, but it is his instant attraction to the Cuban beauty Renata that is to shape his destiny, one that leads from passion to gun-running, pagan marriage and sharing a cigar with Fidel Castro.

It’s a beautiful, even poetic, novel at times, extremely well-drawn and utterly captivating, even when halfway through the action frustratingly jumps 10 years to Albany in 1968 and follows a seemingly disjointed series of events on the eve when Bobby Kennedy was shot and the town was set to explode in racial violence. But somehow it 42 | Reviews |

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all works and comes together for a powerful finale, not to mention some wonderful jazz and, of course, two-tone shoes that can’t half dance.

I.D. Roberts CALLING ME HOME Julie Kibler, St. Martin’s, 2013, $24.99/C$28.99, hb, 336pp, 9781250014528 Julie Kibler’s debut novel travels between the current era and the late 1930s to early ´40s.

The outer rim of the story concerns an unusual friendship between Dorrie, an African-American hairstylist, and Miss Isabelle, her 90-year-old white customer and friend. When Miss Isabelle asks Dorrie to drive from Texas to Miss Isabelle’s former home in Kentucky for a mysterious funeral, Dorrie doesn’t realize she will become the caretaker of Miss Isabelle’s forbidden love story.

As that story unfolds, we discover Miss Isabelle is the daughter of the town doctor and, consequently, lives with more financial security than most of those trying to survive during the Great Depression. Isabelle’s mother is more concerned with appearances than anything else, and this desire to impress others causes much conflict between mother and daughter. Things become even more combustible as Isabelle matures into an independent young woman.

Isabelle finds friendship with Nell, the daughter of her family’s cook, and Nell’s brother, Robert.

When Isabelle decides to escape from one of the boring parties she’s required to attend and sneaks over to the seedy side of town with her friend, Trudy, to a dance hall, it is Robert who rescues her from an overly enthusiastic would-be lover. That moment of connection is the spark that ignites a love affair between Isabelle and Robert, an affair that has serious consequences for them both.

Kibler leads the reader back in time with ease, and Isabelle’s story is wonderfully told. In Robert, Kibler has created an appealing romantic lead -an honorable young man, intelligent and full of integrity. In Isabelle, we find a woman ahead of her time, one who is willing to risk everything for love.

Anne Clinard Barnhill TIGERS IN RED WEATHER Liza Klaussmann, Little, Brown, 2012, $25.99/ C$29.95, hb, 357pp, 9780316211338 / Picador, 2012, £12.99, hb, 400pp, 9781447212058 Klaussmann’s debut starts innocently, with Nick and her cousin Helena celebrating the end of World War II on a hot summer night in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Both are readying themselves to join their husbands—Helena’s in Hollywood, Nick’s near Jacksonville, Florida.

This scene of carefree gaiety and the focus on the resumption of normality is all too brief, however, as reality sets in. Nick’s husband, Hughes, comes back from war a different man, not the eager risk-taking lover she remembers. Helena’s Avery turns out to be more interested in a crazy film project than in earning a living.

What follows are scenes of family life, told from the perspectives of various family members, and

covering the next two decades with the summer of 1959 as the focal point. That summer, Nick has a spectacular house party, two children see something they shouldn’t, adults do things they regret later, and suddenly, “normal” seems a lot further away.

The one point of stability, as with many families, isn’t a person, but rather a place: Tiger House on Martha’s Vineyard is where Nick’s family gathers, every summer. It’s here that promises are made, lies are told, and people of all ages learn about life, love, and community. You can hear the dance music and smell the sunscreen in Klaussmann’s descriptions of the festive atmosphere, and she’s spot on in her descriptions of the restrictions on and yearnings of the housewives of the time. The darkness at the edges of the façade of family and community invades even Tiger House when the truth of what happened that fateful summer finally comes to light.

This terrific beach read will make you look carefully at those around you next time you hit the sandy shores of the Hamptons or the Cape.

Helene Williams DEAD IN THE DOG Bernard Knight, Severn House, 2012, $28.95/£19.99, hb, 240pp, 9780727881618 When Tom Howden enlisted for three years as a pathologist in Her Majesty’s Far East Land Forces during the campaign against the Communist Chinese insurgents, he didn’t imagine that the British Military Hospital in Malaya would be involved in a mysterious civilian murder nor that he would be called upon to provide forensic assistance.

Upon his arrival in 1954, Tom discovered an assorted group of characters at the hospital and the members-only Sussex Club, also known as The Dog, where the officers and white planters met for dancing, drinks, and drama. Rubber plantation owner James Robertson and his beautiful but unhappy wife, Diane, caused much of the commotion. His abrasiveness and unfaithfulness annoyed the officers and infuriated his wife, whose own discontent manifested itself in over-imbibing and amorous liaisons with several of the men.

When James is murdered, almost everyone is a suspect. Because Tom is the only person with forensic skills and without a motive to kill Robertson, he is asked by Steven Blackwell, superintendent of the local police in the nearest town, Tanah Timah, to assist with the investigation.

Through Tom’s reactions, we discover Malaya’s exotic climate and culture as he does. Interactions between the characters and succinct narration give historical perspective without heavy-handed political or violence-ridden exposition. When Knight does describe the heat and the dangerous Black Areas, it does not distract from trying to determine who, out of the many suspects, could be the killer.

Dead in the Dog, first in this new series, further bolsters Knight’s reputation as a top murder mystery author and does not disappoint.

Suzanne J. Sprague 20th Century

DEADLY INHERITANCE Janet Laurence, Mystery Press, 2012, £9.99, pb, 413pp, 978072470016 Deadly Inheritance is to be the first in a crime series featuring the resolute American, Ursula Grandison. Ursula comes to England in 1903 as a paid companion to the teenaged Belle Seldon, who is visiting her sister, Helen, now Countess of Mountstanton. Ursula has also been commissioned by the Seldon girls’ multi-millionaire father to find out what might have happened to Helen’s dowry money, but Helen has an old grudge against Ursula, the earl is cold and unsympathetic, and the formidable dowager countess rules over servants and family alike.

Then, when out walking, Ursula discovers a dead body — identified as Polly the nursemaid, whom everyone believed had run away. She finds it hard to believe the inquest’s verdict of suicide, and neither does the earl’s brother, Colonel Charles Stanhope.

He and Ursula begin their own investigations, but the naïve and reckless Belle rushes blithely towards scandal, further deaths ensue, and it soon becomes clear that there is something very wrong at Mountstanton House.

This is an enjoyable classic country house mystery, with plenty of dizzying plot twists, although some of the characters, particularly the servants and villagers, verge on the stereotype. I found the start rather slow and exposition-heavy and, editorially, a couple of characters’ names changed in the course of the narrative. Some of the many shifts in viewpoint, whilst giving alternative perspectives and filling in background information, did not go particularly smoothly, and there were some plot elements that I felt were left too unresolved.

However, Ursula is a great character whom I would gladly seek out again. Well-educated and cultured, she has suffered her own tragedies with bravery and stoicism. She is a woman who determines to see justice done, in spite of the risks involved.

Mary Seeley JOY TAKES FLIGHT Bonnie Leon, Revell, 2012, $14.99, pb, 324pp, 9780800733612 As the book opens, Kate Evans, a bush pilot in 1938 Alaska, is about to marry Paul Anderson, frontier doctor. The newlyweds discover several issues they must deal with. Paul has a past he’s reluctant to talk about (responsibility for his first wife’s death), and Kate struggles with Paul’s and society’s expectations of a female pilot. Her boss is extra tough on her, and she chafes at Paul’s wanting her to take fewer risks, especially after a convict attacks his guard during one of her flights.

They also disagree on whether to live in Anchorage or at their wilderness cabin. Then Paul receives a message that his mother in San Francisco is dying.

The couple’s enforced separation brings their relationship to a crisis point.

This is volume 3 of Alaskan Skies series. Even though I had not read the first two, Leon gives 20th Century

enough backstory in this volume to understand the plot and characters’ motives. While there are a few melodramatic plot elements, it’s an enjoyable relationship novel in an unusual setting. Certain passages could serve as a model for young couples in how to work out a disagreement. Christian fiction and romance fans will love it.

B.J. Sedlock A LOVE SURRENDERED (Winds of Change, Book 3) Julie Lessman, Revell, 2012, $14.99, pb, 396pp, 9780800734176 It’s 1932, and small-town girl Annie Kennedy has lost her parents, her faith in God, and her home. Starting over in Boston, Annie is determined to run in the same fast circles as her older sister, Maggie. Weekends spent at Ocean Pier and a local speakeasy provide plenty of boys, Dr. Pepper, and repeat encounters with Steven O’Connor, a handsome officer who sees Annie as an innocent. Steven’s perceptions of Annie may not be the greatest obstacle to their happiness if a family secret comes to light.

Lessman continues the Winds of Change series by exploring faith and the dangerous impact of secrets in courtship and in marriage. Annie and the O’Connor women struggle with issues of truth and temptation in a real way that builds empathy near the climax in a heart-rending plot twist. Lessman jazzes up the romantic subplot with moments of passion and temptation but keeps it aboveboard for inspirational fiction readers.

Lauren Miller BIG MOTHER 40 Marc Liebman, Fireship, 2012, $19.95, pb, 404pp, 9781611792317 The Soviets are working with the North Vietnamese at an experimental base to develop and test new strategies and tactics meant to cripple US air and ground efforts in the Vietnam War. Navy pilots, and the SEALs they support, are a particularly deadly thorn in their side. Josh Haman, pilot of the helicopter Big Mother 40, has proven himself to be cool under fire, steadfast when confronted with both belligerent hostiles and commanding officers, and a truly gifted and dedicated pilot. So much so, that his name, and the name of SEAL team Gringo Six leader, Marty Cabot, have become known to the NVA. But as the action heats up, more than their lives and the lives of their men are at stake. This entire theater of war hangs in the balance.

Liebman is a veteran helicopter combat pilot himself, and he has poured his firsthand experience into Big Mother 40, his debut novel. So much so that you’ll leave this novel feeling as though you might be able to fly a helo yourself. Or conduct a Navy SEAL raid. It’s significant that the back cover blurbs for this book all come from military personnel. If you like a quick-paced and actionpacked story, you’ll enjoy this one. Liebman also does a great job of fleshing out the foils to our hero pilot. Both Koniev and Thai are compelling

characters. Unfortunately, they are far more compelling than our hero and his sidekicks.

Haman and Cabot are little more than Hollywood action heroes who can do no wrong.

Liebman’s choice to interweave a love story into an otherwise testosterone-laden spree comes off as contrived and artificial. It serves to flatten the characters by being forced upon them rather than provide depth. That being said, Liebman does have a flair for combat description and impeccable credentials when it comes to Vietnam-era warfare.

His earnestness in demonstrating his characters’ prowess and infallibility will hopefully be tempered in his future novels.

Justin M. Lindsay DEATH ON PONT NOIR Adrian Magson, Allison and Busby, 2012, £19.99, hb, 384pp, 9780749040116 Well done, Adrian Magson. He knows what readers like, enjoys writing detective novels, and knows how to construct a fast-paced, twisty plot.

This is the third in the inspector Lucas Rocco series, and I shall definitely download the other two. Magson has persuaded his publisher to both print and e-publish, which makes good sense as mysteries are popular downloads.

It’s a pleasure to read a detective novel set in 1963. No mind-boggling forensics to help out the police, just observation, questions and brain work.

This is a novel without pages of brutality and blood but with plenty of action, clues and constructive thinking. Magson takes us to the France of General de Gaulle with deft touches, little details which evoke the Sixties. He keeps things nicely international with English and French villains, a wicked French plot, and political shenanigans on both sides of the channel.

Inspector Rocco, the suave bilingual policeman, is a likeable character, and readers can cheer him on through all the nasty problems thrown into his path. We want him to get his man and yet are never sure right until the end. Excellent tight writing by Magson; this novel is bound to add to his fan base. pdr lindsay-salmon A WINTER’S NIGHT Valerio Massimo Manfredi (trans. Christine Fedderson Manfredi), Europa, 2012, $18.00, pb, 368pp, 9781609450762 The Brunis are tenant farmers in Italy’s Po Valley at the start of the 20th century. They frequently make their barn available to vagrants and travelers in need of shelter. One particularly cold winter night, a travelling storyteller claims that the sighting of a golden goat in the mountains foretells disaster, a prophecy met with mixed reception.

As the family continues with their daily lives, a war flares up in central Europe. Soon the Bruni boys find themselves forced to leave and fight in Italy’s service. Separated from each other, the seven brothers are sent to various fronts, each of them destined to experience his own horrors. War takes its toll on the family, as does the peace that follows.

HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 43

Despite the long separation, the family settles into old habits and old grudges. The end of the war is followed by a heated political climate in Italy, and the rise of fascism begins to affect everyday life.

Marriages, births and deaths ensue as industry and politics change the fabric of Italian life indefinitely.

Then, on the heels of all this change comes another world war.

This epic novel boasts several entertaining characters. One cannot deny the endearing charm of the Brunis, with their cultural and familial quirks, but the overwhelming size of the family, while appropriate for the time and place, reduces the intimacy needed to carry the reader through a time period that has been exhausted from every angle. The narrative style jumps from one family member to another at random, robbing the tale of some much-desired momentum. Despite these minor shortcomings, A Winter’s Night manages to entertain and enlighten. It also accurately frames, in the manner of a folk tale, the extraordinary upheaval that families in in this time period were forced to endure. I would recommend it to anyone interested in the period.

Hanne Pearce

unsuccessfully tries to convince his father to hire guards. One night Wiktor’s home is set afire, and they must flee to safety.

In 1915, Wiktor, now 21, is forced to fight in the Russian Army against the Germans. One night, he steps in to save a couple of Latvian citizens from renegade soldiers and is critically injured. While recuperating, he is coerced by the Russian Army to act as a liaison and spy. His ability to converse in Latvian, German and Russian has not gone unnoticed. During this time he becomes a member of the Red Riflemen, otherwise known as “Lenin’s Harem.”

McCormick’s battleground scenes prove to be a gruesome lesson in man’s inhumanity to man. As Wiktor walks through the aftermath of destruction, the skillful, sobering imagery is equal to the best of any horror show. His observations of chemical warfare are detailed with grim precision: lifeless, stiff corpses, with gas seeking to hide in every crevice. Lenin’s Harem is an important historical fiction work that offers clarity to a complex and tumultuous time in Russian history.

A prodigious and gripping read.

Wisteria Leigh

AT EVERY TURN Anne Mateer, Bethany House, 2012, $14.99, pb, 312pp, 9780764209048 It is unusual for a young woman to drive her own automobile in 1916, but Alyce Benson is a rebel. She drives too fast and shows her ankles, but her integrity outweighs her rashness.

Religion is the biggest influence in Alyce’s life.

When she pledges $3,000 ($65,000 today) to visiting missionaries, her church vows to match it, unaware that Alyce expects her father to write a check. When he refuses, Alyce sees driving as a way to make money. Automobile racing is a dangerous sport restricted to male drivers; but the winners receive prize money. Disguised as a man, Alyce risks her life to win a few modest purses. When the truth comes out, the remarkably understanding members of her church help Alyce meet her obligations.

There was war in Europe in 1916, the US was debating entry, yet At Every Turn has virtually no historical framework. Alyce’s fecklessness is appalling, but like spoiled young women in any era, she has to learn her lessons the hard way. Only the patient reader will see Alyce mature in this uncomplicated inspirational novel.

Jeanne Greene

THE FROST ON HIS SHOULDERS Lorenzo Mediano, Europa, 2012, $15.00, pb, 137pp, 9781609450724 The 1930s in the Spanish Pyrenees, very close to the French border. I found it easy to believe an isolated contemporary valley could tell the same tale – except no televisions or phones tangle up the plot. The news comes on paper, read aloud at night in the lone local bar. If you’ve read a Nobel Prize winner or two, you will recognize the tropes: The voice of the village schoolteacher trying in his own small way to save the world. The numbing life of the landless peasant. The oppression of the masters, the landowners. The distant promise of revolution. They’re calling this “eco-fiction,” but Nobel laureates are also required to evoke the harsh but beloved landscapes of their native haunts. The simple story. I don’t think it’s a spoiler to suggest that the ending may bring more cheer than your average laureate. Is that all that will keep Mediano from a trip to Stockholm?

This quick read tells the tale of the poor shepherd Ramon who falls in love with Alba, the villainous landowner’s daughter. That such a thing could even be dreamed of sparks hope in every peasant’s heart in a way beautifully described by the author. I’m sure we let Hollywood give us such hope in every blockbuster. Ramon slaves, lives frugally, learns to read, then turns first to smuggling and the gun running to attain his prize. And then-Ann Chamberlin

LENIN’S HAREM William Burton McCormick, Knox Robinson, 2012, $27.99/£19.99, hb, 400pp, 9781908483447 Lenin’s Harem takes place between 1905 and 1941 during the turbulent political and social struggles of the Russian Empire. The story begins with the Russian Revolution. Wiktor Rooks is the youngest son of a Latvian aristocrat with Baltic-German heritage. As a factory owner of considerable wealth, his father is a natural target for the local peasants. His older brother Otomars 44 | Reviews |

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KALAHARI PASSAGE Candi Miller, Tindal Street/Trafalgar Square, 2012, $12.99/£7.99, pb, 288pp, 9781906994365 Koba, a young San girl, is kidnapped from her home among the Kalahari bushmen. She is taken to live with Marta and Deon Marias, who believe they can provide a better life for Koba, knowing her

own parents were killed by white hunters. Over the years, a mutual bond of love grows between her and the Marias couple. She learns how to read and write in both English and Afrikaans and travels everywhere with them, often hidden from view.

Several years pass, and she falls in love with Mannie, a young Afrikaner boy. They are caught in bed together, a punishable crime in apartheid South Africa in 1964. Koba is sentenced without trial and sent for repatriation back to her homeland. Her fate appears to be certain death when she discovers her guard has given her up to Andre Marias, the same white man who murdered her parents. She is subjected to horrible abuse and torture, bound in the back of his transport truck. When Andre leaves the truck unattended, she is befriended by Twi, a nomad, who helps her to escape. When her flight is discovered, she becomes the prey of an enraged, heinous and coldhearted hunter.

