Tag: historical fiction

Day 318: Cathedral of the Sea

~ whatmeread ~ Leave a comment

Cover for Cathedral of the SeaCathedral of the Sea was written to relate some of the history of Barcelona and of the Church of Santa Maria de la Mar. Unfortunately for Ildefonso Falcones’ readers, even though there is some fascinating material here, this purpose is all too obvious.

The novel begins with Bernat Estanyol’s wedding. Because of his father’s foresight in making a will, Bernat is allowed to keep his father’s property on his death. Otherwise, it would be forfeit to his lord, as Bernat is a serf. Left relatively prosperous, Bernat decides to marry a shy girl named Francesca. However, on the night of the wedding, his lord chooses to exercise his droit de seigneur, his right to deflower the bride. He follows this act up by forcing Bernat to rape her, too.

This horrible start to their marriage shows no sign of improving after Bernat’s son Arnau is born, and more atrocities follow. Eventually, to save his son’s life, Bernat flees the land, making for Barcelona, where, if he can live for a year and a day without being recaptured, he can become a free man of the city.

The growing Arnau soon becomes the novel’s main character, and he has many hardships to overcome. Missing a mother, he becomes fascinated with the image of Mary at the Santa Maria de la Mar, which is just being built as a cathedral for the common people. The novel follows Arnau’s life and the building of the cathedral together.

Well, sort of. The book’s jacket compares this novel to Ken Follett’s Pillars of the Earth, but there is really very little comparison. The cathedral is only brought into the plot periodically when needed or when Falcones wants to tell us something about it.

And that’s the problem with the entire book. Although the novel deals with the themes of the medieval caste system and the problem of justice for common men, and also treats of the special rights of the area, everything is driven by the plot. Even with a third-person omniscient narration, we seldom learn what anyone is thinking unless it is important to the plot. Characters are not so much developed as given things to say and do.

The plot itself has no focus. When I read at the end of the novel that Falcones followed the Crónica written by King Pedro the Third, that explained a lot. To show this history, Falcones must put his main character through some contortions. Beginning as a bastaixo, one of the men who unload ships and carry their cargo into town on their backs, Arnau runs off to war and later becomes a money lender, an extremely unlikely sequence of careers.

Characters appear as needed, disappear, and then pop up again when they’re needed. This might make sense for some characters but not for all of them. Women are uniformly raped, die from the plague, become prostitutes, or are otherwise mistreated, as if Falcones doesn’t know what to do with them except have something terrible happen to them.

One of the worst instances of this treatment is of Maria, Arnau’s cardboard wife. (The rest of this paragraph is a spoiler.) During all the first years of their marriage, Arnau is involved in a torrid affair with another woman. Arnau wants to leave this woman, but she threatens to tell his guild, which will expel him for immoral conduct, so that he has no work. Arnau goes to war to get rid of her, and when he finally sheds his mistress, do we have scenes of everyday married life? No. We immediately jump five years, and within two pages Maria dies of the plague.

Finally, we come to Joan, Arnau’s adopted brother. Treated with nothing but kindness and love by Bernat and Arnau despite a rocky start in life, he becomes a priest, after which he disappears for years. When he returns, he has suddenly become a hard, self-righteous right hand of the Inquisition.

My conclusion? Falcones is clearly not an able enough storyteller to skillfully handle a complex plot and many characters.

Day 313: Murder on the Eiffel Tower

~ whatmeread ~ Leave a comment

Cover for Murder on the Eiffel TowerThis mystery set at the opening of the Eiffel Tower has a nice sense of history and is well written, but like mysteries written early in the genre (which it is not), it depends almost entirely upon determining opportunity. There is no indication of motive until the lengthy written confession at the end of the novel–standard early detective fiction nonsense–that is, charming in earlier fiction, but not so much now. This novel was published in 2009.

People begin being killed by “bee stings” on or near the Eiffel Tower the day before Buffalo Bill arrives in Paris for the opening of the 1889 World Exposition. Bookseller Victor Legris starts looking into these incidents after he notices that Kenji Mori, his father figure and business partner, met with more than one of the victims near the time they were killed. He also begins to fear that the woman to whom he is attracted, Russian illustrator Tasha Kherson, could be involved.

