Historical Fiction

Review – The Map of Lost Memories

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Irene Blum has spent her life studying the Khmer Empire and acquiring knowledge of ancient civilizations and artifacts. She’s an expert in her field and fully expects to be running the Brooke Museum of Oriental Arts in Seattle, which houses a collection she helped to build, in due time. When the curatorship is given to another, it devastates her. Still reeling from the death of her father a few months earlier, she turns to Henry Simms, a close family friend and the man who helped raise her after the death of her mother. He is also the person who instilled in her the intense interest she has in the Khmer Empire. Mr. Simms is dying of cancer, and knowing it will be the last great adventure of his life and the start of one for Irene, he shares an unknown diary with her that talks about lost copper scrolls containing the history of the Khmer. The scrolls are supposedly hidden in an ancient Khmer temple in the Cambodian jungle. With nothing left for her in Seattle, Irene leaves for Shanghai to convince a woman named Simone Merlin to join her on the trip to Cambodia. Both women have much to prove — to each other and themselves — and the trip to discover the lost scrolls becomes a test of wills.

While the big draw for me was the setting, Shanghai and the Cambodian jungle in 1925, it was the characters that surprised me. Everyone has secrets so deeply ingrained it drug them all down and each and every character fought out of desperation; each not wanting to admit being wrong or to give in. The setting amplified every single flaw these characters carried.

Irene and Simone are bound together in horrific ways that neither woman wants to think about — murder, drugs, and a personal history neither knew existed until Irene found Simone in Shanghai. Their interactions are sometimes painful to witness but that’s what I enjoyed so much about this particular relationship. In 1925, two women struggling to be more than what society has deemed appropriate was great to see. Their efforts to regain some sense of themselves, understand their dreams, and deal with how those dreams have changed made for notable characters.

The Map of Lost Memories is full of mystery and suspense — some of it brought on in the course of the discovery of an archeological gem in the jungle and at other times it’s complete human folly. I adored the mixture. I feel like I’ve skipped the brilliant setting in favor of discussing some flawed but captivating characters. The setting and the discovery of an ancient Khmer temple deep in the Cambodian jungle was what made me want to read this book and it turned out to be a book full of characters looking for and waiting for redemption in different forms.

Historical fiction is a favorite of mine and the thing that keeps me reading this genre are books that make me want to know more about an event, a person, or discovery after I finish the book. This book did just that. I found myself wanting to know more about the Khmer Empire and the forgotten temples covered by moss and vines.

A setting that’s fascinating, thrilling, and dangerous, and characters that are in turn annoying and absorbing with strong personalities but are flawed and human. Together these elements made it difficult for me to put this book down. Fay obviously has a love for Asian culture and history. If she decides to write more books with this setting, I’ll be reading.

In addition to this blog, I also do reviews for The Book Reporter website. The above review was done for the Book Reporter which can be found here. The book was provided to me by the publisher.

The Map of Lost Memories

Kim Fay

Ballantine Books

ISBN: 9780345531346

4 stars

 

Review – Frenchman’s Creek

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Frenchman’s Creek is a book I wanted to read last year. I even got it out of the library, very excited to have it in my hands, and then I never read it. It went back to the library unopened. A few weeks ago I decided to put it on hold and decided this would be the time I read it, and I did. And it was wonderful. It’s full of cold, rainy Cornwall days, French pirates, romance, and pillaging. What more could I want?

Lady Dona St. Columb is not one for high society although she is a fixture in London society. Always the most daring and outspoken one in the room, and mostly by choice, she tires of it all and take off for her husband’s country estate on the coast of Cornwall with only her children and a few servants in tow. She arrives at the dreary closed up home happy to finally be alone and out of London. She can’t stand the neighbors and does her best to make a few scenes to amuse herself but they reluctantly pester her to write to her husband and ask him to take care of the pirate who is raiding the coast. Not at all wanting to see her husband, she doesn’t bother with telling him the news but she does find she’s interested in finding out more about this pirate.

This book is certainly more romantic than the other du Maurier books I’ve read. Dona, a very selfish woman by all accounts, and even though she claims to care for her children, is happy to run off for days without seeing them. It’s all about her and what she wants. What she wants is the French pirate and that’s what she gets. I can’t say I blame her. I too pictured a lovely French pirate as well, but overall, Dona’s not an endearing person and not all that likable for her actions. Did I mention her leaving her children for days on end and she doesn’t even think about them while she’s gone. Oh, and she’s claiming this entire time that she’s a good parent. And, you guessed it; she’s also having an affair. If you didn’t guess that, my apologies, I didn’t mean to ruin that for you. Wipe that last sentence from your memory. But I came to like her anyway and especially at the end which I won’t be sharing.