Koba’s harrowing journey of survival is emotional and gripping. Miller captures Koba’s innermost thoughts and enduring strength with emotional precision, as if it were a memoir. Candi Miller, who was born in Africa, expresses the inherent evils of apartheid South Africa firsthand.

Kalahari Passage gives the reader a realistic and sensitive look at a society and fading culture few experience.

Wisteria Leigh THE LAST OF THE BIRD PEOPLE John Hanson Mitchell, Wilderness House, 2012, $15.95, pb, 184pp, 9780982711576 This short but intriguing novel, written by a cultural historian, blurs the lines of genre to create a thought-provoking speculative tale. It is presented as archival evidence relating to the 1928 disappearance of an anthropologist, in the form of a deposition given by an eccentric old man. Jon Barking Fox claims to be the last of the Bird People, a mixed-race tribe who had lived in seclusion in the Swift River Valley of Massachusetts, isolated from modern civilization, until a public works project exposed them to outside threats. The missing anthropologist, known to the Bird People as Tracker, had offered to lead them to an equally secluded place (the Florida Everglades) where they could live unmolested and preserve their way of life. But despite Tracker’s attempts to bridge the gap between cultures, the modern world interfered with tragic results.

The Last of the Bird People is an unusual story that gives the reader a look at our world through the eyes of the past. Since it is written in the voice of Jon Barking Fox, you may need some time to engage with the writing style, but after that the pace keeps the pages turning. If you’re looking for something a little different, The Last of the Bird People may be an interesting choice.

Heather Domin THE HEALING STREAM Connie Monk, Severn House, 2012, $28.95/£18.99, hb, 9780727882004 Fans of the late Maeve Binchy will love The 20th Century

Healing Stream by Connie Monk, a prolific writer of romance. As in Binchy’s work, Monk’s novel is about country people, love, happiness and raising children; you know from the beginning everything will end well, and nobody is really evil, only misguided. The writing is smooth and assured.

The heroine is Tessa, orphaned young, raised by a grandmother whose death propels her into the care of an unknown aunt and uncle. Naomi and Richard live on a small farm in Devon; they have the kindly hearts of people committed to working the land and caring for livestock and Tessa falls quickly into their way of life. Then she meets a glamorous, unsteady man. The rest follows as you would expect — the pleasure of books like this is that you know what’s going to happen, and when it does you’re gratified to find you were right all along.

The second half of the book takes place in a bucolic Spain, which seems as timeless as the Devonshire of cows and muddy barnyards. In spite of constant references to the Great War, there is no real sense of history in any of this. The novel satisfies because of its universality, and its comforting sense that nobody is really ever lost.

Cecelia Holland CURRAWALLI STREET Christopher Morgan, Allen & Unwin/Trafalgar Square, 2012, $17.95/AU$27.99, pb, 298pp, 9781742377100 Currawalli Street is an average rural Australian street. It has orderly numbered homes with normal people who uniquely blend into this harsh world where residents hold their secrets close.

There’s Rose, who has a gift of foretelling disasters; Jim, who paints portraits but also other pictures that speak of his inner feelings that just can’t be expressed in words; Johnny, who travels to find his neighbor’s daughter on the road and muses frequently on the bush fires that “follow” a man to his death; a pastor who lost his faith and logic during his father’s faith crisis when he was dying; and so much more. For this is the time, between 1914 and 1918, of the “great war” that promised adventure.

The story then leaps to 1972, and we meet Jim who has returned from fighting in the Vietnam War only to find out his parents have been murdered. Again we meet all the residents living on this street. They’ve lost the grand ideas held by their grandparents in the Great War and are seeking to find a place of peace and security.

Death is a common theme threading through this novel about three generations, but it is more the story of very special human beings who love, hate, weep, laugh and more, an Australian Our Town interweaving the personal and historical moments worth celebrating and dying for. Currawalli Street is quiet and gentle but poignant, well-written historical fiction.

Viviane Crystal SUMMON UP THE BLOOD: A Silas Quinn Mystery R.N. Morris, Severn House, 2012, $28.95/£17.99, 20th Century

hb, 240pp, 9781780295268 Morris begins a new series (after The Cleansing Flame, 2011) with a grisly novel set in the foreboding atmosphere of London in 1914.

Detective Inspector Silas Quinn, head of the Special Crimes Department, is known for his unconventional methods but, as long as he avoids publicity, Scotland Yard gives him a relatively free hand. Quinn does their dirty work — like his latest assignment.

A male prostitute has been drugged, murdered, and his body completely drained of blood. Similar crimes follow. The suspects are numerous — aristocrats, hangers-on, thrill seekers — but all have ties to an exclusive club for upper-class homosexuals. The perpetrator and, briefly, his prey, provide readers with the gory details while leaving behind little hard evidence. Quinn follows wherever deductive reasoning leads him until, using violence to combat violence, he ends the killings and satisfies Scotland Yard.

With his good brain and dark history, DI Quinn makes a good antihero. The early 20th century distaste for homosexuality that colors Quinn’s vocabulary is convincing. Other characters are stereotypes, however, marked not by their own words but those of the author/narrator. When a writer fails to rise above his subject matter, it gives a book a sordid flavor; but perhaps that is intentional.

Summon Up the Blood is only for readers who like their murder, to butcher a phrase, served cold and bloody.

Jeanne Greene

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THE DECEPTION OF LIVVY HIGGS Donna Morrissey, Viking Canada, 2012, C$32.00, hb, 274pp, 9780670066056 “If there’s one thing life has taught me,” muses 80-year-old Livvy Higgs to herself as she catches her neighbour, Gen, sneaking through her bushes looking for a ‘lost’ hockey puck, “it’s how to spot lies.”

Although Livvy may be adept at spotting lies, she has spent her entire adult life trying to figure out the truth concealed by them. The truth about her mother’s incongruous emigration to a small French-speaking fishing village on the coast of Newfoundland, the truth behind her parents seemingly loveless yet interminable marriage, and her father’s inexplicable alliance with her maternal grandmother when clearly neither can stand the other. With flashes back to the 1940s and the help of Gen in the present day, Livvy begins to piece together the secrets of the past and finally lay her burdens down.

Donna Morrissey, herself raised in The Beaches, a small fishing outport in Newfoundland, brings local knowledge and colour to her descriptions of Livvy’s life. The unique expressions and cadence of the language spoken and the tensions which existed between the English, the Irish and the French inhabitants of this remote area as well as its raw geographical beauty immerse the reader in Livvy’s childhood world.

Morrissey is also adept at evoking the atmosphere of her adopted home, Halifax, Nova Scotia, with some of her best passages describing

THE TWELVE TRIBES OF HATTIE

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Ayana Mathis, Knopf, 2013, $25.95, hb, 256pp, 9780307959430 / Windmill, Sept. 2013, £7.99, pb, 256pp, 9780099558705 Surely the whole world knows by now that this novel is an Oprah pick. I have never used television to choose my novels, but I was already talking this book up to family and friends before I heard that Mathis’s fortune was made.

The Hattie of the title is an African-American who becomes part of the Great Migration to Northern cities, hopeful to escape Jim Crow, “her skirt still hemmed with Georgia mud.” In the first harrowing chapter, 16-year-old Hattie, without money or family to help, watches her 7-month-old twins die of pneumonia in the cold North. Each of the chapters that follow focuses on one of her other nine children and one granddaughter – the twelve tribes – not in the order of their births, but in the order that the most important events of their lives occurred in time, from 1925 to 1980. What a brilliant form Mathis hit upon to bring control and universality to what must have started as a chaos of her own family’s stories.

None of these stories is free of the heartbreak and corrosive effects of poverty, for the North wasn’t Zion, after all. Even marrying a rich doctor doesn’t save Alice from her own destructive guilt. But the humanity must reach everywhere, the characters beautifully drawn. And Hattie – who never showed an ounce of tenderness in her life, she was too busy trying to keep her kids clothed and fed – may become a great American heroine.

Ann Chamberlin HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 45

the city in the midst of World War II when it became an important jumping off point for troops and navel convoys heading across the Atlantic. She paints a vivid picture of not only those who went to fight but also those who stayed behind to maintain supplies lines and security inspections for those who went to fight. And what happened when it all came to a screeching halt in 1945, suddenly leaving a small Canadian city with a restless population the size of Detroit.

Janice Parker THE HUNGER ANGEL Herta Müller (trans. Philip Boehm), Metropolitan, 2012, $26.00, hb, 290pp, 9780805093018 The fact that this book’s German title, Atemschaukel, translates as something like “Breath Swing,” while the British edition is titled Everything I Possess I Carry With Me, and the American edition is called The Hunger Angel, says something about the elusiveness of this grim, hallucinatory, plotless, and introspective novel. Much of it reads like the ravings of a lunatic, which is certainly intentional because the protagonist, a German youth imprisoned in a Soviet labor camp in the 1940s, is driven mad by hunger.

The “hunger angel” of the title is a kind of ghostly presence — the personification of starvation — that, waking or sleeping, haunts the narrator and all of his maimed and broken fellow prisoners.

(It is based on the reminiscences of a number of survivors, including the author’s mother.) A brief quotation will give the flavor: “And the hunger angel flies as well. He is in the coal, in the heart-shovel, in your joints. He knows that nothing warms the whole body more than the very shoveling that that wears it down…We weren’t sure whether there was one hunger angel for all of us or each one had his own…”

If this is your cup of tea, there are 290 pages of it. Needless to say, it helped earn Müller the Nobel Prize for Literature. Let us hope, at least, that Steven Spielberg never makes a movie of it.

Bruce Macbain WISE MEN Stuart Nadler, Little, Brown, 2013, $25.99, hb, 252pp, 9780316126489 Writing fiction set in the near-history of the mid-20th century is a sticky task. Characters may seem too familiar or mundane to captivate the more adventurous reader, and settings can lack the sparkle of ancient foreign courts and exotic lands. Nevertheless author Stuart Nadler holds our interest while deftly plunging us into a 1950s quagmire of racial tension, class confusion, and sexual awareness.

The story revolves around Hilly Wise. We first meet him in 1947, at the age of 12, the son of a lackluster attorney who somehow finagles himself into the limelight by representing the broken families of Boston Airways plane crash victims. Dad’s newfound notoriety lifts the family out of a hardscrabble existence into the realm of the nouveau riche, and they aren’t really sure what 46 | Reviews |

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to do with all that money. Hilly’s mother orders a bewildering assortment of luxury items that arrive by the truckload—Christofle stemware, crates of Florida oranges, tweed garments from Oxley & Hawlings, English gin, beach furniture—while Dad lords it over everyone who crosses his path, including Hilly.

Initially, the most downtrodden of the senior Wise’s victims is Lem, caretaker of the family’s freshly acquired seaside home in Cape Cod, who appears to have been inherited along with the property. Dad boasts that he got the old man on the cheap—and he works him like a draft horse.

But it’s not until Hilly meets Savannah, a young black girl, that the father’s secrets come to light, shattering all of their lives. This multigenerational novel is brilliantly conceived and masterfully written. Wise Men is an irresistible debut novel that serves as both a love story and a brutal indictment of the cruelty born of wealth and greed.

Kathryn Johnson FRANCESCA PASCAL Fredrik Nath, Fingerpress, 2012, £12.99, pb, 306pp, 9781908824110 Francesca Pascal, an artist, is caught in Paris during the German occupation. In a shocking accident, her daughter is shot by German soldiers under the command of an SD officer, Egger. When Jewish friends are arrested and their cherished painting, an early Matisse, is stolen by the Nazis, she determines to avenge her daughter and to recover from the enemy the Matisse, a symbol of French culture and life. Fleeing Paris for Bergerac, she becomes involved with the partisans and encounters Egger again. The Matisse is in his possession. Obsessed by the painting and her daughter’s death, she joins a plot to save the picture and to kill Egger, but he is a clever and cruel opponent with the resources of the SD behind him.

Nath has drawn a powerful and grim picture of life in France during the Occupation. In Francesca, he has a strong heroine whose grief and almost insane passion for revenge and for the Matisse carries the story. Despite some irritating repetition, this is an interesting novel and a good read.

Lynn Guest THE ANNIVERSARY WALTZ Darrel Nelson, Realms/Charisma House, 2012, $13.99, pb, 293pp, 9781616387150 Adam Carlson returns to Montana after serving in World War II, where he is welcomed by his mother but not his father. Hector still resents Adam’s enlistment, because farmers were not required to serve, and Adam left him with no help. At a town celebration, Adam meets Elizabeth Baxter, who is going steady with banker Nathan Roberts. Adam and Elizabeth feel a spark of attraction nevertheless and get further acquainted on a hay ride. Then Adam finds out that Nathan’s bank is going to foreclose on his parents’ farm, and Adam is largely the cause, since his father couldn’t harvest enough alone during the war to pay the

mortgage. Can Adam stop Nathan foreclosing on the Carlson farm? Will Elizabeth act on her feelings for Adam?

Nelson based the story on incidents in his family’s past, according to his author’s note. It’s a sweet romance, with a moderate religious element compared to others in the genre. Adam and Elizabeth are warm characters; their romance comes across as genuine. Adam’s readjustment to civilian life has realistic bumps in the road.

Nicholas Sparks fans who are looking for similar books by other authors will enjoy Nelson’s debut novel.

B.J. Sedlock ALL FOR A SONG Allison Pittman, Tyndale House, 2013, $13.99, pb, 368pp, 9781414366807 Dorothy Lynn Dunbar is comfortable. She has her church, her family, and her devoted fiancé — the local pastor. She spends her days luxuriating in the woods, praising the Lord with her magical music. But deep inside, Dorothy Lynn longs for life outside the small town of Heron’s Nest, Missouri.

When she meets Aimee Semple McPherson, a female evangelist, she leaves home in search of this new life. Will the temptations of the Jazz Age entice Dorothy Lynn, or will she keep her faith despite it all?

A tale of faith and forgiveness — set in a time of widespread depravity — Allison Pittman’s All for a Song will touch both your mind and your heart. When the novel begins, Dorothy Lynn is preparing to celebrate her 107th birthday, adding a contemplative air to the story’s delivery. Identity is a major theme in Pittman’s work. Throughout the novel, the young Dorothy Lynn searches for identity while the old Dorothy Lynn reflects upon how this identity has changed over the years.

All for a Song is not a mystery, but Pittman’s intricate weaving of the present into the past will keep readers guessing to the very end.

Shaylin Montgomery KAFKA IN LOVE Jacqueline Raoul-Duval (trans. Willard Wood), Other, 2012, $15.95, pb, 288pp, 9781590515419 Kafka in Love presents a prose summary of hundreds if not thousands of letters and diary entries intently pored over by author Raoul-Duval.

The effect is odd and somewhat stilted, although that could be partly due to this being a translation from the French. There is a certain post-postmodern charm, perhaps, in the unusual, bare-bones style which portrays the four strange and bedeviled relationships Kafka had with women.

An example of such correspondence, and how it is presented, is illustrative. Kafka has sent his private diaries to his tempestuous journalist lover Milena and is dying to hear from her: “Franz is waiting, one would swear, for Milena to swoon and send flowers. Yet once again she says nothing. The proof? On January 20, 1922, four months later, he asks her this question: ‘Did you find something decisive against me in the Diaries?’ He perhaps 20th Century

wonders if Milena even took the trouble to open his notebooks. Might she have stuffed them into some corner of her vast armoire and forgotten them? Does he decide to fish for a criticism, if only to make her read his heart laid bare?”

Kafka never married anyone and seemed far happier (if such a term could ever be applied to the tormented writer) when his women lived in distant cities, so he could live out their “love” only in passionate, torturing letters and even telegrams.

As a biography, the book follows in chronological order through Kafka’s early middle years until his death in 1924 at age 41. It is filled with intimate details of the food he ate, the cafés and theatres he went to, his dreams, his insomnia, his illnesses, and above all, his tortured, guilty obsessions with truth, sex, and writing. Although presented as a biographical novel, it might be more aptly called a novelistic biography. If you’re keen on Kafka, you might find it interesting.

Mary F. Burns THE JUMP ARTIST Austin Ratner, Viking, 2012, £12.99, pb, 271pp, 9780670921591 At times this is not the easiest book to read, nor is it the most enjoyable, nor the most exciting.

You will either love it or loathe it – there is no inbetween. It is one of those books full of beautifully crafted moments, a book where every sentence has clearly been thought about, a book of words more than story. Those of you who enjoy a good historical murder mystery will be disappointed; those of you who enjoy words for words’ sake, with a little story threaded through literary moments, will be in heaven.

Based on the early life of Philippe Halsmann, the Latvian-born Jew who became one of the most famous portrait photographers in the world – photographing such famous names as Albert Einstein, Salvador Dali, Andre Gide and Marilyn Monroe – this book begins with the little-known fact that Halsmann was convicted of murdering his own father in 1929. Weaving psychoanalysis with murder, courtroom drama with inner angst and romance with the art of seeing, all set against the clouds of Nazism threatening Europe, it is definitely a unique novel, both gripping and frustrating in equal measure as we follow Halsmann’s retrial then jump to his exile in pre-World War Two France and finally leap to his life in America.

It’s hard to deny this book’s attention to historical detail, but it’s also hard to really love.

A curio for most, and a must-read for Halsmann fanatics.

I.D. Roberts THE IMPOSTER BRIDE Nancy Richler, St. Martin’s, 2013, $24.99, hb, 352pp, 97812500100063 The imposter bride is Lily Azerov, a Jewish refugee from post-World War II Europe who comes to Montreal to marry Sol Kramer, with whom she has been corresponding. At the train station, Sol takes one look at Lily and leaves her stranded. His 20th Century

brother, Nathan, steps into the breach and marries Lily. At their wedding, Sol meets Elka, his future bride, whose mother Ida Pearl happens to be Lily Azerov’s cousin. However, Ida doesn’t believe the bride is her cousin.

One day Lily disappears, leaving behind her three-month-old daughter, Ruth, a notebook full of dreams, a blank notebook, and an uncut diamond.

