Julie
Elizabeth of York: The Forgotten Tudor Queen This really wasn't about Elizabeth of York, it was a rehash of the Wars of the Roses and what her life might possibly have been like both during and after. It touches on the main events of her life including her possible affair with Richard III and the emergence of Perkin Warbeck as pretender to the throne but there is no evidence of any of the suppositions made about what she did, how she was feeling and the like. The author also has an irritating habit of repeating herself almost verbatim. So all in all, if you don't know much about the period this could be an interesting read but if you are looking for a biography of Elizabeth of York with supporting evidence you will have to look elsewhere. I found the book disappointing.
Edit: On reading this a second time I actually enjoyed it more and have consequently revised my star rating.
Having read quite a few post-apocalyptic stories I can say that there is nothing new here. A land ravaged by something devastating (we never really find out what), communities who mistrust strangers, disease, bandits, religious zeal and a promised land (but no cannibals). Sound familiar to anyone. The plot is like The Road and the scenery is borrowed from The Postman but the prose is all the author's own. That, for me, is what makes it stand out. Jim Crace knows how to turn a phrase. This is only the second book I have read by the author, the first was The Harvest where I found his way of writing more of a hindrance than a help - I decided after that, that I wouldn't rush to read any of his other books. I'm glad I did eventually pick this one up. I would recommend it to those who like a trip through post-apocalyptic America but for whom The Road was too bleak.
I never knew that...
That is the way I should always start a review of a novel about a character I have only ever come across as a supporting actor in other stories. I knew nothing about Henriette Marie before reading this but I am certainly interested in learning more now. She is an interesting, if not particularly likeable, character who played an enormous part in English history, if this book is to be believed.
Fiona Mountain's take on the lives of Henriette Marie and her husband Charles I is interesting with good character development although Charles comes across as weak and Henrietta as headstrong but rather vacant: neither of which does much to endear them to the reader although they both have their redeeming qualities. Unfortunately, the graphic sex scenes have dragged this book down from being a solid historical novel to something rather trashy in places, that should have had Harlequin or Mills and Boon stamped on the cover. I'm no prude but sometimes less is more.
This story has two parallel threads, one concerns the evil deeds of the Countess of Bathory in the 17th century, the other concerns the desperate search by a psychoanalyst for her mother who disappeared under suspicious circumstances in Slovakia (or was it Hungary? or maybe Poland? This border hopping is quite hard to follow) and who just happens to be an historian researching her next book on the bloodthirsty Elizabeth Bathory. Add to that a mysterious old geezer with a silver tipped walking stick, a Goth teenager, Daisy, suffering from bloody dreams who follows her psychoanalyst, Betsy (Elizabeth - what a coincidence) Path into danger and her sister, Morgan, who looks remarkably like the Countess, and what have you got? A remarkably average and predictable book.
It is a pity, the book could have been so much more. However, the formula, the predictability and the dialogue, particularly in the 17th century, let it down. Having said that, it isn't a bad way to while away a wet Sunday afternoon as it is an easy read and if you haven't read many books of a similar formula, it could be quite gripping. For me personally, it was a disappointment.
Thomas Howard, third Duke of Norfolk was a powerful, ambitious and unbelievably selfish man at the courts of the Tudor monarchs, most notably Henry VIII???s. He managed to put 2 of his nieces on the throne and condemned both of them to death. His daughter was married to King Henry???s bastard and might one day have been Queen of England had Henry Fitzroy lived past the age of 17. This is Thomas Howard???s story, as told from his point of view, that of his second wife, Elizabeth Stafford and of his mistress, Bess Holland.
???We see Thomas as a man with all his faults. He is turned into the megalomaniac we know from history by grief and power but he was a man with feelings.
???The characters and relationships were well developed. They each had their own journey to make through the book and you could believe at the end that despite the antagonism and maltreatment involved, Elizabeth would never leave her husband. Domestic violence hasn???t changed much in 500 years.
???The story itself is simply incredible. While reading it I kept having to look on the internet to find out if the events were made up. It seems they were not. The facts came to light when he held his wife captive and she appealed to Thomas Cromwell and again when Elizabeth Stafford, Bess Holland and Mary Fitzroy testified against him
???The pace was quick. I couldn???t put the book down.
???The title is simply awful. I expected some kind of cheap bodice ripper when I read the title. It put me off reading the book until I picked it up for next to nothing. I started to read the reviews then and decided to give the book a go based on these reviews. I was pleasantly surprised. This is not some kind of soppy romance but a hard core depiction of a man driven by grief and power. He took the idea of looking after no. 1 to new heights.
