What Angels Fear by CS Harris

September 18, 20156 Comments

When I made my list for this year’s RIP challenge, I decided to give priority to books I’ve been wanting to read for a while rather than search out new titles. What Angels Fear, the first in CS Harris’ Sebastian St. Cyr mystery series, is one of those books. I can’t remember where I first heard about this series but I know it has been recommended to me several times over the last few years and did sound like something I would enjoy. There are now ten books in the series, which is slightly overwhelming, especially as I’m already in the middle of so many other series, but I thought it was time I at least gave the first one a try.

What Angels Fear is set in London in 1811. With King George III suffering from mental illness, the Prince of Wales is preparing to start his period as Regent and members of the two main political parties, the Whigs and the Tories – who are strongly divided over issues such as Britain’s role in the Napoleonic Wars – are hoping to gain positions of power and influence in the newly-established Regency.

At the beginning of the novel, Sebastian St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin, returns from fighting a duel to discover that he has become a suspect in a murder investigation. A beautiful young actress, Rachel York, has been found dead on the steps of a church altar and evidence found at the scene has implicated Sebastian. Determined to clear his name, Sebastian decides to investigate the murder himself. As he delves deeper into the circumstances surrounding Rachel’s death, more and more people are drawn into the mystery, including a French spy, an Italian artist and a London street urchin, as well as some of the country’s top politicians and even members of Sebastian’s own family.

I’m pleased to say that I enjoyed What Angels Fear enough to want to read the next book in the series. I didn’t love it, but I found it very entertaining with a good mixture of mystery, political intrigue and romance (Sebastian’s love interest in this book is an actress whose stage name is Kat Boleyn). Harris captures the atmosphere of the Regency period very well, although I occasionally came across a choice of word that didn’t feel quite right. It was probably a mistake to read this book immediately after finishing April Lady as there are few authors who bring the Regency to life as convincingly as Georgette Heyer!

I haven’t really warmed to Sebastian yet, but I’m hoping that will eventually happen if I continue with the series. He is certainly an intriguing character: Harris gives him an interesting past, with five years spent in the army, some family secrets which are only hinted at in this book, and some unusual abilities (he has quick reflexes and very acute eyesight and hearing, which according to the author’s note are signs of Bithil Syndrome, although I couldn’t seem to find out whether this is a real condition or not). Because so many things are left unresolved at the end of this first novel, I’m sure there’s still a lot more to learn about Sebastian and I’m curious to see how his character develops.

What Angels Fear was a good start not only to my reading for the RIP challenge, but also to a new series. Now I’m looking forward to the second Sebastian St. Cyr novel, When Gods Die.

April Lady by Georgette Heyer

September 16, 201512 Comments

I first tried to read April Lady five years ago but didn’t get very far with it, so when it was one of the ten books I chose at random for my Ten from the TBR project I didn’t feel very enthusiastic about trying it again. It seems, though, that it had probably just been the wrong book at the wrong time (I was very new to Heyer then and had previously only read The Talisman Ring) and on my second attempt I found it much more enjoyable.

April Lady is one of Heyer’s Regency romances – although the couple in this novel are already married at the beginning of the book and the romantic aspect of their story centres around learning to love and trust each other. Nell Irvine, our heroine, is only seventeen when she marries the Earl of Cardross in what she believes to be a marriage of convenience. Nell does love her husband, but he is much older than she is and – as her new sister-in-law informs her – he has had a mistress until very recently, so Nell isn’t sure exactly why he has chosen to marry her.

Cardross (Giles) is also very rich, but his new wife has no experience of managing money and quickly finds herself in trouble. Cardross helps her to pay off her debts, but when Nell discovers another outstanding dressmaker’s bill that she had forgotten about she decides to keep it hidden from her husband. She is sure he will be angry with her and the last thing she wants is for him to think she only married him for his money. To make matters worse, Nell has also been giving money to her brother, Dysart, to cover his gambling debts and she knows Giles won’t be happy about that either!

April Lady follows Nell as, with the help of Dysart, she tries to obtain the three hundred pounds she needs to pay the dressmaker – while ensuring that her husband is kept in blissful ignorance. It’s obvious to the reader from the beginning that Giles does love Nell and that all they need to do is talk to each other, but each is unaware of the other’s feelings and their lack of communication leads to a whole series of misunderstandings. But Nell is not the only woman with a secret in the Cardross household. Her young sister-in-law, Letty, is determined to marry the man she loves, Jeremy Allandale…but Giles disapproves. Will Letty be tempted to elope against her brother’s will?

