Tag: Kate Quinn

The Astral Library by Kate Quinn

11 Comments

Life has never been easy for Alix Watson. Passed around from one foster home to another, her childhood lacked love and security, and now that she’s an adult she’s living in poverty, juggling three part-time jobs in an attempt to make ends meet. But today has been the worst day of all: she’s lost one of her jobs – the highest paying one; her roommate has thrown her out of their shared apartment because his girlfriend is jealous; and she only has a few dollars left in the world, which she can’t even access because her card has been declined. Homeless and alone, Alix takes refuge in the reading room of Boston Public Library, the only place that has ever felt like home. Stumbling through an open door, she finds herself emerging into the Astral Library – a place where time stands still and where the desperate, the lonely and the abused can find sanctuary, literally, inside a book.

Many of us have probably wondered what it would be like to live in one of the fictional worlds described in our favourite books, but in the Astral Library people get the chance to really do exactly that. Alix just needs to decide which literary world to choose – Austen’s Regency? Dickens’ London? The possibilities are endless (as long as the book is in the public domain). Eventually Alix makes her decision, but before she can step inside her book and begin her new life, an urgent message arrives. Someone already within another book is in danger and it seems the future of the Astral Library itself could be under threat.

The Astral Library is a change of direction for Kate Quinn as she has previously only written historical novels, some of which I’ve read and enjoyed. I don’t read a lot of modern fantasy, but was curious to see how Quinn would handle such a completely different genre. First of all, I loved the concept of people being able to enter a book and make it their new home, interacting with the characters and watching the well known storylines play out. I was looking forward to seeing which book Alix would choose and what would happen to her once she’d entered it. However, the novel goes in a direction I wasn’t expecting and instead of Alix becoming immersed in one fictional setting, she jumps constantly from one to another as she and the Librarian are called on to rescue other library users. We only get brief glimpses of most of these books, which is a shame as a lot of them are books I’ve read and enjoyed – such as Jane Eyre, Dracula and The Three Musketeers – and it would have been nice to have spent longer exploring them!

There’s some interesting worldbuilding in terms of the Astral Library itself and the many rules that govern it – rules on who can and can’t enter, which books you can live inside and what you’re allowed to do once there, what to do about suitable clothing, the different privileges granted to the Librarian and her assistants, and much more. The Librarian is a great character; Alix finds her a bit unwelcoming at first, but gradually gains respect for her when she discovers what lengths the Librarian will go to in protecting those who have sought sanctuary in the library and how valiantly she’s been battling the bureaucracy of the Library Board who disagree with the way the library is being run. I was intrigued by the addition of two more characters, the Gallerist and the Programmer, but I won’t say any more about those!

I found The Astral Library mostly entertaining, although not quite what I’d wanted and expected it to be. Later in the book, though, it becomes clear that it’s a novel with a message – a message about the many threats facing libraries today. Libraries all over the world are at risk of closure, in need of more funding and increasingly focusing on offering other things rather than just books. Quinn also explores the topics of book banning and censorship. Towards the end of the book, it did seem that these messages were starting to dominate and become more important than the plot and the characters, but still, I enjoyed the book overall. I would prefer Kate Quinn to go back to writing historical fiction, which I think she does better, but it’s always interesting to see authors trying something different.

Thanks to HarperCollins for providing a copy of this book for review via NetGalley.

The Briar Club by Kate Quinn

14 Comments

Kate Quinn’s new novel, The Briar Club, begins with a murder in a Washington, D.C. boarding house on Thanksgiving, 1954. We don’t know who the victim is – that will be revealed later on – but it does seem that the killer is likely to be one of the seventeen people gathered in the kitchen waiting to be interviewed by the police. To get answers, we have to go back to the day four years earlier when Grace March arrives at Briarwood House and agrees to take the tiny apartment in the attic…

Grace is just one of several women living in the house, all of whom are hiding secrets and in some cases are not quite what they seem. There’s Nora, who works at the National Archives and is in love with a gangster; Bea, a former baseball player forced to give up her dreams; Claire, who is desperately trying to save to buy her own home; Fliss, an Englishwoman with a baby and an absent husband; unhappy, spiteful Arlene whom nobody likes; and Reka, an elderly Hungarian refugee. The novel unfolds through a series of interlinked short stories each focusing on one of these women, interspersed with chapters describing the aftermath of the Thanksgiving murder. The latter are narrated by Briarwood House itself, because the house knows better than anyone else what has been going on within its walls!