On Ruth’s sixth birthday, after not hearing from her mother since her mysterious disappearance, a package containing a rock arrives for the child. It is from Lily, who continues to send rocks for most of Ruth’s birthdays – and then suddenly the presents stop. Each time the rocks arrive, Ruth puts the wrapping and the card in a scrapbook. This is all she knows of her mother, but considers it proof that her mother still loves her. Despite growing up without maternal love, Ruth is a well-balanced, loving young woman. And then she and Lily meet again.

Nancy Richler has written a complex novel.

Ruth’s search for the answer to the perplexing question of why her mother abandoned her and her father is compelling. However, the explanation of Lily’s true identity, her tragic past, and her connection to the real Lily Azerov comes at the end of the novel, when the reader is so disconnected from the plot that it seems anti-climactic.

Audrey Braver THE BADGER REDEMPTION J. A. Ricketts, Flanker Press, 2012, $24.00, pb, 373pp, 978171170000 In 1959 a labor riot in the town of Badger in Newfoundland resulted in the death of a local policeman. The violence shocked the town for years. J.A. Ricketts’ painstakingly detailed novel, third in a sequence about the riot, shows how the consequences of the Badger Riot rippled on and on through the community, and led some to grief but many others to a heightened understanding.

Ricketts knows and loves the area, and she knows the people; her account of everyday life rings with observation and empathy. Badger is a small logging town, like so many such a humble presence in a vast natural landscape, and she makes the snowy hillside, the sweep of the wind and the sleep[y murmur of a summer river vivid and dramatic. But in recreating the daily lives of the local people, she loses any sense of pace or drama.

It gets very hard to tell one Badgerite from another.

Even when Ricketts ventures off into time travel and the spiritualism of the vanished native people, the story seems to plod. As a record of a way of life this is impressive, and certainly historical fiction is supposed to do this. But instead of making the ordinary luminous, this novel manages to make the luminous ordinary.

Cecelia Holland THE LIGHT BEHIND THE WINDOW (UK) / THE LAVENDER GARDEN (US) Lucinda Riley, Pan, 2012, £7.99, pb, 400pp, 9781447218425 / Atria, June 2013, $15.00, pb, 416pp, 9781476703558

Lucinda Riley’s The Light Behind the Window is a romance that frequently pushes its sentimentality to the point of melodrama. Whereas Riley establishes early why we should empathize with poor, little rich girl Emilie de la Martinières, Emilie’s character is never fully developed. We are told she is a veterinarian, yet we never see her at the profession she chose at the risk of further estrangement from her mother. Emilie’s father, Édouard de la Martinières, the last of an old aristocratic French family, dies 16 years before the novel opens: in 1998, when Emilie’s aristocratic mother dies. With Emilie’s inheritance comes a myriad of decisions and challenges, one of which is whether to supervise the refurbishment of the old family chateau at the price of giving up her profession. Emilie’s choice to do so, influenced by Sebastian Carruthers and his offer of marriage, undermines the construction of a character who seems to have little agency.

In an alternate historical narrative, Sebastian’s grandmother, Constance Carruthers, trains with the British army in 1943, parachuting into the French countryside in order to aid the French Resistance. Due to unforeseen complications, she finds herself sitting out her assignment in the elegant Parisian home of Édouard, Emilie’s father and a seeming Nazi collaborator. It is this historical narrative that increases the novel’s tension the most. The conflict Emilie faces living in Sebastian’s Yorkshire home, sharing the old place with his younger, recalcitrant brother, rarely matches the cloak-and-dagger intrigues faced by Constance.

The unraveling of wartime historical secrets in Emilie’s historical present offers few surprises in this plot-driven novel. Set in Paris, Provence, and Yorkshire, this book would appeal to those who love romance and European settings.

Terri Baker THE SECRET OF THE NIGHTINGALE PALACE Dana Sachs, Morrow, 2013, $14.99, pb, 336pp, 9780062201034 In her second novel, Dana Sachs delivers a satisfying story about an estranged grandmother and granddaughter who are able to take a journey together to discover things they hadn’t known about each other. In the process, the rift in their relationship is mended and healing begins.

Anna, a 35-year-old widow, is surprised to receive a phone call from her 85-year-old grandmother, the same woman who disapproved of Anna’s deceased husband, the same woman to whom she has not spoken in five years. When her grandmother, Goldie Rosenthal, begs Anna to drive her across the country to return original Japanese artwork to its rightful owner, Anna reluctantly agrees. As the two women progress from hotel to hotel across the often desolate landscape, Goldie’s past life begins to take shape in the form of flashbacks.

We see that in her youth, Goldie, poor and on her own, makes friends with Mayumi Nakamura, a fellow employee at Feld’s, a luxury department store. Soon, Mayumi’s brother, Henry, enters the HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 47

picture, and Goldie falls for this debonair and sensitive man. However, a relationship between a Jewish woman and a Japanese man proves difficult on the eve of World War II. Goldie must move on with her life as Henry is taken to an internment camp.

Goldie’s lesson to her granddaughter becomes obvious: we must move past our losses to “make our own parties.” I won’t give away the twist at the end but will say every time I think of the way Goldie made her own party, I smile.

Anne Clinard Barnhill RAVENSCLIFFE Jane Sanderson, Sphere, 2012, £6.99, pb, 519pp, 9780751547689 Set in Yorkshire in 1904, this novel depicts the lives of ten or more characters living in or around the mining town of Netherwood. Each character has been chosen to illustrate the changing times and how each strata of society copes with it.

The local lord means well but makes mistakes, businessmen rule by fear, and trade unions struggle for recognition. The emancipation of women is contrasted in various guises and set against the widow who simply goes out, off-page, and hooks a duke as her next husband.

The writing is simple and modern in style, much of it narrated, some of it in character point of view and with dialogue often in the Yorkshire dialect local to the area. The storyline moves somewhat jerkily but always chronologically as the author visits and revisits each of her major characters in turn. The detail of mining life is depicted as harsh, as indeed it was, but perhaps thankfully is written in a cool, seen-from-a-great-distance kind of style that I found slightly soporific and unemotional. I can admire Nellie’s stolid acceptance of death, but only with 12-year-old Seth did I feel any real sense of empathy. I found the book a little old-fashioned in its style, but there will be many readers who will relish it for its detail of a time gone by. The book can be read as a stand-alone novel, but many of the characters will be known to readers of the previous novel, Netherwood.

Jen Black LOVE IN THE YEAR OF LUNACY Mandy Sayer, Simon and Schuster, 2012, $15.00, pb, 326pp, 9781451678468 Love in the Year of Lunacy is a wonderfully written World War II story of siblings who share their love of horn playing, jazz clubs, and danger.

The war in the Pacific heats up in Sydney, Australia, in 1942 when the American soldiers arrive and jazz and passions run hot. Martin introduces his twin sister, Pearl, to both his fascination for the music played late at night in the Negro nightclub and his aboriginal girlfriend. The lunacy begins when, during an air raid, Pearl falls for a very gifted black horn player, a soldier in the segregated American army. Pearl and Martin have always been close, and as the Japanese attack Sydney, they find their lives changed forever. He is pressed into the armed forces, and she is separated from the man she 48 | Reviews |

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loves, sending her into depression under the care of the “Lunacy Doctor.” The doctor offers her hope of a normal life as his wife, but the passion she experienced with James still lingers in her mind.

Can she settle for the proper life, or will lunacy of love send her off to the jungles of New Guinea to find the man she wants?

We follow Pearl’s story with the author keeping up the rhythm as the story draws to its surprising conclusion. Having heard of the war in this region from my father-in-law, who, like Martin, served in the 41st division, I was drawn to reviewing this book. I highly recommend this peek into World War II in the Pacific, with the jungle fighting, troop entertainers, and racism that crosses so many cultures.

Beth Turza MY ONE SQUARE INCH OF ALASKA Sharon Short, Plume, 2013, $16.00/C$17.00 pb, 336pp, 9780452298767 Life in 1950s small-town Groverton, Ohio, doesn’t hold much interest for ambitious highschool senior Donna Lane, who has visions of becoming a fashion designer in New York City.

But working two jobs — waitressing at her stern grandmother’s café and altering dresses at Miss Bettina’s Dress Shop — and trying to stay out of the way of her alcoholic father while taking care of Will, her younger brother, seem to turn her dreams into unattainable fantasies. Will has fantasies of his own and is obsessed with a TV show called Sergeant Striker and the Alaskan Wild.

The boy believes that Trusty, the junkyard husky he has stolen, needs to be returned to his home in

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MARY COIN

the territory of Alaska, even though the dog never lived there; Will is certain that he is the one to take him there.

Donna’s life is complicated by the arrival of two strangers to Groverton, one the son of the paper mill owner and the other a bohemian art teacher — who may also be a “commie” — hired by the high school. Donna begins dating Jimmy, son of the mill boss, and secretly poses for the art teacher, Mr. Cahill. The two men, in their own ways, rekindle the spark of her desire to leave Groverton, but when Will falls ill with a terminal disease, Donna drops everything to make Will’s dream come true.

Donna packs up her mother’s old convertible with Will, Trusty, and a road atlas, setting off on an adventurous trip that will take them many miles from home, both physically and spiritually.

The novel is written from Donna’s perspective and is loaded with details about fashion design, as well as social issues of the ’50s, such as the threat of childhood polio and communist paranoia. Yet, this debut novel is still essentially a quest story that resonates for men as well as women in a heartwarming and compassionate way.

John Kachuba TWILIGHT OF HONOR Annie Laura Smith, Ardent Writer, 2012, $16.00, pb, 308pp, 9781938667046 Wynne Reardon is an Air Force wife whose husband, Michael, is missing in action – then declared dead – in Vietnam. His remains are not recovered, and Wynne cannot let go of her hope that this valiant, posthumously-decorated fighter pilot may yet be found alive. As Wynne develops

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Marisa Silver, Blue Rider, 2013, $26.95, hb, 336pp, 9780399160707 Think of the Depression, and the first image that comes to mind is Dorothea Lange’s wrenching photograph of the prematurely aged mother, surrounded by her children, staring off into the distance. Mary Coin is the fictionalized story of that photograph, with Mary standing in for the actual subject, Florence Owens Thompson, and Vera Dare standing in for Dorothea Lange.

Since so little is known of the actual Thompson, this was a story ready and waiting for a fictionalized treatment. And Marisa Silver does it full, glorious justice. The story is compelling and honest, never sentimentalized or made easy, the writing exquisite in its luminous clarity. Silver accomplishes much in this work, including giving a human face and story to overwhelming disaster, just as the original photograph did. Mary Coin is Native American, as was the real Thompson, and the story begins in her youth and follows her through marriage, widowhood, poverty, and the wanderings of the homeless during the Dust Bowl era and the Depression.

Silver’s story is artful in a way that life often is not, carrying the story of one family through several generations. She assigns meaning and suggests redemptive closure. This novel is simply not to be missed. It is memorable.

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her art gallery and finds a potential new love, she is held back at every turn by her inability to accept that her husband is really dead. She cannot move forward to accept the love of another good man, a fellow artist and also a Vietnam veteran. She is cruelly scammed by false-hope agencies who give her bogus information suggesting that Michael is still alive. It is many years before Wynne can achieve closure. In the meantime, the author weaves in the history of this painful war that so divided America.

All the struggles with moral and political issues are discussed here, under the veil of fiction.

Smith’s publisher describes this story as light romance, which doesn’t really give the book enough credit. The romance is there, all right, as is the interesting trope of the art gallery and the luscious, seaside, tropical Florida setting. The stilted dialogue and pedestrian prose in some spots detract from the book, and there is a really failed transition. The 1970s are suddenly the early 1980s, and then 1986 – leaving the reader flummoxed and wondering where thirteen years went.

Still, the war issues and the effect a military member’s death has on family and friends are depicted all too well. This reviewer is herself a Vietnam-era USAF veteran. The story’s final evocative resolution left her in tears.

Elizabeth Knowles WHISPERS IN THE WIND Lauraine Snelling, Bethany House, 2012, $14.99, pb, 348pp, 9780764204166 In 1906 South Dakota, Cassie Lockwood, recently cast off from a defunct Wild West show, arrives at the ranch which her father co-owned.

She discovers that the late Mr. Engstrom did not tell his resident children that they don’t own the property outright. The Engstrom sons are angry at usurper Cassie, but Mavis Engstrom welcomes her almost as a long-lost daughter and later confesses that she nearly married Cassie’s father.

Cassie struggles with a lack of money, ignorance of the simplest of household chores, and prejudice from townspeople who resent her bringing Native American companions to the area. Her plans to earn money as a sharpshooter in a new show may be dashed when rowdies attack her cabin and she is injured.

This is the second in the series Wild West Wind.

I would not recommend starting with this volume.

Snelling does give interesting details on prairie life, such as how food was preserved, but I found the plot very slow going. There are only hints of the romance expected in the Christian fiction genre; apparently Snelling is drawing out the story over multiple volumes. There isn’t enough in this book alone to make me care for the characters.

B.J. Sedlock COMING HOME Roy E. Stolworthy, Claymore, 2012, £7.99, pb, 256pp, 9781781590713 It might have been expected that the passing of time would diminish the appeal of works of fiction set in the two major conflicts of the last century.

20th Century

This has not been the case, and Coming Home, set during the First World War, deserves its place amongst them.

The author cleverly opens with a horrendous domestic incident that not only sets the tone of the novel but hooks the reader into the situation of its central character. What follows is a soundly‑structured, well‑observed and often harrowing account of 15‑year-old Thomas Elkin’s story. There are no clichés here, and although one senses the detailed research that lies under the text, it never becomes an intrusion into the well‑paced narrative. The main characters are engaging and believable, and nor is there any laziness regarding the minor ones, which are, without exception, well drawn and satisfyingly three‑dimensional.

This is a lengthy and dense read but well worth the struggle with its very small print.

The jacket design by Jon Wikinson is attractive and appropriate, but it is regrettable that more care was not taken with the editing of the text. The clumsinesses I encountered were precisely the sort that a writer tends to miss, however diligent his or her revisions, but which an editor should pick up on. An example lies quite early on, on p.16, where we get “Thomas felt a raging turmoil surge into his body and a pent-fury streamed from his body”.

This irritation aside, and there are other examples of it, this is a fascinating novel and one not to be missed.

Julia Stoneham HER FATHER’S DAUGHTER June Tate, Severn House, 2013, $28.95/£19.99, hb, 192pp, 9781847514516 In November 1945 in Southampton, England, Victoria Teglia reopens the Club Valetta, which her father had run until his death rescuing a man from a fire that burnt down much of the club. Can she handle all the trouble that is going to come her way as club proprietor?

Victoria aims at running a legitimate business, but her father operated the club as a brothel with criminal connections, and Victoria’s partner, George Coleman, was her father’s right-hand man.

George has given up crime, but as the plot turns to danger, George’s underworld friends will prove essential as he tries to protect Victoria.

Two men vie for Victoria’s heart: Johnny Daniels, the son of a notorious mobster, and the handsome Navy captain, Bruce Chapman. Will Victoria’s love life get her into even more trouble?

Her Father’s Daughter is an entertaining, light read. The characters are recognizable, fairly one-dimensional types. Tate creates the feel of London and Southampton during the postwar rebuilding. She focuses on reconstruction and renewal, leaving aside any portrayal of grief or lingering psychological effects of the war. Tate’s plot amidst the gangsters and Victoria’s romantic entanglements keep the pages turning.

Judith Starkston THE WALNUT TREE Charles Todd, HarperCollins, 2012, $16.99, hb,

304pp, 9780062236999 A light, romantic story, The Walnut Tree takes place at the outbreak of World War I. Lady Elspeth Douglas leads a charmed life as the wealthy daughter of Highland aristocracy. The novel opens in Paris as she is attending the lying-in of her friend, Madeleine. Elspeth has felt a strong attraction to Madeleine’s brother, Alain, since their school days, but he has shown no mutual interest until now. The Germans move toward France, and Madeleine’s husband, Henri, and Alain are called away to war. Alain gives Elspeth a ring and a promise to marry. As Elspeth flees France to return to England, she runs into enemy fire and the protection of handsome Captain Peter Gilchrist, a childhood friend.

Elspeth proves to be more than a pampered and protected woman when she cares for injured soldiers traveling back to England and joins a nursing service. Her time there is short-lived when her guardian finds out, but she is too busy caring for a severely injured Captain Gilchrist and her fiancé. Torn between loyalty and true love, she finds that ultimately only fate can decide for her.

This book does not negate the horrors of war and is worth reading.

Susan Zabolotny THE PLUM TREE Ellen Marie Wiseman, Kensington, 2013, $15/ C$16.95, pb, 367pp, 9780758278432 Wiseman writes engagingly about WWII from the point of view of a seventeen-year-old German girl on the home front. At the opening, Christine Bölz is thrilled the boy she loves, Isaac Bauerman, returns her feelings. We shudder. It’s 1938, and Isaac is Jewish. His family is wealthy and influential. Christine’s mother works as their cook.

The reader knows all that will change.

Hitler passes laws that outlaw Christine’s contact with Isaac, but for a while they risk meetings. Eventually Isaac recognizes the danger and they stop, although they will meet again as the plot progresses. Their love story is central to the book.

Wiseman portrays the straightening of circumstances for Christine’s village. The Jewish families are rounded up. All the men of whatever age are sent to the front lines unless they are willing to serve in the S.S. Food grows scarce and bombings occur nightly. Wiseman does depict pro-Hitler rallies and anti-Semitism, but for the most part her portrayal of the German citizenry is sympathetic: victims of tyranny, trapped by fear and violence. When the plot moves to Auschwitz, we see one of the young men of the town serving as an S.S. guard and relishing it, but we also see the camp’s commander secretly abhorring his actions and trying to inform the Swiss.

Wiseman focuses on the strength found in love, and on ordinary people enduring and carrying on in horrific circumstances.

Judith Starkston SECRETS AND LIES HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 49

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E D I TORS’ C H OI C E

Brendan Connell, Chômu Press, 2012, £10.00/$12.50, pb, 164pp, 9781907681202 On first look, this little book doesn’t give much away.

