Difference between revisions of "Newest Historical Fiction Reviews"

From TheBookbag
Jump to navigationJump to search
 
(711 intermediate revisions by 5 users not shown)
Line 1: Line 1:
 
[[Category:Historical Fiction|*]]
 
[[Category:Historical Fiction|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Historical Fiction]]
+
[[Category:New Reviews|Historical Fiction]]__NOTOC__<!-- Remove -->
==Historical fiction==
+
  <!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->
__NOTOC__
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Tananarive Due
|author=Margaret Muir
+
|title=The Reformatory
|title=Floating Gold
+
|rating=5
 +
|genre=Historical Fiction
 +
|summary= Gracetown, Florida. June 1950. After a scuffle with a white boy, twelve year-old Robbie Stephens Jr is sentenced to six months at the Gracetown School for Boys, otherwise known as the Reformatory. It's a place with a brutal and dark reputation. But the segregated reformatory is a chamber of horrors, haunted by the boys that have died there. In order to survive the school governor and his Funhouse, Robert must enlist the help of the school's ghosts – only they have their own motivations...
 +
|isbn=1803366532
 +
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|author=Katherine Howe
 +
|title=A True Account
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Historical Fiction
+
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The novel opens with a description of the rotting remains of a human being battered by the waves on the beaches of the Isle of Wight. I cannot recall any book I have ever read starting on a more depressing note, but this is far from a depressing, or disappointing, story.
+
|summary=Hannah Masury is living in Boston, having been sent to live with a family who run an inn, and being made to work there from a young age.  When she hears there is to be a hanging of some pirates in the town, she decides to go and watch.  Enthralled and horrified in equal measure, Hannah finds herself embroiled in a young boy's death at the hands of two vicious pirates.  She hides away, so that they don't find and kill her too, and then to escape them completely she runs away to sea, dressing as a boy and joining the notorious Ned Low's pirate ship as a cabin boy.  She soon finds herself in the thick of things when there is a mutiny on board, and from there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of life on the ocean waves.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>070909051X</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0861547438
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Sarah Marsh
|author=E V Thompson
+
|title=A Sign of Her Own
|title=No Less Than The Journey
 
 
|rating=3.5
 
|rating=3.5
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary= ''No Less Than The Journey'' concerns a young Cornish miner seeking a new life in America.  He makes many interesting acquaintances and some rather arduous journeys in his quest to find a family member.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709087551</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Katie Flynn
 
|title=Heading Home
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Women's Fiction
 
|summary=Claudia is seven when this book opens, in Liverpool in 1926.  She's a careful girl, perhaps a little spoilt, although clearly not wealthy.  She enjoys the protection of thirteen-year-old Danny who comes from a poorer family, and evidently has something of a crush on Claudia.  Even in this first chapter, she comes across as somewhat self-centred, wanting people to think well of her, but not naturally generous or empathic.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099520265</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=G. De Beauregard and H. De Gorsse
 
|title=The Stamp King
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=Set in 1896, this is the story of William Keniss and Betty Scott, two young American philatelists each intent on owning the world’s only complete stamp collection.  The rarest specimen of all is one issued by the Maharajah of Brahmapootra but never placed on general sale, although one copy did pass through the postal system, and it is one of only two in the entire universe.  The Maharajah owns this one himself - and our collectors are determined to get their hands on the other.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0852597460</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Julie Orringer
 
|title=The Invisible Bridge
 
|rating=5
 
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=In a story that takes us from the elegance of Paris, through the streets of Budapest and on into the Hungarian countryside and the Ukraine this is an epic tale, masterfully toldIt is 1937 and Andras Levi, a young Hungarian Jewish student, is about to leave his brother Tibor to go and study architecture in ParisAndras' story unfolds first amongst the beautiful buildings of Paris, the theatres and the bars, as he struggles in his studies and falls in love with a beautiful ballerina who has a terrible secret to hideAs the tragedy of World War 2 edges ever closer to Andras, the book moves back to Hungary, to the little village where Andras and his brothers grew up, to Budapest where his new family live and then on into the forced labour camps across Hungary.  
+
|summary=After a bout of scarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing.  Suddenly plunged into a world of silence, everything about her life changesLiving in a time when the use of sign language was seen as something only savages do, Ellen is sent to a school where she is taught to lip read, but physically restrained from signingFrom here, she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the deaf and using a system called Visible SpeechAt the same time, Bell is working on other inventions and ideas, and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a complicated tangle of espionage.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670914584</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1035401614
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Claire North
|author=Beverley Eikli
+
|title=House of Odysseus
|title=Lady Farquhar's Butterfly
 
|rating=3
 
|genre=Women's Fiction
 
|summary=Olivia - Lady Farquhar - has recently been widowed.  This does not upset her in the least; indeed, as becomes clear through the novel, her husband was an unpleasant bully who subjected her to all kinds of abuse.  Unfortunately, however, the terms of his will have ensured that her beloved toddler Julian has been taken away to live with his uncle Max until such time as Olivia marries someone considered to be above reproach.  For that reason, she is seriously considering marrying Nathaniel, a clergyman who has helped her for many years.  The only problem with that is that she finds him increasingly repulsive...
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709090579</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Anita Diamant
 
