Tara Chevrestt's Blog, page 31

The Sweetness by Sande Boritz Berger: A Life Lesson from a Hidden Jewish Girl in WWII

Since I've been here, every day, without realizing, I have tried to find something that makes me happy, no matter how small a thing that might be. Today it was the little speckled bird chirping outside that reminded me that it is nearly spring.

The sweetness is about finding sweet in what's sour, about adding sugar to lemons to make lemonade. It's about finding joy where there is not much to be found. This lesson comes from a young girl (age 8 to 9), who after her parents are massacred by the Nazis, hides in the home of a Catholic woman for the war.

And while this young girl finds pleasure in little birds at the window--'cause really, there's not much else to be found--Mira and her two aunts make a life in New York City.

We have two very different situations here. While that girls hides in the basement with little joy in her life, her Jewish family in America has no clue how good they have it. Oh, they say they do, but the patriarch of the family is such a jerk. He pulls strings to keep the men out of the war, when it's his own people they'd be fighting for. He worries about money when he has more of it than he needs, while his own people starve in camps. He just controls things constantly--in his daughter's and his sisters' lives.

And I'm sad to say that was the majority of the book--him and his daughter, Mira, who I really liked until she got married and threw her dreams away. Every now and then the story strayed to the older sisters/aunts and one of them was just...well, she went through trauma after trauma and in the end after surviving much and finally getting married--which she wanted above all else--she still couldn't get right in the head and I am left wondering what the point of her story was.

I also didn't care for the narrative of the American stories. It was third person and all telling, no showing. The author did a much better job with Rosha's story, which was in first person and allowed myself, the reader, to actually live in the story for a bit...a very brief bit. As I said above, Rosha's parts are VERY FEW and in the end it hurt the story for me. By the time the story ended, while I appreciated the lesson Rosha imparted in such a brief time, I was tired of her American family, of reading about their everyday lives and problems and their attitudes. And I was BORED. I don't want or need pages TELLING me about Mira's wedding.

Instead, I'd have preferred to be with the Polish family and Rosha. I also don't see how in the world it all tied in. It felt like all these different stories going all these different places with no real plot.

A miss for me, but I thank Netgalley for the chance to read it.

Ten Questions from Tara: Interview with David Ebsworth

Tara: Welcome. You’re here to promote The Last Campaign of Marianne Tambour, a historical fiction novel. Tell me, please, what was the inspiration behind this story? How did it come to you?

Readers, here is a blurb:On the bloody fields of Waterloo, a battle-weary canteen mistress of Bonaparte’s Imperial
Guard battalions must fight to free her daughter from all the perils that war will hurl against them – before this last campaign can kill them both.

“Superb! David Ebsworth has really brought these dramatic events to life. His description of the fighting is particularly vivid and compelling.” – Andrew W. Field, author of Waterloo: The French Perspective and its companion volume, Prelude to Waterloo: Quatre Bras
Praise for David Ebsworth’s novel, The Jacobites’ Apprentice, critically reviewed by the Historical Novel Society, who deemed it “worthy of a place on every historical fiction bookshelf” and named it as a Finalist in the Society’s 2014 Indie Award.

David: This is my fourth novel and I had already decided to write a book about the Battle of Waterloo. This year is, after all, the 200th anniversary of that turning point in European history. But from what angle? I always to tell the stories that I wish somebody else had already written but which don’t yet exist. I studied all the fiction written about Waterloo since Stendhal first published The Charterhouse of Parma in 1839. And, surprise, surprise! Nobody else has ever written about women on the battlefield itself. And there were plenty of them. The French army had adopted the use of cantinières very early – women sutlers serving with each battalion and usually in the thick of battle. And, in the more equal aftermath of the French Revolution, there were always women soldiers who served in the front lines. They became my inspiration.

Tara: We focus a lot on heroines here on Book Babe. Tell me what makes your heroines strong. This does not necessarily mean she’s running around with a sword. A woman has many different types of strength. Though running around with a sword rocks too. LOL

David: Well, in truth, one of them does run around with a sword. Her name is Liberté Dumont and her character is based on the real-life exploits of a woman called Marie-Thérèse Figueur who fought in her own right, as a French Dragoon, all the way through those wars from 1793 until 1814. Then there’s Marianne Tambour herself. Based on another real woman, Madeleine Kintelberger, a cantinière of astonishing bravery who went into the thick of the Battle of Austerlitz with her three small children when she was, herself, eight months pregnant. These women survive on a negligible diet, rise at 4.00am, then march 9-10 hours each and every day, look after the soldiers in their battalion, care for their own kids, then find themselves plying their trade (selling brandy, mostly) in the front lines of the battles themselves. And yes, of course, on top of all these things, they carry all the normal attributes of female strength too – always taking charge of their own destiny even in the midst of tears, pain, despair and heartbreak.