The strong personalities in du Maurier’s books are amusing, entertaining, and full of passion of one kind or another — think Rebecca, Rachel, and add Dona to that list — and that’s what I like that about her characters. I don’t always like her characters but do like the surprises her sometimes selfish, mean, and cruel female characters can bring about.

Frenchman’s Creek has only made me want to read more of her books. My library has Jamaica Inn and that might be the next one on my list of du Maurier books to tackle. This one was a real pleasure.

Frenchman’s Creek

By Daphne du Maurier

Source Books Landmark

ISBN: 9781402217104

4.5 stars

Review – Shadow of Night

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In Shadow of Night, we pick up with Diana Bishop, now Diana Clairmont, and her new husband Matthew in 1590 Elizabethan England. Having time walked back to 1590 to find a witch capable of understanding Diana’s magic and who can teach her how to control her powers, the two soon get caught up in 16th Century English politics and court intrigue. It’s a particularly fascinating place for Diana, being the scholar that she is, but for Matthew the new setting brings on a fresh set of problems and emotions. Matthew, a vampire who once hunted down witches, now has to reconcile his old role as witch hunter which is more than difficult now that over 400 years later, he finds himself married to a witch. He also must come to some understanding with his father — a man he knows as dead in his present.

In only a few months, Diana and Matthew have to find Ashmole 782, the mysterious book that brought them together months ago in their present time at the Bodleian Library at Oxford University. Hoping it may still be intact in 1590, they’re both somewhat optimistic that Diana’s burgeoning powers can help them understand who they are, what they are, and what will happen to their families. All the while they are dealing with Matthew’s past, well-known historical figures — Queen Elizabeth I anyone? — famous playwrights, witches, family drama, and weddings. Diana and Matthew not only have to figure out how to be married but also how to be a witch and vampire married to each other while looking for a book that they hope holds the answers to their future.

Matthew is still his controlling self — he’s a vampire but it’s still hard to ignore this annoying trait of his — but Diana is finally starting to understand what her witch heritage means, how to control her powers, and starts to stand her ground. Once reluctant to accept witchcraft, she finally begins using it and accepting it as part of who she is. Something her husband, a man who wants to control everything, struggles with as well. Their relationship becomes more of a partnership in the second book. These two obviously have picked a strange road to follow and one that many don’t see ending happily. I felt this second book in the All Souls trilogy (Shadow of Night is the second book in the series following A Discovery of Witches) had a bit less mystery for me but a lot more intrigue. I enjoyed the numerous strange characters that appeared and we finally get a look at Matthew’s past. Getting to meet Matthew’s family and friends explains his sometimes irrational mood swings and what both he and Diana will be facing in their life together.

I’m a series reader and am happy to say that Shadow of Night kept up with A Discovery of Witches. Book two in a trilogy can sometimes feel like a place holder, and while Diana and Matthew’s questions aren’t answered, their lives do move on and I liked seeing their relationship change. They both wonder about their intrusions on the past and how their actions will alter their futures and the past. Diana finally accepts witchcraft as part of who she is but there are few precious hints at what it will hold for her future self. Matthew’s history hits him full on in 1590 and Diana understands for the first time why her husband falls into such dark places.

In short, time walking, famous dead people, more vampires, witches, and daemons, and lots of magic shape book two in the All Souls trilogy. And yes, I’m now sitting and hoping Deborah Harkness writes faster because I’m anxious to know what happens to Diana and Matthew.

In addition to this blog, I also do reviews for The Book Reporter website. The above review was done for the Book Reporter which can be found here. The book was provided to me by the publisher.

Shadow of Night

Deborah Harkness

Viking Adult

ISBN: 9780670023486

4.5 stars

 

French Pirates and Dragons

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Don’t see the connection? I went to the library and this is what I came home with. Well, not actual pirates and dragons but close enough.

Honestly, it’s been months since I’ve been to my library and there are a couple reasons for that. Reason number one — the books on my shelf have been calling! But I decided it was time and off I went to the lovely place with all the books. On this visit, I held myself to two books.

Frenchman’s Creek by Daphne Du Maurier — I’ve had this in my hands before but never got around to it but that won’t happen this time. I will finally get to this one, and really all I have to say, is French Pirates!

