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The Burning Times: A Novel of Medieval France

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The Burning Times: A Novel of Medieval France

By Jeanne Kalogridis

Simon & Schuster

ISBN: 068486923-3

4 stars

Jeanne Kalogridis writes historical fiction that I love.  She mixes a little fact with a little fiction and adds a tiny bit of the paranormal.  The magical element never feels odd in her stories either and most times when I come across it, I go right along with it.  She blends everything so well.

I’ve read several of her books including: The Scarlett Contessa, The Devil’s Queen: A Novel of Catherine de Medici and Covenant with the Vampire.  My library does not have a huge back list for her, but I plan to seek out a few of others if I can.

In The Burning Times, we meet Sybille, a poor midwife with pagan ways who is forced into hiding and assumes the name and appearance of Sister Marie Francoise so she can take refuge among the Franciscan sisterhood.  She does this to escape the Inquisitors who wish to burn all heretics and those they deem witches.  She is eventually caught by the Inquisitors, and during the course of her imprisonment and interview with a young monk, her story unfolds and the powers she holds, she sees the future and can heal the sick, become clear.  It’s obvious to the other Inquisitors that she’s clearly a witch and should be burned but the young Monk Michael wants to hear her story not thoroughly convinced that she is what they all say.

The story is told through this interview and even if you think you know how it will end, the way in which the story is told keeps you interested.  Sybille won’t be rushed, knowing this will be her last chance to tell her story and that of her people.  There are others in the world with her powers and abilities and she wants the church to know that killing her will not end what they consider to be a scourge of heresy.

There’s an interesting mythology to this book that is more than just witchcraft. The pagan ideals of worship and belief in something higher added an interesting new level that ran against the stalwart beliefs of the church.  The historical elements — the Black Plague, the Hundred Years’ War, and the war between England and France — provided a nice background for the story to play out.

I love going back to read earlier works of an author I like.  While the writing quality of this particular book doesn’t compare to the book released this year, The Scarlett Contessa which I thought had a much better flow and felt much more cohesive, I like to go back and see how a writer evolved.  Don’t get me wrong, this is still a good book, but I can see how Kalogridis’s writing has changed over the years and I know that she will be an author whose work I continue to enjoy in the coming years.

Corrag: A Novel

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Corrag:  A Novel

By Susan Fletcher

W.W. Norton & Company

978-0-393-08000-1

4 stars

I wasn’t sure what to expect when I started this book.  It’s historical fiction (which I adore), set in Scotland, (a favorite setting of mine), features Highlanders as characters, (see previous), and is about a woman accused of witchcraft.  All things I usually enjoy entangled in a story.  What I found was something entirely different and not all bad either.

Corrag is a woman accused of witchcraft and slated to burn for her wanton ways.  It’s 17th Century Scotland and the accusation of witchcraft is common enough for women who have an understanding of medicinal herbs, are outspoken, and in some cases misunderstood.  Corrag is a mixture of all the above.  She’s a very small person, so small that some think of her as a child and in many ways she is childlike.  She was the only daughter of a woman hung for being a witch, has little education, and has been on the run for most of her life in search of a place to feel safe.  She finds that place in the Highlands of Scotland.  The MacDonald clan, which is settled in the area Corrag decides to call home, welcomes her and she feels finally at peace in the world.  When the clan is massacred by English soldiers, she is thrown in jail to await her death.  While there, a man named Charles Leslie comes to hear her story and hopefully find out more about the massacre.  What he finds is a filthy woman with a tale that will astound him.

This story is told by Corrag and is broken up by letters from Charles to his wife.  While Corrag’s story does skip around (She fully admits to being a rambler and in some places I felt inpatient with her telling.), but eventually she weaves a tale that makes your heartbreak.  It’s not only about the massacre but there’s also an interesting love story between Corrag and Alasdair MacDonald.  He’s married and while her heart breaks for him, she refuses to break the vow he has made to his wife.  I almost wish that it was a different story but the way Fletcher chose to tell it made sense from the perspective of Corrag.

It’s also a story about an incredible woman who showed little fear even when facing her own death.  She spent a great deal of her life alone, by choice, and was raised by a mother who told her never to love.  Corrag understood why her mother told her that but lets herself experience it anyway.  Becoming involved with the clan creates a life she never imagined possible.  She stops being this strange figure and starts to see herself in a better light.

