Interview with Donna Russo Morin, author of Portrait of a Conspiracy

In Florence, Italy, on 26 April 1478, members of the Pazzi family and their allies plotted to assassinate the powerful Lorenzo de' Medici and his brother, Giuliano, in full public view within the city's magnificent Duomo (cathedral).  In the case of Giuliano, they succeeded.  First in a new series, Donna Russo Morin's Portrait of a Conspiracy (Diversion Books, May) uses this historical event and its deadly aftermath as a springboard for a multifaceted thriller about a dangerous painting, a secret sisterhood of women artists, their plan to help a missing friend, and the resounding power of art.  I enjoyed the book very much and hope you'll enjoy the following author interview.

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How did you come up with the novel’s premise?

It really was a convergence of events and ideas. I was finishing work on my 2012 release, The King’s Agent, which features a true to life Indiana Jones of 15th-century Italy that included one of his actual dear friends, Michelangelo. I found myself longing to write more about art and artists.

At the same time, I was going through one of the most personally traumatic periods of my life. If not for a group of truly dedicated, loyal, and supportive women, I’m not sure if I would have had the strength to continue. It gave me a clarity of vision into the power of women united. Female relationships can be so much more intimate than those of men. But they can also be hard on each other. This book, the whole trilogy in truth, is nothing if not an homage to that power and the complexities of female relationships.

The two thoughts connected, and Da Vinci’s Disciples were born.

The scene of Giuliano de’ Medici’s assassination is full of cinematic action and a high level of tension. What was the experience like for you as an author, choreographing such a terrible, iconic moment on the page?

That assassination, the true attempt of the Pazzi family to eliminate the Medici family, is an historical event, one of the greatest conspiracies of the 15th century. I found two non-fiction books that detailed the event in great, if clinical, detail (Martines, Lauro. 2003. April Blood. London: Random House; and, Simonetta, Marcello. 2008. The Montefeltro Conspiracy. New York, NY: Doubleday).

Our job, as historical fiction writers, is always to breathe life into these clinical dissertations.

I’m very fortunate to have a very sharp, vivid mind’s eye. Once all the events are in there, my mind allows me to "see" it, almost in movie form. And, perhaps because I have an acting background, as I watch the movie I "feel" what the point-of-view character would feel. It was disturbing and possibly the hardest part to convey.

But the difficulty comes when the writer must depict all the details without the assistance of a single screen shot. Yet it needs to be fast-paced and tightly written while still conveying the enormous emotion of the event. Tight and fast-paced being critical. The moment of verbal choreography is the most challenging. IT MUST BE BIG…but with the sparsest of words. Deciding what to leave in and what to take out was the most demanding task. The event went through more than a few versions. One of the more difficult revisions my agent and I decided to make was to cut one of my favorite portions of that event. How Lorenzo de’ Medici really escaped the attack. While it is a story in itself (a scene I will probably put up on my blog at some point) it didn’t further this story, and so to serve immediacy and the aura of impending danger, it was taken out.

What were your concerns or challenges in writing about a historical figure as famous as Leonardo da Vinci?

In truth, the da Vinci depicted in Portrait of a Conspiracy is a da Vinci most people are unfamiliar with. His genius and greatness are widely known. But he was not, by any means, an "overnight sensation." He is not that old, wizened man in a portrait that is, most likely, not him. My da Vinci, is the young, questioning, experimenting, struggling, youthful da Vinci poised on the precipice of his greatness.

There were fewer restraints when writing this lesser known man; there were more places where I could theorize from my prolonged research on da Vinci, especially in terms of attitudes and opinions, personality traits and quirks. The greatest challenge was in terms of time (this is especially true in the second book). Da Vinci moved around a great deal (hence, his death in France). I needed him to be in the right places at the right times, but I squirm with playing fast and loose with such details of truth.

For the women, Leonardo’s mentorship is welcomed and important to their ongoing development as artists. Did any special mentor have a role in your writing career? 