Tara: Did any particular woman in your family or life help inspire some of their traits?

David: Yes, of course. My mother survived the Second World War and raised her family despite being blitzed three times. She lost three homes and every single possession and stitch of clothing in three different British cities (Plymouth, Liverpool and Glasgow) over not much more than a single year. My wife, Ann, was a tough union organiser in a local factory and fought her way through a serious cancer. And I worked regularly with feisty women who had struggled against repression and adversity in many forms, both in the UK, and also in Spain, Nicaragua and Colombia.

Tara: Wow! Are you going to write or have you penned a novel about your mother? She sounds amazing.
Was there any particular part of this story that was the hardest for you to write? Tell me why.

David: There’s the scene in which Marianne has to deliver a baby while the army’s on the march – well, in truth, on the edge of a battlefield. This was based on several real-life incidents that I’d read. But I found that describing the birth from such a close perspective, and in the detail it deserved, was a bit harrowing. Marianne took it all in her stride, of course – well, more or less! After all, she had to keep one eye on the progress of the battle at the same time, watch out for her daughter too, while also guarding against attacks by some pretty nasty rivals.

Tara: What kind of research did you do when you penned this novel? Did anything surprising come up in your search? Perhaps something you had no need to put in the book but stayed in your mind nevertheless?

David: For historical fiction, the “big” things – the settings and historical backgrounds – are relatively easy to research. It’s the smaller details that lend them authenticity and, generally, are more difficult to track down. In this case, for example, I had to think a great deal about armies on the march. So their boots, of course, became a feature. What did they do when (it happened frequently) they would lose just one of them in a quagmire? How did they get a replacement? It took a lot of searching before I found that, until well into the 19th century, boots weren’t made with left or right feet, and came only in three sizes – small, medium or large.

And then there were the teeth. It was the teeth that have stayed in my mind. They say that, on the day after the battle, you couldn’t find a pair of pliers for love nor money. Not for fifty miles around. The new fashion - in London, Paris, Berlin and St. Petersburg – was for dentures fitted with real teeth. And there, on those few square miles of Belgian soil, lay no less than 50,000 potential donors, most of them dead, the rest so close to it that it didn’t much matter. There was real money to be made for local citizens, hundreds of them – if only they could find a pair of pliers!

Tara: Now that's an interesting tidbit about the boots. I had no idea. I imagine their feet hurt not having properly fitting shoes.

What would you like readers to gain from reading your book? Is there a strong moral? Do you hope they will laugh, learn something about a particular subject/person, ponder a point?

David: Entertainment, above all, is the thing I hope readers will gain. This is a work of historical fiction, and I’m sure that when folk pick up a copy in the bookstore, or browse it online, they’re mostly just hoping for a “good read” – and I therefore have a duty to provide one. But within that I also think it’s important for any of my stories to have measures of laughter, happiness and all the other sentiments that fill our lives. If they didn’t, the stories wouldn’t be very realistic. Similarly, the characters have to possess whatever moral viewpoints might also be important for the tale. That’s very different, I think, from authors imposing their own moral viewpoints on a novel. So what are the morals that spring from Marianne? Human fortitude in the face of terrible and repeated loss, perhaps. The futility of war naturally but, more importantly, the realisation that wars might ostensibly be justified on moral grounds but, in practice, for the past two hundred years and more, have actually been driven in general by international bankers and the arms industries.

Tara: Your book takes place in Belgium. If I were a tourist, what would you recommend I see in this country?

David: When I’d finished writing the first draft for Marianne, I needed to visit the battlefields to check them out. So we followed the route that Napoleon’s army would have travelled during the campaign – and then wrote a short travel guide that would help readers and travellers to follow that same route. It appears at the back of the novel. So, starting in Paris, the most fabulous of all European capitals, and then heading up towards the Belgian borderlands. Beautiful countryside along the River Sambre. Then the rich countryside north to Brussels – also a wonderful city to visit. But the highlight, naturally, is the Waterloo battlefield itself. It is remarkably little changed since 1815 and a series of tracks allows visitors to walk all the key areas along and between the ridges on which the opposing armies formed for the conflict. The visitor centre there is currently being renovated in time for the bicentenary celebrations but it contains a very beautiful and impressive panorama – similar in size and style to the equally famous cyclorama at Gettysburg. Well worth a visit!

Tara: Moving on to personal things...if you could time travel to absolute any time and place in history, where and when would you go and what is it that draws you to this time period? What would you do whilst there?

