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Feb 14, 2008

Nicole rated it:

I wanted to like this book. The story was great and I loved the concept, but there were too many things that ended up annoying me.

On the positive side, it was very well written. I did love the character Fiammetta. I wish the book had focused on her throughout. And I liked the descriptions of courtesan life and of Venice. I especially liked the fact that the author took a real painting by Titian and seemingly created a story around it.

Now for the less positive stuff. [Sp More...

2 comments like (11 people liked it)

Sep 10, 2008

JG (The Introverted Reader) rated it:

Bucino is a dwarf employed by one of the most favored courtesans of Rome, Fiammetta Bianchini. When Rome is sacked by Spaniards and Lutherans in 1527, Bucino and Fiammetta barely escape with their lives and a few jewels they managed to swallow. They are forced to start over again in Fiammetta's native city of Venice. The going is slow at first, but they are both determined to rise to the top again, with the help of some unlikely accomplices.

This was really about 3.5 stars. I enjo More...

0 comments like (6 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Susan rated it:

I kept waiting for this to be lusher and smuttier than it was. The story follows the dwarf companion of a renowned courtesan in Venice's heyday. It starts with a dramtic escape from Rome as it's being sacked by some sort of protestant infidel, and watches the courtesan trying to make a name for herself in a new city as she befriends a strange, witchy woman. The relationship between the dwarf and the courtesan is the important one, but lacks meat until the book is nearly over. It's telling that I More...

0 comments like (4 people liked it)

Apr 22, 2008

Phyllis rated it:

This book was great, as the plot was creative,
the characters interesting and there was lots
of action. At first I figured that I wouldn't
be able to relate well to the story of a courtesan
and dwarf, but the themes of love and friendship,
hardship and politics, drew you into the story.
Sarah Dunant is a talented author, I enjoyed her
use of analogies. I especially liked reading
about Venice in the 1500's, and thought her
account of the times was w More...

2 comments like (4 people liked it)

Jun 03, 2008

Savvy Suz rated it:

Having had the pleasure of being in an on-line book discussion of IN THE COMPANY OF THE COURTESAN
last year with Ms. Dunant, I came away with a much finer appreciation of the historical honesty of this novel!

A few months ago, I had the opportunity to finally meet Sarah Dunant at a book reading and signing of this book in Seattle. Her passion for history is evident and just listening to her enthusiastic account of the research she does in crafting her novels was awe-inspi More...

0 comments like (5 people liked it)

Jan 26, 2008

Doug rated it:

Set in the 1500s in Venice, Dunant gives us a sometimes raunchy, sometimes touching and always realistic view of the world in this era. The book is written by the partner/manager of a gorgeous "courtesan" which I like to think of as more like a geisha than a prostitute, but make no mistake, our heroine is a high end prostitute and entertainer of rich men of the era. The partner is an extremely likable, insightful, resourcesful dwarf who is well aware of his position in life as a freak More...

0 comments like (6 people liked it)

Dec 14, 2007

Laurie rated it:

I liked this book alright. The story was interesting enough to keep me flipping pages. I do have sort of a bone to pick over the narrative voice, though. Enter Bucino: affable dwarf, loyal friend, astute business partner, curious bed buddy, annoyingly detached story teller...I had a tough time bonding with the characters in this story; I don't feel like I really got to know any of them. As the narrator, Bucino kind of peripherally describes events and characters' feelings about said events, More...

0 comments like (5 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Janice rated it:

While I enjoyed Dunant's first novel, The Birth of Venus moreso than this work, I think she has a great knack for writing extremely interesting characters. Bucino is a great hero for her novel and she also does a wonderful job of characterizing 16th century Venice as well.

The novel started off quickly, however the middle moved VERY slowly and made the ending less exciting. I was hoping for more of a resolution, and more exposition, but in the end the book doesn't really need to pr More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Mar 11, 2009

Megan rated it:

This novel opens with a beautiful courtesan and her ugly dwarf of a servant fleeing the sacking of Rome in 1527. Not getting away unscathed, the courtesan Fiammetta has lost much of her looks and health, and they are living on the jewels they were able to smuggle out of Rome by swallowing them. Bucino the dwarf must help his mistress recover her beauty and her professional standing as they try and re-establish themselves in Venice. To help get Fiammetta back on her back earning them money, they More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jan 08, 2012

Laura rated it:

As I huff and puff about this book being required as a book club book, allow me to stimultaneously reveal that I had picked up a Sarah Dunant, THE BIRTH OF VENUS, about a year ago in a Borders going-out-of-business blowout. Since that day, it has remained dormant on my shelf at my parents’ house (not even in the city), collecting dust with the rest of my personal reading life because, yes, I am STILL working on reading through a sample of each of the editor’s lists at Signet/NAL. Sometimes, I w More...