An easy straight forward read for fans of Tudor fiction. The title and some of the dialogue let it down but I think that you can learn something from this book and I saw Thomas Howard in a different light afterwards ??? he was still a nasty piece of work though ;)
A sect living on a rooftop garden. Violence and decadence on the streets. Gene spliced animals and plants. This is the grim future in Margaret Atwood???s ???The Year of the Flood???.
The book jumps backwards and forwards in time, some chapters cover the years leading up to ???The Dry Flood??? while others follow the few survivors in the months after.
I find that I have a love/hate relationship with this book, which is why it has taken me so long to write the review. The writing is excellent, the worlds well thought through, the characters believable, and still I couldn???t really enjoy it until the end. I have an aversion to sects of any kind, even ???nice??? groups like the one portrayed in this story. At first I found it confusing because a chapter describes Year 1 which I assumed to be Year 1 after The Flood. It took me several chapters to work out that it was actually Year 1 of the Sect and that the Flood didn???t happen until Year 25. Over the course of the 25 years not much seemed to happen, we had descriptions of everyday life and of how the main protagonists came to be there (and then left again) but not much else. The pace was too slow to hold my interest so I kept putting it down and reading something else. It wasn???t until the last few chapters that the pace picked up again and I became immersed in the story.
???
Although well thought through, the story was just too slow for my taste. However, the premise is interesting enough to make me want to read the previous book in the trilogy ???Oryx and Crake???. This may make me want revise my opinion of ???The Year of the Flood???.
Another excellent book about the people accused of witchcraft on Pendle Hill in 1612. This time the story is told by Demdike and her granddaughter, Alizon. I found this interpretation to be as heartbreaking as Mist Over Pendle was entertaining. It describes a family's slow slide to absolute ruin as, one after another, each member suffers mistreatment at the hands of others, forcing them to turn on each other and take dire measures just to survive. Unfortunately, their friends and neighbours are dragged down with them.
What a gripping story. as the tale neared its climax I was devastated because I knew what was going to happen. If you enjoyed The Heretic's Daughter you should read this.
Mist Over Pendle by Robert Neill
???????????????
The Lancashire Witch trials of 1612 were the basis for this story. We have a young puritan girl, Margery, sent to her cousin Roger Nowell because her family doesn???t know what to do with her (she is distinctly un-puritan) and nobody can provide her with a dowry to marry her off. Roger???s way of life is more to Margery???s taste and, freed of the restrictions her upbringing had imposed on her, we see her blossom into an intelligent young woman. She accompanies her cousin, a Justice of the Peace, on his investigations into increasingly frequent accusations of witchcraft, soon becoming an integral part of the inquiries, her actions leading to at least one incidence of romance and several incidences of execution.
My opinion:
??? I loved the writing, you could tell at once that it wasn???t written in recent years, it was lighter and more tongue-in-cheek (in places) than novels written in recent decades.
??? The descriptions were evocative of the time and place, I could feel the icy cold of the winter rains as they rode around the county and the warmth of a blazing fireplace afterwards. I could feel the threat emanating from the witches and feared for the young girls, Margery and Grace, in particular
??? The dialogue could be very amusing, the characters of both Roger and Margery made me smile on more than one occasion
??? The minor elements of romance (after all, she was there to find a dowry if not a husband) were handled delicately and left me smiling
??? The only negative aspect I found was that it was getting a little bogged down in the beginning with the descriptions of the area. I found that a little tedious but it was obviously meant to set the scene and introduce the different locations in the story.
I really enjoyed this book, it put a smile on my face in some places, made me anxious in others and entertained me throughout, The focus is more on the investigation and Margery???s ???coming of age??? than on the witchcraft side of it, so if that is what you are looking for then this probably isn???t the story for you. However, if you are interested in the psychological aspect on the populace in general, then you might find this interesting.
This book follows on from The King's Daughter but isn't strictly a sequel, it can be read as a stand-alone story. Instead of continuing to follow the fortunes of Elizabeth Stuart, it focuses on the fate of Lucy Russell, the daughter of Elizabeth's guardian and Chief Lady of Queen Anne of Denmark introduced in the first book. Fate hasn't been kind to Lucy and she has fallen on hard times since the death of the Queen. Her only chance to shine at court again is to get Elizabeth and her husband to return to England and set up court with her father. But for political reasons, King James doesn't want her back in England, nor will he send armies to protect his daughter who is now in exile in the Hague. So Lucy takes it upon herself to orchestrate Elizabeth's return. Although Lucy wants Elizabeth back for her own personal reasons there are others who would like to see the return of the First Daughter of England for darker reasons and Lucy becomes embroiled in their plotting...