This book reminded me very much of an earlier Heyer novel, The Convenient Marriage, which I read about a year ago. It seemed to me that the characters of Nell, Cardross and Dysart (and the relationships between them) were very similar to Horry, Rule and Pelham in The Convenient Marriage and large parts of the plot were almost the same too, right down to a scene in which Nell’s carriage is held up by highwaymen on the way to a ball. However, I didn’t find April Lady as entertaining to read as The Convenient Marriage; the dialogue wasn’t as funny and although Nell didn’t annoy me as much as Horry did, I preferred Rule to Cardross and Pelham to Dysart. Maybe I would have felt differently about this book if it had been the one I’d read first, as I found it difficult not to make comparisons.

I did enjoy April Lady but I didn’t love it and I wouldn’t rank it very highly on my list of Heyer novels read so far. I still have plenty of her books left to read, though, including some that I’m particularly looking forward to as I know they’re big favourites with Heyer fans. I’m also wondering if I could find time to read another one of her mysteries before the end of October for this year’s RIP challenge, having enjoyed Envious Casca a few years ago.

Historical Musings #6: Non-Fiction

September 13, 201522 Comments

As my previous Historical Musings posts have all concentrated on historical fiction, I thought it would make a nice change to discuss historical non-fiction this month. As you can probably guess from the title of my blog, I would rather be reading a novel than any other type of book, but I have been making an effort lately to read more non-fiction and some of the books I have read in the last few months include She-Wolves by Helen Castor, a book on the lives of four medieval queens; An Accidental Tragedy by Roderick Graham, a biography of Mary, Queen of Scots; and Rebellion by Peter Ackroyd, the third volume of his History of England series (this one covers the English Civil War and the Restoration).

I find most periods of history interesting, but I tend to be drawn to subjects that I’ve previously read about in historical fiction. I picked up She-Wolves, for example, after reading Colin Falconer’s novel, Isabella, because I wanted to know more about Isabella of France. Similarly, I chose to read Blood Sisters by Sarah Gristwood and The Hollow Crown by Dan Jones to add to the knowledge of the Wars of the Roses I have gained by reading fiction. It can be fun and often quite enlightening to read a factual account of a character or an event I’m only familiar with through fiction and to see how closely (or not) the fictional version had followed historical fact.

However, it’s not very often that I finish reading a work of non-fiction feeling as satisfied as I would have done at the end of a novel. The only non-fiction book I can think of that I truly loved and that I connected with emotionally in the same way I would with fiction was Wild Swans by Jung Chang. Of course, Chang was writing about her own experiences and those of her family so although Wild Swans can still be considered historical (it covers a whole century of Chinese history) it is in a different category from the other books I’ve mentioned so far in this post – and in general, I just don’t find non-fiction as engaging as fiction.

My questions for you this month, then, are these:

Do you enjoy reading non-fiction or do you prefer to gain historical knowledge through fiction? Do you choose your non-fiction reads based on subject or author (or both)? Which historical non-fiction books and authors are your favourites?

Kit by Marina Fiorato

September 11, 2015September 11, 20158 Comments

Marina Fiorato’s latest novel, Kit, tells the story of Kit Kavanagh, a young woman from Ireland who disguises herself as a man and follows her husband to war. Those of you who have never heard of Kit Kavanagh (and I hadn’t until I read this book) may be surprised to know that she was a real person and that this novel is loosely based on a true story.

Kit’s adventures begin one evening in a Dublin inn when her husband, Richard Walsh, is pressed into the British army and disappears overnight. Having only been married for a few weeks, Kit is devastated and can’t stop thinking of her beloved father who was killed in battle several years earlier. Determined to save Richard from the same fate, she decides to dress as a man and enlist in the army herself. Soon Kit finds herself on a ship heading for Italy where she will serve with the Scots Grey Dragoons under the command of the handsome Captain Ross.

It’s 1702 and the death of the last Habsburg king of Spain has sparked conflict across Europe. The heir to the throne is the grandson of King Louis XIV of France, meaning that both Spain and France could potentially be ruled by the same monarch. In an attempt to prevent one man from gaining so much power, England and Scotland have formed an alliance with the Holy Roman Empire and the Dutch Republic in support of a rival claimant, Leopold I. The two opposing armies are battling for control of the north of Italy as Kit arrives in Genova to begin her search for Richard Walsh.

The first half of the novel follows Kit as she fights alongside the men of her regiment, hoping that her luck will hold out and her true identity won’t be revealed before she catches up with her husband. To complicate things further, she finds herself falling in love with Captain Ross – but as he believes her to be a man, she is unsure how he really feels about her. The second half of the novel is where Fiorato moves away from reality and further into the realms of fiction, creating a storyline in which Kit is recruited by the scheming Duke of Ormonde to spy on the French.

Kit is the third book I’ve read by Marina Fiorato (the other two are The Glassblower of Murano and Beatrice and Benedick) and this is my favourite so far. I loved Kit as a character and was completely gripped by her story. This is the first time I’ve ever read about the War of the Spanish Succession, but as Kit also knows nothing about it, we have the opportunity to learn along with her. Battle strategies and political intrigue are clearly explained and we meet important historical figures of the period such as the Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene of Savoy.