I enjoyed this book but it does move slowly.  I’ll admit to taking a few breaks and moving on to another story while in the midst of this one.  I wanted very much to know what happened to the MacDonald clan and Corrag takes her time getting to that part.  Yes, I understand this was about her telling her tale so that someone knew her fully before she died, but some of it was too meandering.  In the end, I was happy to have finished it.  Fletcher is an interesting writer and at times can also be quite lyrical.  Descriptions of places and Corrag’s thoughts added wonderful touches to the story.

Fletcher is a new to me writer but I plan to look up a few of her previous novels and see how this one compares.

I received a copy of this book through the Early Reviewers Program on Librarything.

Today’s Book

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I usually participate in a meme of some sort on Thursdays but since Alyce from At Home With Books has ended My Favorite Reads and I don’t do Booking Through Thursday anymore (although I love reading the responses), I’ve been struggling with what to do with Thursdays.  There are tons of memes out there and I like them all but I thought I’d do something a little less memey.  I thought I would simply talk about the book I’m reading today.  Marg over at The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader does this every once in a while and I enjoy hearing about what book(s) she’s reading so I thought I would take a page and do something similar.  It won’t be a review or a re-cap.  I may even get lazy a few mornings and post only the cover and leave you wondering.  Mostly it will be my first initial thoughts on a book and whether or not I’m enjoying it.  Nothing fancy, nothing extravagant cuz I’m lazy in the morning and far, far, far from being a morning person.

Today I’m reading The Distant Hours by Kate Morton.

I requested this book which is something I don’t normally do (my TBR is big enough without adding promised reviews to the mix) but this made it onto my list a long time ago and when I saw an ad for copies in Shelf Awareness, I asked for one.  Then it sat because I had other things to read and it’s long (672 pages), and while I love long books, I kept putting it off.

Yesterday, I decided it was time.  So, here’s what’s happened so far (I will try to avoid spoilers and since I’m only 144 pages in that should be easy.) —

Edie Burchill is having dinner with her parents when her mother gets a letter that causes her to cry, something her mother never does.  Edie gets her to talk about the letter and she finds out that her mother was a child evacuee during WWII and was taken in by the Blythe sisters at Milderhurst Castle.  A short time later, Edie gets lost on a business trip and finds herself at the castle.  She talks the sisters into giving her a tour, and after a creepy encounter with the youngest sister, she now seems a little obsessed with the castle and the sisters.

If you want general info, the publisher’s website has it.  I don’t want to add more since that’s actually as far as I got in the book last night.  I’m enjoying it but it’s reminding me of another book, The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield, and I keep comparing the two in my head and  I need to knock that off or I won’t get through this one.

On another note — and since I’m talking about whatever I want today — I bought The Exile by Diana Gabaldon.  It’s the Outlander graphic novel and, YES, Jamie Fraser looks nothing like the Jamie Fraser in my head but that’s okay.  He’s still a hot Scottish guy in a kilt.  🙂  The Outlander series ranks high on my favorite scale so I had to buy this one since I own all the other books.  It’s told from Jamie’s perspective, and I don’t read many graphic novels which I’m trying to change for the better, and I think a hot Scottish guy in a kilt will get me there.

The Last Kingdom

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The Last Kingdom

By Bernard Cornwell

Harper Collins Publishers

ISBN: 0-06-053051-0

4.5 stars

I’m on a mission to read all the Cornwell books in my library and that’s a rather long list so it may take me a while.  The good news is that I will be entertained by the challenge I’m setting for myself.  This latest series I’m starting features Saxons and that’s a topic I fully enjoy.

Uhtred, a boy of ten, joins his father in battle against the invading Danes.  He’s the son of a nobleman and, thanks to the death of his oldest brother during the battle, heir to his father’s English lands.  In the same battle that leaves his father and brother dead, Uhtred is captured by the Danes.  Earl Ragnar, the Danish chieftain that defeated his father, raises Uhtred as his own teaching him to fight like a Viking.  Expected to fight the English alongside his Danish tribe, he fights an internal battle between his loyalty to Ragnar, who loved him as a son, and to his English heritage and the new king, Alfred.  Uhtred feels little loyalty toward Alfred and doesn’t like him on a personal level, but he clings to his dream of ruling his homelands someday.  Fortunately for Uhtred, he prefers battle to loyalties and would rather fight than worry about the person on the other side of the shield wall or political implications.