There have actually been two prominent people in the development of my craft.

The first is my sixth grade teacher, Mrs. Alfonso. She was a lovely young woman (I think we were her first class after graduating college). I was constantly writing then, silly stories about a pink pussycat who wanted to run for president and how the numbers 2 and 4 were in love, but 3 kept getting in the way. She started Story Time with Donna on Friday afternoons. When I heard the other kids laughing at my story, or saw them looking at me wide-eyed, waiting eagerly for my next word, I came to know I was meant to be a storyteller.

In the last decade, there has been one man who stands out above the rest. Writers are incredibly supportive of each other; there’s a bit of a shared survival in this crazy industry. But this man, Christopher Gortner (known as the bestselling author C. W. Gortner), has astounded me with his generosity of advice, technical tutoring, and so much more (including being there just to listen when I rage and cry about this business—and my personal life as well). He has taken me under his wing, unfurling it without hesitation; there is never-ending learning there. It is a warm and safe haven I am truly grateful for. He is my da Vinci.

author Donna Russo Morin

Portrait of a Conspiracy showcases women’s experiences, supportive friendships, and their clandestine pursuit of artistic creation, and I especially liked that the women came from a variety of social backgrounds. Did you come across any intriguing or surprising facts while you were researching women of the Italian Renaissance?

There were some surprises…the equal propensity for noblewomen to be as promiscuous as their husbands (it was true in other countries, I knew, but I didn’t expect it in Roman Catholic-dominated Florence). The line of demarcation between the classes is more sharply drawn in these women’s lives, but it did not always seem to be what they wanted, but what they had to do. And there was great prejudice within the classes as well, even those on the lowest rung.

What never ceases to surprise me as I research the periods of my books, are the common ground women of today share with women of the past. We are still struggling to achieve what we want to achieve without greater obstacles than men. We still totter with putting ourselves and our professional dreams and goals before the care and dreams and goals of our loved ones.

This backward, reflective mirror is a priceless recompense in being an historical novelist.

Were any of the women based on real-life artists?

No; in fact they are based loosely on actual women in my life, including myself. Granted, there is some blurring of characteristics—what one real woman demonstrates may be a trait of one of the other fictional women. Portrait of a Conspiracy is a study of female relationships and their ambition, the explosive and artistic Renaissance, a mystery, a thriller, and at times, a violent depiction of life in 15th-century Florence, but it is also one of the most personal stories I’ve ever written.

Ultimately, the trilogy will lead us to one of the earliest and greatest women artists of the time; it’s where the story was always meant to go.

Your admiration for Florentine history, culture, and architecture comes through vividly. What were some of your favorite locales to visit, or to write about?

Architecture is an art form in my mind, and in many others, I think. Architecture in the Renaissance was evolving at a break-neck pace, as were the other art forms. As Florence is the cradle of the Renaissance, it is filled with architectural wonders.

Brunelleschi’s Duomo, the basilica of the Santa Maria del Fiore Cathedral, is a highlight. Not only is it the factual scene of the assassination, it is a first of its kind construction, the first freestanding dome built at the time.

The Palazzo della Signoria (known now as the Palazzo Vecchio, the Old Palace) is also a favorite. As the government center, it is filled with all the secret passages and odd additions that prevailed at the time. I thoroughly enjoyed mapping out covert invasions and escapes in this building.

Although my birth name, Russo, can be traced to 9th-century Florence, I have not had the privilege of traveling there. It will remain, for now, the obsession of my pen. But the day is coming; oh, yes it is.

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Donna Russo Morin is an award-winning of author of historical fiction. A graduate of the University of Rhode Island, she lives near the shore with her two sons, Devon and Dylan, her greatest works in progress. Donna enjoys meeting with book groups in person and via Skype chat. Visit her website at www.donnarussomorin.com, friend her on Facebook, and follow her on Twitter @DonnaRussoMorin.