David: No question about this one. It would be 6th Century Britain (the subject of my fifth novel). It’s the start of what we call the Dark Ages – normally because it’s traditionally been thought that Europe was, during this time, plunged into barbarity. We now know that this is incorrect, so the Dark Ages now signify, far more, our own ignorance of this period of history. And in that general ignorance, nothing is more shrouded than the history of Britain from 500-600 AD. There is only one contemporary chronicler, a monk called Gildas, and clearly selective in what he wrote. After that, it’s a couple of hundred years until anybody else puts quill to vellum and, by then, “Chinese whispers” have set in and the “records” completely confused. So I’d take my iPad and chronicle the whole period properly. And resolve once and for all, of course, whether there was (and this is highly unlikely!) ever a “real” King Arthur.

Tara: Oh no! I'd rather just go on believing he really existed, as did Lancelot. LOL

What’s the one thing you hope to accomplish before you die? Your main goal?



David: Oh dear, that’s a tricky one! To be honest, I’m fairly content with my life and accomplishments to-date. My main goal is simply to see my family continue in good health and for Ann and myself to see our kids, grandkids and, now, our first great-grandchild, grow and prosper in a world where the politics of hate will, hopefully, be less prevalent.

Tara: I’m a dog mom, so I always ask this. Do you have pets? If so, tell me about them and do provide pictures.

David: No, no pets, I’m afraid. We live a fairly nomadic life, one way or the other – so caring properly for pets would be difficult, to say the least. And, to be honest, I’m more comfortable with animals in the wild than in the home. Some of my happiest moments have been while sharing sea-room with porpoise and dolphin, pilot whales and gannets. Or out on the mountains with red deer, buzzards and the occasional golden eagle. Or on the South African veld with giraffe, cheetah and Cape buffalo. I think it’s important to keep wildlife in the pages of my books. It’s just as important as keeping sounds, smells and colour in descriptive writing. And authenticity too. After I’d been to KwaZulu-Natal to check out the locations for The Kraals of Ulundi (my third book), I realised there was something missing. Then remembered that, wherever we’d visited during the trip, there’d always been the raucous cry of the Hadeda Ibis. It gets its name from the noise it makes and anybody reading my book in South Africa itself would have said that the settings weren’t authentic if there’d been no Hadeda in some of the scenes. So these have all become some of my “pets”, I guess. But my real pets? My books, naturally!
Tara: Thanks so for joining us today, David, and good luck!
***
David Ebsworth is the pen name of writer, Dave McCall, a former negotiator and Regional Secretary for Britain's Transport & General Workers’ Union. He was born in Liverpool (UK) but has lived for the past thirty years in Wrexham, North Wales, with his wife, Ann. Since their retirement in 2008, the couple have spent about six months of each year in southern Spain. Dave began to write seriously in the following year, 2009.


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A Question of Death: An Illustrated Phryne Fisher Anthology

Spill your drink down his shirt. In extreme cases, a fork in the groping hand or a cup of hot coffee in the crotch is a guaranteed distraction.
--One of six ways to discourage the overenthusiastic suitor

The first story (A woman in a hotel searching for her husband) is awful. It's vague; the conclusion is so rapid you don't have time to even guess what it is. There are editing errors. (Only in this edition. The situation is being remedied, I'm assured, by Poisoned Pen Press.)

The second story finally brings into the book the characters we've come to love so much by watching the TV show: Inspector, Dot, Butler... The cases are quickly resolved, but each one tells us some new tidbit about Phyrne.

The second one didn't appeal to me all that much--two men dead, both due to inherit the same estate. The third was more interesting and on top of a case of missing jewelry, we see Phyrne struggle with a marriage proposal. I loved her quick thinking on the case too. And even better, there's a moral in this one. Revenge may feel great...for a moment, but it's not a long-lasting solution. My favorite story has to involve the mentally challenged gardener. I love how Phryne comes to his rescue.

Some of the cases reminded me of some of the episodes in the TV series: a missing football "charm", a woman of possible ill-repute dead in a lawmaker's home, a ski chateau setting, Juana the Loca and college.

Interspersed here and there are cocktail recipes and such and some lovely illustrations. I especially like how each story is on different printed paper. Blue circles, green lines, pink circles... It's very subtle and only visible in certain light. It was a surprise to me when I realized it. The pictures of Phyrne herself seem to get better as the book continues. And of course, Phyrne's delightful conversations are as witty and humorous as always.

I do think, however, that the mysteries could have been a little more fine tuned. I prefer a little time to figure it out on my own, a few hints so I can get to that point. I didn't get that with stories this short. It was just "here's the situation...and oh, here's the solution!" We're told a man pours the soup but we're not told that his hand is discolored until Phyrne announces the case is solved and how she figured it out. We're never given clues to come to any conclusions ourselves.