The Danish way of life portrayed in this book is brutal but it’s hard to dislike the Danes simply because of the love they show for Uhtred, and even when he decides that he must fight for the English, don’t hold it against him as they value his sense of loyalty which they instilled in him.  Alfred is a thoroughly unlikable person, and along with Uhtred, I had trouble liking him but you still have to appreciate his cunning.  Uhtred managed several times to get caught up in Alfred’s plans and being young, cocky, and willing to think with his fists instead of his brain, he walks right into situations that get him in trouble.  That’s also what makes him extraordinarily likable.  He’s flawed, frequently irrational, and single minded in his thinking sometimes, but he believes what he’s doing is right and you agree with him.

Cornwell, and I have probably said this before, has an amazing talent for writing historical fiction.  The details make his stories and each time I finish a book I immediately want to pick up the next in the series.  I have been trying to pace myself so I don’t burn out because while I always enjoy his books, they tend toward the violent aspects of war and I sometimes find myself needing a break to forget the sound of swords crashing against bone.

Religion plays a large part in this story as Alfred is extremely pious but Uhtred, who veers more toward the pagan, is an equal opportunity believer who is happy to let his king think he has found god and secretly prefer to ask Thor and Odin for their assistance in battle.  It’s an amusing side-story and I’m sure one that will be developed more as these types of religious battles seem to always find a place in Cornwell’s books.  It’s never overpowering but always presents enough of an internal battle for a character to be an interesting element.

There are five books in the Saxon series and I’m looking forward to more.

Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire

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Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire

By J.K. Rowling

Scholastic, Inc.

ISBN: 043913959-7

5 stars

I’m moving along nicely with this series.  I was surprised, again, by how much more I remember from the movies than the books but that’s what’s making this re-read so much fun.

The short re-cap — Harry starts his fourth year at Hogwarts, gets to see the Quidditch World Cup, finds out that Hogwarts will host the Tri-Wizard Tournament, sees his name thrown out of the Goblet of Fire as a contestant, almost gets killed by a dragon, eats some gillyweed, and sees Voldermort re-born.

As you’ve been warned — spoilers below.

There was a lot about this book I didn’t remember, one being just how mean Snape is to Hermione!  I knew it was there but re-reading it again was awful; he is just so harsh to a young girl.  As you can see, I’m moving along with my Hate Snape Campaign nicely.  There is no redemption for him.  I will not forgive him later even when he tries to redeem himself in Harry’s eyes.  Nor will I forgive Harry for forgiving him but that comes later and I’m getting way ahead of myself.  Another thing about this book I forgot is how profoundly sad it is when Cedric dies.  It’s always been a sad moment but I found myself tearing up at those bits this time around.  There’s also a lot to laugh at in this book and I like the way Rowling balances the two.  Honestly, I can’t wait for the Divination classes to be over.  I’m just as fed up with Professor Trelawney as Harry is but I find both Ron and Harry’s homework full of deathly predications to be quite amusing.  The ending of this book, while very sad, also gives you that look ahead that makes you want to pull the next book off the shelf and keep going with the story.

I’ve been pacing myself with these books.  If I didn’t, I probably would have overdosed on Harry Potter already.  It’s been fun rediscovering this story slowly and letting it unfold as it does and I’m glad I decided to go this route instead of for the all at once indulgence.  I haven’t read these books in so long that I have forgotten a lot of the little details so each one has held small surprises for me.  Those surprises are well appreciated I can tell you.

I’m excited about book five for several reasons: more Sirius Black; more angry Dumbledore; more Mad-Eye Moody; and the Weasley twins!

 

The Shipwreck That Saved Jamestown: The Sea Venture Castaways and the Fate of America

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The Shipwreck That Saved Jamestown: The Sea Venture Castaways and the Fate of America

By Lorri Glover and Daniel Blake Smith

Henry Holt and Company

ISBN: 978-0-8050-8654-6

4.75 stars

My original review of this book was very long and detailed.  Unfortunately, the file was corrupted and the book is back at the library so I don’t have it here as a reference while re-writing this review.  I like to write my own re-caps but I’m going to do something I normally don’t do — link to Amazon.  It has a bit of information about the book and I’ll supplement below from what I remember and add a few thoughts.

