Sunday, March 19, 2023

Classics Club Spin #33: Number Reveal


 

Today is the day to see which number I got for the Classics Club Spin!  Drumroll......18! I am very excited because number 18 on my list is Now, Voyager by Olive Higgins Prouty.  I have meant to read this book for YEARS as it is in the top five of my all time favorite classic movies. It is my favorite Bette Davis movie after All About Eve and I had no idea there was a book until years after I'd fallen in love with the movie. This spin will finally get me moving to read the novel that inspired it. So April is looking like a lot of fun! I will post my review on my Classics Club page when I am finished with it, by April 30th. 

Publication Date:  January 1, 1941

Length: 284 pages


 











Book summary courtesy of Goodreads:

Boston blueblood Charlotte Vale has led an unhappy, sheltered life. Lonely, dowdy, repressed, and pushing 40, Charlotte finds salvation at a sanitarium, where she undergoes an emotional and physical transformation. After her extreme makeover, the new Charlotte tests her mettle by embarking on a cruise—and finds herself in a torrid love affair with a married man which ends at the conclusion of the voyage. But only then can the real journey begin, as Charlotte is forced to navigate a new life for herself. While Now, Voyager is a tear-jerking romance, it is at the same time the empowering story of a woman who finds the strength to chart her own course in life; who discovers love, sex, and even motherhood outside of marriage; and who learns that men are, ultimately, dispensable in the quest for happiness and fulfillment.

Friday, March 17, 2023

Falls the Shadow by Sharon Kay Penman



Publication Date: 1988

Length: 592 pages

My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐☆☆

I originally was not going to write a review for this book until I'd written one for Here Be Dragons, book one of the Welsh princes trilogy. But I read that one two years ago and I've honestly forgotten a lot. So I decided to go ahead and finish this one, book two, and give my thoughts on it. Sharon Penman is one of my favorite authors and I always look forward to starting a new book of hers. While this one was not as engaging for me as I'd hoped it would be, it nevertheless is still a masterpiece of the time period she's covering. 

I really felt like this story was two timelines in one. Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester and Llewellyn of Wales both take center stage, with de Montfort monopolizing most of the book. It is part of the Welsh princes trilogy but it felt more like Simon's tale. When it begins, he has gone to try to reclaim his inheritance from his cousin, the Earl of Chester, who has no heirs and was given the title by King John, who saw fit to disinherit de Montfort's family. This opening scene sets the stage for Simon's courage and boldness as he is taking a chance that he will be rebuffed and humiliated. He eventually achieves his goal along with the admiration of those who are surprised he is able to pull off such an unlikely feat. 

He eventually weds, Eleanor, King Henry III's sister and develops the trust of the King. When Henry sides with other influential nobles against Simon, their relationship begins to sour. Throughout the first half of the book a lot of time is devoted to describing how these events came to be and why Simon and Henry begin to fall out with each other. Simon is charismatic and fearless, while Henry is portrayed as weak willed, heavily influenced by his mother and wife's relatives, and frustrated by what he sees as insubordination by Simon and Eleanor to his rightful place as the King. As tensions grow and Henry is forced to abide by the Provisions of Oxford, the document setting up accountability by the King to his barons, both men are pushed over the threshold into all out war.

Woven within the main storyline is also the relationship between Simon and Henry's sons. Prince Edward is the anti-thesis of his father, a born warrior with a restless nature. He spends time with Bran and Harry, Simon's sons, getting into a lot of mischief. Although Edward is not able to defeat Simon initially, losing to him at the Battle of Lewes in 1264, he eventually manages to escape and the two will meet later in the epic showdown at Evesham. In between, Simon essentially rules England for a year and sets the background for representative government, which is why he is still relevant in history books today. 

As for Llewellyn the Last, grandson of Llewellyn the Great, several parts are devoted to his relationship with his brothers, especially Dafydd, and his victory in establishing, for a time, an alliance between himself and de Montfort. We see Llewellyn grow from a young boy into a ruler, harkening back to his grandfather whom he loved and admired while having a very difficult relationship with his father and mother. Unfortunately, his future remains insecure as things do not go as planned for his country when de Montfort is unable to fulfill his own plans for England. Without giving away the entire story, it is clear that neither man's path to victory is guaranteed. The ending is both compelling and heartbreaking. 

I think the main reason this book became a bit of a slog to get through is that it was very dry. A lot of the relevance of de Montfort and his place in history is due to his involvement in the battles between the barons and the King and the balance of power between both. Without proper background knowledge and the intricacies of the legal documents involved with it all, one easily becomes lost and confused. I know I often did. There were times I spent looking up information online just to understand what was being discussed. I felt this way sometimes in Penman's book Time and Chance, which detailed King Henry II and Thomas Becket's squabbles but the difference was I somehow cared a lot more about the two men as people, not just their feud. With Falls the Shadow I just didn't feel as attached to Simon or this King Henry. There were also a huge number of people coming and going in the novel that just seemed to be irrelevant and made it confusing to keep track of everyone.

Penman is always a wonderful author so I can't say the book was not worth it, and certainly I came away with a good sense of the time. It is not easy to find historical fiction on the people featured here so that makes it worth the read. Hopefully the third novel, The Reckoning, will be more to my taste as it covers Wales and the final battle between Edward and Llewellyn. I plan on reading and reviewing it eventually but am taking a break from this trilogy for a bit. 