I bought this on Amazon.

Rough Rider by Victoria Vane

Rough Rider is the second book in the Hot Cowboy Nights Series. I really liked book 1, Slow Hand, but I loved Rough Rider. This book was full of chemistry and didn't follow the norm of a romance. Janice doesn't take the path we as the reader want her to, and we have to sit back and wait.

We meet Dirk in Slow Hand, but Dirk's story starts years before we met him in Slow Hand. In Slow Hand, he's kinda a dick. He's angry, and when you sit to read Rough Rider, you learn about his life and the things he went through. He hasn't had an easy life as he's tried to discover who he is in the world.

He meets Janice in his early twenties after a bad relationship. She's always admired him from afar, but he never notices her until one night when he takes her virginity. However, there is another man who has his eyes set on Janice, and he's determined to win. Here is where the story changed from the normal romance. She never would've looked twice at the other guy, however Dirk wasn't ready to settle down, so the other man is able to swoop in and delay her and Dirk's love story. But even years later, Dirk still isn't ready to settle down and Janice has to decide if this angry man is really worth it.

There was a little twist at the end of the story, one that I enjoyed and had really wished the story had gone on and showed how the "three" dealt with this twist. Perhaps in another book we'll get a glimpse at that part of life.

Like I said last time, Victoria Vane is a wonderful writer. She wrote a story that sizzled and there weren't many intimate scenes, but I still felt the connection between the characters.

I can't wait to read the next one.

Lacey's Rating
About the Book:

Two wary hearts ...
Janice Combes has two loves, bucking bulls and Dirk Knowlton. But Dirk only has eyes for a dazzling rodeo queen. How can Janice ever compete while mired ankle-deep in manure? Exchanging playful banter with Dirk is all Janice can expect-until the stormy night he knocks on her door dripping wet and needing a place to crash.

Different Dreams...
Dirk Knowlton is living the cowboy dream. Life should be good-roping, branding, backing broncs, riding bulls, but there's a void he can't seem to fill. After getting hung up by a bull, he wonders if this is really the life he wants. Restless and rebellious, he bolts...but there's a certain cowgirl he can't forget.

When a battle-scarred Dirk returns to his Montana ranch he's determined to hang on at any cost. Janice has come back home to lick her own wounds. When old dreams turn to dust, can two wary hearts take another chance on love?

The Garden of Letters: The Cellist Who Was Code Named Dragonfly

The Garden of Letters by Alyson Richman takes place in Italy during WWII.  I have not visited Italy in WWII through the pages of a book since reading The Garden of the Finzi-Continis during my teen years. Regrettably, I have not read Alyson Richman since The Mask Carver’s Son which I very much admired for the way it showed the differences between the perspective of art as a tradition, and the perspective of art as an individual accomplishment.  In The Garden of Letters Richman deals with the perspective of a musician discovering her true priorities in a time of fear and privation.  
                                                


When I read about fictional protagonist Elodie Bertolotti’s dedication to music and her love for the fine cello that her father had given her, I was reminded of The Rainaldi Quartet by Paul Adam, a mystery I read some time ago  dealing with luthiers and the love of great violins with a history behind them.  It also took place in Italy, but it didn’t stray outside the world of music as The Garden of Letters does.  Because when your friends are courting danger and your country is about to be invaded by alleged allies, being absorbed in music is not enough for a person of integrity.  I was impressed by Elodie’s courage when she joins the Resistance, and her ingenuity in inventing a new means of secret communication.  I’ve read a number of novels dealing with the French Resistance.  I had expected the Italian Resistance to be similar, but Elodie brought her background into the Resistance which gave fighting the Nazis an unusual twist. 
I would like to discuss a few thoughts I had about The Garden of Letters of the title.  It was seen as a private expression of love, but no one ever called it art or its creator an artist.  Do people only think it’s art if it’s public and the elite give it sanction?   Does the fact that a woman created it for her husband make it not art?   If so, then the definition of art needs to be broadened.  My paternal grandmother had examples of her crewel embroidery hanging on a wall of her living room.  Few people got to see them, but I’d definitely consider them art.  My grandmother was an artist with her needle.   I think that Dalia, the creator of The Garden of Letters, was an artist though she probably would never have thought of herself that way.  All expressions of the creative impulse could be considered art. The Garden of Letters also gave Dalia the strength to deal with separation from her husband.  Therapeutic art is still art. 
The Garden of Letters shifts perspectives and time periods.  I never got confused even though the story didn’t unfold in linear order.    I didn’t think that the head hopping was unclear or excessive.    Other readers might have problems with the author’s narrative techniques, but I consider this the best historical fiction that I’ve read so far in 2015.
                                             

The Reading Radar 1/31/2015

Both Shomeret and I have our eyes on this one due to our interest in the Night Witches, The Witch of Stalingrad by Justine Saracen.