|title=Day After Night
 
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
|genre=Historical Fiction
+
|genre= Literary Fiction  
|summary=First of all, I really liked the unusual pitch for a Second World War novel, set in a detention camp in Palestine in October 1945, soon after the liberation of Europe.  The war machine has ground to a halt, leaving millions of bewildered refugees to find their way out of chaos.  With huge effort, hundreds of Jewish men and women reach their promised land, albeit as illegal immigrants.  Though imprisoned again, Atlit camp is emotionally a halfway house between the past and the future for them.  They are at least well-fed and humanely treated by their British captors. With no particular duties and in limbo for an indeterminate period, the women start to come to terms with how life will be for them in the future, safe at last from Nazi persecution, but having lost all their loved ones.
+
|summary= ''What could matter more than love?''
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847398618</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
+
The follow-up to the excellent ''Ithaca'' picks up a few months after where we left off. In the palace of Odysseus, with delicate care Queen Penelope continues to rule without her husband, who sailed to war at Troy and then by divine intervention never returned home. As ever she remains surrounded by suitors vying for the throne of the Western Isles. Having survived – politically and physical – the chaotic storm that Clytemnestra brought to Ithaca's shores, Queen Penelope is on the brink of a fragile peace. One that shatters however with the return of Orestes, King of Mycenae, and his sister Elektra, seeking refuge.
|author=Jennie Rooney
+
|isbn=0356516075
|title=The Opposite of Falling
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=It is 1862 and when wealthy Liverpool girl Ursula Bridgewater finds herself single and restless after her fiancée Henry Springton leaves her for another woman, she soon turns to travel as a means of escape and sets off on her first expedition. But she has agreed to stay friends with Henry and cannot quite escape him completely as they continue to write to each other. Ten years later and Ursula has travelled all over the world and is about to embark on a trip around America, but this time she decides to take a companion.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701182687</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=B0C7J9D21B
|author=Iain Pears
+
|title=A Captive in Algiers (Muhammed Amalfi Mysteries)
|title=Stone's Fall
+
|author=A J Lewis
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=I read Iain Pears' ''The Portrait'' a year or so ago and loved it so I was really looking forward to reading this novel.  The front cover is strikingly handsome and hints of good things to come between its covers.  The novel is divided up into sizeable chunks of threeThree different decades and three different locationsPears then dips in and out of the main characters' lives, telling the reader basically what makes them tick.
+
|summary=When we first meet our hero, his name is Ettore and he lives at The House of Beautiful SwallowsIdyllic as this might sound, it's a bordello and Ettore's mother died when he was bornHe's not been short of mothers, though - but for someone of his background in late-eighteenth-century Amalfi, it's difficult to obtain decent employment. The stint working with the preparation of anchovies didn't work out and bastards are considered bad luck on fishing boatsEttore was nothing if not resourceful - and determined - and it was not long before he had a successful business as a guide for visitorsHe was even saving some money.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099516179</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Nicola Cornick
 
|title=Confessions of a Duchess
 
|rating=3
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=Dowager Duchess Laura Cole has come to the village of Fortune’s Folly to live a quiet life as a widow with her young daughter.  But when the village squire decides to invoke the Dames’ Tax, a law requiring every unmarried woman to give up half her wealth to him, the town becomes a hotbed of men searching for heiresses now desperate to marry.  Joining the men is Dexter Anstruther, sent to secure a rich wife and carry out a murder inquiry on behalf of Lord LiverpoolThe last thing Laura and Dexter expect is to see each other again after their steamy encounter four years agoBut their passion for each other is reawakened and looks set to ruin them both.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0778303802</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Essie Fox
|author=Gill Schierhout
+
|title=The Fascination
|title=The Shape of Him
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=The story is told in the first person by Sara Highbury. She's running a small business in an efficient but rather detached fashion.  She's all washed up.  She starts to recount her earlier, happier life when it meant something to her.  And the reader soon discovers that a diamond digger called Herbert was - and still is - the love of her life. And here Schierhout gives us a taster of the hard and dirty work digging for stones (they're never called diamonds by the workers apparently).  The danger and precarious nature of the work is laid bare.  But Herbert seemed to be a natural. Why?
+
|summary= The Victorian era is incredibly over-romanticised as a setting for historical fiction (matched only, perhaps, by the Second World War) which has often led to more than a few writers mishandling it. There's such a glut of media set in the era that the hallmarks we've come to associate with it are familiar to the point of being cliched, hackneyed even. All this is simply to illustrate that it would be an easy thing to do poorly. But despite that, something about it still grabs me – and something about this book's description did as well.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099535777</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1914585526
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Anne-Marie Vukelic
 
|title=Far Above Rubies
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=Shy Catherine Hogarth first meets Charles Dickens at her parents' house when he hilariously comes in through the window to dance a jig before the assembled guests, before leaving and then entering again via the front door.  Employed by her father George, the editor of the Evening Chronicle, as a reporter and sketch writer, Charles is at the start of his writing career and soon becomes a regular visitor to the Hogarth household.  
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709090536</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Nicole Jarvis
|author=Elizabeth Chadwick
+
|title=A Portrait in Shadow
|title=To Defy A King
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=#Set in the traumatic and violent period leading up to the Magna Carta, Chadwick concentrates on the fortunes of two extended families. The Marshals, close to the throne for their expertise, political and military might, and the Bigods, who are directly related to King John, through their half brother Longespee, son of the family matriarch, and John’s father. Banished from Court, and forced to leave her son there, Ida marries Roger and founds a strong patriarchal dynasty. However, tension is never far from boiling point, with the two half brothers tolerating each other at best, loathing each other more often than not, due to their opposing  natures.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847442366</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Anne O'Brien
 