Grace by Natashia Deón, an affecting novel of freedom and motherhood in the antebellum South

Given the chance, Naomi, a 17-year-old slave in rural Alabama in 1848, would have named her daughter Grace, but she is shot and killed moments after giving birth. In her gripping debut novel, Deón, awarded a PEN Center USA Emerging Voices Fellowship, among other honors, dramatizes alliances formed by women in a violent place and time with adroit characterizations, a powerful narrative voice, and the propulsive plotting of a suspense novel.

Kept lingering in the afterlife through her love for her daughter, Josey, Naomi tells the story in two intertwined strands. One traces her earlier life via flashbacks, covering her flight to Georgia after a deadly confrontation, her rescue by a female brothel owner with her own secretive past, and her falling in love with a white gambler. In the other, Naomi follows blonde, light-skinned Josey as she grows up before, during, and after emancipation, which hardly brings the liberty the former slaves hope for.

Naomi’s unique situation is movingly evoked: she offers Josey tender maternal advice, which goes unheard, and is unable to protect her from painful realities. Deón stays in control of her complex material, from its clever parallel structure to the women’s psychological reactions to relentless tension. Readers will ache for these strong characters and yearn for them to find freedom and peace.

Grace is officially published by Counterpoint in June (hardcover, $25, 400pp), but Amazon has copies in stock now.  This starred review first appeared in Booklist's April 15th issue.  I was pleased to see, later on, that Kirkus and Publishers Weekly had also published starred reviews.  This is a book that has important things to say about the American past, and it deserves widespread attention.

Accuracy in historical fiction: a guest post by Ashley Sweeney, author of Eliza Waite

In today's guest post, author Ashley Sweeney expands upon a topic familiar to historical fiction writers and readers: getting the facts right.  I'll be posting a review of her debut novel, Eliza Waite, in the near future.

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Accuracy in Historical Fiction

Ashley Sweeney

In children’s literature, if a frog and a monkey wear striped pajamas and go on vacation to the moon, we think nothing of it. But give Jean Valjean a cellphone or Jane Eyre a Corvette and poof! Our credibility’s shot.

author Ashley Sweeney
(credit: Karen Mullen Photography)

Back when I was a newbie reporter at a rural weekly newspaper, the Five W’s: Who/What/When/Where/Why ruled first paragraphs. The thinking behind a formulaic style of writing is that if stories must be shortened due to space limitations, all the facts still appear in the story.

And our editor drilled into our heads: Check your facts. And you better get them right. Period.

In literature, authors have the luxury of spreading out details, at times feeding them crumb-by-crumb to readers. All elements are not weighed equally. In character-driven plots, Who or What is vital. In murder mysteries, Why, and its partner How, reigns. Historical fiction draws heavily on Where and When; setting identifies time, place, and mood of the narrative.

And what’s paramount for authors of historical fiction: we can’t make mistakes. We have to check our facts and get them right. Period.

In writing Eliza Waite, I was constantly fact-checking myself. Did matchsticks exist in the late 19th century? Who was president of the U.S. in 1890s? What was the major source of news in the San Juan Islands and Skagway, Alaska at the turn of the last century?

Where did women go for female hysteria treatments? When was The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde published? Why did tens of thousands of men and women drop out of their lives to search for elusive gold in the Klondike?

And how did women cook and bake without any modern conveniences?

I amassed more than 100 books on various subjects pertinent to the era and turned to librarians, historians, museum curators, authors, and storytellers to fill in holes. Of course the Internet was a constant companion.

I encountered surprises while researching, including the fact that Skagway was electrified before most of the United States. A.F. Eastman founded Skagway Electric Light Company in the fall of 1897. Within months, Alaska Electric Light and Power Company, which traced its roots to 1893 Juneau, appeared in Skagway in competition. By the summer of 1898 at the height of the Klondike Gold Rush, the companies dueled for customers and Skagway’s streetlights, hotels, and businesses were illuminated.

The fact that Skagway was electrified allowed my protagonist—a baker at Skagway’s The Moonstone Café—to marvel over the new-fangled invention.