I enjoyed The Briar Club, but found some of the women’s stories much more engaging than others. Nora’s story came first and was completely gripping, which maybe raised my expectations too high for the rest of the book. By the time I reached Bea’s section in the middle, I was starting to get bored, although things did pick up again later on. Despite the brief chapters about the murder that are scattered throughout the book, I think anyone who starts to read this expecting a mystery novel or a thriller will be disappointed – but if you like character-driven novels with a slower pace it will probably be more to your taste. Speaking of taste, food and drink play a big part in the story, with each character sharing some of their recipes with us! So if you want to know how to make Bea’s ragù, Arlene’s candle salad or Claire’s potato pancakes, the instructions are all in the book (and even if you’re not a cook, I recommend skipping to the end of each recipe where you’ll find a suggestion for a suitable song to accompany the meal).

Although each woman in the house has her own individual story to tell, they all get together for weekly social gatherings in Grace’s attic room (the ‘Briar Club’ of the title) and over the years most of the women begin to form close bonds. A very different kind of relationship that also develops is between the women of the Briar Club and the two children of their landlady, Mrs Nilsson. Pete Nilsson gets a chapter of his own, but I particularly loved seeing how his younger sister, Lina, grows in confidence (and improves her baking skills) due to the friendship and support of the Briar Club. The novel also provides us with a snapshot of life in America in the early 1950s, with a focus on McCarthy and the fear of communism.

The Briar Club was an enjoyable read overall, but I would have preferred some of the women’s stories to be cut short or left out altogether. So far, The Rose Code is still my favourite of the three Kate Quinn books I’ve read (the other is The Diamond Eye).

Thanks to HarperCollins for providing a copy of this book for review via NetGalley.

This is book 16/20 of my 20 Books of Summer 2024.

Book 34/50 for the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge 2024

The Diamond Eye by Kate Quinn

12 Comments

I loved The Rose Code by Kate Quinn – it was one of my favourite books last year. Because of that, I think my expectations for her new novel, The Diamond Eye, were slightly too high. I enjoyed it, but I don’t think it will be one of my books of the year this time.

The Diamond Eye is the story of Lyudmila Pavlichenko, a female sniper in the Soviet Army during World War II (and a real historical figure). Lyudmila, or ‘Mila’ as she is called in the novel, was born in Ukraine but considered herself Russian. The book was written before the current war in Ukraine began earlier this year, which gives something as simple as Mila’s choice of identity new relevance.

When we first meet Mila, she is a twenty-one-year-old history student in Kiev (now known as Kyiv, of course) and is trying to get a divorce from her husband Alexei, who seduced her as a teenager then left her to raise their son, Slavka, alone. After an encounter with Alexei at a shooting range during which Mila embarrasses herself by missing a shot, she decides to join an advanced marksmanship course so that she’ll never miss again and can prove to Slavka that she’s the equal of his father. This decision changes Mila’s life because, when Hitler invades Russia a few years later, she is handed a rifle and enlisted into the Red Army as a sniper.

We then follow two alternating storylines – one which describes Mila’s time in the army and how she acquires her reputation as ‘Lady Death’, being credited with 309 kills, and another set in 1942 as Mila embarks on a US tour in an attempt to persuade the Allies to provide support for Russia against the Nazis. The chapters set in America explore Mila’s relationship with Eleanor Roosevelt and a fictitious plot to assassinate the President. This invented storyline adds some tension and excitement to the book, but with Mila’s own life being so fascinating I’m not sure that it was really necessary!

The factual parts of the novel are based on Lyudmila Pavlichenko’s own memoir, Lady Death: The Memoirs of Stalin’s Sniper, which I haven’t read. In fact, I knew nothing at all about Mila before reading this book so everything in it was new to me. Quinn includes a very comprehensive author’s note at the end in which she explains where she tried to stick to the known facts and where she had used her imagination to fill in gaps or make the story more interesting (mainly the bits concerning Mila’s marriage to Alexei and her romantic relationships with two men she meets in the army). Some of the most surprising parts of the story, such as Mila’s friendship with the First Lady are actually true.