I found Victor to be silly, not very good at investigating, and prone to overlooking clues. Many secondary characters are only sketchily drawn and therefore difficult to keep straight. So for me, despite all its promise and its setting in an exciting period of time, Murder on the Eiffel Tower was not a success.

Day 311: Lords of Misrule

~ whatmeread ~ Leave a comment

Cover for The Stewart TrilogyNigel Tranter was a historian and a prolific historical fiction writer whose work can be uneven. During the 1950’s through 1990’s he wrote more than 60 historical novels, some of which employ dialogue and characterization only to drive the plot forward. Such is not the case, however with Lords of Misrule, the first book in his Stewart Trilogy, a novel that is fully realized.

Jamie Douglas is a young esquire to the Earl of Douglas, the most powerful man in 14th century Scotland, certainly more powerful than the King, Robert II, a sorry descendent of Robert the Bruce and doddering old man who just wants to be left alone. The King has spawned a clutch of squabbling Stewarts who are waiting to see what happens when he dies. Unfortunately, his oldest son, John, seems unsuited to power, and his second son, Robert, is ambitious and dangerous.

When Jamie’s lord is foully stabbed in the back by his own armorer during battle, Jamie fears that any of several powerful men may have had enough to gain in the subsequent power vacuum among the Douglasses to have suborned the armorer. But when Robert Stewart, acting as his father’s Governor, appoints his good friend Archie Douglas to take the position of Earl, Jamie’s suspicions point to Robert.

Jamie and some other men lie in wait outside the armorer’s home after they figure out where he is hiding, in hopes they can capture him and question him about who paid him to murder the Earl. Their plans go awry, however, ultimately sending Jamie Douglas north in pursuit of another man, to the Highland territories of the dreaded Alexander Stewart, Earl of Buchan, known as the Wolf of Badenoch.

This novel provides a fascinating glimpse into the rivalries and political in-fighting among the early Stewarts. It has an appealing protagonist, although Jamie is a bit too honest and outspoken for his own good. It also includes a romance, as Jamie is drawn to two different Stewart women while serving a third, his Earl’s widow. Having learned most of my Scottish history from the excellent historical novels of Dorothy Dunnett, I am not accustomed to thinking of Douglasses as heroes, but Jamie makes a good one.

Day 309: Parrot and Olivier in America

~ whatmeread ~ 2 Comments

Cover for Parrot and OlivierBest Book of the Week!

Peter Carey’s Parrot and Olivier in America is a fictional riff upon Alexis de Tocqueville’s trip to America in the early 19th century, from which resulted the classic Democracy in America. Olivier de Garmont is the character meant to be Tocqueville, an aristocrat with liberal leanings who is nevertheless an elitist snob.

Parrot is his servant, a man who has lived a colorful but frustrating life. An Englishman, he has had his life disrupted since he was a boy by another French aristocrat, the Marquis de Tilbot, who spirited him away from England after his father, a typesetter, was arrested as an accomplice to forgery.

In dangerous post-revolutionary France, Olivier’s mother has decided it would be wise for Olivier to leave the country, as his liberal leanings have offended the conservatives, but he is unacceptable to the liberals because of his aristocratic birth. She ends up shipping him off to America with Parrot as his secretary, on loan from Tilbot and instructed to report back Olivier’s movements.

But America inflames Parrot’s own democratic leanings. He believes himself to have a talent for engraving that he has never been able to develop while working as Tilbot’s servant, and he resents his status as a “vassal.” While Olivier feels that their rocky start has developed into a relationship that is almost love, Parrot affectionately? calls him “Lord Migraine.”

This novel is narrated in alternating chapters by Olivier and Parrot. It is entertaining–wittily and robustly written–although sometimes we seem to have stumbled into a Dickens novel, especially when reading about Parrot’s early life. In fact, I read recently that Carey wrote an earlier book, Jack Maggs, based on Magwich of Great Expectations, so that feeling is probably not too far off.

Day 305: The Dark Enquiry

~ whatmeread ~ Leave a comment

Cover for The Dark EnquirySome elements of Deanna Raybourn’s Lady Julia Grey romantic mystery series sometimes get old, such as the debate between Lady Julia and her husband Brisbane about how involved she is allowed to get in his investigations. This debate begins The Dark Enquiry, and eventually Brisbane reluctantly agrees that she can be a partner in his investigations, but not before she discovers for herself that her own proper, conservative brother, Lord Belmont, is being blackmailed. As a government official, he should have known better than to get involved with a lady, but especially to send her love letters. The lady turns out to be working for a foreign government.

