Book Description: 

Reviewed by Sandra Olshaski

Set in London in the late 1800's, this novel traces the life of Theodore Hartley, rich, handsome, stylish, man-about-town and confirmed bachelor as he woos and marries beautiful, charming, but naïve Alice. The newlyweds are madly in love and have eyes only for each other even as their children arrive. Then tragedy strikes and adjustments are required by the entire household.

Book Description

Being an independent woman in 1913 London is certainly empowering, but Emmy Nation is tired of the inescapable damp seeping through her worn shoes and the hopeless grumblings of her stomach. When she receives an offer from Scotland Yard to boost her typist income by spying on the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), Emmy jumps at the chance. But as she grows closer to the WSPU women the lines begin to blur, and when a painful part of her past resurfaces Emmy begins to question her choices. How far are you willing to go to secure your equality?

My Review

Reviewed by Sandra Olshaski

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. It has all the elements of a story that I love: historical fiction, turn-of-the-century London, an independent woman, romance and suspense.

Emmy Nation as a typist for the London Metropolitan Police is finding it hard to make ends meet. Scotland Yard asks her to infiltrate the London suffragette movement to report on their activities. The police are determined to prevent militant acts connected with the movement and to catch the women who are committing them. Emmy agrees to the request and is soon earning more money. She is an impoverished young woman, but there are hints that she has seen much better days, so right away the reader wonders about her story. Who is she and what's in her past?

This is also an interesting glimpse into the early days of the British suffrage movement. The author succeeds in writing an entertaining fiction inspired by real events. For example, I didn’t know that the suffragettes chained themselves to Winston Churchill's carriage in protest of his not supporting their petition for women's votes. Prominent women in the movement, such as the Pankhursts, were well-to-do, stylish, elegant women who could have remained in the sanctuary of their homes, but chose not to. The movement attracted women of all walks of life, however. They marched on Selfridges Department store, invaded and destroyed orchids in the Royal Botanical Gardens, were willing to starve while in prison, all to secure the vote for women. They published a weekly newspaper called The Suffragette that they sold on the street corner. Quite a statement for women back in the day who were still considered second-class citizens, whose place was in the home!

Emmy is a very likeable character who we want to succeed. She is intelligent, strong, determined, yet vulnerable. There is romance, suspense, and a certain mystery connected with Emmy. I hope the author has further adventures for her.

I highly recommend this well-written, thought-provoking novel.

Sandra Olshaski's disclosure: Thanks to the author for sending me this book for review. I was not compensated in any other way, nor told how to rate or review this product.

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My Review
Reviewed by Sandra

It’s 1805 London. William Brook, a young vicar wants to serve humanity by going to far-flung lands. What he actually gets is a “living” in the English countryside at a village called Amberley. He quickly becomes a person of interest to the local mothers looking for an eligible man for their unmarried daughters. He’s not interested, but somehow Cecilia, a pretty young woman keeps catching his eye, although she herself is not looking for a husband. Her mother, however, has other plans, wanting a secure future for her daughter, preferably to a man from a rich, prominent family. A vicar will never do. It’s a pure Jane Austen feeling.

St. Martin’s Griffin
ISBN: 978-0-312-64273-0
Published April 27, 2010
Trade Paperback, 373 pages

This is my second review of a book about the famous Brontë family in recent weeks. Something about their story alternately attracts and repels me.

The story opens with a dreary deathbed scene that pretty much sets the tone for the book. The story, by the way, is not just about Charlotte and Emily, but rather includes the whole family. The children, of whom there were six, were highly imaginative. They wrote and bound miniature books of their imaginary exploits. But what else is there to do “in a remote and primitive spot”, says father Patrick. 

The narrator says that these miniature books “create, constitute, and delimit a world that is self-sufficient.” And that I believe, explains their ability to live such limited, sparse lives – they were a world unto themselves – “we three” - Charlotte, Emily, and Anne, following the death of their two older sisters and their brother Branwell’s descent into alcoholism and drug addiction. Who could blame them for becoming irritatingly introspective on seeing their family gradually disappear? In reference to her siblings Charlotte thinks “only they understood, only they were capable of understanding; it was as if you were a little knot of islanders who spoke a language unknown to anyone else on the globe, and untranslatable.”

The author writes in a style reminiscent of Jane Eyre in evoking a time and place long since gone. Snide comments about the clergy corresponds to Charlotte’s description of the founder of Lowood School that Jane Eyre attended. Jude Morgan deftly describes English village life in the early 1800s. I enjoyed the author’s rich descriptions of situations, i.e., “it was as if silence was nakedness, and every moment must, for decency’s sake, be verbally clothed.” This is in reference to a character in the book who talks non-stop.

This is a novel that reads like a biography. Obviously, the author has done extensive research to “capture” the respective personalities of the Brontës. They were extremely complex individuals, to say the least. Charlotte was the most determined of the three sisters to make a name for herself as an author. And only Charlotte succeeded in having a measure of happiness during her one year of marriage, for she, too, died an early death in childbirth. Patrick Brontë, the father, outlived his wife and all of his children.

This is a book sure to please readers who enjoy biographies, the Brontës, and a story very well written.

Note: This book is rated P = profanity for expletives and f-bombs.

Published August 1999
Trade paperback, 281 pages

I have often wondered how three untraveled, unsophisticated spinster sisters living in the wilds of England could write such haunting, gothic tales like Jane Eyre, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and Wuthering Heights. So when I saw the title of this book on a hospital bookshelf recently, it intrigued me. I immediately set out to get a copy for myself which I devoured in a couple of days. I wanted to know how the author of Jane Eyre could have crimes attributed to her!