As the German Blitzkrieg brings the Soviet Union to its knees in 1942, a regiment of women aviators flies out at night in flimsy aircraft without parachutes or radios to harass the Wehrmacht troops. The Germans call them “Night Witches” and the best of them is Lilya Drachenko. From the other end of the world, photojournalist Alex Preston arrives to “get the story” for the American press and witnesses sacrifice, hardship, and desperate courage among the Soviet women that is foreign to her. So also are their politics. While the conservative journalist and the communist Lilya clash politically, Stalingrad, the most savage battle of the 20th century, brings them together, until enemy capture and the lethal Russian winter tears them apart again.

***
I spotted this on Edelweiss: Madame President by Nicolle Wallace, and of course the title nabbed my attention. It is however, the third in a series so I've immediately acquired book one.
With Madam President, current cohost of The View and former White House Communications Director Nicolle Wallace returns with an electrifying portrait of three powerful women on a day that will change the country forever.

Charlotte Kramer, the forty-fifth President of the United States, has done the unprecedented in allowing a network news team to document a day in her life—and that of her most senior staff. But while twenty news cameras are embedded with the president, the unthinkable happens: five major attacks are leveled on US soil. Her secretary of defense, Melanie, and her press secretary, Dale, must instantly jump to action in supporting the president and reassuring the country that the safety they treasure is in capable hands.

But secrets have always thrived in President Kramer’s White House. With all eyes on them and America’s stability on the line, all three women are hiding personal and professional secrets that could rock the West Wing to its very foundations…and change the lives of the people they love most.

With an insider’s sharp eye and her trademark winning prose, Nicolle Wallace delivers a timely novel of domestic and political intrigue that is impossible to put down.
***
And as I said, having only learned of the series when I saw book three listed, I immediately ordered book one, Eighteen Acres.
From the former Communications Director for the White House and current political media strategist comes a suspenseful and smart commercial novel about the first female president and all dramas and deceptions she faces both in politics and in love.

Eighteen Acres, a description used by political insiders when referring to the White House complex, follows the first female President of the United States, Charlotte Kramer, and her staff as they take on dangerous threats from abroad and within her very own cabinet.

Charlotte Kramer, the 45th US President, Melanie Kingston, the White House chief of staff, and Dale Smith, a White House correspondent for one of the networks are all working tirelessly on Charlotte’s campaign for re-election. At the very moment when they should have been securing success, though, Kramer’s White House implodes under rumors of her husband’s infidelity and grave errors of judgment on the part of her closest national security advisor. In an upheaval that threatens not only the presidency, but the safety of the American people, Charlotte must fight to regain her footing and protect the the country she has given her life to serving.

Eighteen Acres combines political and family drama into one un-put-downable novel. It is a smart, juicy and fast-paced read that we’re sure fans of commercial women’s fiction will fall in total love with.

***
Secrets of the Tower by Debbie Rix sounds awesome. Saw it on Netgalley.

Two women, centuries apart, bound together by the secrets of one of the most iconic buildings ever created.

Pisa, 1999
Sam Campbell sits by her husband’s hospital bed. Far from home and her children, she must care for Michael who is recovering from a stroke. A man she loves deeply. A man who has been unfaithful to her.

Alone and in need of distraction, Sam decides to pick up Michael’s research into the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Immersing herself in the ancient city, she begins to piece together the mystery behind the creation of the tower, and discovers the woman who history forgot…

Pisa, 1171
Berta di Bernardo, the wife of a rich merchant, sits in her chamber, dressing for a dinner party. A gathering that will change the course of her life and a young master mason, Gerardo, forever.

A strong, intelligent woman, Berta’s passion for architecture also draws her closer to Gerardo. As she embarks on a love affair, her maid Aurelia also becomes spellbound by the same man. Yet for Berta, her heart’s desire is to see the Tower built, and her determination knows no bounds…

***
Five Brides by Eva Marie Everson is on my wishlist after spotting it on Edelweiss because I love me a good fifties' tale and vintage dresses...oh yea.

One dress, five women, a lifetime of memories.
Five single, fiercely independent women live together in a Chicago apartment in the early 1950s but rarely see one another. One Saturday afternoon, as they are serendipitously together downtown, they spy a wedding dress in a storefront window at the famous Carson, Pirie, Scott & Co. After trying it on—much to the dismay of the salesclerk and without a single boyfriend or date between the five of them—they decide to pool their money to purchase it. Can one dress forever connect five women who live together only a short time before taking their own journeys to love and whatever comes happily ever after?