I had read the blurb which told me, in part, what to expect: a set of 51 fictional biographies of great chefs.

It really is so much more.

It is beautifully written; the author has a fine handle on language that simply springs off the page and into your senses. Rather than reading this from start to finish, in chronological order, I read a little each night.

Like the fine meals and strange ingredients pressed between the pages of this book, the real flavour soon becomes clear. It is about love, life and death — big themes that make up all of our lives and of course the food that fuels it.

The biographies date from pre-history to the final days of World War 1 and include a vast variety of food, themes and lives, from an ancient lentil‑loving Greek to magnificent cooks of Baghdad, Taoist sages and French kings.

I wondered why no one before had linked the food we ate/eat with the lives we lead before. These chefs come from both history and legend, so I don’t know if they all really existed or not. I like to think that they did, but as with all great books it doesn’t matter. What matters is I believed every word and was hooked from the first story I read (page 73, Abu Kassim, if you are wondering).

I would recommend this book to everyone. I absolutely loved it, and it will stay on my bedside table for many months to come.

Jane Lawrenson Janet Woods, Severn House, 2012, $28.95/£19.99, hb, 240pp, 9780727881816 This story transports you into the very different worlds of London and Sydney, Australia, during the Depression era through the eyes of best friends Esmé and Minnie. One was raised in an orphanage with her siblings following the tragic death of her parents, and one would like nothing better than to move forward into an adventurous adult world, leaving her dysfunctional family behind her. Both girls have just completed nursing school, and Minnie suggests that they sign on for a cruise bound for Australia, working for the passage as a nurse and as a dancer. Relationships form on this cruise that will change their futures.

This impetuous life-changing trip does not sit well with Esmé’s older sister, Livia, and her second husband, who put her through nursing school in hopes that she would settle near the family. Livia holds her family very close, and her daughter by her first marriage even closer. There is a hint of a family secret and a lie that cut off her young daughter from her only living grandparent. When Esmé comes home for a visit, she finds herself caught in the middle. She then returns to Australia to help Minnie, who has made some bad choices, and together they rise up to conquer adversities and move forward with people and surprising events, which complete this story in a most satisfying way.

Secrets and Lies is a terrific novel. It is rich in characters and their relationships and interactions with one another and was very difficult to put down. I found it interesting to see how the Depression affected Australia and the UK, and the 50 | Reviews |

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industry and life in Sydney and the rural areas are filled with detail and authenticity.

Beth Turza DEATH IN HER FACE Sheila York, Five Star, 2012, $25.95, hb, 265pp, 9781432826208 In post-WWII Hollywood, screenwriter Lauren Atwill and her private eye beau are hired to help with a potential PR nightmare for the studio machine: a starlet has disappeared, just as her latest film is about to start shooting. Her secret boyfriend, a former prizefighter with mob ties, has been found murdered in their burned-out love nest. While PI Peter looks into the starlet’s disappearance, Lauren is hired to do script rewrites for the picture. The mystery quickly becomes larger and much more dangerous as gangsters and the FBI get involved.

This is the third Lauren Atwill mystery, but it’s not necessary to read the predecessors in order to enjoy this one. Terse but vibrant character descriptions (of a mobster: “His pale, manicured hands rested on the arms of his chair. They were blotched and red from years of dipping into other people’s misery.”), crisp dialogue, and cracking pace result in a quick and enjoyable read. The studio lot, California coast, and historical Hollywood make for a convincing and compelling setting – film noir on the written page. Atwill is also a fairly engaging character; she’s flawed, not exactly adept with the gun she carries in her purse, next to her lock pick set – but she’s intelligent and conscience-driven. I’ll be picking up the other Atwill mysteries; you might

want to try this one and do the same.

Bethany Latham

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WASHED IN THE BLOOD Lisa Alther, Mercer Univ. Press, 2011, $26.00, hb, 460pp, 9780881462579 I’d only vaguely heard of the Melungeons before reading Washed in the Blood. Lisa Alther has brought this mysterious Appalachian race out of the shadows with her excellent novel.

This multigenerational story depicts the comingtogether of the Melungeons, or Porterghee Indians. She introduces us to Portuguese and Spanish conquistadors in search of treasure, Cherokees defending their land, escaped African slaves, and Englishmen searching for new homes.

Their descendants live in the Shenandoah Valley, calling the disputed area the Squabble State. It is not always hospitable, and such places as Hunger Mountain mark where settlers lost their battle with the elements.

Racial tension also makes life difficult. Will Martin is a young doctor who received his education in return for practicing in his state after World War I. His skin is not fair enough to let him pass for white, even though he has had the extra fingers removed which mark him as one of the mixed-blood folk. His fair-skinned wife, Galicia, is also his cousin.

The Martins are generally accepted by their community, but then Will reads about a “Secret Negro” who is lynched for raping a white woman, though they were married. That man’s skin and features were little different from Will’s own. Will now questions his own identity. White? Black?

And what of Will and Galicia’s unborn baby? It is a roll of the genetic dice for them. If that child is born dark, they could be forced from their home or worse. Ms. Alther handles Will and Galicia’s dilemma with sensitivity, and her story grabbed me from the first sentence. Highly recommended.

Jo Ann Butler WHERE TIGERS ARE AT HOME Jean-Marie Blas de Robles (trans. Mike Mitchell), Other, 2013, $32.50, hb, 832pp, 9781590515624 Each chapter of this novel begins with a selection from a biography of the 17th-century Jesuit polymath Athanasius Kircher, purportedly by his closest associate. Eléazard von Wogan, a French scholar living in Brazil, is editing the book in spite of a diminishing respect for its subject.

The rest of each chapter takes place in Brazil in the 1980s and involves the scholar’s life and that of the people connected with it: a bisexual daughter who writes him for money she needs for drugs; his estranged wife, a paleontologist on an expedition into the wilds between Brazil and Paraguay; a mysterious Italian woman he meets in a restaurant; a likeable young beggar with an ambition to buy a motorized wheelchair; and a corrupt governor 20th Century — Multi-period

who is planning to turn part of his territory into a golf resort. Kircher’s speculations on Egyptian hieroglyphics, science, linguistics, and history are usually interesting, although frequently incorrect and always governed by a desire to stay within Catholic orthodoxy.

The modern stories alternate between the characters with cliffhanger endings, not to be resolved until several chapters later. The fossil expedition becomes dangerous, the daughter’s sex life grows more complicated, and the Italian woman reveals more of herself while deflecting Eléazard’s romantic overtures. Each thread of the story becomes increasingly interesting as they all move toward a connection. Events in modern Brazil contain subtle echoes of the Kircher story.

Mike Mitchell’s translation finds English equivalents like “killing two birds with one stone” for expressions like “two daughters with one son-inlaw” making the English read smoothly but losing the sense of the underlying French. Latin sections are translated in footnotes but brief snatches of Portuguese are left untranslated.

Highly recommended.

James Hawking EDEN’S GARDEN Juliet Greenwood, Honno, 2012, £8.95, pb, 419pp, 9781906784355 Greenwood’s pleasing debut employs a familiar device — a mystery that bridges different generations — to tell two original love stories.

1898. Ann is a runaway in her 20s. When William finds her, hungry and fearful, outside the London charity hospital he manages, he takes her in, gives her work, and keeps her safe. Ann becomes William’s assistant and, in time, his wife.

1996. When Carey completes her finals with high marks, she lifts her eyes for the first time to consider life outside her Welsh village. David wants a life with Carey at Plas Eden, the rundown estate he inherited. He dreams of restoring the statuary garden to its former splendor. When Carey tells David her plans for university and a career, their conflicting ambitions drive a wedge between them.

Carey leaves, and David stays in Wales.

2011. Carey’s mother becomes ill. Carey puts her life in London on hold to return to Wales.

When she discovers a link between Plas Eden and the site where David’s parents died inexplicably in Cornwall, Carey and David join forces to explain the connection. By following a trail of clues from Wales to Cornwall and back, they discover not only their own histories and Ann’s but also the secret of the statues in the Plas Eden garden.

Eden’s Garden is highly recommended for readers who enjoy romantic family mysteries with a strong sense of place.

Jeanne Greene THE MISSING MANUSCRIPT OF JANE AUSTEN Syrie James, Berkley, 2012, $15.00, pb, 432pp, 9780425253366 University librarian and Austen enthusiast Multi-period

Samantha McDonough happens upon a partial letter in an old poetry book that leaves clues to a possible missing manuscript penned by Jane Austen during her youth. She travels to a centuriesold manor home in the English countryside where she believes Austen had stayed and prevails upon the owner, on the evening before he is to put the estate on the market, to make a thorough search for the supposed rare novel.

While part of the book is set in the present day, the booklets that make up the lost manuscript take readers back to Regency England in a style that is so much like Jane Austen’s that it becomes almost as if The Stanhopes is in fact a seventh Austen novel. Following Austen’s Plan of a Novel, a comedic snippet from the author’s memoir, Syrie James uses the outlined formula to create a credible story nearly identical to the writings of Austen, with all of the humor, complexities of character and circumstance, and even the idiosyncrasies that Austen’s novels engender.

Flipping back and forth between Samantha’s story and that of the protagonist of The Stanhopes, Rebecca Stanhope, the plots run in parallel in regard to the two women’s romantic plights.

Anthony Whitaker, to whom the fate of the lost manuscript will be decided, finds that during the reading of the surprisingly engaging novel his financial predicament and his moral desires are at odds.

The story-within-a-story aspect may sound complicated, but it is very important for readers to understand how an alleged Austen manuscript would be presented today and the effect it would have on the literary and historical community.

This is a beautifully written and magnificently interwoven novel by an author who is obviously an Austen expert. The Stanhopes would certainly make Austen proud!

Arleigh Johnson WINTER GAMES Rachel Johnson, Fig Tree/Penguin, 2012, £14.99, hb, 326pp, 9780141048697 A crossover novel between chick-lit and historical drama, and charting specific and interrelating events in the lives of a grandmother and granddaughter, Winter Games shares its time between two very different generations and lifestyles: Nazi Germany in 1936 and yuppie consumerist 2006 London.

Johnson amalgamates the tensions governing pre-war British-German relations with gentle critique over contemporary lifestyle to form a narrative which intertwines the lives of magazine journalist, Francie Fitzsimon, with her own grandmother, Daphne Linden, at finishing school in Bavaria in 1936. As Francie’s own emotional journey coincides with discovering the story behind a photograph of her grandmother with Hitler, a simultaneous narrative emerges which dramatizes the excitement, uncertainty and the disastrous consequences of too much sexual innocence in the year when everything began changing for the world – and for Daphne herself.

This is a very easy, sometimes disturbing and equally touching novel. Do be prepared for some salacious language in the contemporary section – as already noted, the chick-lit style dominates a portion of this novel, which is counteracted stylistically by the innocence of language which permeates the pre-war sections. A recommended read for readers of interwar faction and chick-lit advocates.

Claire Cowling THE LINCOLN LETTER William Martin, Forge, 2012, $25.99/C$29.99, hb, 448pp, 9780765321985 I never miss the chance to read a Peter Fallon/ Evangeline Carrington novel because Martin has the uncanny ability to seamlessly interweave a modern related story with historical events. This is one of William Martin’s best efforts, and although I have never been a Civil War buff, this book snared me from the start.

Halsey Hutchinson is wounded at Ball’s Bluff early in the Civil War. Of a well-established Boston family, Hutchinson winds up working in Lincoln’s War Department and is at the epicenter of the war’s activities and of Lincoln’s thinking about emancipation and the war effort. Almost every night, Lincoln visits Halsey and his companion as they field telegrams coming in from the front. The President welcomes their companionship during this difficult time. Though Hutchinson is not an abolitionist, he sees firsthand the torment that darkens Lincoln’s soul. And one evening, Lincoln mistakenly leaves behind his diary, a book where he opens up that soul knowing that the doubts, fears, hopes he harbors are meant for no one’s eyes but his own. Halsey takes it – and it is stolen from him. And so Peter and Evangeline’s hunt – some 150 years later – begins.

Peter, a universally renowned book dealer from Boston, and his once-to-be-wife, Evangeline, need to find that diary, a book which could change the world’s perspective about the Great Emancipator.

As Martin shifts the focus back and forth from modern-day Washington to the Civil War, we are introduced to folks who intersect with Halsey’s path – Walt Whitman, Clara Barton, Oliver Wendell Holmes, John Wilkes Booth – all of whom become real people in this terrific story. Civil War Washington itself becomes a character.

I enjoyed this book immensely and recommend it, not merely as a fun read but, in a time when interest in Lincoln is at a peak, since it so humanizes the President.

Ilysa Magnus THE LAIRDS OF CROMARTY Jean-Pierre Ohl (trans. Mike Mitchell), Dedalus, 2012, £9.99, pb, 286pp, 9781907650741 Some books are a real surprise, and this is one of them. What is at heart a detective story becomes in turn a love story, a tribute to friendship and courage, an ode to books and booksellers and to 19th-century literature. Perhaps strangest of all, Ohl clearly has an intimate knowledge of Islay and Jura, including the whirlpool of Corryvreckan, as well as of Edinburgh.

The story is mainly set in the 1950s when HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 51

Mary Guthrie, a brilliant postgraduate student of English from Islay, decides to write a doctoral thesis on Sir Thomas Urquhart, the Scottish author, mathematician and translator of Rabelais, who supported the Royalist cause in Scotland and then died in exile in 1660. The Urquharts — both present and past — play a leading role in the story, as does a renegade Catholic priest, Ebenezer Krook, with whom Mary, rather improbably, has an affair.

But against Krook’s unfolding family story, the most improbable events start to feel quite normal — even down to Eric Blair, aka George Orwell, who visited Jura regularly in the 1940s, being cast in a lifesaver’s role. While researching her doctorate, Mary visits the Urquhart family’s crumbling home in Cromarty where the events of the Spanish Civil War, Sir Thomas Urquhart’s treasure, a Renaissance desk with a coded mechanism for opening its thirty-two drawers, not to mention servants whose nicknames are inspired by golf jargon and a voyeur maiden aunt are just some of the bizarre details invented by Ohl. For all its Gothic twists, this is a book filled with humour, acute observations of character and place, and literary citations worthy of a professional bookseller — Ohl’s other career. It has been flawlessly translated by Mike Mitchell in what deserves to become another of the latter’s awardwinning works.

Lucinda Byatt THE MUSEUM OF ABANDONED SECRETS Oksana Zabuzhko (trans. Nina Shevchuk-Murray), AmazonCrossing, 2012, $14.95, pb, 760pp, 9781611090116 This novel, written in the style of Joyce or Proust, is essentially based on Faulkner’s theme: “The

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past is never dead. It is not even past.” While the opening is set in turbulent contemporary (2003) Ukraine, the twin-frame plot covers nearly 60 years of Ukraine’s recent chaotic history, from the Stalin era through WWII, the guerilla warfare leading to independence, and the 2004 Orange Revolution.

The story revolves around the mysterious lives of three women: Daryna, a present-day TV journalist; Vlada, Daryna’s artist friend; and Olena, who served in the Ukrainian underground army and died during WWII. Daryna, having discovered an old photograph of Olena, is captivated by her and wishes to film a documentary to uncover Olena’s past — much like the game Slavic girls played by secretly burying their treasures to be unearthed later. During her research, Daryna falls in love with Adrian, an art dealer and Olena’s grandson. Their love is overshadowed by some dark secrets, as we learn through Adrian’s dreams, of Olena’s romance with another Adrian. Vlada dies tragically in a car crash that is believed to be accidental, but Daryna thinks it is murder. She is thus faced with two mysteries set about 60 years apart while facing the challenges of her media world.

The press release calls Oksana Zabuzhko “one of the most acclaimed voices in Ukrainian literature,” which is indeed reflected in the lyrical prose.

Written primarily for a Ukrainian audience, the English translation reads well. Although this 760page historical novel’s length may not be unusual, the large cast of characters and their stream-ofconsciousness discourse, which goes on for pages, require careful reading to follow the complex plot.

Since the historical background is sparse, keeping a laptop handy to look up the details would help.

Recommended.

E D I TORS’ C H OI C E

Elizabeth Wilhide, Simon & Schuster, 2013, $24.99, hb, 352 pp, 9781451684865 / Fig Tree, 2012, £12.99, hb, 336pp, 9781905490950 Ashenden, the delightful debut novel from Elizabeth Wilhide, traces the life of a beautiful English house from the time of its building in the late 18th century until the present day, when it lands in the hands of a brother and sister who cannot afford its renovation and upkeep. As they contemplate what to do with the estate, we are transported back through the years to follow the lives of Ashenden’s owners, servants, and community. We meet the man who built the house, his nieces, and the families who take ownership when circumstances force change; some of these people are good and decent, and some are sneaky and dishonest, but all find themselves tied to the house in some vital way.

The beauty of Ashenden lies in the interwoven tales that move us carefully through the years at irregular intervals, giving us intimate glimpses into not only the people who occupied the house but inside the heart of the very building itself. I particularly loved the large Henderson family and the story of Alison’s rebel heart during World War II, but all of the characters are well-written and vivid. We are taken through the Victorian and Edwardian eras into more modern times without losing the essence of what brings the house its soul: its history and its constancy. I found myself wishing I could live within Ashenden’s walls, experiencing its stories and looking for the hidden initials. The ending is surprising and bittersweet, and absolutely perfect. This thoroughly engrossing novel deserves a wide, appreciative readership, and this reader highly recommends it.

Tamela McCann 52 | Reviews |

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THE SILENT TOUCH OF SHADOWS Christina Courtenay, Choc Lit, 2012, £7.99, pb, 323pp, 9781906931766 The prologue to The Silent Touch of Shadows sets the tone for this romance. In Chapter One, we meet Melissa Grantham, a single parent and genealogist who is troubled by vivid dreams after her first visit to her great-aunt’s ancient house, Ashleigh Manor in Kent. In Chapter Two, Melissa dreams of a totally different set of characters, Sibell and Sir Roger Langford, who lived at Ashleigh in 1460. The dream is vivid enough to start Melissa on a hunt to discover the history of the house. Jake Precy is the local vet living nearby, and he bears an astonishing resemblance to Sir Roger. Life becomes very confusing for Melissa as she learns more about Sibell and Roger and tries to disentangle her feelings for Jake from her knowledge of Roger. The intrigue surrounding Sibell and Roger’s story is nicely handled, only coming to light right at the end of the book. Whatever you do, don’t peek at the end or you will spoil the suspense.