|title=Virgin Widow
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=The mighty Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, is famous throughout England as one of King Edward IV’s most trusted advisors. But as Edward is lured towards another influential family when he falls in love with Elizabeth Woodville, Warwick responds by backing the alliance between Margaret of Anjou and King Louis XI of France, aiming to put Margaret’s husband Henry VI back on the English throne. A helpless pawn, Anne is torn away from the man she loves, who will grow up to become Richard III, to be used as political capital by her father and his allies as they try to regain the kingdom of England.
+
|summary=''I want all of Florence to know my name''
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0778303756</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
+
Cast out from Rome, Artemisia Gentileschi arrives in Florence seeking an oasis in which her art can find a home and where her future can thrive rather than stagnate. But as some as she enters Florentine society she faces great opposition from the powerful Accademia, the self-proclaimed guardians of the healing magics that through paintings have the power to protect the city and its citizens from plagues and curses. The all-male Accademia has hoarded power over art and architecture for centuries and guard it above all else. To them, Artemisia – an ambitious young woman who promises trouble and change – has no place amongst them and their society.
|author=Lynn Shepherd
+
|isbn=1803362340
|title=Murder at Mansfield Park
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=Straight away the reader is plunged into the language of Austen's era, so dotted all over are such rather flowery phrases as ' ... conjugal felicity ...' and ' ... her family were not consumptive...'  We are also introduced to a host of characters and although Shepherd has thoughtfully provided right at the beginning ''Names of the Principal Persons'', it does bombard and perhaps confuse the reader a little.  I must admit to referring to this dratted list time and time again.  It does break the flow at the beginning of the novel.  But, several chapters in and you're right into the story thereafter.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905636792</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Sara Stockbridge
 
|title=The Fortunes of Grace Hammer
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=The short prologue shares with the reader a childhood incident in the life of Grace Hammer.  It had a dramatic effect on her and her life thereafter. She is a changed person.  She's also driven.  She grows into a desirable woman and turns men's heads wherever she goes.  But she's also smart.  Some would perhaps think at this point, why not go 'up west', bag a sugar-daddy and live in luxury for the rest of her days?  But life is not as simple as that.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099520958</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|author=Thomas D Lee
 +
|title=Perilous Times
 +
|rating=3
 +
|genre= Fantasy
 +
|summary= ''Hate is the path of least resistance''
  
{{newreview
+
Set in the near-distant future, in a world on the verge of climate collapse, Britain is in great peril. The British Isles desperately needs a hero (or several) to save the day and rescue what little remains. What no-one expected was that one of the Knights of the Round Table would answer the call.
|author=Emily Purdy
+
|isbn=0356518523
|title=The Tudor Wife
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=From the moment she sets eyes on handsome George Boleyn, plain Lady Jane Parker falls madly in love and prays that George will be hers. As Jane and George's families negotiate the marriage Jane meets Anne Boleyn and quickly realises that George only has eyes for Anne, but remains determined that she can make George love her.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847561942</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=G K Holloway
|author=Anne Perry
+
|title=In the Shadows of Castles
|title=The Sheen on the Silk
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=Anna Zarides arrives in Constantinople, determined to find out why her twin brother Justinian has been convicted of murder. But it is 1273, and a woman cannot move about freely to ask questions. Anna is a skilled doctor, who uses Arab and Jewish medicine in secret as well as more accepted Christian remedies: in her quest for information she disguises herself as a eunuch and successfully treats a wide range of people from the very poorest right up to the emperor himself.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755339061</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Penny Ingham
 
|title=The King's Daughter
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=The central female character - 'The King's Daughter' is Elflaede.  She's young, feisty and very pretty.  She also has this unforgettable reddish hair.  At this point in the story I was reminded a little of Queen Elizabeth I, I have to say.  In Elflaede's own words she 'had never known a time without war .'  The hordes of Pagan Norsemen are to blame.  They've come to England with their own set of superstitions.  And they've come with one aim.  To conquer great swathes of England.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095559975X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Trevor Bloom
 
|title=The Half-Slave
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=At Samarobriva in Roman Gaul, a raiding Saxon tribe meets its match in the form of a division of the Franks, who have suborned the Roman authorities and are establishing their control throughout the region. A mysterious meeting with the Frankish Overlord persuades the leader of the Saxons to sign a treaty that will forever alter the fate of his people. In return for Frankish silver, he hands over to them his youngest son, Ascha the half-slave, as a perpetual hostage to guarantee the peace. But in the frozen north new powers are rising, and Ascha will soon be drawn into a web of lies and ambition as two very different worlds come into conflict.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0955563062</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Seth Hunter
 
|title=The Tide of War
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=The Tide of War is the second book in a trilogy of historical fiction
+
|summary= We begin after the momentous battle in 1066 and on the day of William of Normandy's coronation as King of England. William's position is not secure and the new king has many challenges. Imposing authority through a coronation is important. And William is right to worry. While the previous king, Harold, is dead and the likelihood of more pitched battles is over, the rebels are stirring and much of the country does not wish to recognise a new overlord.
novels by Seth Hunter, set in the 1790s and recounts the adventures of
+
|isbn=1800422466
British naval captain Nathan Peake. In this book newly-promoted Peake
 
is sent to the Caribbean to command a British frigate, the Unicorn,
 
to hunt for the French warship, the Virginie.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755357612</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Michelle Lovric
 
|title=The Book of Human Skin
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=''Ye can't take the slither out ovva snake.''
 