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Nov 08, 2011

Rusty rated it:

Ah, this is the third novel I have read by Sarah Dunant and by far the best. I loved the story from beginning to end that is told by the indomitable Bucino. Bucino tells the story from his diminished height and short legs. I found myself cheering this man who deals with ridicule day after day. Fiammetta, a lovely courtesan, and Bucino, her intellectual and wily companion, flee Rome in 1527 when it is invaded and burned. Fiammetta's hair was brutally cut from her head and she suffered a cut More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Mar 19, 2011

Karen rated it:

This story about a Roman courtesan who, after the city is sacked is forced to start life afresh in Venezia, along with her dwarf companion, Bucino, starts beautifully. Rome, with its eternal contradiction of spirituality and sin is convincingly established as is the young and lovely courtesan's popularity and wits - particularly when her world crashes around her.

Relocating to Venice, she experiences physical and financial hardship and a loss of status that she works hard to re- establi More...

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Mar 05, 2011

Marie rated it:

There are a lot of great things going on this book, but in the end if fell a bit flat for me, never fully capitalizing on what could have been so fulfilling.

Things I liked:

* the story is set in Venice in the 1500's, at the height of the city-state's power
* the characters are unusual and interesting - a dwarf, a courtesan, a healer, and a cast of wealthy, corrupt Venetians/Romans
* The storytelling is good - the writing is solid and the voice is true to the era
More...

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Dec 27, 2010

Donna rated it:

In the Company of the Courtesan is another entry in the historical fiction genre, akin to Tracy Chevalier's Girl with a Pearl Earring but not nearly as well written. Cunant's tale is the imagined backstory behind Titian's masterpiece Venus of Urbino.

As she brought to life 15th-century Florence in The Virth of Venus, Dunant re-creates the warren of canals, campos and piazzas that weave through 16th-century Venice. Dunant's tableaux of street life are vivid and lifelike; unfortunately, More...

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Jan 11, 2010

Kate rated it:

For once, a novel that does not romanticize the life of a courtesan. Sarah Dunant continues her mastery of the Renaissance in her second novel, which details the adventures of the Venetian courtesan Fiammetta and her dwarf companion Bucino. The dwarf is the narrator, cynical and worldly, and behind his clowning role at his mistress's back they have forged a shrewd partnership. Fiammetta is a delightful mix of beauty, vanity, courage and desperation as she is left destitute after the Protestan More...

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Jan 08, 2010

Zed rated it:

In the 1500s, a courtesan and her companion dwarf flee the sack of Rome and struggle to make their way in Venice. It took me three attempts to get beyond the first few pages. The start is vulgar and violent. The title character appears to be a whore by nature as well as by profession, and she's beautiful, intelligent and witty: she's the sort of woman men love and women loathe and the sort who scorn women in turn. And I'm a woman. The narrator, the dwarf, is no more likeable, thanks to his admir More...

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Dec 17, 2009

Charles rated it:

Historical novels are always as much about the present as about the past. When Margaret Mitchell was writing "Gone With the Wind," for example, women had recently received the right to vote and a certain measure of sexual freedom. Scarlett O'Hara is more like a flapper of the Roaring Twenties than like any actual Southern woman of the Civil War era – more Zelda Fitzgerald than Mary Chesnut.

The trick is to keep up the illusion of the past. In her first historical nove More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 11, 2009

Chu rated it:

Chu Lam
Life of a Courtesan

In the Company of the Courtesan, a novel written by Sarah Dunant, illustrates a Roman courtesan, Fiammetta Bianchini, and her loyal dwarf servant, Bucino, who is the narrator of the story. The novel begins as the war is happening in Rome, the invasion of the Spanish as they’re raping, killing, and taking over the wealth of all the Romans. Fiammetta tries to offer the Spanish hospitality to protect herself and her servants, but in return the raping and More...

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Jul 20, 2009

Betty rated it:

I probably wouldn't normally read a story about a courtesan but I've had a love affair with anything Venetian for over thirty years, so the setting intrigued me.

The author magically transports us to Venice in the 16th century by her wonderful characterizations and the authentic descriptions of that magnificent city. Written in the "voice" of the dwarf, Bucino, who manages the courtesan's career, you feel only sadness for this unlikely couple. After the fall of Rome to the More...