This tale is recounted by Martha Brown, a servant at the Parsonage of Haworth on the Yorkshire moors, where the Brontë children were born, raised and lived their short lives. The accepted story/myth/legend is that three almost saint-like sisters lived with their stern father in a grim parsonage in a wild part of England. After very little formal schooling, and not until they are all in their late twenties, each writes in the same year a romantic novel. Within ten years they are all dead from consumption (tuberculosis). Charlotte is the only one to marry a handsome curate, Arthur Nicholls and then tragically dies while pregnant with their first child. 

But, the questions this novel poses are intriguing. What if none of this is true? What if murder and mayhem took place? What if Wuthering Heights was written not by Emily, but by their drunken brother, Bramwell? What if Emily and curate Nicholls were lovers prior to his marriage to Charlotte? What if Martha Brown was also Nicholls' lover? What if Nicholls slowly poisoned Emily, Anne (with Charlotte’s knowledge) and eventually Charlotte herself? 

The author paints Charlotte Brontë as a thoroughly unpleasant, self-seeking woman who “puts on airs” and who is quite “economical with the truth”. In other words, she lies when it is to her advantage. Emily is painted as a tender-hearted, quiet person who, in the 1800’s has a sexual liaison with a man (an unheard of thing at the time for a Parson’s daughter). And that brother Bramwell is a blackmailer and possible pedophile!

The author weaves historical data and speculation to produce this sinister picture of the famous Brontë family. It is true that there are a number of inconsistencies in the traditional story of the Brontës and those inconsistencies are what the author uses to pose the tantalizing what ifs.

This book makes interesting and intriguing reading, whether the Brontë story is authentic or not. It is an exciting mystery, all the more so because it just may be true.

Note: This book is rated C = clean read. 

Reviewed by Sandra 

Disclosure: I ordered this book online. I was not compensated in any other way, nor told how to rate or review this product.

The writing is so witty and insightful that the reader almost forgets that it isn’t J.A. herself. She certainly writes in the style of Jane Austen, using the flowery language of the time, that makes the story that much more believable. Whereas you or I might say, “I’m crabby because I didn’t sleep last night;” the author says “one consequence of broken sleep is assuredly diminished civility.” To add to the “feel” of authenticity is the use of lines straight out of some of Austen’s own novels. For instance, in reply to a dashing, mysterious Lord Harold, Jane says “your lack of finer feeling, of scruple and honour – of everything, in truth, that turns a man a gentleman – makes you the very last person I could ever be prevailed upon to marry.” (Pride and Prejudice)

This is a historical mystery novel complete with murder, high treason, political intrigue as Bonaparte threatens England, a beautiful, young heiress, eligible young men and two love interests for Jane. 

I think Jane Austen fans will enjoy the book. Who better than Jane, with her keen understanding of human nature, to solve a mystery! 

This book is the first of nine novels with J.A. as heroine. I’m already a fan.

Note: This book is rated C = clean read. 

Reviewed by Sandra 

Disclosure: I bought this at a second-hand bookstore in Burlington, Vt. I was not compensated in any other way, nor told how to rate or review this product.

Claude & Camille: A Novel of Monet by Stephanie Cowell
ISBN: 978-0-307-46321-0
Crown Publishing Group
Published April 6, 2010
Hard Cover, 338 pages

This is the passionate love story of the famous 19th-century
French Impressionist painter, Claude Monet and beautiful, ethereal Camille Doncieux. The world knows Monet as a venerable white-bearded successful artist in his garden at Giverny. This novel allows us to get a glimpse into his early years as a struggling painter at the center of the Impressionist movement and his love affair with an upper-class Parisian.

Camille falls hopelessly in love with Monet and leaves her comfortable lifestyle at her family home to throw in her lot with his bohemian lifestyle. Monet paints and paints but cannot sell his work, so Monet and Camille struggle to survive. They live on credit and charity of friends in order to have the necessities of life. At times they are kicked out of their lodgings and often suffer the indignities of destitution. At one point Monet is forced to scrape down canvasses in order to have something on which to paint (he can’t afford new canvasses) and borrows paint from his fellow artists.

He is in good company, however, with friends like Renoir, Pisarro, Cezanne and Manet, who encourage one another to keep going. The importance of friendship is a strong theme in this book. Despite everything, Camille stands by him and believes in his work. She is portrayed in many of his paintings. Nevertheless, he sometimes leaves her and their son for months at a time to paint in the countryside. Monet is a driven man, desperate to paint and to receive recognition. Eventually he begins to sell his work and they enjoy a more comfortable lifestyle. Camille and Monet have a second child and then life takes an unexpected turn for the worst. Heartbreak ensues. But art continues until old age.

The author has great descriptive ability that evokes Paris of the 1800s:
“Paris, where the emperor and his wife rode through the streets in their carriage, where mansions and palaces rubbed walls with hovels. Thousands of cafes, their windows painted with advertisements; thousands of alleys, whose brick houses were pasted with posters. In stately green parks, sunlight danced through the trees onto the women’s fine dresses and onto the feathers and silk flowers on their hats.”

If you’ve ever taken a trip to Monet’s home in Giverny and seen his lush gardens there and/or have reveled in his paintings at the Orangerie in Paris, you will love this novel. It is a very poignant telling of the events and determination that led up to his wonderful, delicate, light-filled paintings.

Reviewed by Sandra

Note: This book is rated C = clean read.