In following up her investigation into her brother’s difficulties, Lady Julia disguises herself as a man to go to the Ghost Club, where Madame Séraphine holds nightly séances. There she is discovered by Brisbane. As they sneak back into the club together later in the evening, they are just in time to see Madame Séraphine be murdered by poison.

This novel is peopled with Lady Julia’s eccentric family, but it also features blackmail, gypsies, and spies. Raybourn’s novels are lively, and the dialog is entertaining. If we can just get over the endless debate about Julia’s part in the investigations, the series will continue to be fun to read.

Day 304: Flashman

~ whatmeread ~ Leave a comment

Cover for FlashmanHaving enjoyed Fraser’s The Candlemass Road, I thought I would give his satirical Flashman series another try. I read one years ago but wasn’t prepared to be met with such an unmitigated scoundrel as the main character.

Flashman is the first of the series, and it begins when Flashman is expelled from Rugby. Apparently, the character is based on a bully who appears in Tom Brown’s School Days, a novel I have never read but which is frequently referenced in other literature.

Flashman at a young age is already a complete scoundrel, cheat, and poltroon, so the comedy in the novel centers around his ability to be successful and eventually to be lauded as a hero despite his true nature. Having set his sights on a position as officer in the Eleventh Light Dragoons, a unit he selects as unlikely to see combat, Flashman is getting along swimmingly under the ridiculous Lord Cardigan until he makes the mistake of seducing a Scottish merchant’s daughter and being forced to marry her. To the snooty Lord Cardigan this fraternization with the middle class is unacceptable, so Flashman is forced into an Indian regiment.

Flashman is not happy to be consigned to what was then regarded as second class service, but once he arrives in India he finds he enjoys bossing around the natives and discovers in himself a facility for languages. Unfortunately from his point of view, this talent gets him assigned to Afghanistan as an aide to Lord Elphinstone just before the infamous and harrowing 1842 retreat.

This satire of the army and society reminds me of Thackeray’s more subtle Vanity Fair. I think you have to be in the mood for Flashman’s antics, but the novel is based on solid historical research and is certainly entertaining. Fraser’s prose is incisive as he cuts swaths through Victorian society and skewers the ineptitude of the British army.

Day 299: Moriarty

~ whatmeread ~ Leave a comment

Cover for MoriartyI thought the idea of a novel written from the point of view of Sherlock Holmes’ nemesis, Professor James Moriarty, was an interesting one, but since I always found the Moriarty plot tedious, I now wonder why I thought so. When I opened the book cover to find that John Gardner is the author of many, many series novels and Moriarty is one of them, I was further dismayed, not generally being a fan of series writing (although I have a small number of favorites) and being even more skeptical of someone who writes many different series. Moreover, don’t be mislead into thinking this is a Sherlock Holmes mystery–this novel is missing Sherlock Holmes entirely and it isn’t really a mystery.

The novel opens with two introductions, both putting forward the pretense that the novel  is based on newly discovered diaries of Moriarty, which cannot be reproduced because of their vile content. I suspect the truth is that Gardner found himself unable to sustain a convincing 19th century writing style, this hunch seeming to be confirmed by the modern writing style of the book and the dialogue.

The plot concerns Moriarty’s attempts to re-form his criminal empire after an absence of several years following the Reichenbach Falls incident, in which, if you’ll remember, Conan Doyle attempted to kill off both Holmes and Moriarty. In Moriarty’s absence, other criminals have taken over his various enterprises.

Although not badly written, the novel completely failed to capture me. I was not interested in any of the characters and in fact thought they made unconvincing and boring criminals. One incident early in the book that is artificially spun out by going back and forth in time and place is confusing, and such a device seems totally unnecessary.

All in all, I found the novel tedious and only finished about a third of it before quitting.

Day 294: Death on the Nevskii Prospekt

~ whatmeread ~ Leave a comment

Cover for Death on the Nevskii ProspektGiven my interest in Russia and the time period, this novel should have been a slam-dunk for me, but I was disappointed. Lord Francis Powerscourt is asked to investigate the death of a British diplomat in Russia, who was discovered with his throat cut on a bridge across the Nevskii Prospekt. No one in the British government knows why the victim was in Russia, and the Russians, having reported his death, pretend that they know nothing about it.