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The Race for Paris by Meg Waite Clayton hit the list. It was spotted on Edelweiss. Check out this smashing cover.

The New York Times bestselling author of The Wednesday Sisters returns with a moving and powerfully dynamic World War II novel about two American journalists and an Englishman, who together race the Allies to Occupied Paris for the scoop of their lives.

Normandy, 1944. To cover the fighting in France, Jane, a reporter for the Nashville Banner, and Liv, an Associated Press photographer, have already had to endure enormous danger and frustrating obstacles—including strict military regulations limiting what women correspondents can. Even so, Liv wants more.

Encouraged by her husband, the editor of a New York newspaper, she’s determined to be the first photographer to reach Paris with the Allies, and capture its freedom from the Nazis.

However, her Commanding Officer has other ideas about the role of women in the press corps. To fulfill her ambitions, Liv must go AWOL. She persuades Jane to join her, and the two women find a guardian angel in Fletcher, a British military photographer who reluctantly agrees to escort them. As they race for Paris across the perilous French countryside, Liv, Jane, and Fletcher forge an indelible emotional bond that will transform them and reverberate long after the war is over.

Based on daring, real-life female reporters on the front lines of history like Margaret Bourke-White, Lee Miller, and Martha Gellhorn—and with cameos by other famous faces of the time—The Race for Paris is an absorbing, atmospheric saga full of drama, adventure, and passion. Combining riveting storytelling with expert literary craftsmanship and thorough research, Meg Waite Clayton crafts a compelling, resonant read.

The Tyrant's Daughter by J.C. Carleson

I'm so far beyond yoga, or scented candles, or whatever feel-good methods people use to calm their suburban anxieties. What tidy little pill could remove the fear of my entire family being killed? What amount of medication could erase the memory of being hunted, a screaming mob outside the gates? How many long bubble baths would I have to take to forget the image of my mother staggering out of my father's study, covered in his blood?

I thought this was a very engrossing read. I was absolutely hooked from page one. The heroine, though young (this is aimed at young adults), is a strong one. She has been through so much and continues to go through much as the book continues.

Many a young lady would have caved or given up, but this one tries to not only be strong but do the right thing.

Her father, a dictator in an unnamed Arab country, has been killed. Her uncle has taken over. Her mother has taken her and her brother to refuge in America...but in exchange she must work with a possibly shady CIA agent. While her country is torn apart and her home life not much better, Laila also must deal with a new country, new rules, new school, new friends. As we follow Laila, we see American high school in a new light. People making light of bomb threats. People blissfully ignorant of war across the world, of real bombs, of loss.

And then she gets drawn into drama involving her country that she doesn't want to be involved in...just as she gets to enjoying the freedoms American life provides a young woman...sorta. See, she's always torn, and we witness this many times through how she feel at a dance, for example. She discovers the power her body can have, yet at the same time she feels self conscious showing a bit of leg.

Laila must do what she feels is right, even if it means hurting her family or walking away from friends and though in the end I hated her decision, I admired that she had the guts to do it. She made up her mind and followed through, stuck to it.

The author notes are very enlightening. If you didn't know much about Arab Spring before, you'll understand much better after reading this novel. Something else I liked was how this book showed us that...even the most unlikable of people, such as dictators, are capable of loving their children and being loved in return. And yes, we can still love our parents and yet hate who they are to others.

I highly recommend this. I am merely unsatisfied with the ending though. It was too unconcluded for me and the conclusion I felt I was possibly reading didn't seem right.

I received this via Netgalley.

Rodin's Lover by Heather Webb

Please join Heather Webb as she tours the blogosphere with HF Virtual Book Tours for Rodin's Lover, from January 19-February 13.
Publication Date: January 27, 2015PlumeFormats: eBook, PaperbackPages: 320
Genre: Historical Fiction


A mesmerizing tale of art and passion in Belle Époque France.

As a woman, aspiring sculptor Camille Claudel has plenty of critics, especially her ultra-traditional mother. But when Auguste Rodin makes Camille his apprentice—and his muse—their passion inspires groundbreaking works. Yet, Camille’s success is overshadowed by her lover’s rising star, and her obsessions cross the line into madness.

Rodin’s Lover brings to life the volatile love affair between one of the era’s greatest artists and a woman entwined in a tragic dilemma she cannot escape.

