Susan Appleyard's Blog, page 9

La Luministe by Paula Butterfield

A fictionalised biography set in France in the mid to late 19th century

When the story opens, Berthe Morisot is a young girl who, along with her sister Edma, is allowed by their parents to study painting prior to the inevitable marriage. While Edma makes a suitable marriage, Berthe refuses the role society and parents have assigned her and hopes to make a career as a serious artist. Such a career for a respectable woman was unthinkable in those days. When she meets the great Édouard Manet and falls under his spell, her desire to enter and conquer his world becomes her overriding passion.

This book is not a page-turner. Nor is it a conventional romance. It is a detailed and fascinating look at Paris at a time after the Franco-Prussian War when the city was undergoing great changes; a time when the new boulevards were being laid out; when artists well-known today were struggling to make names for themselves and impressionism was a new movement setting itself against the constraints of the staid Salon. Mostly it’s about Berthe and her fraught relationship with Manet as she struggles to find herself as artist, lover, and woman. She’s a very nuanced character. We see her in moments of weakness, despair, envy, and self-doubt, but she never let’s go of her vision, and we have to root for her. And it’s also about Manet, a libertine who loves life and lives it to the fullest. There is also a supporting cast of famous names.

The writer goes deep into the complex love affair between Berthe and Manet. The prose is excellent. The book is a sensual delight that must be not just read but experienced. It’s always a pleasure to rub shoulders, in a manner of speaking, with the good and the great of the art world. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I recommend it for anyone who likes literary fiction, but It is a must for those interested in art history.

I wrote this review for Discovering Diamonds.

Of Cathars, Catholics and Crusaders

Crusading fervour was at its height in the medieval period. ‘Free Jerusalem!’ Death to the infidel!’ ‘God wills it!’ These were the rallying cries that drove men – and some women – from their homes, to mortgage their lands, to risk their lives in arduous travel and then face the Saracens in battle. But, as we know, many were diverted along the way by the promises of Venice, the riches of Constantinople, attacks on Jews and never made it to the Holy Land. Of those who did survive the trek, the great lords were at least as interested in carving out principalities for themselves, as they were in freeing the holy places. Lesser men were greedy for loot to take home.

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In the early 13th century, Pope Innocent III, who is considered one of the most powerful of the medieval popes, proclaimed a crusade. Not against the infidel in the Holy Land but against French Christians in Languedoc. It is known as the Albigensian Crusade and was directed against a people who believed and practised their religion differently than Orthodox Catholics: a heretical sect called Cathars. As a bonus, to stir the zeal of prospective crusaders, who might have preferred the Holy Land, Innocent offered them any land taken from Cathars – land, incidentally, of which King Philip II was suzerain.

One could recognise a Saracen by his brown face and mode of dress, but how to tell a Catholic from a Cathar, unless the latter was discovered during one of their rituals? But did it really matter? Is it true that Arnald-Amalric, Abbot of Citeaux said during the assault on Beziers, ‘Kill them all. God will know his own.’? Whether he said it or not, the French knights went at it with crusading zeal. Thousands of Cathars went to the stake. Many more thousands of orthodox Catholics were killed in battle, during sieges, or by execution.

The Albigensian Crusade is a shameful episode in the history of the Church, and the subject of my new book.

 

My review of Weave a Web of Witchcraft by Jean M. Roberts

Set in 17th century Massachusetts

Hugh of Gosberton is a bricklayer. When his older brother is forced off the family farm and the brick business takes a downturn, Hugh decides to emigrate to Massachusetts and settles in the small village of Springfield. After three years of hard work, he pays off the loan for his passage and obtains a ramshackle house, a plot of land and a brick kiln. Then he set about finding a wife. His choice is Mary, a servant girl, but Mary shows her shrewish nature immediately after the wedding. Hugh continues to work hard, but Mary is unhappy with her lot and their marriage goes from bad to worse. When their little son dies of a strange illness, Mary at first thinks it is the work of a woman she had previously accused of witchcraft. But then, inexplicably, her suspicions fall on Hugh. She believes he is a witch and shares her suspicions with the other villages who begin to turn away from Hugh. From this point, the drama increases in tantalizing increments.

Springfield is a community of ordinary, hardworking people who help each other out. The women are there when a neighbour is in labour or to offer solace to the bereaved, and the men borrow each other’s tools. But when witchery raises its ugly head they are eager to point the finger, to fabricate outlandish tales about an erstwhile friend. Why? They work hard for little reward. They have few pleasures. Only the misdeeds of their neighbours add spice to the dreary round of their days. It is a perfect climate for the kind of superstitious hysteria that accompanies a suspicion of witchcraft. Ordinary people feed on the sensational.

Hugh and Mary are credible characters. To her credit, the author hasn’t tried to smooth out their rough edges. They are people of their time. There is a slew of other characters. With the exception of a few, I wasn’t able to follow who was who, but this did not affect my enjoyment of the story.

This is a thoroughly enjoyable book. I believe it is the author’s first, and she told it well, laying out the groundwork for the accusation without the story ever dragging. There is, however, a considerable number of grammatical errors. The book would be much improved if these were removed.