 
 
So says Gianni, valet in a wealthy eighteenth century Venetian household. The master, a merchant, divides his time between Italy and Peru, where he deals in silver. But the merchant isn't the serpent - his son Minguillo is. On the night an earthquake ripped through Peru and deposited fanatical nun Sor Loreta at the convent in Arequipa, Minguillo was born - a serpent in his family's midst. His own mother couldn't bear to nurse him and his father went into denial, making more and more frequent trips to a South American home free of sociopathic progeny.  
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140880588X</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=3949666079
|author=Elif Shafak
+
|title=Noema
|title=The Forty Rules of Love
+
|author=Dael Akkerman
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
+
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=This is a sixth novel from best-selling Turkish author, Elif Shafak. Set in twelfth century Anatolia, two famous characters from Islamic history meet in a gorgeously real world.  A delicate contemporary US love story is wrapped around the rich, meaty historical fiction. Don't be misled by the dodgy-sounding title!
+
|summary=''This is a story about some things that happened to me about twelve thousand years ago.''
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670918733</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
+
Maya is a young girl living in a hunter gatherer village during the Mesolithic era. Climate change is occurring, the Sea of Grass encroaches further and further into Maya's forest home, and food is becoming more and more scarce. What to do? Can the law givers in the federation of villages muster peaceful ways to cope? Can the Traveller, a spiritual figure who interprets the wisdom of All Life, provide solutions?
|author=Lawrence Hill
 
|title=The Book of Negroes
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=Although this is a work of fiction, the whole distasteful and deeply upsetting subject of slavery is a fact, therefore, at times I felt as if I were reading a true account.
 
 
The narrative goes back and forth, starting with Aminata (or Meena as she is usually called) as a relatively old woman (what we would call middle-aged).  She's in London, far from home, but she's there for an extremely important reason. The powers-that-be need her to tell her story, as a slave over many years.  The hope is that other Meenas will not have to suffer the same fate.  On a lighter note (and they are few and far between) Meena gets to visit some London schoolchildren.  They think that she eats elephant.  She is able to laugh at their naivety.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0552775487</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1529125898
|author=Phil Rickman
+
|title=Godmersham Park
|title=The Bones of Avalon
+
|author=Gill Hornby
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=When Elizabeth I's most trusted men fear for her safety and think there's a possibly supernatural plot against her, the obvious man to investigate it is Dr John Dee, her astrologer and consultant in the hidden arts. Aided by his former pupil – and Elizabeth's reputed lover – Robert Dudley, he travels to Glastonbury to try and find the bones of King Arthur. Glastonbury, however, has never recovered from the Dissolution of the Monasteries and the execution of its beloved Abbot Richard Whiting, and many residents view the pair with suspicion. The exception to this is Nel Borrow, who treats Dudley when he's ill and becomes the first woman Dee has ever been interested in romantically. Can the three stop the villainous plot? I'll leave you to find out…
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848872704</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Susan Fletcher
 
|title=Corrag
 
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=A small and dirty woman sits in a prison cell.  With her bare feet and her matted hair and her damp, filthy clothes, she doesn't wonder at the word ''witch''.  She has been called it all her life.  Her mother called her ''witch'' before she named her.  Her given name Corrag – was a corruption: for Cora (her mother) and Hag (which she'd get as used to as Cora had).
+
|summary=''If it were not for the casual dereliction of the odd gentleman's duty, there would no women to teach well-bred daughters at all.''
 
 
She sits through the snow of the winter, knowing that the sound she hears outside is the dragging of the logs for her pyre.  
 
  
She was told, though, that a man would comeSo she waits for him.
+
Anne Sharpe was thirty-one years old when she arrived at Godmersham Park to take up the position of governess to twelve-year-old Fanny Austen.  She had no experience of teaching but this was a case of necessity.  Until the death of her mother, Anne had a comfortable life and was loved by both parents although her father was frequently absent from the household.  When her mother died, her father cast her off and would have nothing more to do with herNo explanation was offered but she would receive an annuity of £35 a year.  Her maid, Agnes, would receive nothing but was fortunately taken in by some neighbours.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007321597</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Melissa Fu
|author=Richard Denning
+
|title=Peach Blossom Spring
|title=The Amber Treasure
 
 
|rating=3.5
 
|rating=3.5
 +
|genre=Historical Fiction
 +
|summary= I loved the prelude to Peach Blossom Spring, a short chapter entitled ''Origins''.  Unfortunately it is the only truly poetic part of a book that I expected more from. Covering Chinese history from 1938 to 2005 as viewed through one family's perspective. When their home city is set ablaze during the war with Japan, a young mother (Meilin) and her four-year-old son (Renshu) are among those who flee. The story follows them on their journey across China, and in Renshu's case eventually to America. 
 +
|isbn=1472277538
 +
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=1916072038
 +
|title=The House in the Hollow (The Talbot Saga)
 +
|author=Allie Cresswell
 +
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=
+
|summary=We meet part of the Talbot family in Yorkshire in November 1811. Twenty-seven-year-old Jocelyn Talbot and her mother have travelled in some discomfort from their home at Ecklington, to the house in the hollow. The two women are angry with each other and Jocelyn is well aware of her mother's strengths and weaknesses:
Cerdic is the younger son of a minor lord living in a quiet Anglo Saxon village in sixth century Northumbria. His people are settled and the Welsh (Romano-Britons) seem contained behind the Pennines. Cedric fully expects to live out his live as a gentleman farmer, hopefully with the beautiful Aidith by his side. But as he listens to the tales told by Lilla the bard, he can't help but dream of following after his uncle, the great warrior Cynric, and finding glory in battle.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849140235</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
+
''She is practiced at subterfuge, at concealing, beneath a facade of respectability, the deplorable truth''.
|author=Katherine Howe
 
|title=The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane
 
|rating=3
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=Connie is doing postgraduate research on witchcraft. Although she is initially rather wary of being asked to clear out her grandmother’s old house, the project turns out to lead to lots of exciting possibilities, including romance and perhaps original sources for her studies.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141047550</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
+
Hester is furious about Jocelyn's refusal to do as she was asked, which has precipitated ''this violent and unexpected removal''.
|author=Debbie Elliott
 