The time-slip theme is not explored here in as much detail as we’ve come to expect from writers like Barbara Erskine and Diana Gabaldon, but it is an entertaining novel, and if you enjoy the slight shiver down the spine as you read, then this story will be for you.

Jen Black TIME’S ECHO Pamela Hartshorne, Pan, 2012, £7.99, pb, 467pp, 9780330544252 Hartshorne’s engaging time-slip opens with one chilling scene after another. Hawise, a young Elizabethan woman, is drowned as a witch on All Hallows’ Eve, the bells of York Minster ringing in the background. As the River Ouse drags her skirts down, she dies in fear, knowing she’s leaving her daughter Bess in the hands of an evil man.

In the present, Grace Trewe awakens in her late godmother Lucy’s house in York, having dreamt of Hawise’s last moments. Or perhaps she’s having flashbacks to past trauma, as a survivor of the ´04 tsunami. After traveling from Asia to claim her surprising inheritance, she hopes to move on quickly but finds herself caught by Hawise’s life. Grace’s neighbor, single father Drew Dyer, is a local historian who offers his help. He’s not quite handsome, but she finds his solidity and strength attractive.

There’s no mistaking this novel’s genre. In the first 40 pages, Grace experiences déjà vu, sees an apparition, and has multiple visions of a long-ago time. Rotting apples mysteriously appear, along with their putrid scent (a unique and eerie touch).

The supernatural elements feel overdone initially, and some words in the text repeat too often, but the two women’s stories are equally gripping and deftly blended together. In 1577, Hawise is a mercer’s servant whose future turns unexpectedly bright, but her unconventional habits and an unwanted suitor’s obsession lead to her downfall. As Grace and Drew grow closer, Hawise’s presence becomes more intrusive. Is Grace possessed or suffering from PTSD? Will she die from drowning, just like Hawise and Lucy?

A novel of jealousy, passion, revenge, witchcraft, and coming to grips with the past, Time’s Echo is Multi-period — Timeslip

haunting and dramatic, with a sterling sense of place. Tudor York comes marvelously alive with its bustling marketplace, cobblestone streets, and plenty of interesting details on running a household.

Enjoyable escapist reading.

Sarah Johnson THE GEEK GIRL AND THE SCANDALOUS EARL Gina Lamm, Sourcebooks Casablanca, 2013, $6.99/£4.99, pb, 352pp, 9781402277597 When 21st-century gamer-girl Jamie Marten is sucked through an antique mirror into the 19th century and the Earl of Dunnington’s bedchamber, she thinks she must be dreaming. Micah, the earl, is stunningly handsome, and because of his trouble with past mistresses, he fights his attraction to the beautiful and crazy Jamie. Thanks to her cellphone and a game of Angry Birds, Jamie convinces Micah that she is from the future. Micah agrees to house and protect Jamie while she tries to get back to her own time, which won’t happen because Mrs. Knightsbridge, the earl’s friendly housekeeper and a witch, brought Jamie through the mirror. She has “seen” that Jamie is the only woman for Micah. A great deal of physical and mental grappling occurs between Jamie and Micah, the lovers sometimes logical, and sometimes not, in their decisions about one another. Not to worry, their sexual attraction (and love) for each other will certainly win out. The Geek Girl and the Scandalous Earl is a light romance with plenty of passion and conflict.

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went on to have further thrilling adventures in the Roman Empire.

The novel includes a handful of real historical characters such as Marcus Lucinius Crassus and Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (better known as Pompey), but the majority of the other characters are fictional. This tale involves Spartacus going into partnership with Cassian Antonius, an aristocrat and fixer whom we gradually learn more about as the action progresses. There are plenty of scenes of violence and gore, as you would expect, but these are never done gratuitously but rather with a measure of restraint and functionality that render them more effective. Other colourful characters make their entrances and sometimes swift exits in high gladiatorial drama.

Robert Southworth is an author with potential and is already at work on the sequel (Spartacus: the Gods Demand Sacrifice). A sample chapter is included at the end. He has a long way to go, however, before he can rival the likes of Douglas Jackson, Ben Kane, Harry Sidebottom and others in this field. The other point is that, while the story in itself is engaging enough, the overall effect is spoilt by the huge number of proofreading errors I found throughout. These really did detract from the flow of the narrative, and I have even taken the liberty of contacting the publishers directly (they happen to be local to me!) and offered them my own services as proofreader.

Ray Taylor

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paranormal & | historical fantasy

MOSAIC OF AN UNQUIET TIME Mary Chiappe, Doma, 2012, £9.99, pb, 300pp, 9780958301626 This novel is set in 1963 in the fictional British colony of As Areias, an archipelago located off the coast of Portugal. The book itself was published and printed (to a very high standard, incidentally) in Gibraltar, which explains an awful lot, particularly the insights into the mindset of the characters.

Actually, As Areias is more an amalgam of several past and present UK colonies. Life is ordered, staid and genteel. The social structures are very traditional. Crime is almost nonexistent. Most people are happy with their lot, although arguably that is because most of them have never bothered to consider any alternative to their current situation.

The whole colony is presented as a little bubble of the past, with the larger world something that exists a long way off.

The characters are a good cross-section of this cosy set-up, and the way they react when change does come enables you to thoroughly appreciate the pluses and minuses of colonial life. It’s very much a character-driven novel, insightful and often humorous.

Martin Bourne

THE WINTER WITCH Paula Brackston, St. Martin’s, 2013, $24.95, hb, 368pp, 9781250001313 This is a fun, satisfying read about young Morgana, mute since her father’s disappearance, and newly wed to widower Cai Bevan. What Cai doesn’t know about his pretty bride is that she is also a witch with magical powers. She’ll need them in this story, set in the rugged mountains of 19thcentury Wales, since Cai’s farm contains a magic well, and there’s another witch in the village, a much less benign one, who wants both Cai and the “cursing well” on his farm.

Perhaps the most satisfying part of this tale is the slow and tender unfolding of the love story between Cai and Morgana. Having married for practical purposes, they must find a way to reveal the gradual love they come to experience for each other. The story contains several deaths as well as the suggestive malevolence of a small, closed society experiencing hard times. Brackston has used this tale of witchery to show readers a world in which people deal with sorrow and loss by assigning otherworldly causes and effects... one of the great impulses for historical and magical fiction. The writing is deft and the pacing quick, making it an enjoyable read.

Jeanne Mackin

SPARTACUS: Talons of an Empire Robert Southworth, Claymore, 2012, £8.99, pb, 208pp, 9781781590483 This slim novel is a new addition to the already crowded Roman history genre, and Robert Southworth’s is a new voice. Its premise is that Spartacus survived the slave rebellion of 73 BC and

BETWEEN TWO FIRES Christopher Buehlman, Ace, 2012, $25.95, hb, 432pp, 9781937007867 It is 1348, and the Black Death has come to wreak its destruction. Thomas, a fallen knight, finds himself in the company of a young Norman girl.

There is an innocence and purity about her that he

Timeslip — Historical Fantasy & Paranormal

finds unsettling. More than that, there is a holiness, one that allows her to see angels and to know what path they must take as they make their way through the cursed countryside.

The world of men has found itself caught between the fires of hell and the war in heaven. Demons and abominations walk the land, and the walls of heaven are besieged. The very throne of God is at stake. And all the hopes of this world lie with this one girl and her reluctant guardian. Thomas must account for his many sins and find the faith he needs to escort the girl to Avignon and aid her in her mission.

Between Two Fires is a dark novel, one full of horrors and a vileness that had me cringing at times. It is full of miracles, demonic beings, and bloody combat. And it is beautiful. The characters are captivating and the action riveting. The world is full, and the story inspiring. It is one of faith, of redemption, and one of loyalties. I recommend this only to stout hearts, but I do so vehemently. I intend to reread the novel and pick up Buehlman’s debut novel.

Justin M. Lindsay BATTLE OF KINGS (US) / PROPHECY: Clash of Kings (UK) M.K. Hume, Atria, 2013, $16/C$18.99, pb, 470pp, 9781476715124 / Headline, 2011, £7.99, pb, 608pp, 9780755371440 First published by Headline in the UK (2011), this is the US paperback edition of Book One of Hume’s series The Merlin Prophecy, itself a prequel to her King Arthur trilogy. The story begins with the conception of Myrddion (Merlin) during his mother’s rape and concludes after the death of Vortimer, Rowena, and Vortigern, as he sets out for the European continent to discover his father’s identity and to further his knowledge of the healing arts. Included are such traditional elements as his mother’s claim that he was fathered by a demon, his vision of the warring dragons, and his prophecy to Vortigern, who plans to sacrifice him to stabilize the foundations of his fortress.

Hume’s major departures from tradition are to make Myrddion a healer and to rationalize the magic. Apart from his “second sight,” he possesses no supernatural powers, rather acquires his various skills from reading, learning, and close observation.

She also offers cultural and psychological explanations for her characters’ actions, notably the rejection of Myrddion by his mother. This does make sense of extreme behavior, but it can impede the flow of the story, especially when the focus shifts to the highly emotional reaction of witnesses.

Hume conjures up a depressingly plausible vision of the real world in which the legend of Arthur is set, a land racked by the cruelty of suspicious and quarrelsome autocrats and the brutality of vengeful warriors, and as a healer, Myrddion must deal with its consequences for innocent and guilty alike. The novel will appeal most strongly to readers with an interest in the harsher side of life in a strife-torn Britain of the 5th century.

Ray Thompson THE PLACE OF DEAD KINGS Geoffrey Wilson, Hodder & Stoughton, 2012, £19.99, hb, 442pp, 9781444721133 In 1855, Britain has been conquered by a magical Indian empire. Only a few small bands of rebels hold out against Rajthana. Jack Casey, a reluctant hero of the resistance, lives in the remote wilds of Shropshire training young rebels to use the empire’s magic. Spies bring news of a rogue Indian sorcerer HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 53

C

E D I TORS’ C H OI C E

SOMETHING RED

Douglas Nicholas, Atria, 2012, $25.00/C$28.99, hb, 315 pp, 97814516600074 In 13th-century England, four travelers try to cross the rugged northwestern Pennines during a harshly cold winter. The formidable but nurturing Molly, her enigmatic granddaughter, Nemain, and Molly’s strange but stalwart lover, Jack, are all more than they seem – as the young apprentice boy, Hob, discovers during the journey. All the troupe’s skills and strongest character traits will be tested as a terrifying, supernatural danger follows them from monastery to inn to castle. It is sheer evil, it is implacable, and they may not be able to stop it.

Partly a medieval historical novel, partly a horror story, and partly a love story – of more than one pair – this tale is seasoned with strong lashings of fantasy, mythology, and coming-of-age. Hard to pigeonhole, this is the debut novel of an award-winning poet. The language is lush and evocative, but the reader is not tempted to linger over the beauty of the prose. The racing plot keeps pages turning, and nervous types should not read this book alone late at night.

The shocking but satisfying resolution does not quite end the story. There is a second ending that is more positive, if a little predictable. The reader who has become engaged with these characters will want more. There is no indication that a sequel is on the way, but fans of Molly, Jack, Nemain, and Hob will be asking, “What’s next?”

This book is highly recommended, even for those who don’t usually like this type of thing.

Give it a try.

Elizabeth Knowles in Scotland who has discovered a mysterious power – could it be the Holy Grail? Jack must find the answer even though he is gravely ill, with only two months to live.

The Place of Dead Kings is the second in a series

by Geoffrey Wilson. Well written, the characters are clearly defined, and the action sequences are stirring and realistic. The plot is believable and builds to a satisfying ending, which leaves the door open for further adventures. This is an interesting mixture of Arthurian legend, fantasy and history. I have not read the first book in the series (Land of Hope and Glory), but this did not detract from my enjoyment of this novel. If you are looking for something a little different, try this.

Mike Ashworth

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children & young adult

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SOPHIA’S WAR Avi, Simon & Schuster, 2012, $16.99/C$18.99, hb, 320pp, 9781442414419 It’s 1776, and 12-year-old Sophia is a patriot trapped in British-occupied New York City. Her father has been injured in the fighting, her brother has been taken prisoner, and she and her family are forced to pose as Loyalists and quarter a British solider in their own home. Despite the dangers, Sophia is fiercely determined to support the patriot cause however she can. But when the British soldier who comes to live with her family turns out to be disarmingly handsome and charming, her loyalties begin to slip. When Sophia gets caught up in Benedict Arnold’s infamous plot to hand over West Point to the British – a scheme her charming Major 54 | Reviews |

HNR Issue 63, February 2013

unknowingly holds the key to destroying. With the help of Will, a gypsy groomsman, and former Order members Lucinda and Oliver, she must conquer a set of elaborate mechanical challenges to find the location of the machine, all the while eluding the people who wish to see her efforts — or herself — terminated.

When I first read the description of this book, I thought it sounded like just another steampunk novel, and unfortunately I was proved correct in many respects; the plot was almost dull in its predictability. What set this book apart was the originality and whimsy of the Amusementists and their mechanical creations: a replica Stonehenge that emerges from the ground, a sea battle between a ship and a mechanical leviathan, and many other wonders, all amazingly described. Overall, I could see a little sloppiness in plot and character development, but the quality of the descriptions and a couple of interesting subplots served to somewhat balance it out. I would recommend this book for girls ages 13-16 but perhaps not for true fans of the steampunk genre.

Magdalen Dobson

Andre is also involved in – she must decide how much she is willing to give up for her country.

Avi is an established master of children’s historical fiction, and so I was disappointed to find that Sophia’s War was not up to his usual standard.

The framing narrative is superfluous and trite (“Dear Reader… on these pages I have dared to put my trust in your heart”); the plot has many dull transitions (“During the next few weeks, things of considerable import happened”); and Sophia herself shifts between being improbably fearless and daring, and improbably faltering and helpless. I didn’t find her relationship with Major Andre quite convincing for a 12-year-old, nor did I find her eventual revenge entirely satisfying. However, the action did pick up considerably near the end of the book, and the final unraveling of the traitorous plot was thoroughly enjoyable to read.

This is a good introduction to the Revolutionary War and Benedict Arnold for younger readers.

More sophisticated readers would do better to turn to Laurie Halse Anderson’s Seeds of America series, or M. T. Anderson’s Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing.

Ann Pedtke

THE HAUNTING OF CHARITY DELAFIELD Ian Beck, Corgi, 2012, £5.99, pb, 281pp, 9780552562065 1903. Twelve-year-old Charity Delafield lives a very restricted life in Stone Gate Hall, a creepy mansion with lots of rooms she’s not allowed to enter. She’s taught at home by her governess, Rose; she’s not allowed to go outside unaccompanied; and her only real companion is her cat, Mr Tomkins.

Her morose father is determined to protect her – but from what?

Charity, however, has a strange persistent dream where she is exploring the forbidden part of the house with Mr Tomkins. She begins to sense that the solution to the mystery lies there – and it’s something to do with her mother, who died when she was born. Then, one day, she meets an old woman who tells her she knew her mother. It’s the first time Charity has been told anything about her. Later, she meets Silas, a chimney sweep, and, suddenly, with Silas’s help, unravelling the secret which has been kept from her begins to seem possible. It just requires courage…

This is a story in the Frances Hodgson Burnett tradition: a lonely child, a missing parent, and a mysterious quest has echoes of A Little Princess; and the touch of magic, the house with forbidden rooms and Charity’s friendship with the chimney sweep’s boy, reflects Mary Lennox’s friendship with country lad Dickon, and the hidden heir of Misslethwaite Manor in The Secret Garden. I loved both books as a child, and I’m sure I’d have enjoyed The Haunting of Charity Delafield, too. Imaginative girls of 9 plus should enjoy this book.

Elizabeth Hawksley

LEGACY OF THE CLOCKWORK KEY Kristin Bailey, Simon Pulse, 2013, $17.99, hb, 416pp, 9781442440265 In Legacy of the Clockwork Key, Meg, a young Victorian woman, loses her parents and all her worldly possessions in a tragic fire and becomes a servant to the mysterious Baron Rathford. When she discovers a secret room in the baron’s apartment, she finds a book detailing the works of the Secret Order of Modern Amusementists, a society her parents and grandfather belonged to, as well as an account of a terrible machine Meg herself

FALLING FOR HENRY Beverley Brenna, Red Deer, 2011, $12.95, pb, 281pp, 9780889954427 Falling for Henry tells the story of Kate, a 16-year-old girl who stumbles upon a hole in time and switches places with the young Spanish princess Katharine of Aragon. She must perfectly impersonate the young queen-to-be in order to avoid changing the course of history and ruining Katharine’s future – and that includes pretending to be in love with the young prince who will become Henry VIII. At the same time, Kate makes the Historical Fantasy & Paranormal — Children & YA

heroic decision to collaborate with one of Henry’s servants and attempt to save a remnant of England’s wolf population from relentless extermination, all the while hiding her attempts from the wrath of her betrothed. Will she be able to keep up the deception as long as she is stranded in the past – and more importantly, will she be able to do so while remaining true to herself?

This book attracted me because of its interesting premise – a young Henry VIII is not a subject many authors like to touch upon, and I am happy to say that I very much enjoyed the way Brenna sketched Prince Henry as a complicated character, with charm and intelligence but also faults of temper and bullheadedness. I admired the fact that she didn’t decide to just pin him as a villain and be done with it, something I see all too often in stories of Henry VIII. Brenna makes an attempt to incorporate pseudo-scientific explanations into Kate’s time travel theories, but I did not find these entirely plausible.

I also found myself frustrated at the lack of depth of character development and setting, which would lead me to recommend this book for ages 11-14 rather than for more mature YA readers.