****

 

My review of Ella Maud by Nicholas Nicastro

Set in the early 20th century in North Carolina, this murder mystery is a fictionalised account of a true crime. Ella Maud – Nell, as she is known – stepped out onto the porch of her family home with her beau, Jim Wilcox and disappeared. The first questions posed are: Was she murdered? Did she commit suicide? Did she run off? Thirty-six days later, her body is found in the river that runs behind her house in a remarkable state of preservation and with a contusion on her temple. After a public outcry against so heinous a crime, Jim Wilcox, the last person to see her alive, is tried – twice – and found guilty.

There is a fistful of characters believable they leap off the pages as flesh and blood. Even the minor characters are well-drawn with distinct personalities. This story is not so much about Nell or her murder. It is the author’s imagining of what might have happened, and he takes us well beyond the bare details of the crime to examine Jim’s inability to forgive himself for the part he played in her disappearance, the pathos of his downward struggle into dereliction, and a family unhinged by the loss of a loved one. It’s also about human strength and frailty and the cruel effects of guilt.

The writing is concise and the dialogue is appropriate to the period. It is one of the best true murder mysteries I have read – perhaps because it is so much more than that.

I have one caveat but it’s a big one. Early on in the book, the author gives us a glimpse into what happened. It is an unnecessary ‘spoiler’. The author could have kept the reader in suspense for longer. It didn’t impair my enjoyment of the book at all. It was just a little irritant. I hope the author will fix it.

This review was created for Discovering Diamonds

The Carpet Weaver of Uşak by Kathryn Gauci

Set in 20th century Anatolia and Greece.

There are two villages in Anatolia. Pinarbaşi is Turkish, Stravrodromi is Greek. The only thing that divides them is a road. Their people live together in complete harmony. In reading about the relationship between the two villages, I got a sense that the march of time had left them behind. Mention of a caravanserai, camel trains, goat-herders, and the excitement produced in the women by a chiming clock, all suggest a simple people living simple lives according to a simple ethic: Help your neighbours; they are your family. They could as easily (apart from the clock) belong to biblical times.

The lifeblood of the two villages is the carpet weaving industry. Aspasia, a gentle, curious woman weaves exquisite carpets. Her husband Christophoros, a proud, hardworking and generous man works in Uşac for a carpet company. They are an adoring couple, whose language is spiced with tender endearments. They long for a child.

Then a bullet fired in faraway Sarajevo changes everything. In the villages, no one knows where Sarajevo is or who Archduke Franz-Ferdinand is or why war has been declared. The young men are summoned to fight, the Ottomans side with Germany and Austria, the Greeks with Russia and the allies. They march away and many are never heard from again. The war also impacts the carpet industry as the women are called upon to turn their skills to making blankets. Production is reduced but even so, carpets stockpile. After the war, further hardship for the two villages begins, testing friendships in the struggle for survival.

There is great depth to this book. The author invites us to look at our lives with all our sophisticated toys and gadgets and ask if we are any happier than women who thrilled at the chiming of a clock. The horrors of war, the ruin and devastation it brings to ordinary people, is juxtaposed by the birth of a child and the hope it brings; and also with a delightful description of Anatolia in spring

In keeping with the characters, the writing is simple and concise, with no dramatic flourishes or superfluity. I expected to enjoy this book and I did. It’s a story of love, friendship, courage, loss and war, superbly told, set during an epic and tragic event I suspect few know about. I didn’t. I have no faults to pick except that there were a few grammatical errors or typos.

I wrote this review doe Discovering Diamonds

*****

The Development of Castles in Britain (Part 1)

Ah, the castles of England…

just history posts

Today we are very lucky to have a guest author! Simon Forder, a writer, researcher and historian who specialises in castles, has written a great introductory post about their origins in Britain. Starting in the Norman period, he explores what different types of castles appeared in Britain after the conquest, and just how original they may have been. You can find him on Twitter, Facebook, or via his website. Over to you, Simon!

Motte at Twmbarlwm, South Wales; late 11th/early 12th century. Picture taken by Simon.

Castles appear in many guises to us. Once massively dominant structures in the medieval landscape, they are inspirational reminders of our past, enabling the visitor to wonder and imagine the splendours of a bygone age. However, in most cases today they are sad remnants of their former glory, often little more than humps and bumps in the landscape.

Britain has a…

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The Reversible Mask by Loretta Goldberg

Set in various parts of Europe in the 16th century

Sir Edward Latham, middle-grade courtier is torn between his adherence to his faith (Catholic) and his loyalty to Queen Elizabeth (Protestant). His answer to this dilemma is to accept his cousin, Lord Darnley’s invitation to go to Scotland and serve his wife Mary, Queen of Scots (Catholic). After the murder of her husband, Mary sends him to the Duc de Guise in France to raise funds for her. Latham becomes a liaison between Guise and the Spanish Ambassador and eventually ends up in Spanish service as a spy. This career takes him to other countries, the most interesting of which is a glimpse into the Divine Porte, where he takes a Turkish lover (Islamic) and learns that different faiths can live in harmony.

