BOOK CLUB – The True Memoirs of Little K by Adrienne Sharp

Sep 272011

5256159881 7ba9c432e6 m picture Welcome to BOOK CLUB, which I run with co-conspirator Nicole from Linus’s Blanket. Today we will be chatting about The True Memoirs of Little K by Adrienne Sharp, which is being released in paperback by Picador on October 25th (website | twitter | facebook). For those of you reading this post, please remember that this discussion is likely to contain spoilers.

Here is the synopsis of the book I wrote for my review:

Little K was a prima ballerina, the lover of the last Russian tsar. A woman whose determination brought her into the beds of many members of the imperial family, but whose brilliant future was derailed when Russia as she knew it began to disappear, along with her beloved Tsar Nicholas II, and something where the concubine of the Romanovs was a dangerous thing to be. But perhaps it would be best to let Little K introduce herself in her own words, as this is a story she has been endlessly remembering for the past 50 years:

My name is Mathilde Kschessinska, and I was the greatest Russian ballerina on the imperial stages. But the world I was born to, the world I was bred for, is gone, and all the players in it are also gone – dead, murdered, exiled, walking ghosts. -p. 3

littlek picture Before we get started, here are some of the reviews of readers who will be participating today:

Beachreader
Devourer of Books
Reviews by Lola

If you plan on participating in today’s BOOK CLUB, please consider subscribing to comments at the bottom of the page (please use the TOP subscription option, the second option will subscribe you only to replies of your own comments). I will be updating this post with new questions and ideas over the course of the day.

Here we go…

First off, what were your general impressions of the book?
Is this a book you would have read had you not been reading it for a book club?
Near the beginning of the book, Little K makes this somewhat provocative statement about Nicki’s marriage to Alix. Do you think, based on the events of the book, that she was correct about this?
And what kind of wife would I have made him? Could I have stood his future – imprisonment and
a martyr’s death? I can assure you this: if I had been his wife, that would not have been his future. -p. 23
What do you think was the root of Little K’s determination to be part of the tsar’s life? How did you feel about the way she positioned her son?
Do you think that Little K fully understood the causes of the revolution? What helped or hindered her in this?
Do you think that Sharp made the causes of the revolution clear to the reader?

12 review copies of The True Memoirs of Little K were provided by Picador in order to facilitate this discussion. Thank you!

For the King by Catherine Delors – giveaway

Jul 052011

fortheking picture Just in time for Bastille Day, Catherine Delors’ story of post-Revolutionary France, For the King is coming to paperback. As you may remember from last summer, I loved For the King, so I am thrilled to be able to offer two copies for giveaway to readers with US addresses, courtesy of Penguin.

If you want to know more about the history behind For the King, please check out the guest post that Catherine Delors wrote about the revolutionary group depicted in her book: “The Chouans and the Downfall of Napoleon.”

To enter, please fill out the form below by Sunday, July 10th at 11:59pm Central.

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Dragonfly in Amber by Diana Gabaldon – Book Review

Feb 162011

Dragonfly in Amber by Diana Gabaldon
Published by Delta, an imprint of Random House
This is the 2nd book in the series, review may contain spoilers for earlier books

Claire and Jaime are back again, trying now to prevent the battle at Culloden Field, in which Claire knows thousands of highland men will die. In an attempt to change history, they travel together to France to try to subvert the cause of Bonnie Prince Charlie.

“Dragonfly in Amber” has perhaps the most confusing opening of any book I have ever read. When we last left Claire at the end of “Outlander,” she had decided not to go back to her own time, but to stay with Jaime. At the beginning of “Dragonfly in Amber,” she is back in the present with a grown daughter, trying to find out who of all of the men she had known made it alive through the battle at Culloden Field. I wondered if I had skipped a page in “Dragonfly in Amber,” or whether I had misinterpreted or misremembered the end of “Outlander.” Before too long, though, it all made sense again, and I was happy to be back, drawn into the lives of Claire and Jamie once more.