Tooth and Claw by Jo Walton — I’m reading Among Others right now and enjoying it and thought why not go for another one. Why not the one with the dragons?

Review – The Reckoning

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The Reckoning is the second book in The Taker trilogy. My review of The Taker is here.

The Reckoning picks up where the first book in The Taker trilogy left off — with Lanny running away from Adair, the man who bestowed eternal life upon her. After escaping the small cell Lanny imprisoned him in, Adair is now free and looking to exact revenge on Lanny, the woman he supposedly loves and has convinced himself he cannot live without.

Lanny is on the run with her new love Luke trying not only to avoid criminal charges for murder back in Maine but also any last vestige of her previous life. The last 200 years, while memorable for numerous reasons and punctuated with the odd famous individual or well-known events, have also been filled with terror for her. She knows that the prison holding her former lover, and tormentor, Adair, may break at any time and he will come looking for her. When the day Lanny most dreaded arrives and Adair is freed, she tried to impress on everyone in her life, current and past acquaintances, that Adair being free is more than a simple matter of hiding. She knows he will find her and she doesn’t want to let that happen knowing only years of pain, fear, and humiliation will be hers to endure. Thanks to her immortality, death will never be a release from the nightmare she knows awaits her.

Luke doesn’t understand her fear, and not having ever known Adair or anyone else from Lanny’s past, he believes her fear to be irrational. Knowing she can’t have Luke found by Adair, Lanny leaves him to search out the others and hopefully find answers and some solace in their company. What Lanny finds is not at all what she expected.

As in the first book in this series, The Taker, a good deal of the story is told through flashbacks of Lanny and Adair’s lives. They spend days thinking over their pasts and wondering where it got them. This is especially true in the case of Adair, who after 200 years of imprisonment is now part of a world that doesn’t conform to his style of living. For a man with freedom, he seems oddly intimidated by it —- he can’t frighten the world and its people into submission. Even the ones he has bestowed eternity upon aren’t as he remembered.

While Adair is trying to form some sense of identity (and search out Lanny to exact vengeance for locking him behind stone) Lanny is looking for some sort of forgiveness. I have to admit that I felt some of the characters, Adair in particular, changed too much and too little all at the same time. Adair is a monster, to be certain, a man obsessed with a woman he’s tortured physically and mentally, and, yet, he can’t understand why she wants him buried behind a stone wall. Of course, any time he becomes soft hearted, you’re immediately reminded of his past actions. Katsu doesn’t let you forget you aren’t supposed to like Adair.

At the end of The Taker, I was wondering where Katsu would take this story and now at the end of The Reckoning, I’m feeling much the same curiosity. I think Katsu has a skill for building characters with extensive pasts that continue to fascinate. In many ways, I was left guessing as to what the truth was and what was told to impress or scare. The characters all walk fine lines. They may be immortal but they’re all part of a mortal world that most likely wouldn’t understand or accept them. Most find ways to blend in and survive but I still can’t get past their actions. It’s a character driven story with incredibly interesting and sometimes hateful characters and that’s keeping me firmly attached to the story.

If you’re interested in The Reckoning, start with The Taker. This is a story best read from the beginning. It’s a tale of obsession, love, and fear among immortals who can’t be harmed by the trials of life but who manage to do a number on each other. You’ll need all the gory details to understand why waiting on the final book in this series will feel like an eternity.

In addition to this blog, I also do reviews for The Book Reporter website. The above review was done for the Book Reporter which can be found here. The book was provided to me by the publisher.

The Reckoning

By Alma Katsu

Gallery Books

ISBN: 9781451651805

4 stars

Review – All the Flowers in Shanghai

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Feng is a young woman who is mostly ignored by everyone in her family with the exception of her grandfather who dotes on her. Her older sister is the one everyone’s hopes and dreams ride on but she’s cruel to Feng and the two have never had any sort of relationship. When her sister dies unexpectedly, Feng is forced to marry her fiancé to hold up the arrangements her parents made and Feng finds herself a wife to a son of a well-known and rich family in Shanghai with no idea how to fend for herself or any understanding of what’s expected of her.

All the Flowers in Shanghai interested me because this is a timeframe I’m unfamiliar with — Shanghai in the 1930s — and I don’t read much historical fiction set in China which was very appealing. While the setting was interesting, I didn’t care for any of the characters. Feng goes from being exceptionally naïve to bitter in an amazingly short time frame. Her mother, the social climber, is not even worth mentioning as she wasn’t much of a mother so much as person bartering away her daughters for social acceptance. In the end, this book is a letter to a daughter Feng doesn’t know but why she would write such awful things to her daughter I just don’t understand. Yes, she was looking for forgiveness in the end, but throwing every hateful thing she’s ever done out into the world — both to the daughter and to her husband — doesn’t portray her in a good way.