My history of the Jamestown colony is sparse, at least what I remember from grade/middle school, and I’ll admit that it’s mostly dates and names.  The drama of what Jamestown was about wasn’t covered in those far away history lessons.  Here, the story isn’t so much about the dates and times but the drama of Jamestown.  The Virginia Company, indebted to the King of England, was so worried about forfeiting their claim that they went out and recruited individuals that had no business being part of a settlement.  These were people looking for a way to escape the poverty and grief of London and the Virginia Company promised clothes, food, and shelter if they signed up.  Of course people signed up for the chance at a new life where they would have no worries and want for nothing.  Unfortunately, the Virginia Company forgot the simple things, like signing up people who could build houses, plant crops, dig wells, and hunt.  They were doomed.

The first group of settlers fared badly, fought with the Powhatan Native Americans, and ended up being starved out by them and then turning to cannibalism.  When the second wave of settlers arrived, they didn’t find any milk and honey, what they did find were open graves and starving, mad people.  When reports got back to England, the great public relations machine that was the Virginia Company kicked into high gear to mitigate the rumors and lies as they called them.  They even went so far as to stop the publication of a memoir of one of the survivors so they could go on recruiting.

Now, the Sea Venture was a ship in the second wave of settlers.  Unfortunately, it was caught up in a hurricane and crashed on Bermuda.  There the settlers found a land full of promise and riches.  There were birds, turtles, pigs, fruit and vegetables, and a land that was rich for farming.  They didn’t want to leave.  The leaders knew that their allegiance was to the Virginia Company and built two new ships to get them the short distance from Bermuda to Jamestown.  They arrived to a land of horror.  However, they were in a way, the saving grace of the colony.  Shortly after the arrival of the shipwrecked passengers, new ships arrived with provisions and people were, in a way, saved and the settlement preserved.

The interesting part of the story for me was the founding of Bermuda.  As it turns out, some of the travelers that landed on the island, which has been known as the Devil’s Island, told the leaders of the Virginia Company what a wonderfully fruitful place it was and the Company sent new ships to the island which was settled quickly and bountifully.  In a strange twist of fate, the Virginia Company which was losing money in the pit that was Jamestown made its money back in the first settlement of Bermuda due to the richness of the land.  So the Sea Venture not only gets credit for reviving Jamestown, but also for the settlement of Bermuda.

Since I’ve been feeling historically deficient this was one of the books that I picked up with the intent of fixing that need.  This one came through for me.  It doesn’t read like a dry history book but is filled with fascinating and wonderful facts that only made me want to read more about Jamestown and the Powhatan tribe.  There was not much discussion of the Powhatan other than their fighting with the first settlement and ultimate starvation of the settlers but the history there interested me and now I have a new subject to follow up on.

If you’re looking for something to fix a history craving, I recommend this one.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

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Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

By J.K. Rowling

Scholastic

ISBN: 0-439-13635-0

5 stars

This is my favorite book in the series, and before I tell you why, there will be spoilers so feel free to look away now if you don’t want to know.

First, the short re-cap: Harry is off to his third year at Hogwarts, and before he gets there, blows up his aunt like a balloon, worries that he might be expelled, takes the Knight Bus to London, learns that a madman named Sirius Black has escaped Azkaban, finds out that Sirius is after him, and that he may not be safe even at Hogwarts.

I love this book for so many reasons.  Aunts blowing up, Knight Buses, werewolves, dementors, boggarts, Quidditch, Firebolts, and Maurader’s Maps, ahh, yes, we’re back at Hogwarts.  Let’s start with a favorite, Professor Lupin.  He, for the first time, teaches the students practical applications in his Defense Against the Dark Arts class and his classes add a lightness to an otherwise gloomy year with dementors and escaped killers running around.  Lupin teachers Harry new skills and gives him hints into his parents’ lives from the perspective of an old friend.  He’s kind and a friend to Harry when he needs one.  The dementors are a dark turn in this book and become, sadly, a way for Harry to connect with his parents.  The attacks on him cause him to grow stronger though and he uses the sadness that he didn’t know existed, to move forward.  Hagrid, now the teacher of the Care of Magical Creatures class, is still finding odd things to harbor.  And it is thanks to Hagrid that we get to meet Buckbeak the Hippogriff, creatures I just adore for some reason.  Hermione is still being her good self in this book and when she causes Harry’s new Firebolt broom to be confiscated for fear that it might be cursed, she makes no friends and even I get annoyed at her.  Does she not know the Quidditch season it right around the corner?  And then there is Sirius.  He’s a dark figure in Harry’s past and one he didn’t even know existed.  He’s Harry godfather, a fact Harry never knew until this book.  One thing that does annoy me — when Sirius explains everything and offers Harry the chance to come and live with him, Harry jumps at it.  He doesn’t know this person and it just shows you how quick he is to make decisions before thinking about anything.  Harry?  Really?  Yes, I know the Dursley’s are awful people but this man just escaped from prison, and while I like him too, give it a second will you.