As with “Outlander,” I felt that “Dragonfly in Amber” was just a bit too long. And really, it is a testament to Gabaldon’s writing and storytelling that her 800+ page books are only a little too long, and not painfully too long. Still, though, it makes me hesitate a bit to get to the later books, which are even longer. Even so, I am loving these books and have no plans to stop the series any tiem soon.

Recommended.

Buy this book from:
Powells.*
A local independent bookstore via Indiebound.*
Amazon.*

Source: Personal copy.
* These links are all affiliate links. If you buy your book here I’ll make a very small amount of money that goes towards hosting, giveaways, etc.

Sunday Spotlight on: Some Sing, Some Cry by Ntozake Shange and Ifa Bayeza

Oct 102010

5060639214 141edd3ab0 m picture Today I want to talk about a book I am dying to read, but which I was not able to fit in in time to review it for my Chicago Author Month.

At 560 pages, “Some Sing, Some Cry” is a sweeping epic of the African American experience from emancipation through Vietnam, told through the lives of one family. Interestingly enough, “Some Sing, Some Cry” is actually the result of a collaborative effort between sisters. Ntozake Shange and Ifa Bayeza are both successful playwrights, with Shange also having published fiction and poetry. Although Shange lives in New York, Bayeza makes her home in Chicago, which is why I chose to spotlight this during my Chicago Author’s Month.

I am typically not a huge fan of historical fiction set in the United States, but this is exactly the sort of thing that sways me. I love epics like “Some Sing, Some Cry” that showcase a nation and a people’s history while at the same time personalizing events through a focused group, such as a single family.

From the few pages I read, “Some Sing, Some Cry” seems to be well-written and moving, just the sort of book I’d like to settle in with over a long weekend.

4866515992 41b02a5de1 m picture Have read “Some Sing, Some Cry?” If so, what did you think of it? Is this the type of book that appeals to you?

I received no compensation for this post, including a copy of the book for review.

Addicting Series – The Results

Sep 252010

On Tuesday I asked you all to recommend some addicting series, and boy did you come through! By Thursday afternoon we had 49 comments (including a few replies of mine) for a total of 48 series recommendations. The most-mentioned series by far was “Outlander” which I am reading now, with seven mentions, followed by a handful of series which were mentioned 4 times. Apologies if any are mis-cataloged here, but I was going off either what people said or a very cursory Google search. Historical mysteries are listed with historical fiction. Without further ado, here they are:

Mystery/Crime fiction

M.C. Beaton – Hamish Macbeth series
Lee Child – Jack Reacher series (2 mentions)
Arthur Conan Doyle – Sherlock Holmes
Janet Evanovich – Stephanie Plum series (2 mentions)
Tess Gerritsen – Rizzoli and Isles
Sue Grafton – Kinsey Milhone series (2 mentions)
Martha Grimes – Richard Jury series
Charlaine Harris – Harper Connelly series
Arnaldur Indridason – Reykjavik murder mystery series
P.D. James – Adam Digliesh series
Faye Kellerman – Peter Decker/Rina Lazarus (2 mentions)
Laurie R. King – Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes series
Stieg Larsson – The Millennium Trilogy
Jeff Lindsay – Dexter series
J.D. Robb – Eve Dallas/In Death series (2 mentions)
Dorothy L. Sayers – Lord Peter Wimsey series (3 mentions)
Alexander McCall Smith – Number 1 Ladies’ Detectives Agency series
Jacqueline Winspear – Maisie Dobbs series (2 mentions)

Historical Fiction

Sarah Donati – Into the Wilderness series
Ariana Franklin – Mistress of the Art of Death mystery series
Margaret Frazer – Sister Frevisse mystery series
Diana Gabaldon – Outlander series (7 mentions)
Sandra Gulland – Josephine trilogy
Patrick O’Brian – Jack Aubrey series (3 mentions)
Ellis Peters – Brother Cadfael mystery series (2 mentions)
Deanna Raybourn – Lady Julia Grey mystery series (2 mentions)
Penny Vincenzi – No Angel