This book has it all: deceit, murder, treason, secret affairs...so why didn't I enjoy it as much as ‘The King's Daughter'? It's hard to say - the story is interesting and the subject new to me (although Lucy was a major historical figure at the time). It is well written and the detail impressive. I think the biggest problem was probably that I was expecting more of ‘The King's Daughter'. I ended up comparing Lucy and Elizabeth having read both books back to back. Elizabeth struck me as being innocent and pragmatic, whereas Lucy came across as selfish and sentimental. Far too much time was spent on the details of Lucy's affair with John Donne, from the blurb I had expected more cloak-and-dagger. Also, I felt the pace was slower. I think that had I read this book on its own rather than straight after ‘The King's Daughter' it would have fared better but as it was I was expecting something else. A future reread may well earn this book an extra star.
The King???s Daughter is a story about the ???First Daughter of England??? Elizabeth Stuart. The only surviving daughter of James I of England and VI of Scotland, Elizabeth was third in line to the throne and seen by her father as a potential threat. At the age of 9 she foiled a kidnap attempt by the ???Gunpowder Plotters??? who intended to murder her father and elder brother and put her on the throne in their place. Unfortunately, that did nothing for her relationship with her father who suspected her of collusion with the traitors. From then on he kept a close eye on her and made sure she knew nothing of his plans for her, except, as with so many other princesses of times past, that he wanted simply to marry her off to the most advantageous suitor without compassion for her feelings. He kept her in uncertainty for years so that finally she wondered whether in fact her wouldn???t marry her off at all but just wait until she was desperate enough to marry secretly so that he could lock her up in The Tower for treason.
Having had my (temporary) fill of the Wars of the Roses and The Tudors, I picked up this book about the Stuarts, of whom I knew next to nothing. The character of Elizabeth was completely new to me and I found her to be quite sympathetic, she wasn???t overly ferocious nor excessively timid. And despite her father???s aversion to educating females, she wasn???t empty headed either. I can???t vouch for the accuracy of the events in the book but I enjoyed (if that is the right word) the author???s portrayal of a lewd, hedonistic King James and the lovable baby Charles, who wasn???t expected to reach adulthood, turning into a spoilt brat when he became first in line to the throne.
I found The King???s Daughter to be a light, easy and entertaining read and a good opener to the reign of the Stuarts, leaving me eager to read more.
The world is a grim place and the gap between the haves and have-nots is bigger than ever. The one thing they all have in common however it OASIS, a virtual reality universe far more attractive than the real world. Basic access is free and you can even go to school there. When the creator of OASIS dies he leaves his fortune of billions hidden within OASIS as a kind of ???easter egg??? and up springs a new culture, the ???gunters??? who spend their time looking for the easter egg and following clues through worlds of 1980s pop culture. But some gunters will stop at nothing to get to the prize first...
I found the start of the book slow-going at first, some paragraphs read like an encyclopaedia of the 1980s but as the story progresses it picks up and I started to enjoy it more. Having played video games myself and now watching my kids play them, I was able to understand the attraction of the virtual life and empathise with the main characters. It???s a simple good v evil story, with a race to see who???ll find the treasure first although there is never any doubt just who will that will be, it???s simply a matter of how he will get there.
I found Ready Player One to be a fun, entertaining read without a huge amount of depth but full of nostalgia for people like me who grew up in the 70s and 80s. It should appeal to all ??bergeeks out there, who love video games, dystopian stories and the 1980s.
The premise of this book is that an historian is sent back to the Middle Ages to do some research. As the Middle Ages are a ‘10' (presumably meaning they haven't been declared safe) the project is rushed through while the head of faculty is away. This of course leads to mistakes being made. So instead of sending our heroine back to the relatively safe 1320s, they miss by 20 years and send her to the outbreak of the Black Death (a far more interesting time from an historical standpoint, I would have thought).
So, I liked the book because
??? it was an interesting idea for a story
??? Kivrin was a person and not a cardboard cut out, she had her compassion and her fear
??? I enjoyed her acceptance of her situation and her attempt to save the village in the foreknowledge of what was about to happen
What I didn't like so much
??? the events in the future seemed rather contrived
??? the author hadn't done enough research: the descriptions of Oxford seemed like they had been taken from a 1950s movie, and cholera did not exist in the Middle Ages (I wouldn't have picked that up myself had I not read the introduction but the slip is unforgiveable given the amount of times the author mentions it during the story)
??? the 12 year old boy (I forget his name) seemed much older.