*****REVIEW*****



I had heard the name Camille Claudel before reading Rodin’s Lover, but knew nothing about her.  Women artists interest me, but I had never previously read anything about a sculptor.   This means that I was completely uneducated about the methods and traditions of sculpture.  So I learned a great deal from this book about Camille Claudel, Auguste Rodin and sculpture in general.   Yet I felt that the Wikipedia article on Camille Claudel caused me to understand the general outline of her life better than Heather Webb’s novel, much of which is written from Claudel’s own perspective.
To say that Claudel was an unreliable narrator is to put it rather mildly.  She was diagnosed with schizophrenia.  Schizophrenia covers a great many types of mental disease.  I consider it a vague catch-all diagnosis.  Camille Claudel had bouts of severe paranoia.  I noticed in the novel that she became much worse later in her life, and that hormones appeared to have an influence.  I know that hormone fluctuation is an important factor in the lives of bipolar women.  It seems likely, for example, that hormonal changes in the aftermath of pregnancy were probably the primary cause of the suicide of Chinese American writer Iris Chang. I wondered if women’s hormones had a similar effect on schizophrenia.  So I ran a search on schizophrenia and estrogen, and found the Wikipedia article that I’ve linked here.  The article does confirm the idea that lower levels of estrogen aggravate the condition.  
Yet Claudel was a brilliant sculptor.  There is a sample of Camille Claudel’s work and work by Rodin that the author of the article linked thought was influenced by Claudel at The Art of Camille Claudel and Auguste Rodin.  You can click on the images to get a larger version.  I really liked The Waltz which was considered indecent in Webb’s novel, so she created a clothed version which is the one that survives. 
I appreciated Camille Claudel’s conflict between love and independence from a feminist perspective.  It was not paranoid to want to have her own identity as an artist and not be considered an imitator of Rodin.    This is a problem that many people in the arts have had.  Literary critic Harold Bloom called it “the anxiety of influence”.    I felt that Heather Webb was portraying it as part of her pathology because she wavered so much between being primarily focused on art and being primarily focused on her relationship with Rodin.  She was continually breaking up with him, but I didn’t think it was always due to mental instability.    There were some legitimate reasons why being with Rodin wasn’t the best thing for her.  He helped her to get commissions and exhibit space, but Webb also shows him as having engaged in some stalker type behavior which was the real basis for her later paranoia about Rodin spying on her.   The lines between Claudel’s feminism and Claudel’s insanity seemed blurred in Rodin’s Lover, and it made reading this emotionally intense book an uncomfortable experience for me.

 I found Rodin's Lover to be highly reminiscent of I Always Loved You by Robin Oliveira  about the ambivalent relationship between artists Mary Cassatt and Edgar Degas. I reviewed it on Book Babe here.  I wish that Camille Claudel and Mary Cassatt could have met.  I think they would have understood and supported each other as woman artists.

I received this book from the publisher via both First to Read and Net Galley in return for this honest review.


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AmazonBarnes & NobleIndieBoundAbout the Author Heather Webb grew up a military brat and naturally became obsessed with travel, culture, and languages. She put her degrees to good use teaching high school French for nearly a decade before turning to full time novel writing and freelance editing. Her debut, BECOMING JOSEPHINE, released January 2014 from Plume/Penguin. Her forthcoming novel, RODIN'S LOVER, will release in winter of 2015.

When not writing, Heather flexes her foodie skills or looks for excuses to head to the other side of the world.

For more information, please visit Heather's website. She loves to chitchat on Twitter with new reader friends or writers (@msheatherwebb), on Facebook, or via her blog. Stop on by!
Rodin's Lover Blog Tour ScheduleMonday, January 19Review & Giveaway at Let Them Read BooksReview & Interview at With Her Nose Stuck in a Book
Tuesday, January 20Review at Broken TeepeeSpotlight at Boom Baby Reviews
Wednesday, January 21Review at Oh, for the Hook of a Book!
Thursday, January 22Review at History From a Woman's PerspectiveInterview at Oh, for the Hook of a Book!
Friday, January 23Review at Teddy Rose Book Reviews Plus More
Monday, January 26Review at Poof BooksReview at Ageless Pages Reviews
Tuesday, January 27Review at Library EducatedSpotlight at The Lit Bitch
Wednesday, January 28Review & Giveaway at Peeking Between the Pages
Thursday, January 29Review at Book BabeReview at The Book Binder's Daughter
Friday, January 30Review at Book Drunkard
Monday, February 2Review at Unabridged Chick
Tuesday, February 3Review at Caroline Wilson WritesInterview at Unabridged Chick
Wednesday, February 4Review at Brooke Blogs
Thursday, February 5Review at A Book Geek
Friday, February 6Review at The True Book Addict
Monday, February 9Review at A Literary VacationReview at CelticLady's Reviews
Tuesday, February 10Spotlight at Historical Fiction Connection
Wednesday, February 11Review at 100 Pages a Day - Stephanie's Book Reviews
Thursday, February 12Review at Flashlight CommentarySpotlight at Historical Readings & Reviews
Friday, February 13Review at The Maiden's Court