I particularly loved the first part of the book – The Sword – which concentrates on Kit’s time in the army, the beginning of her relationship with Captain Ross, her friendships with the other dragoons (whose names Fiorato chose from her local war memorial), and her clashes with the villainous Sergeant Taylor and the sinister army surgeon Atticus Lambe. I was very impressed by the amount of detail Fiorato goes into in showing how thoroughly Kit prepares herself for life as a man, not only by changing the way she dresses, but also by adjusting her speech, her mannerisms and her whole persona. Knowing that the character is based on a woman who really existed just makes Kit’s story even more fascinating!

The second part of the novel – The Fan – in which Kit falls into the hands of the Duke of Ormonde, has a different feel and I didn’t like it as much as the first part, although I did enjoy watching the development of Kit’s friendship with the Italian castrato singer, Lucio Mezzanotte. The various threads of the story came together nicely at the end, and while I didn’t really think the epilogue was necessary it did mean that all the loose ends were tied up.

In Kit I found the combination of history, adventure and romance that I love in historical fiction and I’m now looking forward to reading the rest of Marina Fiorato’s novels. The Madonna of the Almonds, The Botticelli Secret and The Venetian Contract all sound appealing, but I should probably start with Daughter of Siena, which I already have on my shelf.

Glorious Apollo by E. Barrington

September 7, 20159 Comments

Endeavour Press have been publishing some very intriguing titles recently, including reissues of some older or out-of-print historical fiction novels. I had never heard of the author E. Barrington (a pseudonym of Elizabeth Louisa Moresby, who also wrote under the name Lily Adams Beck) but when I saw Glorious Apollo available on NetGalley I thought I would give it a try.

A bestseller in the 1920s, Glorious Apollo is a fictional biography of the Romantic poet, Lord Byron. Beginning as he prepares to takes his seat in the House of Lords in 1809, the novel takes us through Byron’s entire life and career right up to his death in Greece at the age of thirty-six.

The main focus of the novel is on the women in Byron’s life, particularly Lady Caroline Lamb, Augusta Leigh and Anne Isabella (Annabella) Milbanke. Caroline had an affair with Byron while married to William Lamb, Lord Melbourne, and is the woman who famously described him as “mad, bad and dangerous to know”; Augusta, Byron’s half-sister, was believed to be involved in an incestuous relationship with the poet; Anne was his wife and the mother of his daughter, Ada, but her marriage to Byron was not a happy one. While other aspects of his life and career are also covered in the novel – such as several of his male friendships, his health and weight problems, and the inspiration behind some of his poetry – none of these other things are given as much attention as his relationships with these three women.

This is a novel, so it can’t be assumed that everything in the book happened exactly as Barrington writes it, but it does seem to me that she has closely followed historical fact. At times the book reads more like a work of non-fiction, particularly at the beginning when we are given a lot of biographical information to help us understand Byron’s family background, but she has clearly used some imagination to fill in the gaps, to recreate conversations and to convey the thoughts and emotions of the characters. However, I would have liked to have had the opportunity to get inside Byron’s head more often and to see more of the story from his own perspective rather than from the perspectives of the people around him. The author’s sympathies do seem to be mainly with Anne and the overall impression the book gives of Byron himself is not a very flattering one.

Throughout the novel Barrington also draws on letters, diaries and other primary sources, sometimes quoting from them directly, and she also incorporates extracts from poems, some by Byron and some by other poets. Many of Byron’s major works are briefly discussed, including Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Manfred, English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, and So We’ll Go No More A-Roving, and their significance in the context of Byron’s personal life is explored.

Although I did enjoy some parts of the story – and there’s no doubt that Byron is a fascinating subject – Glorious Apollo didn’t quite work for me as a novel. I found Barrington’s writing slightly dry and I couldn’t help feeling that the book would have worked better as non-fiction rather than fiction. It was an interesting read, though, and worth considering if you would like to learn more about Byron and his poetry. I’m still curious about Barrington’s other novels, which include books on Anne Boleyn and Marie Antoinette, so if anyone has read them I would love to know what you thought!

Thanks to the publisher for providing a review copy via NetGalley.

The Old Man’s Birthday by Richmal Crompton

September 3, 201518 Comments

Richmal Crompton is best known for her Just William stories for children, but she has also written a large number of books for adults. I read one of them – Family Roundabout – last year and enjoyed it, so I was pleased to see that Bello have been republishing several more of her adult novels, including this one, The Old Man’s Birthday.