Speculative Fiction: Dystopian/Science Fiction/Paranormal/Fantasy

Ilona Andrews – Kate Daniels series
Libba Bray – The Gemma Doyle series (YA)
Patricia Briggs – Mercedes Thompson series
Jim Butcher – Harry Dresden series (4 mentions)
Cassandra Clare – Mortal Instruments series (YA)
Jasper Fforde – Thursday Next series
Jeaniene Frost – Night Huntress series
Charlaine Harris – Sookie Stackhouse series (4 mentions)
Kim Harrison – The Hollows series
Robert Jordan – Wheel of Time series (2 mentions)
Stephen King – The Dark Tower series
John Marsdon – Tomorrow series (YA, 4 mentions)
George R.R. Martins – A Song of Fire and Ice
Lisa McMann – Wake series
Karen Marie Moning – MacKayla Lane series (3 mentions)

General/Christian Fiction

Jan Karon – The Mitford Years series
Sophie Kinsella – Shopaholic series
Debbie Macomber – Cedar Cove series
Brendan O’Carroll – The Mammy series
Francine Rivers – The Mark of the Lion trilogy
Ann B. Ross – Miss Julia (Christian fiction)

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon – Book Review

Sep 172010

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon
Published by Delta, an imprint of Random House

Life has been in upheaval for Claire and Frank for some time. The majority of their married life was spent apart during World War II, where Claire acted as a nurse. Now is their time to reconnect on a romantic retreat in the Scottish highlands. One morning on their vacation, Claire heads up to an old stone circle (a la Stonehenge). As she nears the structure she begins to hear odd sounds and suddenly is whisked 200 years back in time where she is rescued/kidnapped by a group of Scottish clansmen. One of them, a young man in his early 20s named Jaime, has been badly injured and Claire immediately uses her nursing skills to help heal him. The longer Claire spends in the 18th century, the more time she and Jaime spend around one another, until something happens that will force them together.

When I first joined LibraryThing, one of my first stops was the historical fiction group, where it seemed like everyone was talking about one series. It was universal love, nary a dissenting opinion to be found. That series was, of course, Diana Gabaldon’s “Outlander” series. After that initial introduction, I began hearing praises for “Outlander” all over the place; it seemed that everyone but me had read it. And yet, I resisted. I resisted for a good three years. I was scared by the fact it was a long series of hefty books (the mass market edition of Outlander I read has about 850 pages, and it appears that many of the sequels are longer). I also wasn’t sure how I felt about the time travel aspect or the whole description of the series as historical romance, since I generally feel like romance aspects add very little to historical fiction.

What I want to know now is this:

WHY did none of you sit me down and make me read “Outlander” before this?

Seriously? Because I L-O-V-E LOVE it.

And what of my objections? Okay, first, the time travel thing. It really isn’t time travel. Yes, Claire goes back in time, but it more about the magical qualities of the Scottish highlands, finding that there is truth to the basis of the old myths, not that there is some science fiction-type thing stuck in the middle of what is primarily historical fiction, just a touch of fantasy. Of course, I was also put off by everyone’s description of this book as romance, because historical romance usually makes me roll my eyes or skip pages. However, I was talking to Michelle from That’s What She Read trying to sum up my thoughts on the romance angle and I think that she put it very well: most sex scenes in historical fiction are either gratuitous or insignificant. She’s absolutely right, but the romantic encounters in “Outlander” and neither of those things. By and large they really do advance the plot and the character development. Plus, Gabaldon perfectly walks the line between too vague and too graphic and writes love scenes that don’t make me want to throw the book against the wall, miracle of miracles!

If you are like me and have heard of these books but failed to read them, please stop what you’re doing and go and find the first one. They’re long, but they’re fast reads and they’re terrific. And now I’m out of here, because I’m on my way to buy the next two books in the series!

Buy this book from:
Powells.*
A local independent bookstore via Indiebound.*
Amazon.*

I read this book as part of a TLC Book Tour. Check out some of the other tour hosts for more reviews. Links go to the host’s site, not to their specific review.