Powerscourt’s investigations seem to be pointing to the victim having had a secret meeting with the Tsar. In addition, Powerscourt may be running up against the Russian secret police, the Okhrana.

The book begins with a completely unnecessary chapter or two devoted to efforts to try to persuade Lord Powerscourt’s wife to release him from his promise not to take any more investigations. In addition, the real circumstances of the death seem completely unlikely. Characterization was minimal, and the plot had several unlikely points.

Dickinson’s historical research is commented on in the blurbs, but there was little in the novel that anyone doing the most cursory reading about Tsarist Russia’s last days wouldn’t know.

Day 290: The House of Velvet and Glass

~ whatmeread ~ Leave a comment

Cover for The House of Velvet and GlassThe House of Velvet and Glass is a slow starter, which I don’t usually complain about, because if I’m enjoying a book enough, it can move as slowly as it wants. Nevertheless, considering how much I enjoyed Howe’s first book, I was surprised at how impatient I became with this one.

The novel begins with Helen and Eulah Allston, two entirely trivial women, mother and daughter, journeying back from a European husband-hunting expedition–on the Titanic. Although we’re told which ship they are on only at the very end of the first chapter, as if it were an ironic or surprising fact, the ship’s identity was very clear from early in the chapter.

Three years later, Sybil Allston is comforting her grief and anger at the death of her mother and sister on the Titanic by visiting a psychic. She is wholly convinced that she is receiving messages from the afterlife. On one of her visits, the psychic gives her a piece of crystal called a scrying stone.

Sybil’s father Lan Allston is a wealthy man who made his money through shipping, but he seems to spend all his time in his dark back parlor. Her brother Lanny looks as if he may be entering the life of a ne’er-do-well gambler and womanizer.

Not everything is as it seems, but I became extremely impatient waiting for the novel to go somewhere while we occasionally skipped backward in time to Lan as a young man in Shanghai or to Helen and Eulah on the Titanic.

Eventually, the novel becomes about a woman discovering her own powers, and the second half of the novel is much better than the first. But I did rebel against one thing. I particularly dislike it when characters in historical novels behave like modern people. I felt it would be extremely unlikely that Sybil would urge her father to bring home a woman they both think is a prostitute (and by their lights, is one) just because she has her brother’s blood on her dress. And I certainly don’t believe that her father would encourage Sybil to get to know her, although there turns out to be a reason for that. Completely unbelievable is the scene where Sybil takes her to her club or the scene where she goes, however, unwittingly, with her to an opium den.

So, a very mixed reaction to this novel. Ultimately, it became interesting, although the much-vaunted twists at the end were largely foreseeable.

Day 289: Birds of a Feather

~ whatmeread ~ 2 Comments

Cover for Birds of a FeatherMaisie Dobbs is a “psychologist and investigator” solving cases in post World War I London. Birds of a Feather is the second book in the series by Jacqueline Winspear. Maisie’s background is unique, in that she is a former serving girl who was taken up by a mentor, educated, and trained in some unusual techniques to use in her investigations.

Maisie accepts the case of a wealthy owner of grocery stores, Joseph Waite, to find his daughter Charlotte, who is in her 30’s, and return her home. As Maisie investigates the case by locating Charlotte’s friends, they begin dying. At each crime scene, a white feather is left. White feathers were traditionally given to young men during World War I to shame them into enlisting, as they are a symbol of cowardice.

I read the first book in this series, Maisie Dobbs, and was not enthralled with it, so I only read this novel because it was chosen for my book club. I finally decided that I like the book a little, but it certainly has its flaws. Winspear is not very good at delineating Maisie’s character, I feel. Maisie also speaks surprisingly modern American English for a British woman in the 1930’s.

The biggest problem I have with Maisie, though, is that the unusual skills she has picked up to use in her investigations are far too New Agey to be convincing for a character in the 1930’s. It does not help my enjoyment of the novel, I fear, that I find many New Age ideas irritating.

In addition, it makes no sense to me at all that no one seems surprised to find the detective is a young woman. Even in P. D. James’ classic An Unsuitable Job for a Woman, written in 1972, characters express surprise to find a woman in that role. All-in-all, this makes too many anachronisms in the series to suit me.

Finally, I know this is a silly quibble, but I feel that Winspear spends too much time describing Maisie’s clothes.