Oddly, Feng gave her daughter away so that she wouldn’t have to face the life she did but the entire time I was reading, I kept wondering why she couldn’t leave any of her bitterness especially for her children. No, her life wasn’t an easy one but she didn’t want to see any happiness in her life and drove all of it away from her which meant she drove every family member away that she could. In the end of her life, she does begin to understand her hatred and deal with it but the letter feels like a poor apology and nothing more. She spent her whole life looking to get back at people and never sought to understand anyone’s motivation but her own and I couldn’t accept her mea culpa.

Like I said, the setting is really appealing and I wish there had been more about the revolution and the changes China went through. Because the story is told through Feng’s perspective, it’s hard to see the impact of the changes and what little of the revolution Feng does come in contact with she doesn’t understand because of the secluded life she led.

While I had trouble with the characters in this book, the writing is solid and has given me a new timeframe for historical fiction to explore.

I won this book through the LIbrayThing Early Reviewers program. An ARC was sent to me by the publisher for review.

All the Flowers in Shanghai

By Duncan Jepson

William Morrow

ISBN: 9780062106971

2.5 stars

Review – The Winter Sea

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I’m an historical fiction junkie and while I don’t read general romance books, when it’s tossed with some historical fiction, I’m all about it. That’s what Kearsley does so deftly in this book — she takes what should be a simple story about a woman writing a book and makes it about the lives of the women she’s writing about. This is a book where I wanted every possible happy ending to happen.

The Winter Sea begins in present day Scotland with an author, Carrie McClelland, working on a new novel about the Jacobites and a failed invasion. She finds inspiration while visiting a friend who lives in Scotland and decides to stay on and rent a small cottage near Slain’s Castle which plays a part in the story she’s telling. The cozy cottage fits her needs well and the writing comes along at an incredible pace for her. Carrie begins making friends with many of the locals; particularly the sons of the man she’s renting the cottage from. All seems to be going incredibly well, except the research. Research has always been a part of her work but she finds herself not needing it so much in this book. Carrie begins to wonder if the past is starting to intrude a bit on the present for her.

Time slips never bother me, especially in historical fiction. In The Winter Sea I particularly enjoyed this because we got to meet so many interesting characters. The second story, the story within the story if you will, only takes place in the time slip, and is centered in 1708 Scotland. It’s here that Sophia Paterson, a young woman running from a bad situation, is taken in by a Countess (she is made out to be a distant relative) and finds love, and a life she never expected.

When I said I wanted the proverbial happy ending above, this is where I wanted it. Without giving much away, there were parts of Sophia’s story that were so sad but understandable. Really, I adored this character and wanted her to be just as happy as Carrie. It was not to be but that doesn’t change how much I enjoyed this book.

I’ll admit that I’m easily seduced by a Scottish setting but it was the wonderful characters that immediately sucked me in. This one lived up to my expectations and beyond. While there were two distinct stories being told here, they never felt separate, they were integrated so well I didn’t feel as though I was missing anything when the perspective switched. I loved the family history that Kearsley wove throughout the story for Carrie, which was part of the reason it worked so well. Tying the fictional author to her ancestral characters was a nice touch.

This was my first of Kearsley’s books. I’m just sorry I waited so long to pick this one up.

The Winter Sea

By Susanna Kearsley

Source Books

4.25 stars

 

The Sunday Salon – Re-Cap

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I had a wonderful post all planned out for today but I can’t find the piece of paper I had it scribbled on so today’s going to be a re-cap of sorts.

  • I finished The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley earlier this week. I’m such a sucker for a Scottish setting and it’s a good story too.
  • After The Winter Sea, I picked up Anne Enright’s The Gathering. It’s a short book but it took me most of the week to read it. I haven’t read a book this depressing, and good, in a very long time.
  • I spent most of yesterday buried in The Watchers by Jon Steele. I’m enjoying the setting (Switzerland) and there’s short list of good characters to cling to.
  • We watched Rise of the Planet of the Apes last night. The ape parts were all good, the people parts were meh.

The last one is not about books but it happened and I added it because it’s still in my head this morning.

I’m planning to find a quiet spot to read more of The Watchers today and then finish planning out our vacation. That’s my day people. Now I’m off to get some coffee and find a quiet spot to read. Happy Sunday.