Monday, August 2nd: Jenn’s Bookshelves (An Echo in the Bone)

Wednesday, August 4th: The Literate Housewife Review (Voyager)

Monday, August 9th: Musings of an All Purpose Monkey (Outlander)

Thursday, August 12th: Under the Boardwalk (An Echo in the Bone)

Friday, August 13th: Starting Fresh (An Echo in the Bone)

Monday, August 16th: Planet Books (Outlander)

Wednesday, August 25th: MoonCat Farms Meanderings (An Echo in the Bone)

Tuesday, August 31st: The Brain Lair (Outlander)

Wednesday, September 1st: My Two Blessings (Outlander)

Thursday, September 2nd: Life in the Thumb (An Echo in the Bone)

Tuesday, September 7th: That’s What She Read (Dragonfly in Amber)

Monday, September 13th: Suko’s Notebook (Outlander)

Tuesday, September 14th: Luxury Reading (Outlander)

Wednesday, September 15th: The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader (An Echo in the Bone)

Friday, September 17th: Devourer of Books (Outlander)

Tuesday, September 21st: Rundpinne (An Echo in the Bone)

Monday, September 27th: Hey, Lady! Whatcha Readin’? (Outlander)

Thursday, September 30th: Pop Culture Junkie (Outlander)

* These links are all affiliate links. If you buy your book here I’ll make a very small amount of money that goes towards hosting, giveaways, etc.

Forgotten Treasure: The Book You Should Be Reading

Sep 162010

4987147550 c3a8c4b790 m picture I don’t know exactly if I would call this forgotten treasure, because it is really quiet new, has only been out for a couple of weeks, but “The Report” by Jessica Francis Kane is a largely undiscovered (at least by book bloggers) treasure. It does seem to be getting great reviews in traditional media, but I haven’t seen (m)any reviews other than mine on book blogs.

4935995209 0c470acbb1 m picture “The Report” is the story of Britain’s worst civilian disaster during World War II, The Bethnal Green incident, and the subsequent government investigation and report. You may think that a government investigation and report sounds like a total snoozefest, and I would understand that, but I promise you, but it is not. Seriously, this is a fantastic and absolutely engaging work of very realistic historical fiction. It is actually fairly amazing how engaged Kane gets her reader, considering she has such a large cast of characters, but she does it.

“The Report” is published by Graywolf Press, a very cool small press. If you’ve thought about spending more time reading books by small presses, this is a good place to start. Or if you just like well-written fiction that is evocative of time and place, this is a must-read.

Catholicism and Perceived Witchcraft in Reformation-Era England – Guest Post by Mary Sharratt, Author of “Daughters of the Witching Hill”

May 112010

Please read through to the bottom of this post for giveaway details.

In 1612, seven women and two men from Pendle Forest in Lancashire, Northern England were hanged as witches, accused of committing murderous acts of diabolical sorcery. My novel, Daughters of the Witching Hill, is based on this tragic history.

The prosecution, wishing to provide evidence of this alleged satanic magic, cited the charms and spells of accused witch Mother Demdike’s family. (Mother Demdike, whose real name was Elizabeth Southerns, died in prison before she could come to trial, but she was the most notorious of the accused, the supposed ringleader who had initiated all the others.) Her charms, recorded in the trial transcripts, reveal absolutely no evidence of devil worship, but instead use the ecclesiastical language of the Catholic Church, the old religion outlawed and literally demonized in Reformation era England. Mother Demdike’s incantation to cure a bewitched person—quoted by her granddaughter Jennet Device, one of the main witnesses for the prosecution, and considered damning evidence of diabolical sorcery—is, in fact, a moving and poetic depiction of the passion of Christ, as witnessed by the Virgin Mary.

What is yonder that casts a light so farrandly,
Mine owne deare Sonne that’s naild to the Tree . . . .