|title=Tesla & Twain
 
|rating=3
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=History remembers nineteenth century inventor Nikola Tesla as a mad scientist, and he did indulge in some very peculiar experiments, most notably the directed-energy weapon, or death-ray, as the press of the time gleefully dubbed it. But the truth is that his work was of groundbreaking importance: he developed the electrical alternating current and the AC motor, and much more. The average person probably has a better awareness of Samuel Clemens - who wrote Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn under his pen name Mark Twain, and who was known as one of the foremost satirists of his day. But perhaps they don't know that Twain was fascinated by scientific inquiry, or that these two seemingly disparate men were great friends.  
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906146756</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
+
Then we are told of the birth of a child and, soon after, Hester Talbot departs, leaving Jocelyn in shame and isolation in Yorkshire.
|author=E V Thompson
 
|title=The Dream Traders
 
|rating=3
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=In the nineteenth century, when European nations are scrabbling to colonise as many territories as possible, a young Englishman sails into Chinese waters seeking fame and fortune. Unlike the rest of his countrymen however, Luke Trewarne refuses to get rich selling opium to the Chinese. All very noble but the fact is that Luke is a passenger on board a ship laden with the stuff and there are Chinese gunships on the horizon.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>070908885X</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Annabel Abbs
|author=Janet Mullany
+
|title=The Language of Food
|title=Improper Relations
+
|rating=5
|rating=4
 
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=Unlucky in love Charlotte Hayden has just lost her best friend and confidante Ann in marriage to the Earl of Beresford. At the wedding she encounters Lord Shadderly, Beresford's best friend, a broodingly handsome man whom she takes an immediate dislike to. Before she knows it Charlotte is caught in a compromising situation with Shadderly and he is forced to propose to her or risk both their reputations.
+
|summary=Eliza Acton is a poet who has never had the slightest inclination to boil an egg. When tasked with writing a cookery book, she recruits Ann Kirby, a local woman with a troubled home life. Together, they test, craft, refine and reshape the world of domestic cookery, reinventing the recipe book and changing the face of cookery writing forever.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755347803</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1398502227
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Freya Marske
|author=Clare Clark
+
|title=A Marvellous Light
|title=Savage Lands
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=The novel begins with one of the central characters - Elisabeth - preparing to leave her home in France, and embark upon a ship to take her to America - to meet and marry a complete stranger. At this time there were literally only a few hundred settlers, so potential wives were shipped in along with other necessities! She is very much in two minds about the entire venture - apprehensive, yet more than a little excited at the prospect of her new life. The voyage doesn't begin particularly well for her, as she feels isolated from the other girls. A voracious reader, she has packed her trunk with books as opposed to the more conventional linens and this immediately sets her apart.
+
|summary=Robin Blyth is nudged into a job in the Civil Service, much to his chagrin. There he meets Edwin Courcey and learns that the streets of London are threaded with magic. Desperate to remove a curse that threatens to swallow him, Robin follows Edwin to the countryside, where the hedgegrows bristle with incantations and the people shimmer with power. There they uncover a sinister plot that threatens the lives of all magicians in the British Isles. |isbn=1529080886
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846553512</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Christi Phillips
 
|title=The Devlin Diary
 
|rating=3
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=It is 1672 and Hannah Devlin, a young widow with a skill for (illegally) practicing medicine finds herself being all but kidnapped by King Charles II's advisors and forced to use her skills to treat his mistress, Louise de Keroualle.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847393489</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn= B09F4CTKJR
|author=Cathy Marie Buchanan
+
|title= Flights for Freedom
|title=The Day The Falls Stood Still
+
|author= Steven Burgauer
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=I imagined this title as a 'Gone With the Wind' sort of novel, a saga-esque historical romance, with a characterful heroine and page-turning story line that necessitates reading late into the night. Well, I wasn't disappointed in this paperback edition of the hardback, already a best-seller in the U.S.
+
|summary=It's the later stages of World War I and the United States has just entered the conflict. Petrol Petronus is a young American who has signed up and joined the 17 Aero Squadron. This company was the first US Aero Squadron to be trained in Canada, the first to be attached to the RAF and the first to be sent into the skies to fight the Germans in active combat. But before that can happen, Petrol has to master flying the notoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camel.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091925967</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author= Christophe Medler
|author=John Wilcox
+
|title=Madrigal: A Closely Guarded Secret
|title=The Shangani Patrol
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=This is the latest in the adventures of Simon Fonthill, a cross between a Victorian James Bond and Indianna Jones.  Although one of a series, it stands alone as a novel.  It's steeped in the history (and there's a lot of it) of the late 19th century when Queen Victoria 'ruled the world.'
+
|summary= Set against the backdrop of the English Civil War, a secret plan (code-named Madrigal) is discovered by Sir Robert Douse in the summer of 1642. As a loyal servant of the King, and Head of the Secret Service, it is Robert's duty to uncover the details of the plan and follow the clues to uncover one of the most guarded secrets in history—especially since the plot could affect the King.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755345614</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=B095HY8SXQ
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1471187179
|author=Terence Morgan
+
|title=A Beautiful Spy
|title=The Master of Bruges
+
|author=Rachel Hore
|rating=5
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=Belgium, the fifteenth century.  Hans is apprenticed to a master painter in the city of Brussels, until the old curmudgeon dies, and his studio falls apart.  Luckily for Hans, a mistakenly drawn sketch, and a bizarre rescue from the gallows gives him a major boost - patronage, for both portraits and many religious images.  With what might seem to be a patchy diary - some years have five pages only, concerning but one month - we see his startling life journey, covering beguiling models, ghostly war scenes, and even the biggest intrigues of English royal court.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230744125</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Eloisa James
 
|title=When the Duke Returns
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=''When the Duke Returns'', the newest volume in the 'Desperate Duchesses' series, continues the regency celebrity romp saga where [[Duchess by Night by Eloisa James|Duchess by Night]] left off.
+
|summary=Minnie is an 'ordinary' girl living an unexciting life in a leafy provincial suburb.  The book is set in the 1930s and Minnie is expected to live up to her mother's expectations and find a nice young man to marry, produce children and spend the rest of her days looking after her husband and their home. Unfortunately, this isn't what she wants to do at all and neither does she want to continue working as a secretary.  As a result of a chance meeting, she finds herself drawn into espionage, working for the secret service and effectively living a double life - attempting to infiltrate the Communist Party of Great Britain.  Minnie finds herself torn between what she perceives as her duty and the friends she has made - and likes - whilst working for the Communist Party.
 