The best of the supporting characters are his Turkish lover and his sidekick/agent in Lisbon, both of whom are interesting and unique. The author does a credible job of capturing the two queens, Elizabeth and Mary, in cameos. As for Latham himself, he is a fully-fleshed character, (the author allows him to tremble in fear) but I just couldn’t warm to him. I’m not sure why, perhaps only because of his way of over-analysing things – even his love affairs – which is natural enough in a spy, I suppose.

Throughout the book, Latham struggles with his divided loyalties. After a number of spying assignments, he decides to return to England and offer his services as a double agent and hope that in the near future, Catholics will be granted the right to worship openly.

There is a great deal to like in this book. The author’s knowledge of war, weapons and deployment is sufficient to lend authenticity. I particularly enjoyed reading about ‘Hellburners’. I suspected they were a fiction of the author, but a Google search informed me that they were real and used as the author described. It’s not all derring-do. It’s a story well-told and the dialogue, which can be confusing at times, has a particular ‘zing’ to it.

Recommended for those who like stories of war and the religious turmoil of the 16th century.

****

Super Specs for the computer obsessed

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Last summer, my eyes started getting bad, sore and weepy and red. I knew the culprit was my computer and the hours I spent staring at it, writing my novel in the morning, marketing/promoting in the afternoon, because whenever I spent a day away from it the condition cleared up. Obviously, something had to be done. All I could think of was to spend less time on the computer. I had to scale back.

I had started a fan page on facebook, so that was the first casualty. Closed. And after a long, painful and frustrating period getting to know the basics of MailChimp, I sent out my first newsletter – to tell my few followers that there would be no more newsletters. It was almost a relief to let MailChimp go. I also cut down on the number of Facebook groups I belonged to. I even thought I might have to give up writing so I could spend fewer hours just doing the marketing for my 8, soon to be 9, novels.

Turns out there is no need for such drastic action. I bewailed my problem with a friend and she told me about blue blocker glasses, which filter out the blue light that can damage the eyes. I rushed out and bought a pair, which now sit on my nose. I’m happy to say, my problem is solved.

I wanted to share this in case anyone else out there has the same issue.

The Bewitcher – A Mompesson Mystery by Hickory Crowl

Set in 17th century England, this is a murder mystery/horror.

It’s 1666 and the plague is visiting the Derbyshire village of Eyam for the second successive year. The new, young vicar, Will Mompesson, makes the courageous decision to quarantine the village, which does not make him popular with some of his parishioners. To add to the terror, the innkeeper is murdered by a demon. The old vicar persuades the villagers that these evils are a punishment from God. As a result, they find a scapegoat in the person of the Jewish baker and hang him. Mompesson is the only one to protest. The murders mount up and it seems the victims are chosen when they break one of the commandments.

This is a lurid and eerie tale. It’s an indictment of God’s role in mankind’s suffering and man’s need to find reasons for his suffering. Mompesson is a pious yet practical man who does his best to assure the villagers that what is happening is not because of their sins. Yet with so much evil in the village, the death of his wife is too much for him to bear and he suffers a crisis of faith, which makes him ripe for…. Well, I can’t say.

What I can say, is that although this is a fictional story, William Mompesson is a historical figure who, by insisting on closing the village, probably saved countless lives. The reader should not neglect to read the quote from him at the end of the book for an extra shiver.

There were a few typos/errors but nothing to spoil the story. Another Mompesson mystery is in the works.

I recommend this book for anyone who enjoys dark mysteries and doesn’t have a queasy stomach.

The Jacobite’s Wife by Morag Edwards

Late 17th/early18th centuries, set in England/France/Scotland

Based on real people and true events, this is the story of Lady Winifred Herbert. Her parents, the Earl and Countess of Powis, are forced to leave England after supporting the Catholic King James II, being accused of treason and imprisoned in the Tower. Winifred joins them at the court of the exiles at Saint-Germain in France where she meets her future husband, William Maxwell, Earl of Nithsdale. All are fervent Jacobites except Winifred, who is less so.  The marriage is a happy one, and when they return to Scotland, Winifred cherishes dreams of settling down to a comfortable life and raising a family. William has other dreams that centre around the Jacobite movement.

I found Winifred to be a contradictory character. At times I wanted to root for her, and just as often I wanted to slap her. For example, she criticises William for his involvement in Scotland’s affairs instead of staying home and looking after his estate, and yet goes proudly with him to a gathering of the clans where the purpose is to organise a rebellion. Again, learning that her husband, an irresponsible but charming wastrel, is heavily in debt, she tells him to cut down on his spending, but when he buys a cute little pony and trap for them to tool around the estate in, she forgives him at once. For the first half of the book, she comes across as self-centered and self-absorbed, as when her mother dies, “How could she leave me?’ and the same when her sister enters a convent. However, without giving anything away, she redeems herself in the end.

The relationship between Winifred and Grace, her maid/companion/friend, is heartwarming and one of the more enjoyable aspects of the book.

The story is well written, with natural dialogue but few descriptions. Although it’s a slow starter, I never lost interest. I recommend it for those interested in Scotland’s independence movement and Jacobite period.

****