In places, the text of this charm is very similar to the White Pater Noster, an Elizabethan prayer charm which Eamon Duffy discusses in his landmark book, The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England 1400-1580.

Her charm to get drink is in ecclesiastical Latin:

Crucifixus hoc signum vitam Eternam. Amen.

(Literal translation: the crucifix is the sign of eternal life.)

Mother Chattox, Demdike’s sometimes friend, sometimes rival, also employed charms full of this same Catholic imagery. The following is Chattox’s incantation to cure a bewitched person:

Three Biters hast thou bitten,
The Hart, ill Eye, ill Tonge:
Three bitter shall be thy Boote,
Father, Sonne, and Holy Ghost
a Gods name,
Fiue Pater-nosters, fiue Auies,
and a Creede,
In worship of fiue wounds
of our Lord.

In modern language the last part would read: five Pater Nosters, five Ave Marias, and a Creed, in the worship of the five wounds of our Lord—the cunning woman would then say these prayers while contemplating the five wounds of Christ.

It appears that Mother Demdike and Mother Chattox were practitioners of Catholic folk magic that would have been fairly common before the Reformation. Pre-Reformation Catholicism embraced many practises that seemed magical and mystical. People used holy water and communion bread for healing. They went on pilgrimages, left offerings at holy wells, and prayed to the saints for intercession. Some practises, such as the blessing of the wells and fields, may indeed have Pagan origins. Indeed, looking at pre-Reformation folk magic, it is very hard to untangle the strands of Catholicism from the remnants of Pagan belief, which had become so tightly interwoven.

Unfortunately these cunning folk of Pendle Forest had the misfortune to live in a place and time when Catholicism was conflated with witchcraft. Even Reginald Scot, one of the most enlightened men of the English Renaissance and a great skeptic regarding witchcraft accusations, believed the act of transubstantiation, the point in the Catholic mass where it is believed that the host becomes the body and blood of Christ, was an act of sorcery. In 1645, in a pamphlet by Edward Fleetwood entitled A Declaration of a Strange and Wonderfull Monster, describing how a royalist woman in Lancashire supposedly gave birth to a headless baby, Lancashire is described thusly: ‘No part of England hath so many witches, none fuller of Papists.’ Keith Thomas’s social history Religion and the Decline of Magic is an excellent study on how the Reformation literally took the magic out of Christianity.

Mary Sharratt’s acclaimed new novel, DAUGHTERS OF THE WITCHING HILL (my review), is published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. To learn more about her and the history of the Pendle Witches, visit her website: www.marysharratt.com

Daughters of the Witching Hill by Mary Sharratt – Book Review

May 102010

Daughters of the Witching Hill by Mary Sharratt

In a time when the old ways of Catholicism were banned in England, Bess Southerns wants nothing to do with the dour new Puritan ways. The things that comfort her heart are the Catholic rites and rituals. When a spirit named Tibbs comes to her and promises her a future as a cunning woman, it is the old Latin prayers of Catholicism that Bess mutters to bring healing to those hurting around her.

Bess’s daughter, Liza, also has a spirit, but she denounces him before long; she is not, though, above living off of the payments from Bess’s healing work. The women know that what Bess is doing could be dangerous, both for the aspects of magic and those of Catholicism, but everyone in their village seems to accept Bess as a force of good. Besides, as poor as they are, they have little other choice. However, the religious and political climate is growing ever more precarious with the ascension to the throne of James I, a man who is obsessed with the occult.

“Daughters of the Witching Hill” is a fantastic read. I was thoroughly immersed in the world of rural 16th century England. The pattern of dialogue was somewhat archaic and at times a bit difficult, but once I got into the story, it only added to the sense of time and place. I bought in so completely to the world that Sharratt was showing me, that I could help stopping and comparing the lives of these women in Pendle Forest to that of the men and women of London and Queen Elizabeth’s court in the same general time period. I was astounded by the differences time and time again, and yet it all rang true.