 
The focus, this time, is on Isidore, the Duchess of Conway: hot-headed, hot-blooded and Italian to boot, she was married by proxy at the age of sixteen and is still a virgin seven years later. Isidore's cunning plot to entice back the husband she has never seen from his travels in Asia and Africa works perfectly and Simeon, His Grace Duke of Conway is now back in England, ready to claim his estate and, as Isidore presumes, ready to claim his beautiful wife.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340961104</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Afonso Cruz and Rahul Bery (translator)
|author=Adam Williams
+
|title=Kokoschka's Doll
|title=The Book of the Alchemist
+
|rating=2.5
|rating=3.5
+
|genre=Literary Fiction
|genre=Historical Fiction
+
|summary=Well, this looked very much like a book I could love from the get-go, which is why I picked my review copy up and flipped pages over several times before actually reading any of itI found things to potentially delight me each time – a weird section in the middle on darker stock paper, a chapter whose number was in the 20,000s, letters used as narrative form, and so onIt intrigued with the subterranean voice a man hears in wartorn Dresden that what little I knew of it mentioned, tooBut you've seen the star rating that comes with this review, and can tell that if love was on these pages, it was not actually caused by themSo what happened?
|summary= ''The Book of the Alchemist'' is a story within a storyIt opens in 1938 during the Spanish Civil War.  Pinzon, a Spanish politician who resigns for moral reasons, is taken hostage by a group of Republican soldiers, along with his young Grandson.  A group of villagers are also taken captive and locked in a cathedral as part of the soldiers' desperate plan to protect themselves from the Fascist forces that are hunting themA cavernous mosque built inside the mountain under the cathedral's crypt is discovered, and in it, a bookAs Pinzon reads the book, another story unfolds, set in the eleventh centuryThis is the story of Samuel the Jew.
+
|isbn=1529402697
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340899131</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Christina Hammonds Reed
|author=Jack Ludlow
+
|title=The Black Kids
|title=Warriors
+
|rating=4.5
|rating=3.5
+
|genre=Teens
|genre=Historical Fiction
+
|summary=Christina Hammonds Reed's debut novel is set against the backdrop of the 1992 Los Angeles riots, a reaction to the absolution of four police officers for beating a black man, Rodney King, nearly to death. Told from the perspective of Ashley Bennett, the novel follows her evolution from a silent bystander when confronted with matters of race, to a woman finding her voice and embracing her heritage.
|summary=Arduin of Fassano is paid by Michael Doukeianos, a young Byzantine general, to keep the peace in Apulia.  Arduin is a Lombard, however, and secretly plans to revolt and take Apulia for himself, hiring a group of Norman mercenaries to help him do the job.  These Normans are William de Hauteville and his brothers, famed warriors with their own conflicts and a desire to gain titles and wealth for their sons.  Even if Arduin and the Normans could take Apulia, there are no guarantees that they could hold it in a land full of treachery and bribes.
+
|isbn=1471188191
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749007559</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Kate Tremayne
 
|title=The Loveday Conspiracy
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=Trevowan Manor has been the home of the Loveday family for generations.  It will still be owned by a Loveday but St John Loveday lost the house on the throw of a dice before killing himself – and now his cousin Tristan has the house.  St John's twin, Adam, vows that he will punish the man responsible. Amelia has been forced from Trevowan and is now living in a cottage with the other dispossessed women.  As if this wasn't enough of a problem, her son from her first marriage, Richard, has become even more than wayward and Amelia is forced to make a difficult choice.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755347676</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=John E Smelcer
 
|title=The Great Death
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary='As Western Europeans settled Alaska, they brought with them diseases against which the indigenous people had no natural immunity. At the beginning of the twentieth century, fully two thirds of all Alaska natives perished from a pandemic of measles, smallpox, and influenza. No community was spared. In most cases, half of a village's population died within a week. In some cases, there were no survivors. It was the end of an ancient way of life. Natives still refer to the dreadful period as the Great Death.'
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1842709194</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Robyn Young
 
|title=Requiem (Brethren Trilogy)
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=It's December 1295, and the bedraggled remnants of the Third Crusade are returning home. Not all have given up the dream of a Christian Jerusalem, and Jacques de Molay, the Grand Master of the Templars, is eager to find patrons to fund a fresh invasion. But the West has turned inward, and, with the Order's reason for existence vanished with the Crusader states, factions within both the English and French courts covet the wealth and military might of the Temple. With his homeland of Scotland under assault by his old rival Edward, and his position usurped by former comrades who wish to turn the Order to sinister ends, peace for series protagonist Will Campbell seems far away.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340921420</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
  
{{newreview
+
Move on to [[Newest History Reviews]]
|author=Anthony Riches
 
|title=Wounds of Honour (Empire)
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Historical Fiction
 
|summary=Riding to the Northern outpost of the Roman Empire to deliver a message, Marcus Valerius Aquila is seemingly attacked by a band of barbarians, but is rescued by a group of Tungrian irregulars, fighting as part of the Roman army.  Arriving at his destination, it soon becomes clear that the attack was deliberate, as his father has been condemned as a traitor back in Rome by Emperor Commodus and his whole family have been put to the sword.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340920300</amazonuk>
 