Magdalen Dobson CROWBOY Philip Caveney, Fledgling Press, 2012, £5.99, pb, 244pp, 9781905916559 This is the story of Tom Afflick, who reluctantly moves from Manchester to Edinburgh with his mother after his parents split up. Immediately he feels like an outsider, a “manky”, both at home, where his mother and her new man only have eyes for each other, and at school, where he’s an easy target because of his Mancunian accent and some unpleasant rumours about his mother’s boyfriend.

On a school trip to Mary King’s Close, a section of an Edinburgh street which has been authentically restored to what it was like in the 17th century, Tom follows a girl dressed in historical clothing and falls through the floor into another dimension. He is now in 1645, the year of the Edinburgh plague.

Here he ends up in an orphanage, and when one of the other children falls ill, he crosses paths with the feared plague doctor, Doctor Rae, who forces Tom to become his apprentice.

Thus begins a chilling adventure, full of surprises and twisty turns. Tom, who has hitherto tried to blend into the background to avoid the school bullies, proves himself to be resourceful and learns to speak up for himself and when he sees an injustice done.

Crowboy is described in rich detail, so rich that you can almost smell the dirt, hear the horses’ clattering hooves, taste the unpalatable food. There’s also a real sense of unease running through the novel as the lines between the past and the present become blurred, and the reader is presented with a number of alternate realities.

Despite the complexities of time travel, which is the subject of Crowboy, the novel is written in a very accessible style, and should appeal to both boys and girls age 10 plus.

Henriette Gyland GREEK MYTHS: Stories of Sun, Stone and Sea Sally Pomme Clayton and Jane Ray, Frances Lincoln, 2012, £14.99, hb, 9781847802279 Sally Pomme Clayton retells ten classic Greek myths, stories which, one way or another, have reechoed in Western literature, music, poetry and theatre ever since.

There are stories of the gods involving themselves Children & YA

in human lives, such as the goddess Athena challenging the over-proud Arachne to a weaving contest – a warning against hubris.

There are the deeds of heroes, such as Perseus’s killing of the Gorgon Medusa. This is a series of stories within a story: Perseus, on pain of death, must bring the king of Argos Medusa’s head; first he asks the gods for help, and they give him a mirror-like shield, a helmet of invisibility and winged sandals.

Then he must kill Medusa and take her head; this is dangerous because her look turns people to stone.

On his way home, he saves the princess Andromeda from a dragon by turning it to stone. He then returns the gods’ gifts and claims Andromeda as his bride. As Sally Pomme Clayton says, human love is something the gods can never enjoy.

There are also tales of spirited girls like Atalanta who can run faster than all her unwanted suitors – until Melanion comes along and, with the help of the goddess of love, tricks her into losing concentration by rolling three golden apples in front of her.

The reader’s pleasure is greatly enhanced by Jane Ray’s subtly stylized illustrations which complement the stories perfectly.

I have been lucky enough to hear the author re-telling Greek legends in one of her storytelling performances before a spellbound audience. She uses the same storytelling technique in this book; the stories are plainly meant to be read out loud. I’m sure that children of 6 and up will be as enchanted as I was.

Elizabeth Hawksley RISE: A Nightshade Novel Andrea Cremer, Philomel, 2013, $18.99/C$20.00, hb, 416pp, 9780399159602 Ember Morrow has fought her family and convention to be allowed to join the Order of the Knights of Conatus based in Tearmunn Keep. But amongst the Order, concern has grown about the true nature of their leader, Eira, and her mysterious henchman, Bosque Mar. With a small band of fellow knights, Ember leaves the Conatus, choosing friendship and love over the demands of her oldest friend, Alistair. Impossibly fast shadow hounds and a murderous sea kraken pursue them, conjured through a portal to another world by Bosque Mar. And when Ember’s beloved, the knight Barrow, is wounded, she is forced to turn back. For the rebellion to succeed, Ember must persuade Eira and Alistair that she has returned to their side and rejected Barrow, choosing to marry Alistair instead.

But Ember does not yet realize the truth about Bosque Mar or the secret experiments that Alistair is undertaking in the cellars of Tearmunn.

Set loosely in 15th-century Scotland, Rise is a young adult novel that blends historical, paranormal, and fantasy elements into a page-turning read.

Ember is a memorable and strong protagonist beset by dangers on all sides and struggling to know her own heart.

This is the fifth novel by Andrea Cremer set in the Nightshade world, and the second with an additional historical setting. In Rift and now in its sequel, Rise, Cremer suggests a fascinating origin for the werewolf legend and weaves rich fantasy and elements of history into a high-octane adventure with huge teen appeal.

Kate Braithwaite JOURNEY TO PLUM CREEK Melodie A. Cuate, Texas Tech Univ. Press, 2012, $17.95, hb, 192pp, 9780896727410 Through the magic of Mr. Barrington’s

mysterious trunk, modern-day middle school students Hannah, Nick, and Jackie travel to 1840s Texas. Hannah and Jackie find themselves captives of a tribe of Comanche. Jackie is adopted by a couple who has recently lost a daughter, but Hannah is beaten by the women of the tribe and given to the shaman and his son as a servant. Nick finds himself in the company of Texas Rangers who are tracking the Comanche tribe to retrieve the captives. The adventure culminates in the battle of Plum Creek, in which many Comanche were killed but the heroic Texans lost only one.

Journey to Plum Creek is the sixth book in this Texas historical time-travel series. The magic of Mr. Barrington’s trunk seemed intricate but confusing, perhaps because I hadn’t read the other books, but my confusion made suspension of disbelief difficult for me. Why did the children time travel?

Were they supposed to accomplish something?

Find something? I just didn’t know. The dialog was effective in presenting historical information to the reader but never seemed like real conversation.

Cuate has won awards for this series, so her fans are likely to understand and be pleased with this most recent installment.

Elizabeth Caulfield Felt VICTORIAN TALES: The Sea Monsters Terry Deary, A & C Black, 2012, £4.99, pb, 58 pp, 9781408154106 1838. History is about to be made. Two steam ships will cross the Atlantic for the very first time.

One is the Great Western, built by the famous engineer Isambard Brunel. The other is the much smaller Sirius, which has sails as well as paddles. Ben Leary, a boiler room boy, is desperate for the Great Western to reach New York before the Sirius. His cousins, Grace and Patrick, are on board the Sirius, and he wants to beat them to it.

But disaster strikes the Great Western. First, there is a fire in the boiler room and then Mr Brunel falls down the stairs and is injured.

To Grace and Patrick’s delight, the Sirius sets off.

Soon, they are four days ahead. Surely they can get there first! But the Sirius begins to run out of coal, and the children know that the Great Western can’t be far behind. If they use the sails, it would mean that they’d lose the title of the first steam ship to cross the Atlantic. Then Grace comes up with a brilliant idea …

What I particularly enjoyed about this book was all the little historically accurate details: what a steam ship journey was like, how hot it was working in the boiler room, how dangerous it was climbing the mast, and so on.

This epic race really happened, and the David beat Goliath in the way the book describes. I enjoyed the way that the story switched from Ben, aboard the Great Western, to Grace and Patrick aboard the Sirius which keeps up the dramatic tension. Helen Flook’s terrific illustrations set off the story perfectly.

Children age 7 plus should enjoy this book.

Elizabeth Hawksley This story is about a race between two ships, but it is also about how people travelled three thousand miles before they had the engines we have now.

Getting the ship to move was very hard work. There were bits that were frightening like when there were fires. When they ran out of coal, they burnt things which were made of wood, which was good thinking. I was glad that they all got there safely in the end. I would have liked to be on board the Sirius because it was the small ship, and it is named after HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 55

a star that I can see if I stay up late. The pictures were funny but interesting because the ships looked complicated with lots of rigging and places to keep the coal for the fires.

William Stockton, age 7 VICTORIAN TALES: Terror on the Train Terry Deary, A & C Black, 2012, £4.99, pb, 58 pp, 9781408154090 Staplehurst, England, 1865. A piece of railway track over the River Beult at Staplehurst needs replacing. Once the express train has passed, the old track is taken up and work begins. Then the gang stops for tea; they have plenty of time to put it back before the next train. One of the gang, young Tommy Bucket, is worried about another train coming before the track’s re-laid. The foreman laughs and shows him the timetable. No train is scheduled to appear, he says, confidently.

On Folkestone station, the boat train is preparing to leave for London. On board is famous author Charles Dickens, with his friend Ellen Ternan, her mother and a maid, Matilda. Matilda is frightened by the hissing steam. Dickens, who travels a lot, reassures her that it’s perfectly safe. He is wrong.

Tommy’s anxiety grows. He goes up the line with a red flag and, to his horror, sees a train approaching: a train the foreman promised him wouldn’t be there.

He tries to attract the engine driver’s attention …

The Staplehurst railway accident is famous because of Charles Dickens’s involvement. He worked tirelessly to help those who were trapped to get out and to care for the wounded. It is a welldocumented incident. Deary has made a story out of it by introducing several fictional characters who have their own take on the disaster.

I’m afraid it doesn’t quite work for me, mainly because Dickens’s role has been altered. For example, he didn’t send Tommy or anyone else into the teetering carriage to retrieve the next episode of Our Mutual Friend but went in himself to get his brandy flask to offer to the wounded.

Helen Flook’s illustrations are suitably evocative and complement the story nicely. Children of 7 plus should enjoy it.

Elizabeth Hawksley I liked how Terry Deary kept switching characters and how he used someone famous in the book, Dickens. I actually think it was perfect; it has chaos, death and trains. However, I would have liked more detail, such as describing how the train smashed and what happened after, how people felt and what exactly happened. The title tells you what will happen in the book which can be good or bad, but in this book it is okay but I think it should be called something like Train Crash, which is short and snappy. Terror on the Train gives away that there will be terror.

I think the age for reading this book is 7-10. I would like to read another one of his books.

Louis McNulty, age 9 BACK TO BLACKBRICK Sarah Moore Fitzgerald, Orion, 2013, £9.99, hb, 240pp, 9781444006599 This beautifully-written time-slip novel explores memory loss, grief and family relationships. It’s narrated in a lively 21st-century voice by Cosmo, who lives with his grandparents. We learn that Cosmo’s mother has gone to Australia to work and that his brother Brian died in an accident. His grandfather, Kevin, is in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease, and Cosmo searches the internet trying to find a way 56 | Reviews |

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to reverse his beloved grandfather’s memory loss.

But Kevin deteriorates, and it seems he will have to go into a care home. At this critical moment, he gives Cosmo a key. He tells his grandson he must open the gates of Blackbrick Abbey with it and promises that he will be waiting for him there, on the other side of the gates. Cosmo goes – and finds himself in the past, face to face with 16-year-old Kevin, who is working at Blackbrick as a stable boy during World War II. The events that follow involve love, loss, and the birth of a child. Cosmo plays a part in his own grandfather’s past, and eventually this helps the whole family to reach a place of understanding and acceptance.

Despite the sad subject matter, this is not at all a gloomy book. Cosmo’s narrative voice and his reactions to the adults around him make sure of that. The story is involving and kept me reading.

There is a powerful sense of the rural past – particularly the hard work, the uncomfortable beds, and the cold. I liked the respect for the work done by the young employees at Blackbrick and for their real intelligence and skill – even though they could neither read nor write and could not see much use for such things. The character of Kevin – so confident, brave and determined – is particularly well developed.

Recommended for readers of 12 and over.

Ann Turnbull SIRENS Janet Fox, Speak, 2012, $7.99, pb, 384pp, 9780142424308 Josephine Winter is sent to New York City to stay with her aunt and uncle, but she’d rather be home with her family, finishing high school and preparing for college. New York City is a playground for young women in 1925 – a land of flappers and speakeasies, of gangsters’ molls and bootleg gin – and Josephine finds herself swept up in the excitement. Her cousin, Melody, is a carefree flapper, and Melody’s friend Louise is the girlfriend of Danny Connor, one of the city’s most dangerous gangsters. Jo has her own tie to Danny Connor – her father and brother are in trouble with Danny for reasons that Jo is trying to figure out. As Jo starts to unravel her family’s secrets, she finds herself in danger, too.

Sirens has plenty of appeal for teen readers, both in the setting and in the characters. There’s plenty of glamour and intrigue inherent in a 1920s setting, and Jo’s search for her place in the world, as well as her quest to figure out what happened to her brother and save her family, will captivate readers’ interest.

Fox keeps the tension high and the pacing steady, alternating between Josephine’s linear narrative and Louise’s description of future events, and the ending is satisfying. Readers age 12 and older will enjoy Josephine’s journey of self-discovery.

Nanette Donohue BRAVE MUSIC OF A DISTANT DRUM Manu Herbstein, Red Deer, 2012, $12.95, pb, 220pp, 9780889954700 In the early 19th century, Zacharias is introduced to his mother in Portuguese Brazil. The two have not met for many years because they are both enslaved, held separate by different masters. At first Zacharias is repelled by Ama. She is old and blind, ugly to his eyes, and she calls him by an un-Christian name, Kwame Zumbi. Zacharias, a clerk for the United Kingdom consul, wonders whether she can actually be his mother.

Only after Ama asks him to write down her life

does Zacharias begin to understand. Ama was stolen from her African village as a young woman and has been passed from one master to another. She has been raped, lashed, had one eye torn out, and has been treated kindly and promised her freedom only to see it denied. Ama has loved two men and seen both of them brutally slain, and she has had her infant son taken from her arms. In short, Ama’s life echoes the experience of at least twenty million Africans who were forced into slavery.

Manu Herbstein, a Ghanaian/South African, tapped research for a previous, award-winning book about Ama for his 2012 Brave Music of a Distant Drum. The scars of slavery have never healed, and Mr. Herbstein hopes that Brave Music will introduce new readers to the “fetish of slavery” and keep the debate open with his echoes from that distant drum. Brave Music is intended for readers 16 and over. This book is not a pleasant read, but it is a horrific and compelling message from all of our pasts which must not be forgotten.

Jo Ann Butler JEPP, WHO DEFIED THE STARS Katherine Marsh, Hyperion, 2012, $16.99, hb, 376pp, 9781423135005 Jepp, Who Defied the Stars is a story about a little man who reminds us that anything is obtainable if you stay strong and have faith. Jepp lives in a small village in the late 16th-century Spanish Netherlands, where he cultivates an interest in the stars and astrology. But his life changes when a courtier of the Infanta Isabella seeks him out to become a court dwarf. Jepp becomes one of the dwarves serving as entertainers at the Palace of Coudenberg, and his new life is filled with daily injustices and humiliations. When treachery and jealousy in the court cause Jepp to be sent away to a remote island, he meets Tycho Brahe, a brilliant astronomer who spends long nights studying the stars and planets.

Though Tycho dismisses Jepp’s own knowledge of the stars, the astronomer’s daughter Magdalene discovers Jepp in the library and a mutual respect soon blooms between them. With Magdalene’s help, Jepp strives to prove his worth to his new master and find the answers to his own mysterious past.

This book offers a peek into the lives of dwarfs and midgets in early history – with all of the injustices and prejudices that occurred – told in the voice of a brave and intelligent young hero. The fascination with the “little people” in the royal courts of the period was well documented and researched, and I found this book to be an interesting read, one difficult to set aside for long.

Beth Turza VICTORIA REBELS Carolyn Meyer, Simon & Schuster, 2013, $16.99, hb, 272pp, 9781416987291 Princess Victoria will be Queen of England sometime in the future. Everything about her life is under constant examination and comment from those who are grooming her for this incredible role.

As this novel is based on the real princess’s actual journals, the reader carefully follows the people closest to Victoria, for they anticipate what kind of person she will be and how she will rule.

Victoria’s mother is a widow and has allowed Sir John Conroy to run her life. Victoria is helpless to stop him from doing the same when she’s young, but hate him she does, as the reader can discern from the capital letters and underlined portions in her journal, which also indicate a fiery temper. At times she comes across as a precocious brat and at other Children & YA

times as a wise woman who wants to model her life on her heroine, Queen Elizabeth I. When Victoria is 17, the discussions begin about her future marriage. At the same time, Sir John Conroy tries to coerce Victoria into making him part of the royal government after she becomes queen, but Victoria is adamant, rejecting anyone’s counsel on this matter. Her assumption of the throne after the death of King William and her marriage to Prince Albert make for fascinating reading. Young adult readers will be able to relate to this traditional yet rebellious young girl who was so soon to become the longest-ruling British monarch.

Very nicely done.

Viviane Crystal

Walter Tull, son of a white English mother and a black father from Barbados. Walter was brought up in an orphanage and, later, became a professional footballer and the only black officer in the British Army during World War I. He was killed in 1918 and has no known grave.

There is an interesting postscript about how the author’s discovery of Walter Tull and an afterword on Walter Tull’s own life, as well as stories of modern black soldiers whose bravery, at last, is honoured as it should be.

A Medal for Leroy is a moving story, sympathetically illustrated by Michael Foreman, which will appeal to children of 10 plus.

Elizabeth Hawksley

A MEDAL FOR LEROY Michael Morpurgo, HarperCollins, 2012, £12.99, hb, 233pp, 9780007487516 1940s. Michael lives in London with French mother, Christine. His father, Roy, was a Spitfire pilot killed in a dogfight over the Channel before Michael was born. Every few months, he and Christine visit Aunties Pish and Snowdrop, who brought up the orphaned Roy after his mother was killed in a Zeppelin air-raid during World War I. Michael longs to know more about his father, but nobody will talk about him. All Michael has is his father’s medal and the company of Jasper, his father’s beloved dog – and it’s not nearly enough.

When he’s 13, things change. Auntie Snowdrop dies and Auntie Pish falls ill. Michael and Christine take in Jasper – to Michael’s delight. Then a parcel arrives containing Auntie Snowdrop’s photo of his father and, hidden behind the frame, a writing pad.

In it, Auntie Snowdrop tells the real story of both his father and his grandfather, Leroy, a World War I hero.