 

Wednesday, March 15, 2023

Can't Wait Wednesday: The King's Pleasure by Alison Weir

 



For this week's Can't Wait Wednesday, hosted by Tressa at Wishful Endings, I am looking forward to The King's Pleasure by Alison Weir. She is one of my favorite non-fiction authors and this is sure to be a solid fictional account of the life of Henry the Eighth. It's only natural that she'd write this one after her bestselling novels about his six wives. Hoping this one will be entertaining. 

May 30, 2023

Historical Fiction




Book description courtesy of NetGalley

The New York Times bestselling author of the Six Tudor Queens series explores the private side of the legendary king Henry VIII and his dramatic and brutal reign in this extraordinary historical novel.

Having completed her Six Tudor Queens series of novels on the wives of Henry VIII, extensively researched and written from each queen's point of view, Alison Weir now gives Henry himself a voice, telling the story of his remarkable thirty-six-year reign and his six marriages. 

Young Henry began his rule as a magnificent and chivalrous Renaissance prince who embodied every virtue. He had all the qualities to make a triumph of his kingship, yet we remember only the violence. Henry famously broke with the Pope, founding the Church of England and launching a religious revolution that divided his kingdom. He beheaded two of his wives and cast aside two others. He died a suspicious, obese, disease-riddled tyrant, old before his time. His reign is remembered as one of dangerous intrigue and bloodshed—and yet the truth is far more complex.

The King's Pleasure brings to life the idealistic monarch who expanded Parliament, founded the Royal Navy, modernized medical training, composed music and poetry, and patronized the arts. A passionate man in search of true love, he was stymied by the imperative to produce a male heir, as much a victim of circumstance as his unhappy wives. Had fate been kinder to him, the history of England would have been very different.

Here is the story of the private man. To his contemporaries, he was a great king, a legend in his own lifetime. And he left an extraordinary legacy—a modern Britain.


Monday, March 13, 2023

Classics Club Spin #33


 

Classics Club Spin #33

I am joining the Classics Club challenge this month to read a book from my list according to the number given to me on Sunday, March 19th. It is titled "33" because it is the 33rd time the club has had this challenge. This will be my very first spin. I am a little nervous about this as I like to have total control over what I feel like reading each day. But I made a goal to read these classics and this will help get me moving. I am already feeling waayyy behind! So wish me luck and I'll post on Sunday which book number I am tasked with reading. Here is my list of twenty random books from my Classics Club page:

1. Anna Karenina

2. Northanger Abbey

3. Jamaica Inn

4. North and South (Gaskell, not Jakes!)

5. The Man in the Brown Suit

6. Strangers On a Train

7. Emma

8. The Age of Innocence

9. 1984

10. Breakfast At Tiffany's

11. The Circular Staircase

12. Devil Water

13. This Side of Glory

14. Waverly

15. The Woman in White

16. Vanity Fair

17. The Talented Mr. Ripley

18. Now, Voyager

19. The Innocence of Father Brown

20. Whose Body?

Wondering what number the spin will land on? Check back on Sunday for my post! I have to read and review that book by Sunday, April 30th. 

Saturday, March 11, 2023

And Only To Deceive by Tasha Alexander (Lady Emily Mysteries Book One)



Publication Date: October 11, 2005

Length: 320 pages

My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐☆☆

This is a long running series with seventeen books. Her new one is set to be published this fall and has yet to even have a description summary yet. I wanted to start with this book because it is the first in the series. Each book features Lady Emily as the main character as she solves a mystery, often in different locations around the world. 

Lady Emily has been recently widowed and hardly knew her husband, the Viscount Phillip of Ashton. She only accepted his proposal in the first place to escape her life with her overbearing mother and had no real connection to Phillip. They weren't together long as he went to Africa on safari and died there. Emily at first revels in her widowhood and new found freedom that was given to her upon his death and inheritance of plenty of wealth to keep her comfortable but soon she begins to read his journals and finds herself falling in love with him. He clearly was in love with her as evidenced in his writings and Emily starts to regret she hadn't known him better or for longer. 

She finds he was also an articulate, well educated, interesting man who through his affiliation with the museum and artifacts fascinate her and she begins to be interested in learning more about Greek history, poetry, and Phillip's association with it all. 

She is faced in her real, everyday life with her dead husband's friend, Colin Hargreaves and is not so smitten at first. She finds herself running into him with great annoyance and their personalities clashing. But this flesh and blood man turns out to be an exciting prospect himself and along with other suitors, she finds her world getting complicated.

The mystery part of the story involves theft and intrigue and throughout Emily is subjected to some harrowing situations. She has to find out who is behind stolen artifacts that connect to Phillip and the British Museum. The answer is both frightening and close to home. She begins to wonder if her adoration of Phillip was misplaced and if she can trust anyone close to her.

This story started out strong. I enjoyed Alexander's writing and it felt like she was giving me a lesson in art, history, and Victorian manners, along with a mystery to solve. It is clear she is knowledgeable in Greek art history and she did a solid job of dialogue and character interaction for the time. Unfortunately, I can only give it three stars because halfway through I really started to lose interest in the mystery part. It felt more like a romance novel with a background puzzle thrown in. I began to feel there wasn't enough mystery there to keep things suspenseful and the villain was just not well hidden to the end. A solid effort to be sure, especially for a first novel, but not a five star book for me.

I am interested in her upcoming book and will probably try it. The plot intrigues me because it is a Lady Emily mystery set in the Scottish Highlands. Hopefully it will be exciting!