}}
 

Latest revision as of 10:53, 20 November 2023

1803366532.jpg

Review of

The Reformatory by Tananarive Due

5star.jpg Historical Fiction

Gracetown, Florida. June 1950. After a scuffle with a white boy, twelve year-old Robbie Stephens Jr is sentenced to six months at the Gracetown School for Boys, otherwise known as the Reformatory. It's a place with a brutal and dark reputation. But the segregated reformatory is a chamber of horrors, haunted by the boys that have died there. In order to survive the school governor and his Funhouse, Robert must enlist the help of the school's ghosts – only they have their own motivations... Full Review

0861547438.jpg

Review of

A True Account by Katherine Howe

4.5star.jpg General Fiction

Hannah Masury is living in Boston, having been sent to live with a family who run an inn, and being made to work there from a young age. When she hears there is to be a hanging of some pirates in the town, she decides to go and watch. Enthralled and horrified in equal measure, Hannah finds herself embroiled in a young boy's death at the hands of two vicious pirates. She hides away, so that they don't find and kill her too, and then to escape them completely she runs away to sea, dressing as a boy and joining the notorious Ned Low's pirate ship as a cabin boy. She soon finds herself in the thick of things when there is a mutiny on board, and from there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of life on the ocean waves. Full Review

1035401614.jpg

Review of

A Sign of Her Own by Sarah Marsh

3.5star.jpg General Fiction

After a bout of scarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing. Suddenly plunged into a world of silence, everything about her life changes. Living in a time when the use of sign language was seen as something only savages do, Ellen is sent to a school where she is taught to lip read, but physically restrained from signing. From here, she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the deaf and using a system called Visible Speech. At the same time, Bell is working on other inventions and ideas, and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a complicated tangle of espionage. Full Review

0356516075.jpg

Review of

House of Odysseus by Claire North

5star.jpg Literary Fiction

What could matter more than love?

The follow-up to the excellent Ithaca picks up a few months after where we left off. In the palace of Odysseus, with delicate care Queen Penelope continues to rule without her husband, who sailed to war at Troy and then by divine intervention never returned home. As ever she remains surrounded by suitors vying for the throne of the Western Isles. Having survived – politically and physical – the chaotic storm that Clytemnestra brought to Ithaca's shores, Queen Penelope is on the brink of a fragile peace. One that shatters however with the return of Orestes, King of Mycenae, and his sister Elektra, seeking refuge. Full Review

B0C7J9D21B.jpg

Review of

A Captive in Algiers (Muhammed Amalfi Mysteries) by A J Lewis

4.5star.jpg Historical Fiction

When we first meet our hero, his name is Ettore and he lives at The House of Beautiful Swallows. Idyllic as this might sound, it's a bordello and Ettore's mother died when he was born. He's not been short of mothers, though - but for someone of his background in late-eighteenth-century Amalfi, it's difficult to obtain decent employment. The stint working with the preparation of anchovies didn't work out and bastards are considered bad luck on fishing boats. Ettore was nothing if not resourceful - and determined - and it was not long before he had a successful business as a guide for visitors. He was even saving some money. Full Review

1914585526.jpg

Review of

The Fascination by Essie Fox

4star.jpg Historical Fiction

The Victorian era is incredibly over-romanticised as a setting for historical fiction (matched only, perhaps, by the Second World War) which has often led to more than a few writers mishandling it. There's such a glut of media set in the era that the hallmarks we've come to associate with it are familiar to the point of being cliched, hackneyed even. All this is simply to illustrate that it would be an easy thing to do poorly. But despite that, something about it still grabs me – and something about this book's description did as well. Full Review

1803362340.jpg

Review of

A Portrait in Shadow by Nicole Jarvis

4.5star.jpg Historical Fiction

I want all of Florence to know my name

Cast out from Rome, Artemisia Gentileschi arrives in Florence seeking an oasis in which her art can find a home and where her future can thrive rather than stagnate. But as some as she enters Florentine society she faces great opposition from the powerful Accademia, the self-proclaimed guardians of the healing magics that through paintings have the power to protect the city and its citizens from plagues and curses. The all-male Accademia has hoarded power over art and architecture for centuries and guard it above all else. To them, Artemisia – an ambitious young woman who promises trouble and change – has no place amongst them and their society. Full Review

0356518523.jpg

Review of

Perilous Times by Thomas D Lee

3star.jpg Fantasy

Hate is the path of least resistance

Set in the near-distant future, in a world on the verge of climate collapse, Britain is in great peril. The British Isles desperately needs a hero (or several) to save the day and rescue what little remains. What no-one expected was that one of the Knights of the Round Table would answer the call. Full Review

1800422466.jpg

Review of

In the Shadows of Castles by G K Holloway

4.5star.jpg Historical Fiction

We begin after the momentous battle in 1066 and on the day of William of Normandy's coronation as King of England. William's position is not secure and the new king has many challenges. Imposing authority through a coronation is important. And William is right to worry. While the previous king, Harold, is dead and the likelihood of more pitched battles is over, the rebels are stirring and much of the country does not wish to recognise a new overlord. Full Review

3949666079.jpg

Review of

Noema by Dael Akkerman

4.5star.jpg General Fiction

This is a story about some things that happened to me about twelve thousand years ago.

Maya is a young girl living in a hunter gatherer village during the Mesolithic era. Climate change is occurring, the Sea of Grass encroaches further and further into Maya's forest home, and food is becoming more and more scarce. What to do? Can the law givers in the federation of villages muster peaceful ways to cope? Can the Traveller, a spiritual figure who interprets the wisdom of All Life, provide solutions? Full Review

1529125898.jpg

Review of

Godmersham Park by Gill Hornby

5star.jpg Historical Fiction

If it were not for the casual dereliction of the odd gentleman's duty, there would no women to teach well-bred daughters at all.