This book is about family secrets and the cost of keeping them hidden. It’s also about the emotional adjustments that must be made when the truth comes out. Leroy’s story is inspired by the life of

HITLER’S ANGEL William Osborne, Chicken House, 2012, £6.99, pb, 320pp, 9781908435088 The exciting premise of this book is to take two German children who have escaped the Nazis and send them back into harm’s way. They have a special mission to kidnap a girl, and the agent who recruits them tells them the war may come to an end if they succeed. What follows is a high octane thriller: plenty of chases, escapes and tension, which begin just about on this side of believable, but escalate to Bond-scale improbability as the protagonists eviscerate an entire crack SS unit on the snowy slopes of the Alps.

There is plenty to like in terms of pace and adventure, but the book fails for me on the emotional level. The heart of the story from the children’s point of view is the fate of their families, and one of the characters does return home, but the scene is not resolved satisfactorily and probably could not be.

Our sentiments are also engaged by the girl who is kidnapped, but the plot then simplifies down to whether or not she will survive, and the author makes the wrong choice. Are these editorial errors?

Perhaps. There are a couple of careless scenes that I felt could have been easily improved, and some lines

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WATCHING JIMMY

E D I TORS’ C H OI C E

Nancy Hartry, Tundra, 2012, $9.95/C$10.99/£6.99, pb, 160pp, 9781770493605 It’s 1958, and Canada doesn’t yet have universal health care. That’s bad news for Jimmy, who was braindamaged by his “Uncle” Ted and needs an operation.

Uncle Ted tells everyone that Jimmy fell from a swing, but Carolyn, Jimmy’s friend and this little book’s heroine, saw what really happened. She’s determined to keep Jimmy safe from Uncle Ted from here on out.

Watching Jimmy is a fast read, and that’s a good thing, since once started it’s impossible to put down.

The only thing I didn’t like was the scary cover art.

Carolyn’s bravery rings true; the book feels honest and her voice is just right. Readers understand that there’s no guarantee of a happy ending but are left with hope for one. A cameo appearance by Canada’s most-loved political figure, Tommy Douglas, who instituted single-payer health care for every Canadian, was icing on this cake of a book. Watching Jimmy has deservedly won many honors, including the Canadian Library Association’s Book of the Year for Children Award. In fact, this book is so good that its target reader age, “9 and up,” should be taken literally: adults as well as younger readers will love it.

O Canada – what a great book! Warmly recommended.

Kristen Hannum Children & YA

that I would certainly have wanted rewritten: ‘Otto hadn’t moved a centimetre or a muscle for the last ten minutes.’ But it is the emotional arc that I felt was really out of kilter – so much so that my son did not read the last two chapters.

Will appeal to boys of 11 plus.

Richard Lee SPELLBOUND: Tales of Enchantment from Ancient Ireland Siobhan Parkinson & Olwyn Whelan, Frances Lincoln, 2012, £14.99, hb, 64pp, 9781847801401 This original book is described as a collection of ‘seven magical stories from Ancient Ireland, told for younger children by the Irish Children’s Laureate, with beautiful colour illustrations.’

The language used is, as expected, skilful so that the words flow smoothly as the tales are explained in an absorbing way, drawing in the young listener as the stories unfold. They would have no doubt originally have been passed down the generations by word of mouth. Now, captured in print, they have a chance to live again for years to come. They vary in length and complexity, providing some quite challenging stories for young children to understand, including intricate relationships, plots and themes as they often span time in years.

The hierarchy of the culture of Ireland’s heritage is shown with its High King and other monarchs mentioned, which gives the feel of the ancient eras around the telling of the legends. To support the reader who will read these tales of a bygone age to today’s young audience, the book has been beautifully illustrated by Olwyn Whelan.

Valerie Loh GODS AND WARRIORS Michelle Paver, Puffin, 2012, £12.99, hb, 295pp, 9780141339269 1500 BC, Bronze Age Greece. Eleven-yearold Hylas is a goat boy, a nobody, but, even so, mysterious black-armoured warriors are pursuing him to the death. Why him?

When a dying man gives him a precious bronze dagger and urges him to seek out the dolphins, Hylas has no choice. He must flee or die. He has two friends: the stroppy Pirra, a high priestess’s daughter, and the dolphin, Spirit. Somehow, with their help, he must stay alive and leave his island home. And so his quest begins.

Michelle Paver’s books are known for their strong characters, thrilling action and heart-pumping pace.

Gods and Warriors, the first in her new Bronze Age adventure series, is no exception. My heart was in my mouth from the opening sequence with Hylas, an obsidian arrow piercing his arm, desperate to escape the fearsome warriors pursuing him. They have already killed his dog, and his little sister is missing. What did they want? I didn’t know, but I was desperate to find out.

Historically, I found this book very interesting. I have visited various Bronze Age sites in Greece, and they are worlds away from the Greece of Classical times. This is a world of warring tribes desperate for the latest military technology: bronze weaponry. For that they need access to copper and tin and both are in short supply.

It is also a world of magic and superstition. The orderly Greek pantheon of gods is in the future; Hylas’s Bronze Age world worships the Lady of the Wild Things and the Earthshaker, both of whom are unpredictable and must be placated. The scenes with the dolphin, Spirit, desperate to help this alien human creature, are entirely credible. I’m sure HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 57

that confident readers of 9 plus will love this book.

Highly recommended.

Elizabeth Hawksley TIMBER WOLF Caroline Pignat, Red Deer Press, 2011, $12.95, pb, 288pp, 9780889954595 When young Jack Byrne wakes alone in the snow, he can’t even remember his name. He is badly injured, lost deep in the northern Canadian wilderness, and all he has is a pocket knife. That knife saves his life when he finds a snared rabbit and starts a fire with a flint. It also provides the only link to Jack’s past, for he remembers his father giving him that knife. Jack is assisted in his struggle to survive by a pair of Algonquin Indians, though the relationship is difficult. And why does a wolf cub keep following Jack?

Timber Wolf is third in an award-winning YA series about the Byrne family, but this intriguing tale stands well on its own. Pignat presents us with a world stripped to its bones by winter, in which both her readers and Jack must figure out who is friend and who is foe. When Jack’s memories begin to return, he realizes that it is his own folly which led to his abandonment. He also forges a friendship with the Algonquins. They have saved his life, but Jack must come to grips with his mistakes and guilt before he can remember who he really is and find his way home.

Jo Ann Butler LIBERTY’S CHRISTMAS Randall Platt, Texas Tech Univ. Press, 2012, $19.95, hb, 190pp, 9780896727663 Main cast of characters: Liberty Justice Jones, recently expelled from high school; draft horse Quiller, and Rudy García, young hobo. Time and place: Depression-era Texas. Story: Liberty’s college fund has gone to pay debts on her family’s tree farm, but the Joneses still owe the bank more money.

She learns of a Christmas tree contest with a $500 prize, and steals the town’s Christmas tree that her grandfather planted decades earlier. With Rudy and Quiller’s help, she attempts to get the tree to Austin in time to win the contest, get money for the farm, and maybe have enough left to pay for college.

Saving the family farm is a familiar children’s book plot, but Platt gives the story several interesting twists. Liberty excelled in science class but is frustrated by college science scholarships always being awarded to boys. Rudy García may be riding the rails and despised as a “chili eater” by many Anglos, but his family has lived in Texas longer than most whites. Liberty discovers that her prejudices against rich and powerful people aren’t necessarily justified. Local color, enjoyable characters, and steeping the reader in period detail all result in an engrossing young adult novel.

B.J. Sedlock SAILOR TWAIN: OR, THE MERMAID IN THE HUDSON Mark Siegel, First Second Books, 2012, $24.99/ C$28.99, hb, 400pp, 9781596436367 Set in New York at the turn of the century, Sailor Twain evokes the Gilded Age steamboat era on the Hudson River. This beautiful graphic novel features Captain Twain, a young riverboat captain of innocent nature and upstanding morals, who faithfully serves his ship and sends money home to his ailing wife, while secretly yearning for something more. His foil is Lafayette, the dashing Frenchman who has managed the business since his brother’s 58 | Reviews |

HNR Issue 63, February 2013

mysterious disappearance, but who spends more time flirting with passengers than attending to ship affairs. The two men strike up a delicate balance – until one night Twain pulls an injured mermaid from the waters of the Hudson, and everything changes. Where has the mermaid come from? What does she want? What is her connection to Lafayette?

And can Twain resist her magnetic pull when he and his wife have grown so far apart?

Mark Siegel beautifully evokes the rich atmosphere of the Hudson River Valley, and uses strategic composition to create truly extraordinary cinematic effects. However, I was occasionally thrown off by the stark differences in artistic portrayals: while many of the characters are drawn with great realism, Twain and his wife have the round eyes and simplistic, cartoonish features of a Raggedy Ann and Andy. Perhaps this was meant to emphasize their relative innocence and purity, but the effect was overdone, and it proved difficult to concentrate on scenes where starkly contrasting characters interacted on the same artistic plane.

Overall, however, the graphic effects were captivating, and I was entranced by both the artwork and the story. With nudity and occasional sex scenes, this is a graphic novel for older teens, not for younger readers. Teens and adults who pick up Sailor Twain for a quick glance will soon be completely absorbed in this book’s marvelous world.

Ann Pedtke THE CURSE OF THE BODY SNATCHERS Keith Souter, Golden Guides, 2012, £7.99, pb, 174pp, 9781780950037 Jack Moon is a 12-year-old boy living on the streets in 1850s London. His friend has died, and Jack buries him secretly, at night. Jack tries to struggle on alone until he is taken up by a phrenologist, Professor Stackpool. At a public demonstration, Jack protests against the professor’s analysis of his character from the bumps on his head and is supported by a wealthy judge, Sir Lionel. The professor is challenged to prove his theories, and Jack is employed as a servant in attendance on Sir Lionel’s granddaughter, Olivia.

The children become friends, but Olivia suffers from a mysterious illness, and Sir Lionel has been cursed by a disgruntled family of body snatchers.

Jack is caught up in their lives and must struggle through many dangers to prove himself.

The supernatural hovers round the edges of this story, as do questions of belief and superstition. But the characters lack the depth which would take us fully into the historical period. The story is told by Jack, whose resilience is of superhuman proportions.

He survives an escape from a burning building, near drowning in the Thames and concussion, without slowing down or becoming seriously ill. The plot is so complicated that the villains eventually have to explain themselves at some length.

On the other hand, the story works as melodrama. I was caught up in the action and wanted to know how the complications would be resolved. There is plenty of effective period detail about pure finding, bleeding for medical purposes and spiritualism as well as phrenology and body snatching. The locations range from graveyards at night and deserted warehouses to the Egyptian Hall in Piccadilly. Jack’s enthusiasm and courage are engaging and the book as a whole is an entertaining read.

For boys of 8 plus.

Sandra Unerman

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nonfiction

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FOUNDATION: The History of England from its Earliest Beginnings to the Tudors Peter Ackroyd, St. Martin’s, 2012, $29.99, hb, 495pp, 9781250003614 / Pan, 2012, £9.99, pb, 356pp, 9780330544283 This volume is the first in an anticipated sixvolume history Ackroyd is writing following England from its first inhabitants to the present day.

This installment begins with the first people to settle England and ends with the death of Henry VII. Ackroyd is known for his ability to bring history to life with his original insights and aptitude for making nonfiction read like a novel, so it is surprising this book feels a little flat. Perhaps because of its epic scope, it often reads like a dry summary of battles and the succession of kings. Interspersed are some chapters on daily life during the period, describing housing, the weather, and medical practices. These chapters are engaging and leave the reader wanting more. Unfortunately, they are few and far between.

The book picks up a little with the rule of Richard I, but even Ackroyd’s depiction of Henry II’s sons’ battle against their father (and each other) for power lacks the drama one might expect.

Not a book for the casual reader. Recommended for only the most serious history enthusiasts.

Janice Derr ROYAL ROMANCES Leslie Carroll, NAL, 2012, $16.00, 436pp, 9780451238085 The goings-on of history’s royal families are of perennial interest to those not lucky enough to born a prince or princess. In Royal Romances, author Leslie Carroll delves into this well-loved subject with fervor. Twelve royals are profiled: from the rather obscure Charles VII of France to modernday Prince William of Wales. Each section features an introduction to the era and the royal in question, followed by individual passages on the women or men involved in the romance.

Overall, the entries make for fascinating reading, though at times there is a little too much detail. As a result, the pace sometimes slows to a crawl. And with the exception of the entries on England’s George VI and Prince William, all of the romances discussed focus on affairs with both suitable and unsuitable paramours. While salaciousness makes for fun reading, a few imperial love matches can be found in history. Counterbalancing the torrid passions of the nobility with some good old-fashioned “Happily Ever After” would have made this book really shine.

Nonetheless, Leslie Carroll knows her subject and handles it well. Those obsessed with the back door romantic dealings of Europe’s royalty will find treasure in Royal Romances.

Caroline Wilson ISLAND: How Islands Transform the World J. Edward Chamberlin, BlueBridge, 2013, $19.95, pb, 256pp, 9781933346564 Island is a compact but dense study of ocean islands from cultural, biological, geological, literary, and historical perspectives. There is much interesting information in this small volume. Islands constitute the majority of the world’s smallest countries; islands are distinguished by an astonishing variety of fauna and flora, much of which is unique to the Children & YA — Nonfiction

island environment; and, with their volcanic origins, are a microcosm of the development of life on the planet.

Separate chapters describe the storytelling traditions and creation myths of islands, their actual geological formation, the discovery and population of islands by humans and other species, and the island as a place in literature and imagination. The wealth of fascinating detail makes for an instructive and entertaining read. In Island, author Chamberlin represents ocean and lake islands as standing for “much of what we dread, and much of what we desire… they may well define what it is to be human.”

Eva Ulett RETURN OF A KING William Dalrymple, Bloomsbury, 2013, £25.00, hb, 538pp, 9781408818305 / Knopf, 2013, $30.00, hb, 544pp, 9780307958280 In the spring of 1839, British forces invaded Afghanistan for the first time, ostensibly to reestablish Shah Shuja ul-Malik on the throne he had been evicted from 30 years previously. In reality this was a cover for a blatant expansion of British interests, challenging a perceived, but in reality nonexistent, threat from the Russian Empire. On the way in, the British faced little resistance, and the Shah was restored to his throne. However, after two years the Afghan people rose in anger against a perceived occupation, under a puppet ruler, by a people who had little or no regard for the Afghan people or their culture. The First Afghan War ended in Britain’s greatest military humiliation of the 19th century.

Dalrymple has used a wide range of sources, including previously undiscovered material, to produce what is an authoritative history of the First Afghan War. Told through characters on both sides of the conflict, the book provides a remarkable story of military and political incompetence and a disregard of an ancient civilization which still echoes today. Dalrymple has produced a highly readable book which will appeal to both student and lay person alike. Highly recommended.

Mike Ashworth CAPITAL CRIMES: Seven Centuries of London Life and Murder Max Décharné, Random House, 2012, £20, hb, 416pp, 9781847945907 London, as one of the world’s principal cities for many years, has been the focus for incalculable crimes and misdemeanours, and the setting for human behaviour in all its depravity and cruelty. The author takes a number of murders and killings in London, known as capital crimes, i.e., which attracted the death penalty, from 1380 onwards. Each case is discussed in some detail, using contemporary sources wherever possible. This is interesting in itself, but with the accompanying analysis of London’s changing historical topography as well as the developments in society and society’s attitudes towards crime and punishment, each chapter is an absorbing read. The narratives are expertly written, informative, accessible and yet engaging.

Doug Kemp THE PEOPLE SPEAK Colin Firth & Anthony Arnove, Canongate, 2012, £17.99, 529pp, 9780857864451 You probably know Colin Firth better as an actor than an author, so it may be no surprise to learn that The People Speak began as a stage performance and became a TV programme before becoming a book.

Nonfiction

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EMERALD STAR

E D I TORS’ CH OICE

Jacqueline Wilson, Doubleday, 2012, £12.99, hb, 419pp, 9780857531056 1891. Fourteen-year-old Hetty Feather has had a life of adventure but also tragedy. Left in an orphanage as a baby, she was fostered with the Cotton family. Later, she went into service – but was sacked. Then, she met her real mother and earned a living as ‘Emerald, the Amazing Pocket-sized Mermaid’ in ‘Mr Clarendon’s Seaside Curiosities’.

Now her mother is dead, Hetty is searching for her unknown father. All she knows is that his name’s Bobbie, he has red hair like hers, he’s a sailor and he lives in the fishing village of Monksby.

She longs for a proper family of her own and dreams of living with her father and looking after him. Reality is sadly different. Bobbie may welcome her, but his wife and children certainly don’t, and she can’t bear gutting fish all day. Then comes a letter from her foster brother, Jem Cotton, telling her that his father has died. She hasn’t seen the Cottons since she was 5, but that doesn’t stop her impulsively rushing off to help. Surely with them she will find the loving family she craves.

Life has a number of lessons to teach Hetty: to separate dreams from reality, to understand that you can’t force people to accept you, and, above all, to learn the importance of being yourself. But who is she? I love how Hetty is constantly tested and always (after a struggle) comes up trumps in unexpected ways.

I really enjoyed this book. I hadn’t read the first two Hetty Feather books, but it wasn’t a problem. All you need to know is cunningly woven into the story. It’s emotionally truthful, moving, and wise. I’d have loved it as a child. It should appeal to girls of 9 plus, especially those who are going through difficult times.

Elizabeth Hawksley The project was inspired by A People’s History of the United States by Howard Zinn, which began as a book and became a series of readings.

Like its American counterpart, The People Speak is a compilation of brief extracts from the speeches and writings of various radicals and dissenters. It includes nearly 200 contributions ranging from Karl Marx to ‘pensioner Nellie’ (describing the Poll Tax revolt of 1990). At over 500 pages with no narrative thread this is not a book to read, but rather to dip into. It probably works better in dramatised form.

Edward James NANCY: The Story of Lady Astor Adrian Fort, Jonathan Cape, 2012, £25, hb, 378pp, 9780224090162 / St. Martin’s, 2013, $25.99, hb, 400pp, 9780312599034 This new biography of Nancy, Lady Astor (18791964) charts her astonishing life with wit and a lively intelligence. She was born in Virginia to a povertystricken family devastated by the American Civil War. Eventually, her father recouped his fortune and Nancy was successfully launched into the cream of English society. Her marriage in 1906 to Waldorf Astor, newspaper tycoon and MP for Plymouth, enabled her to become a brilliant political hostess at Cliveden where she prided herself on inviting a wide range of guests who might otherwise never have met each other. She was, in modern parlance, a facilitator.