There’s a lot of focus on military life, weapons and tactics, which I suppose is to be expected in a novel about a sniper, but that’s never been a particular area of interest to me and reading about the Bletchley Park codebreakers in The Rose Code was much more to my taste. Still, it’s always good to learn something new and I did enjoy the parts of the book about Mila’s personal life and ambassadorial work, if not so much the parts about shooting and killing. I’m sure I’ll be reading more of Kate Quinn’s books.

Thanks to HarperCollins for providing a copy of this book for review via NetGalley.

This is book 28/50 read for the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge 2022.

The Rose Code by Kate Quinn

28 Comments

I loved this! I’ve never read Kate Quinn before, although she has been recommended to me several times, so I’m pleased that my first experience of her work has been such a good one. The Rose Code wasn’t a perfect book, but the few flaws that I noted were quickly outweighed by the gripping plot, strong characters and interesting historical setting.

The story takes place in and around Bletchley Park, the English country house which became the home of Britain’s World War II codebreakers, and follows three of the young women who work there. Two of them, Osla Kendall and Mab Churt, meet on the train in 1940 as they travel to Bletchley Park, unsure as to what their new jobs will involve but determined to do their best to help the war effort. Osla, a beautiful, wealthy young socialite, is desperate to prove that she is more than just a ‘silly debutante’; the outspoken and fiercely independent Mab is a working class girl from the East End of London who, having escaped from a life of poverty, wants to make a better future for herself. At Bletchley Park, both will find the opportunities they need to change their lives – and so does a third young woman, Beth Finch. Beth has grown up under the thumb of her domineering mother and looks set to remain a spinster all her life, but when Osla and Mab notice her special gift for crosswords and puzzles, they encourage her to overcome her shyness and join them at Bletchley.

Although most of the novel is set during the war years, we occasionally jump forward in time to 1947. On the eve of the royal wedding between Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip, two of the three Bletchley Park women have received a summons for help from the third, who has been confined to an asylum. However, the friendship between the three of them broke down before the war ended and the two women who are free aren’t sure if they really want to help the one who is imprisoned. What happened to destroy their friendship? Was there really a traitor within Bletchley Park? And will the mysterious Rose Code ever be solved?

The Rose Code is a long novel, but was quicker to read than I’d expected because I became so engrossed in the stories of Osla, Mab and Beth. Their work at Bletchley Park is fascinating to read about, particularly Beth’s as a cryptanalyst, working with the legendary Dilly Knox. Although it all sounds very complicated – and I’m pleased the Allies didn’t have to rely on me to break the Enigma codes – Kate Quinn does a good job of explaining how the various machines were used and what the different decryption methods involved. She also explores the psychological impact of carrying out such highly confidential work; all of the codebreakers sign up to the Official Secrets Act and are banned from discussing their work with friends and family or even with people from different departments within Bletchley Park itself. This raises the interesting question of whether it’s ever acceptable to break your oath of secrecy – and if not, what sort of strain will that put on your relationships with other people?

Several real historical figures appear in The Rose Code. I have already mentioned Dilly Knox, but we also briefly meet Alan Turing, Winston Churchill…and Prince Philip, who is romantically involved with Osla before his marriage to Princess Elizabeth (the future Queen). This isn’t as far-fetched as it might seem, as Kate Quinn apparently based the character of Osla Kendall on the real life Osla Benning, who really was a Canadian debutante who worked at Bletchley Park and was Prince Philip’s girlfriend – but I don’t personally feel comfortable reading fictional portrayals of people who are still alive and this whole storyline felt unnecessary to me. I couldn’t imagine the real Philip saying some of the things he says in the book either; in fact, although I did appreciate the author’s attempts to use the slang of the time, the language in general didn’t always feel quite right to me – and there are a few annoying references to England when it should be Britain.

Still, even the Philip storyline didn’t stop me from enjoying this book because the rest of it was so interesting and compelling. There was even one scene that made me cry and I think that’s always a sign that the author has done something right! I’m sure I will be reading more books by Kate Quinn.

Thanks to HarperCollins UK for providing a copy of this book for review via NetGalley

Book 13/50 read for the 2021 Historical Fiction Reading Challenge.