Anne Sharpe was thirty-one years old when she arrived at Godmersham Park to take up the position of governess to twelve-year-old Fanny Austen. She had no experience of teaching but this was a case of necessity. Until the death of her mother, Anne had a comfortable life and was loved by both parents although her father was frequently absent from the household. When her mother died, her father cast her off and would have nothing more to do with her. No explanation was offered but she would receive an annuity of £35 a year. Her maid, Agnes, would receive nothing but was fortunately taken in by some neighbours. Full Review

1472277538.jpg

Review of

Peach Blossom Spring by Melissa Fu

3.5star.jpg Historical Fiction

I loved the prelude to Peach Blossom Spring, a short chapter entitled Origins. Unfortunately it is the only truly poetic part of a book that I expected more from. Covering Chinese history from 1938 to 2005 as viewed through one family's perspective. When their home city is set ablaze during the war with Japan, a young mother (Meilin) and her four-year-old son (Renshu) are among those who flee. The story follows them on their journey across China, and in Renshu's case eventually to America. Full Review

1916072038.jpg

Review of

The House in the Hollow (The Talbot Saga) by Allie Cresswell

4.5star.jpg Historical Fiction

We meet part of the Talbot family in Yorkshire in November 1811. Twenty-seven-year-old Jocelyn Talbot and her mother have travelled in some discomfort from their home at Ecklington, to the house in the hollow. The two women are angry with each other and Jocelyn is well aware of her mother's strengths and weaknesses:

She is practiced at subterfuge, at concealing, beneath a facade of respectability, the deplorable truth.

Hester is furious about Jocelyn's refusal to do as she was asked, which has precipitated this violent and unexpected removal.

Then we are told of the birth of a child and, soon after, Hester Talbot departs, leaving Jocelyn in shame and isolation in Yorkshire. Full Review

1398502227.jpg

Review of

The Language of Food by Annabel Abbs

5star.jpg Historical Fiction

Eliza Acton is a poet who has never had the slightest inclination to boil an egg. When tasked with writing a cookery book, she recruits Ann Kirby, a local woman with a troubled home life. Together, they test, craft, refine and reshape the world of domestic cookery, reinventing the recipe book and changing the face of cookery writing forever. Full Review

1529080886.jpg

Review of

A Marvellous Light by Freya Marske

4star.jpg Historical Fiction

Robin Blyth is nudged into a job in the Civil Service, much to his chagrin. There he meets Edwin Courcey and learns that the streets of London are threaded with magic. Desperate to remove a curse that threatens to swallow him, Robin follows Edwin to the countryside, where the hedgegrows bristle with incantations and the people shimmer with power. There they uncover a sinister plot that threatens the lives of all magicians in the British Isles. Full Review

B09F4CTKJR.jpg

Review of

Flights for Freedom by Steven Burgauer

4.5star.jpg Historical Fiction

It's the later stages of World War I and the United States has just entered the conflict. Petrol Petronus is a young American who has signed up and joined the 17 Aero Squadron. This company was the first US Aero Squadron to be trained in Canada, the first to be attached to the RAF and the first to be sent into the skies to fight the Germans in active combat. But before that can happen, Petrol has to master flying the notoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camel. Full Review

B095HY8SXQ.jpg

Review of

Madrigal: A Closely Guarded Secret by Christophe Medler

4star.jpg Historical Fiction

Set against the backdrop of the English Civil War, a secret plan (code-named Madrigal) is discovered by Sir Robert Douse in the summer of 1642. As a loyal servant of the King, and Head of the Secret Service, it is Robert's duty to uncover the details of the plan and follow the clues to uncover one of the most guarded secrets in history—especially since the plot could affect the King. Full Review

1471187179.jpg

Review of

A Beautiful Spy by Rachel Hore

4star.jpg Historical Fiction

Minnie is an 'ordinary' girl living an unexciting life in a leafy provincial suburb. The book is set in the 1930s and Minnie is expected to live up to her mother's expectations and find a nice young man to marry, produce children and spend the rest of her days looking after her husband and their home. Unfortunately, this isn't what she wants to do at all and neither does she want to continue working as a secretary. As a result of a chance meeting, she finds herself drawn into espionage, working for the secret service and effectively living a double life - attempting to infiltrate the Communist Party of Great Britain. Minnie finds herself torn between what she perceives as her duty and the friends she has made - and likes - whilst working for the Communist Party. Full Review

1529402697.jpg

Review of

Kokoschka's Doll by Afonso Cruz and Rahul Bery (translator)

2.5star.jpg Literary Fiction

Well, this looked very much like a book I could love from the get-go, which is why I picked my review copy up and flipped pages over several times before actually reading any of it. I found things to potentially delight me each time – a weird section in the middle on darker stock paper, a chapter whose number was in the 20,000s, letters used as narrative form, and so on. It intrigued with the subterranean voice a man hears in wartorn Dresden that what little I knew of it mentioned, too. But you've seen the star rating that comes with this review, and can tell that if love was on these pages, it was not actually caused by them. So what happened? Full Review

1471188191.jpg

Review of

The Black Kids by Christina Hammonds Reed

4.5star.jpg Teens

Christina Hammonds Reed's debut novel is set against the backdrop of the 1992 Los Angeles riots, a reaction to the absolution of four police officers for beating a black man, Rodney King, nearly to death. Told from the perspective of Ashley Bennett, the novel follows her evolution from a silent bystander when confronted with matters of race, to a woman finding her voice and embracing her heritage. Full Review

Move on to Newest History Reviews