After her husband’s retirement from politics in 1919, she stood for his seat in Plymouth and became the first woman to enter Parliament. She did not have an easy ride, meeting a wall of prejudice and, often, downright rudeness and obstruction.

Nevertheless, she set herself to make a difference for all women, not just her Plymouth constituents.

As Fort puts it, “MPs and the Party Whips seemed suddenly to find in much proposed legislation a women’s side that previously they had not appeared to notice.” During the ´20s and ´30s a raft of legislation affecting women, ranging from pensions and a register for nurses to divorce and property, reached the statute book.

It wasn’t all triumph, however. Nancy had a tendency to bully which could alienate people, and many in Parliament were relieved to see her step down in 1945. However, that fault in no way diminishes her achievements, which were considerable. Well worth reading. I enjoyed it.

Elizabeth Hawksley THE DEADLY SISTERHOOD Leonie Frieda, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2012, £25, hb, 403pp, 9780297852087 / Harper, 2013, $32.50, hb, 432pp, 9780061563089 After her much lauded biography of Catherine de’ Medici, Frieda has shifted her chronological focus back a few years and broadened it to a cast of eight formidable 15th-century women. Some were related by blood (like the sisters Beatrice and Isabella d’Este), others by marriage (like Lucrezia Tornabuoni, mother of Lorenzo and Giuliano de’Medici, and her daughter-in-law, the Roman aristocrat Clarice Orsini), but all were renowned either as beauties – particularly Lucrezia Borgia and Giulia Farnese – political brides (like Isabella d’Aragona), or viragos like Caterina Sforza.

Frieda’s skill lies not so much in having researched these eight women’s lives – some of whom have HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 59

been the subject of recent, often revisionist research – but in linking them to form a saga spanning an extraordinarily complex and dynamic period of history in the Italian peninsula with its patchwork of major and minor city‑states and principalities ruled – apparently, as Frieda adds – by men. As Burckhardt first pointed out, this was the golden age of bastards in Italy, where men and women born on either side of the marriage vows could seize political control and ride the crested waves of Fortune. This libidinous, opportunistic age ended dramatically in the horrific violence of the Sack of Rome, and the years that followed it ushered in a stricter sense of legitimacy – of birth, nationality and religion – but many of the women who became influential in it were descended from these extraordinary 15th-century women whose lives are charted so magnificently here.

Lucinda Byatt

BBC series Downton Abbey and Upstairs, Downstairs.

Beyond the atmosphere it offers the curious soap opera aficionado, the text provides a fascinating glimpse into one woman’s experiences in service to families of means during the early part of the 20th century. Tom Quinn, editor of Country Landowner magazine, having spent 20 years interviewing people who worked in domestic service, focuses on Nancy Jackman for this book, using her words to describe her rise from lowly skivvy as an innocent ploughman’s daughter to respected cook and, later in retirement, owner of her own home. Mrs. Jackman’s stories of the hardships she suffered along the way, peppered with idiosyncrasies of the gentry (“I don’t want the shame of dying without ever making [my own] tea.”) ring true. She doesn’t sound bitter and often seems sorry for those who employed her and were themselves so helpless.

Kathryn Johnson

THE HISTORICAL NOVEL IN NINETEENTH-CENTURY EUROPE: Representations of Reality in History and Fiction Brian Hamnett, Oxford Univ. Press, 2012, $110/£60, hb, 352pp, 9780199695041 Hamnett sets himself two major tasks. The first might be more intriguing to the casual reader: to explain why the historical novel, initially so acclaimed, had lost its prestige as a literary form by the mid-19th century. Its parallel development to professional historiography gradually meant that historical novelists could not match the historians for sheer scholarship. Soon, practitioners of both forms grew increasingly uncomfortable with how historical fiction blurred two incompatible modes of representing reality (i.e., fact and fiction). Historical novelists also had difficulty keeping current with new novelistic techniques and the increasing emphasis on psychology over plot – Eliot’s Romula and Flaubert’s Salammbo represent two experiments that failed to incorporate the new literary developments.

Hamnett’s second task is more problematic – upholding the “literariness” of the genre by carefully distinguishing between serious and non-serious historical fiction. On one hand, the genre laudably discovers “truths concerning the human situation in time” while portraying “human consciousness of broader social movements through fictional techniques” (13). On the other hand, by strictly equating the “serious” to the “literary,” Hamnett systematically excludes the bulk of popular historical fiction – certainly an important vehicle for conditioning historical understanding and consciousness of society in time. Worse, literariness in a historical novel basically becomes an evanescent quality. When the “issues prevailing at particular moments in the history of specific societies” pass, the intrinsic instabilities of the form become exposed (307), and the individual novel becomes dated. All in all, however, Hamnett’s reflections on the beginnings of the genre, and his account of the mutual development of historical fiction and academic history, are perhaps the best on the topic.

His work is a boon for academic and non-academic readers alike.

Dennis Wise

TOMBSTONE: The Great Chinese Famine, 1958-1962 Yang Jisheng (trans. Stacy Mosher and Guo Jian), Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2012, $35.00/C$40.00, hb, 656pp, 9780374277932 / Allen Lane, 2012, 30.00, hb, 656pp, 9781846145186 This extraordinary and important book is based on 20 years of research on the horrific failure of the Great Leap Forward in China in the mid-20th century. It is written by a Beijing-based Chinese journalist. The highly readable English translation is a condensation of a longer Chinese text published in Hong Kong (though not in most of China). Yang describes the Great Famine which killed more than 30 million Chinese. Chapters detailing the fates of ordinary people alternate with political analysis.

The author’s courage and emotional investment make the book compelling and hard to put down.

How, he demands, did these things happen? He concludes the culprit was a totalitarian political system which stripped most Chinese of any effective way to oppose policies that became murderous. One closes this book shaken by the panorama of suffering and, like Yang, hoping that China peacefully evolves into a full-fledged democracy.

Phyllis T. Smith

THE COOK’S TALE: Life Below Stairs As It Really Was Nancy Jackman with Tom Quinn, Coronet/ Trafalgar Square, 2012, $11.95/£6.99, pb, 247pp, 9781444735895 This nonfiction book will appeal to admirers of 60 | Reviews |

HNR Issue 63, February 2013

PATTON: Blood, Guts, and Prayer Michael Keane, Regnery History, 2012, $27.95/ C$30.50, hb, 256pp, 9781596983267 In the acknowledgements, Michael Keane describes his work as focused on General George S. Patton’s “formative and guiding principles”. To accomplish this, the author has structured the book in three parts with carefully chosen incidents to expose the man behind the legend. Part I – Blood – describes Patton’s heritage as one steeped in heroes, military tradition, and a father who regretted his decision not to join the army. The section’s concluding chapter is dedicated to Beatrice, a woman who believed in her husband’s destiny and was a steadying force throughout their marriage.

Part II – Guts – offers pivotal examples of Patton’s courage and command mixed with episodes for which he was severely criticized. In the final part – Prayer – the reader learns of a man whose faith sustained and motivated him to accomplish great success amidst the frequent possibility of death.

Those who knew Patton described him as spectacular, deeply religious, profane, irascible, kindhearted, lacking judgment, easily moved to anger, brash, boastful, humble, uncertain, and brilliant. Though the timeline is occasionally

confusing, Michael Keane weaves facts drawn from biographies, family papers, speeches, and Patton’s personal diaries to illustrate the complexities of this famous soldier while telling a compelling story of dedication and leadership.

Mary Tod THE GRAVES ARE WALKING: The Great Famine and the Saga of the Irish People John Kelly, Holt, 2012, $20.95 hb, 395pp, 9780805091847 John Kelly’s account of the Irish potato famine is a thoroughly researched and smoothly written story of the events that led to the famine and efforts to bring relief. He covers it all: from the disease that caused the European-wide potato failure to the policies and philosophies of the British to the Anglo-Irish landowners, and cultural prejudices about the Irish. Kelly places the blame on the British but shows in detail how the thinkers of the day believed in a moral and social philosophy that was at odds with giving the Irish the help that was required.

This is a factual account of a tragedy that tore at heartstrings, because it is contains accounts of people and places that make up my family tree.

My heart broke as I read the stories of eviction, mass graves, and epic stupidity in policy-making and famine relief. I understand now why my ancestors left Mayo and Down for the difficult life of coalmining in Scotland, and why my Donegal ancestors fared a little better living in a remote area by the sea. They harvested, along with fish and seaweed, a deep distrust of the British. Indeed, it is hard to read this book without feeling anger and frustration at the British policies and the cruelty of land owning gentry, which led to genocide.

Geri C. Gibbons THE JOY OF SEXUS Vicki León, Walker, 2013, $17.00, pb, 320pp, 9780802719973 Anyone who reads or writes about the ancient world has to wonder how human sexuality was expressed in those days. Was it overt, or kept behind closed doors – or whatever passed for closed doors before the doorknob was invented? Vicki León answers these questions in her 2013 nonfiction The Joy of Sexus.

Exploring sexuality from the beginning of humankind to Nero’s infamous appetites, and from contraceptives to castration, is a broad field.

Fortunately the Greeks and Romans weren’t shy about their tastes, and Ms. León combs literature, art, and archeological remains for her accounts. She introduces us to famous lovers of all types, including gods and satyrs, pornographers, and Amazons, and tells us how they liked to “do it.”

If you love reading about the Classical Age, The Joy of Sexus is for you. It covers topics which are often glossed over, and does it with detail and humor. If you are a writer, this is good research tool, and it’s a fun read too.

Jo Ann Butler JOURNEYS ON THE SILK ROAD: A Desert Explorer, Buddha’s Secret Library, and the Unearthing of the World’s Oldest Printed Book Joyce Morgan and Conrad Walters, Lyons, 2012, $24.95/C$27.50, 336pp, hb, 9780762782970 Sir Marc Aurel Stein, a Hungarian-born British foreign service archaeologist who led early 1900s Nonfiction

expeditions in central Asia, could have been part of the inspiration for Indiana Jones. Journeys tells the story of his freezing, burning, desperate desert adventures but also takes the time to give background for readers not grounded in Buddhist history or paper-making. Here too are fascinating secondary characters: Stein’s friend Lockwood Kipling, curator of the Lahore Museum; the MacCartneys, the empire’s representatives in far-flung Kashgar; a mention of the “Muslim leader named Yakub Beg, a Tajik adventurer and former dancing boy…”

Google Dunhuang, where these hundreds of hidden ancient scrolls were discovered and check out the map: it’s in the middle of nowhere. Unfortunately, if readers want to know where Stein traveled, they too will need to google. The book has no maps, and its photos of the ancient manuscripts are so small as to be nearly useless in trying to discern what the text is describing. Nevertheless, this is a good, albeit surprisingly dry, history for anyone curious about old-school archaeology in central Asia.

Kristen Hannum A LESS BORING HISTORY OF THE WORLD Dave Rear, Square Peg, 2012, £12.99, hb, 286pp, hb, 9780224087025 Horrible History for adults is the best way I can pithily describe this. It is a breakneck gallop through all history from the Big Bang to the present day, told in a relentlessly comic and discursive manner.

Some of the jokes are excellent, others less so.

There’s nothing new in all this and nothing of depth or profundity – an enjoyable divertissement for a quiet afternoon. As the author’s narrative covers more recent events it is intriguing to see how the humorous vein continues as he tries to encapsulate such horrors as the Holocaust and the destruction of the World Trade Center in the same glib style, but without seeming to be callous or indeed, malicious.

He also treads very carefully in making jokes at the expense of contemporary religions, particularly Islam, no doubt conscious of the risks a writer can run these days by being perceived as hostile or insulting to that variety of medieval belief.

Doug Kemp CHILD-SIZED HISTORY: Fictions of the Past in U.S. Classrooms Sara L. Schwebel, Vanderbilt Univ. Press, 2011, $34.95, pb, 272pp, 9780826517937.

What books should middle school teachers and parents choose that accurately reflect history? In the 21st century, factual accuracy about history is critiqued by professional teachers, publishers, and the general public. At the same time, these historical novels must appeal to and educate the young adult population. Sara Schwebel’s goals for this text are not only to describe the most popular middle-grade novels about race (African-American and Native Indian literature) and war, but also to describe how they are taught and how they reflect society’s changing attitudes and philosophy about inclusion and exclusion of issues. For example, early novels about the expanding frontier settlements out West minimized the presence of Indian residents, whose lands were basically stolen. This author calls for collective, professional and popular questioning, investigation, and analysis to ensure fair and accurate coverage of historical events and issues.

For example, Scott O’Dell’s Island of the Blue Dolphins presents the colonial devastation wrought on the Ghalas-at community, but it is always from Nonfiction

the point of view of colonial beliefs and morals. It dismisses the disappearance of this community and fails to note how diseases, warfare, and mandatory relocation minimize the thoughts and desires of the native people while appearing to justify colonists’ behavior as compassionate treatment by a more civilized people. Or perhaps one would care to focus on the evolution of Mildred D. Taylor’s novels. Roll of Thunder, Here My Cry teaches African-American children the severe consequences of thwarting the white man’s rules and only with her last novel stands up to injustice. Numerous examples are treated with depth, and careful reading may have the reader questioning some of the author’s own analyses.

Appendixes on national trends in literary selections, historical sources in pedagogy charts, notes on the text, and a comprehensive bibliography add to the content for those who would engage in further research and study. Child-Sized History is a must read for all middle school teachers, teachers of educational pedagogy, administrators, librarians, authors of middle-grade novels, and the American public as well. It’s a well-researched, well-written guide to a very sensitive topic in middle-grade historical fiction.

Viviane Crystal NELSON: The Sword of Albion John Sugden, The Bodley Head, 2012, £30, hb, 1020 pp, 9780224060981 “Then something surprising happened,” writes this beguiling author. It certainly does, not only on that occasion but throughout. Falling in love with The Sword of Albion and faithful to the end, I am no more capable of moderation than were the admiral and his magnificent, preposterous Emma.

These are thoughts from a Nelson ignoramus on a work of startling brilliance. A worldwide situation of success, calamity and horrible mistakes: what are the Russians doing, or the Austrians? The correspondence alone is prodigious. Each episode brings revelation; quiet reflection is desirable to absorb and sort out what has been learned.

Nelson: that once-in-a-century blend of selfconfidence and anguished vulnerability. Personal relationships were vital to this phenomenal man and sea master: fellow and junior officers, like Nelson, seemingly worn out with sickness and exhaustion at 40, respond as giants to the promise of action.

Crews of indestructible veterans and 13-year-old mini-heroes. Above all, the wooden ships in their final magnificence having to blindly shape the future.

Storms of hardly believable magnitude tearing them apart. Hideous injuries, horrible disease. Lemons and onions.

A culmination of stupendous triumph and tragedy beyond the daring of fiction.

Nancy Henshaw THE MAID NARRATIVES: Black Domestics and White Families in the Jim Crow South Katherine Van Wormer, David W. Jackson III, and Charletta Sudduth, Louisiana State Univ. Press, 2012, $36.95, hb, 384pp, 9780807149683 If you enjoyed The Help, take a look at The Maid Narratives (a takeoff on the famous slave narratives), which offers up a nonfiction look at the South’s Jim Crow strict caste system. Interviews with 13 elderly black women who worked as maids are at its heart, but there are also white voices, people who had loved their nurses and maids. My favorite parts gave me context and reflection on the interviews. For instance, the authors note that while all the whites

saw their maids as “part of the family,” none of the black women recalled feeling that way. The maids typically weren’t allowed to come through the front door, use the bathroom or even, in Vinella Byrd’s case, allowed to wash up in the wash pan. “After that, I didn’t wash my hands at all,” Byrd said. “I would just go in and start cooking.

And yet these relationships weren’t just demeaning with nothing else to say; there was also sympathy on both sides. The authors do a good job delving into that human complexity and presenting it in an accessible way.

Kristen Hannum RISE TO GREATNESS: Abraham Lincoln and America’s Most Perilous Year David Von Drehle, Holt, 2012, $30.00, hb, 480pp, 9780805079708 As our country struggles to define its future and conquer rising debt, we turn hopeful eyes to Abraham Lincoln. Against all odds, that formidable compromiser reunited his country and liberated a people. How did Lincoln do it?

Rise to Greatness examines the pivotal year of 1862. Lincoln has yet to find a general who will fight, and victories against the Rebels are rare.

The US Treasury is going into debt to finance an unpopular war. The border states are in turmoil, and if they join the rebellion, the war is lost.

Von Drehle’s excellent account shows us how Lincoln crafted the Emancipation Proclamation and details the duel between Lincoln and General McClellan. How does that shrewd leader cajole and strong arm Congress into cooperation, and persuade a horrified electorate to support a bloody war to free the slaves? I highly recommend Rise to Greatness to anyone who wishes to learn how Lincoln held a country together and hopes to see our current leaders do the same.

Jo Ann Butler MASTER OF THE MOUNTAIN: Thomas Jefferson and His Slaves Henry Wiencek, Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2012, $28.00, hb, 336pp, 9780374299569 Master of the Mountain by Henry Wiencek shows us American history as it was, not as we might want it to be. The ugliness of slavery, even in the “best” of circumstances, is laid bare as the author uses his study of the relationship of Thomas Jefferson with his slaves to show us once and for all that slavery was not merely an immoral system; it was an insane system. While Jefferson himself condemned slavery in no uncertain terms in his writings he nevertheless did everything he could throughout his life to perpetuate it. In the end he died in bankruptcy; it was his slaves who paid his debts by being sold on the auction block. Carefully researched, every contention in this book is backed up by references, including the discoveries of the most recent scholarship.

Elena Maria Vidal

HNR Issue 63, February 2013 | Reviews | 61

© 2013, The Historical Novel Society ISSN: 1471-7492 | Issue 63, February 2013