Despite my criticisms, I really enjoyed the book. It was well paced and the scenes in the Middle Ages were quite involving. However, I don't think it deserves its awards. I've given it a four star rating for pure entertainment value and I will be looking into reading more from Connie Willis.
I, Jacqueline centres around the true story of a girl of 16 left to rule parts of what is now The Netherlands and Belgium when her father dies. It is set in the 15th century, a time when Europe seemed to run out of male heirs to their thrones but would not accept autonomous female rulers. The young lady of the title was left with few supporters, even fewer options and many enemies including her mother.
I didn't much like the book. The story itself is one that should have grabbed me as so many of the kind have (most recently C.W. Gortner's The Last Queen). Unfortunately, Jacqueline does not compare too well to Juana of Castille. Jacqueline comes across as a spoilt petulant young lady with no judgement when it comes to politics. She marries again and again contrary to her dead father's advice and reaps the dire consequences. This in itself could have made a cracking story but our ‘heroine' is rather dull. It seems she rode at the head of her armies but apart from a cursory mention of this we find out no more about it. I felt sorry for her hardships but in the end I couldn't like her. I can't help feeling that if more had been made of her forays into battle she would have been a more interesting character. On the plus side, I enjoyed the writing style. It was olde worlde enough to give you a feeling of antiquity without it sounding too forced.
All in all, it wasn't a waste of time to read it but I doubt it will make it to my reread list.
A nano plague, invented to help cure cancer, escapes from the lab before it has been fully developed and decimates the population of the world within days. The only survivors are the people who made it above 10,000 feet in time. Since then they have been living off what little remains of the fauna, what they can scrounge on their short trips below the limit and each other. Scientists are working to create a vaccine but not everyone has the same agenda...I can't compare this edition to the original, it has more pages but never having read the original I don't know if they add anything to the story or not. The story itself is well written and quite plausible but the kindle version has some serious proof-reading issues: words missed out, extra words added, wrong sentence order. In some cases it was so bad that even after reading a sentence for a second or third time, I still couldn't make sense of it. It totally spoilt the flow. Still, the story was good, comparable to [b:Prey 83763 Prey Michael Crichton http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1298436337s/83763.jpg 1258566] if lacking the pace and I have downloaded the sequel [b:Plague War 2286329 Plague War (Plague, #2) Jeff Carlson http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348469715s/2286329.jpg 10571903], I hope that there are no similar issues with this one.
I was disappointed with this book. The only thing that made me finish it was curiosity but you know what they say about that! The author was out to shock and nothing more. I didn't feel any tension or fear whilst reading it and I certainly won't be in a hurry to read it again, or buy any more books of his. I read The Ritual a while back and enjoyed it which made this one that much more disappointing. Pity.
Deserved a Reread
In just three years the USA has gone from freedom to total control. Women and men are divided into classes, but unlike women, men can work their way up through the ranks. Women, however, have a set place in society and that place is vividly displayed by the clothes they wear: striped gowns for the lower classes, the econowives; green gowns for the Marthas, the servants of the upper classes and red for the Handmaidens, the surrogates who bear the children of the infertile upper classes. It is to the Handmaidens that the main character of the story belongs. Her name is Offred and in the time before, she had a daughter, a husband, a job and a bank account. This was all taken away from her and now she is just a walking womb. She is not permitted to read or possess anything other than her clothes. She is also not allowed to converse with anybody more than is strictly necessary, there are ears everywhere to hear what she is saying and tongues ready enough to report her words. If she fails to get pregnant she will be sent away to ‘the colonies' whose members clean up toxic waste and where life expectancy is low. Despite all her attempts to remain a good citizen she gets drawn deeper and deeper into subversive activities.
I first read this book a few years ago and couldn't understand what all the hype was about. I think the reasons I didn't like it that much the first time round were that it is quite slow, written in the first person, dystopian (I prefer post-apocalyptic) and held up as an example by feminists. None of these qualities really endeared me to the story although I found the idea itself intriguing. I was used to more pace and more action. In the few years' interval my tastes seem to have broadened because I enjoyed it much more this time, probably largely due to the fact that I knew what to expect. I love the historical notes at the end, they give the story a feeling of authenticity. The same device was used in ‘the Passage' and I enjoyed it then, too. It's cool to read about something in the future as if it is already in the past. As for the feminist side, well, that isn't a problem with the book, that is a problem with my understanding of the word. When I think of feminism I think of women who don't want equality but a reversal of roles. That isn't what this story is about. I really hope though, that if some government today decided that women couldn't own money or have a job, we would fight harder than the women in this book. Maybe we should start hoarding our cash in our pillows - just a thought ;-)