Matthew Royston, the old man of the title, is preparing to celebrate his ninety-fifth birthday with a family party to which he has invited all of his children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Nobody has been left out – not even Matthew’s grandson, Stephen, who has become estranged from the rest of the family because he is living with a woman who is not his wife. Not a problem in modern society, of course, but scandalous in the 1930s! Matthew is determined that Stephen’s partner, Beatrice, will be made to feel welcome, so in the hours leading up to the party he takes her from house to house to introduce her to the Roystons.

The whole novel takes place over the course of that one day, beginning with Matthew waking up on the morning he turns ninety-five and finishing with his birthday meal. In between, we meet each member of the Royston family – and as Matthew has five children and some of those have children and grandchildren of their own, there are a lot of characters to get to know! My advice to anyone planning to read this book is to draw a family tree as each person is introduced; it didn’t occur to me to do that until I was halfway through the novel, but it definitely would have made things much easier.

This is not a book with a lot of plot, but I hadn’t expected that it would be. The strength of the novel is in the characterisation; Crompton gives so much depth to every family member that on reaching the end of the book I was disappointed that I had to leave them all behind. I would like to tell you about all of them, but as I don’t want to spoil too much of the story for future readers I’ll just highlight two or three that I found particularly memorable. First there’s Enid, Matthew’s unmarried granddaughter, who runs the village hockey team. She’s probably not a person I would like in real life (despite the hero worship she inspires among the younger women at the hockey club) but she’s one of the strongest characters in the novel and I eventually found that behind her loud, overbearing exterior lies a shy and insecure woman whom she doesn’t want anyone to see.

Secondly, there’s Matthew’s son Richard, an elderly bachelor who has spent years running away from responsibilities and burying himself in his books. An unexpected friendship formed with one of his nieces on the day of the old man’s party could change Richard’s life for the better. And finally, there’s Pippa, one of Matthew’s great-granddaughters. Sixteen-year-old Pippa has always felt like a poor relation compared to her cousins, Pen and Daphne, so when she is given the opportunity to fulfil an ambition she’s determined to make the family proud of her. These three characters – and all of the others – are well-drawn and convincing, and considering that the novel only covers one day in their lives, we also see a surprising amount of character development.

I loved The Old Man’s Birthday, if I haven’t already made that clear! One slight criticism would be that I found the ending very easy to predict – but having said that, it was the perfect way to end the story, so I didn’t mind the predictability too much. I enjoyed celebrating Matthew’s special day with the Royston family and now I’m looking forward to reading more of Richmal Crompton’s books.

I received a copy of this book for review via NetGalley.

August Reading Summary

September 1, 201516 Comments

I still haven’t come up with a better format for my monthly round-up posts but hopefully I’ll have thought of something different by the end of September. For now, I’m posting my usual summary of the month’s reading.

I started August with 1066: What Fates Impose by G.K. Holloway, a novel which, as you can probably guess, follows the events leading up to the Battle of Hastings and the Norman Conquest of 1066. This is a fascinating period of history and, later in the month, I had the pleasure of reading Gildenford, the first in Valerie Anand’s Norman trilogy. I have now read enough books set in this period to be able to compile a list of Pre-Conquest England and House of Normandy suggestions in the Journey Through Time section of my blog. Please feel free to comment on that list with any more recommendations.

I didn’t make much progress with my Classics Club list in August, only reading one classic – The Odd Women by George Gissing – but that one counted towards my Ten from the TBR Project too, so I’m pleased with that! Another book read for the TBR Project was The Thief of Time by John Boyne. I do love Boyne, but this particular book isn’t one of his best and I was slightly disappointed by it. I also found The Raven’s Head by Karen Maitland a bit disappointing – after a wonderful start the story just didn’t hold my attention. I will read more by both Boyne and Maitland, though, and will hope for better luck with my next choices.

The other three novels I read last month were excellent and certainly didn’t disappoint me at all! The first of these was The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins, Antonia Hodgson’s sequel to The Devil in the Marshalsea, an entertaining mystery novel set in Georgian London. The other two, Kit by Marina Fiorato, and The Old Man’s Birthday by Richmal Crompton, have not been reviewed here yet so I won’t say any more about them. Finally, I read one work of non-fiction: She-Wolves by Helen Castor, which looks at the lives of Empress Matilda, Eleanor of Aquitaine, Isabella of France and Margaret of Anjou. I don’t read non-fiction very often but I did enjoy this book.

Looking ahead to September…

As September begins, I am in the middle of three books – The Heart of Mid-Lothian by Sir Walter Scott, Glorious Apollo by E. Barrington and April Lady by Georgette Heyer. After I finish those, I will be reading my Classics Spin book, The Glass-Blowers by Daphne du Maurier and I would also like to read a few books in September for the R.I.P Challenge. I posted a list of possible R.I.P. reads yesterday and am already being tempted by other books not on my list!