Charitable Hatred: Puritan Preaching Leads To Murder in The Harlot's Tale

The Harlot’s Tale is the second book in a historical mystery series that takes place in 17th century England whose protagonist is the midwife Bridget Hodgson.  She is a widow from a noble family who is accustomed to wielding authority, but she is also highly principled.  When I started reading the first book in this series, The Midwife’s Tale, I thought she was arrogant, self-righteous and intolerant.   I almost gave up on the book because I found her too unsympathetic.   
Fortunately, I became interested in Martha Hawkins, her new maid.  The very fact that Bridget gave Martha a chance despite her background showed that Bridget had more compassion than I had imagined.  I continued reading because of Martha.  She is clever, courageous and resourceful. She also has some very interesting skills that make her useful for crime investigation in both books.
                                             
                                                  In this second book, I think that Martha has influenced Bridget for the better.  She seems more open to new ideas and approaches.  She has become more supportive toward women in unfortunate circumstances which also puts her on the wrong side of the law. As a midwife, Bridget is supposed to report all women giving birth to children out of wedlock so that they can be publicly whipped.  In Puritan dominated York, the city where this series takes place, Bridget’s newfound sympathy can be dangerous to her.
The case in The Harlot’s Tale involves a series of murders of prostitutes.  The killer leaves Biblical verses in the hands of the victims.  This leads Bridget to suspect that some fanatical Puritan is the perpetrator, but this gives her a great many suspects.  The religious zeitgeist had become increasingly fanatical.  There is a popular Puritan preacher in York who calls for “charitable hatred” toward individuals that Puritans consider immoral.  This phrase is never explained.  How can hatred ever be charitable?  It sounds like war for peace or freedom within slavery.   When I analyze it from a Puritan perspective, I imagine that a Puritan might consider it merciful to kill someone who is sinful so that they will sin no more, and won’t enrage God any further.  From a modern secular viewpoint that kind of thinking seems bizarre.  
 This is the sort of environment that leads to witchcraft hysterias.  So it’s fairly predictable that this is the subject of the third book, The Witch Hunter’s Tale in which I imagine that Bridget is in some serious jeopardy.  Midwives have often been suspected of witchcraft during witchcraft hysterias.   I will be reviewing The Witch Hunter’s Tale for a blog tour in February.
Although the situation in The Harlot's Tale is scarcely unexpected during this period of England’s history, there are some plot twists that made for a good mystery.  The plot complications and character growth caused me to consider this novel an enjoyable read.
                                                    

I am Sophie Tucker: A Fictional Memoir by Susan Ecker, Lloyd Ecker

Mama made her way across the bustling road without getting killed by a speeding horse cart, but picked up the phrase "F*ck you!" from a driver who came within inches of running her over. She wrote it down phonetically in Yiddish in a little black notebook she kept in her pocket. She thought it might come in handy someday.

I'd never heard of Sophie Tucker before, but after reading this book, I'll never forget the name or the woman behind it. She was a Vaudeville star with an incredible sense of humor and zest for life. This fictional autobiography takes us from the time she was in the womb and her parents left Russia to come to the States through her first marriage and into the early days of Vaudeville and the Follies.

And everything is told in a humorous manner, with Sohie Tucker wit. The laughs, smiles, and chuckles were endless for me.

Mr. Elliot patiently explained each foreign term, like "marquee." Thankfully that was different than the Marky who sat next to me in grammar school. The only show he could headline was the Breaking Wind Spectacular. 

I enjoyed reading about Sophie and her mother. Her mother was something else. I can see where Sophie gets her "balls". I think one of my favorite scenes in the book was when her mother set a ball of soup in front of her boss and had a few interesting choice words for him.

Sophie is fun and amazing too, as she goes from kitchen slave to singing in a house of ill repute to the stage, as she toes the line between "wholesome" and what sells, as she persistently writes funny letters to important people asking for a chance, as she survives stage rivalry and jealous divas, struggles to fit in dresses, and even becomes friends with Al Capone.

There was one thing in the book that had me frowning at Sophie and it turned out I was wrong about the situation all along. In the end Sophie is a true heroine, selfless, loving, and there for those who need her.

I loved every word of this story. The only thing that bothered me at times was how very often Sophie makes fun of her weight. She acts like she's an elephant. And looking at pictures of her back then, in her early Vaudeville days, I don't see such a large woman. I guess women were smaller then.

This was a fun read and I realize some of it is probably fictional or exaggerated but the authors did a fabulous job in the telling of it. I appreciate this story and the heroines at its heart--Sophie and her mother, two very strong Jewish women. Oh--it even has a murder mystery in a brief bit. A hotel, a dead Russian, and a wedding band. That's all I'm saying.

I received this via Netgalley.