One of the most interesting things about “Daughters of the Witching Hill” is that Sharratt does not assume that all who were accused of practicing witchcraft and magic were innocent. Whether or not the modern reader wants to believe in the efficacy of Bess’s potions and murmurings, she certainly believes that she is doing a form of magic, as do the people around her. I appreciated that Sharratt wrote this story in, what seemed to me, ambiguous enough of a way that it wasn’t really clear whether Bess’s mutterings worked any change on her patients, or whether there were other less supernatural forces at work. I could still accept the outcomes without having to suspend my disbelief and was still able to keep this novel squarely in the realm of historical fiction without having to venture into fantasy.

For a book about accused witches, there was so much more here! Politics, religion, history, power struggles, the lives of everyday people – and women in particular. I highly recommend this book.

Buy this book from:
Powells.*
A local independent bookstore via Indiebound.*
Amazon.*

This review was done with a book received from the publisher.
* These links are all affiliate links. If you buy your book here I’ll make a very small amount of money that goes towards hosting, giveaways, etc.

Researching and writing a historical novel: bringing all the pieces together – Guest Post by Stephanie Cowell, Author of “Claude and Camille”

May 062010

Giveaway closed

It begins with an utter fascination for a place, a time, an historical person: something that will not let you go. Claude and Camille began when I visited an art exhibition of the early works of the impressionists. I stood before one of Claude Monet’s paintings of a stormy seacoast and a weary horse making its way down the sand, and said “What sort of intense man painted that?” I was fascinated by the friendship between the young artists, all then unknown, and thought, “Who were the women who were close to them?” Who loved this sexy, dark-eyed young Monet?

The idea for a novel begins perhaps with a few lines on paper and after a time grows into scenes and sections. Characters and place begin to emerge. And then the writer has the most passionate desire in the world to know every single thing about her historical characters and their times. When I first began to write historical fiction you spent long days in research libraries and haunted used bookshops. Since the internet you can find all sorts of information, or almost any old book, or find access to scholars who can help you.

I ended up buying sixty books on impressionism and Paris and reading and reading and haunting several art museums and walking the streets of Paris that Claude Monet walked and traveling to Giverny. You take all that research and combine imagination with it. The most challenging part for me is plotting the events which lead the characters to the last pages. Eventually you have a full novel and hopefully one good enough that an editor will offer to buy it.

The editor works with your novel, giving suggestions to strengthen it. Often a writer knows so much about her world and characters that she does not realize some of it is still in her head and not on the page. And of course friends have also read it and commented on how it could be strengthened. After that, the copy-editor points out that your heroine’s hair changes color from page 36 to page 94!

But when it is all proofed and printed between the covers with an evocative jacket, the writer hopefully has created a world for readers to enter and live in, a world deep and true and real which may take them on a remarkable journey to places and people all over time.

Older Entries

Devourer of Books

BOOK CLUB – The True Memoirs of Little K by Adrienne Sharp

For the King by Catherine Delors – giveaway

Dragonfly in Amber by Diana Gabaldon – Book Review

Sunday Spotlight on: Some Sing, Some Cry by Ntozake Shange and Ifa Bayeza

Addicting Series – The Results

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon – Book Review

* These links are all affiliate links. If you buy your book here I’ll make a very small amount of money that goes towards hosting, giveaways, etc.

Forgotten Treasure: The Book You Should Be Reading

Researching and writing a historical novel: bringing all the pieces together – Guest Post by Stephanie Cowell, Author of “Claude and Camille”

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* These links are all affiliate links. If you buy your book here I’ll make a very small amount of money that goes towards hosting, giveaways, etc.

This review was done with a book received from the publisher. * These links are all affiliate links. If you buy your book here I’ll make a very small amount of money that goes towards hosting, giveaways, etc.

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Sponsors:

Shelf Awareness for Readers eNewsletter

Recognition

Regular Features/Special Events

Check Me Out

This review was done with a book received from the publisher.
* These links are all affiliate links. If you buy your book here I’ll make a very small amount of money that goes towards hosting, giveaways, etc.