I realized while reading this book that I remembered the ending from the movie better than the book.  The incident with Hermione’s time turner is much different and I was pleased by this happy little discovery and was trying to figure out where it was going the whole time I was reading.  It’s nice to be surprised by books you’re read before.

I also forgot that Hermione doesn’t get Crookshanks until this book.  For some reason, I just always thought of the cat as there but it’s really not until the third book that he arrives and plays a much larger part than I remembered.  Poor Scabbers though.  While I don’t feel anything nice for Peter Pettigrew, I did feel for Ron having to watch his rat deteriorate.

The Prisoner of Azkaban is where I feel the story begins to take a turn and you know that no one is safe anywhere.  Sirius’s escape is even announced on the muggle news which is a warning that Hogwarts or not, there is no safe place.  The dementors with their soul sucking abilities remind the students that life will not always be filled with joy.

And to end this — Snape, still disliking him greatly.

The House on the Strand

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The House on the Strand

By Daphne Du Maurier

ISBN: 0-8122-1726-8

University of Pennsylvania Press

5 stars

Time travel and the 14th Century…what more can one want in a book?  OK, a lot more, but let’s go with these two as the starter for this one.

Richard Young is staying at his friend Magnus Lane’s home in the English countryside.  Magnus is a chemical researcher at the University of London and has concocted a drink, that when taken, will transport a person to the 14th Century.  The one catch is that the traveler cannot touch any person while on the trip or they will be instantly hurled back to the present rather painfully.  Richard, while waiting for his wife and step-sons to arrive, agrees to take the potion and report back to Magnus with the results.  The potion has the same affect on Richard as Magnus and they compare their trips to the past observing the daily lives of the people who used to live in the same area where Magnus’s house is.  Richard becomes fascinated with the past so much so that he keeps returning to see one particular woman that he has become obsessed with.  His sense of reality takes a turn and he starts to have trouble deciphering the past and the present which frightens him but not enough to stop him from taking what is left of the potion like some madman believing he can change the outcome of the past.  The results of his actions make the present a terrifying place for both Richard and his family.

Time travel in books can sometimes go bad but Du Maurier does something that makes it work — she makes it unbelievable.  That might sound odd but stick with me.  For a good portion of the book, Richard isn’t sure what he’s seeing and he isn’t sure he should believe it.  When he starts to believe, things go off track in his life making him wonder if what he thinks he believes is true.  Even when some historical research proves that the people he saw and observed on his trips were real, he still isn’t sure what to think or believe.  Life becomes difficult for him on so many levels and it seems as if you’re watching a man on the brink of madness.  How Du Maurier does this is fascinating and makes the whole idea of time travel so fantastical and terrifying at the same time.

Richard was not a person I liked at first.  I didn’t dislike him either but he’s a selfish person and one who doesn’t seem to think, or care, much for his family which is truly annoying.  Magnus however was a character I would have liked more of.  His ambiguity makes it work though because you get back to the idea of Richard slowly falling into the depths of madness without Magnus around.

There is so much to like about this book.  The fantasy element is done well, and even though you’re not sure if it truly exists outside of Richard’s mind, it works and is believable.  There are rules and consequences to the time travel and I like that.   A free system wouldn’t work here and Du Maurier creates a system that fits perfectly within the confines of the story.  The characters all have some sort of flaw that makes even the annoying ones likable, to a degree.  You do in the end sympathize with everyone which I wasn’t prepared to do half way through the book.

I will be adding more of Du Maurier’s books to my list.  Her writing is wonderfully descriptive and at the same time sparse, as if she’s giving you time to ingest it all.