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Oct 08, 2011

Jen rated it:

My cover was different to this one, but I enjoyed the book none the less. The characters were well drawn, especially poor Bucino, and the plot interesting enough to hold the readers' interest. I enjoyed the detail of the time, 1527, and the setting which portrays Venice in all its smelly reality. I found the slant on characters with disabilities intriguing and unusual.
The story really belongs to Bucino the dwarf, and his foreshortened world is well imagined. The city and the crowd, descri More...

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Jan 14, 2010

Rachel rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

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Mar 31, 2010

Capella rated it:

This book was a major let down. The characters are not nearly as multi-dimensional as the ones in The Birth of Venus so it felt like the book was more of a puppet show. I was especially disappointed to find that the narrator, a dwarf, was not nearly as well wrought as Tyrion Lannister in George R R Martin's Song of Fire and Ice series, but I guess that is a high standard to beat. I was likewise disappointed that Fiammetta was highly predictable and not nearly as good a courtesan as Phèdre in Jacqueline Carey More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 13, 2009

Starling rated it:

In many ways this book is a disappointment. The writer writes beautifully. I cared about the characters. They were all quite different and you got to know them. What was missing was a plot.

Basically what you get in this book is two very well written short stories. In the first one two of the three protagonists get caught in the fall of Rome in the early 16th Century. How they survive what everyone around them doesn't survive and how they make their way out of Rome and to Venice is fa More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Feb 08, 2012

Amalie rated it:

For starters, the title and the cover page of this really can mislead you! "In the Company of the Courtesan" sounds erotic and this is the cover page of my book which I can't find here (I'm guessing Amazon must have stole it!):

I started to read this while going to and coming home from work and I began to notice some are staring at the cover :) so I started to read this before going to bed. Anyway there is no noticeable erotic content in the novel although it is an insider More...

2 comments like (2 people liked it)

Feb 05, 2009

Bookmarks Magazine added it

Her debut novel, The Birth of Venus,explored 15th-century Florence; Sarah Dunant's latest offering__what USA Today calls "both a business thriller and a historical love story"__delves into 16th-century Venice. Dunant paints a remarkable portrait of Venice, from its corruption to its class tensions, filthy ghettos and mansions, and virtues and vices. Critics fell in love with the deformed Bucino, an intimate, tender companion with a deep bond to Fiammetta. A few quibbles: the dearth of

More...

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Sep 19, 2010

Dorina rated it:

This book surprised me. From the title I would have expected some light reading about the exotic decadent life of courtesans set in one of the most beautiful and romantic cities in the world but the saying “Don’t judge a book by its covers” (or in this case by its title) applies very well here. As all great books, In the Company of the Courtesan is not what you would expect it to be, it’s much more than that. The beauty of the courtesan is paired with the ugliness of a violent era. One interesti More...

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Dec 25, 2008

Allison rated it:

For fluff, it's not too guilt-laden. I'm a sucker for historical fiction and I haven't read about Venice in awhile, not to mention I was just there three times in October. Dunant's language is not terribly surprising for a British author (which is probably why I'm enjoying it so much) as all of her characters are very quick and witty with their words and the rest of the language is equally as colorful as it is erotic at times. The plot moves along at a decent pace although it feels a little b More...

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Mar 02, 2010

Ali rated it:

I bought this from a charity bookshop in Kendal while away for the weekend in October with work friends. One friend told me how this was a favourite book of hers and so I should read it. Well now I have.

This is a quick and page turning read. 16th Century Venice is brought wonderfully to life, it's water, it's sprawling passageways and dark underworld. Sarah Dunant has made the coarse and vulgar world of courtesans and pimps more palatable than might be imagined. The riches and the fa More...

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Feb 17, 2011

Marissa rated it:

I wish I had read this book in the traditional way rather than listening to an audio presentation of it. The author expresses many witty asides and internal thoughts that never translates very well on audio. So aside from the less-than-ideal format, I loved this novel. It was quite different from Dunant's The Birth of Venus. It began with a lot of frank, arguably foul language which sets the pace for the novel since it details the lives of an upscale courtesan and her pimp. I loved it and I'm ve More...

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Dec 04, 2008

Camille rated it:

I've been reading so much non-fiction lately, that I found myself wanting to read a meaty novel. This book delivered nicely, and I'm still thinking about the ending. It was not what I expected. I have learned recently that Italian courtesans were the most educated women of their day and time, so I feel an affinity for them. What a horrible choice to have to make. Live a "virtuous" life of boredom and ignorance, or sell your virtue to men and actually have interesting thoughts and More...

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