What wonders will this new electric invention open up? It won’t be long before kitchens are electrified! Electric lights! Electric mixers! Maybe even electric ovens!

But imagine if I had my protagonist driving a Jeep or arriving in Alaska by air in 1898 rather than by steamship from Seattle. I’d certainly get bad reviews or be booted out of historical novel associations. Or worse. I might be tarred and feathered. Or—heaven forbid!—put in the stocks.

Ashley Sweeney is the author of Eliza Waite, published in May 2016 by She Writes Press.

Reporting back on the historical fiction at #BEA2016 in Chicago

I'm just back from BEA in Chicago, which was convenient for me; it's a 3-hour drive, so it didn't involve the usual flight and mailing of books back home.  I had a good time and met up with many friends, librarian colleagues, publisher contacts, and my editor at Booklist.  However, the show was noticeably smaller.  Many publishers, both large and small, decided not to exhibit this year, and the level of energy didn't seem as high.  Some of the booths felt cramped, with little room to move around if someone else was there browsing. These days, having a BEA outside of NYC has its consequences.

I went representing the Historical Novels Review and picked up a number of galleys (and some finished books) that will end up in reviewers' hands.  Others, the signed copies in particular, I got just for me!  Because I had a plan of which historical novels would be available when, I did my best to stick to it and mostly succeeded, although I didn't make it to events late in the day.  Standing on carpeted concrete for an entire day doesn't agree with my back, and by mid-afternoon, I was exhausted.

Here are some piles that I brought back with me.  Rather than repeat myself, I'll link back to the guide to historical novels at BEA 2016 because blurbs for the majority can be found there.  There were some nice surprises, too, books I didn't expect would be there.  Details below on those.

Beth Powning's A Measure of Light (Penguin Canada, March) is biographical fiction about 17th-century Quaker Mary Dyer, who repeatedly defied Puritan authorities.
Kerri Maniscalco's Stalking Jack the Ripper is YA gothic horror, about a lord's daughter with an interest in forensic medicine.  It's out in Sept. from Jimmy Patterson, James Patterson's new children's imprint with Hachette.
These aren't historical fiction but looked interesting:  The Crypt Thief by Mark Pryor is a crime novel set in modern-day Paris, and Robert Olen Butler's Perfume River deals with the aftermath of Vietnam. Daryl W. Bullock's Florence Foster-Jenkins (Overlook) is nonfiction about the world's worst singer, soon to be portrayed in film by Meryl Streep.  Mad Enchantment by Ross King is nonfiction about Monet's painting of the water lilies toward the end of his life.

In this pile, Louis Carmain's Guano (Coach House, Oct. 2015) is a novel about Peruvian independence and lustful adventures in the year 1862.
Taylor Brown's The River of Kings (St. Martin's, March 2017), which was a nice find since it isn't on Amazon yet, is set around the area of Fort Caroline, an early French settlement in 16th century Florida, both centuries ago and in modern periods.
Terry Roberts' That Bright Land (Turner, June) is described as a "southern Gothic thriller" set during the Civil War.
In the Mouth of the Tiger by Derek Emerson-Elliott and Lynette Silver (Sally Milner Publishing, Feb 2015) isn't one I'd come across before.  It's about a young Russian woman's adventures in Singapore and Malaya around the WWII years.  The publisher is Australian.
And Dinitia Smith's The Honeymoon delves into George Eliot's surprising later-in-life marriage and subsequent honeymoon in 1880 Venice.

I picked up some of these at the Friday afternoon speed dating session for librarians, booksellers, and book group leaders, and it was my 3rd year attending this session.  It's one of my favorite events of the show, so I'm kind of upset that I mistakenly left the handout on the table.  Hopefully it will be posted later.

Seeing all these piles, and having some deadlines looming, I'd better get back to reading.

Ambition and deception: Rare Objects by Kathleen Tessaro, set in Depression-era Boston

Maeve Fanning, an educated young Irish American in Depression-era Boston, wants to move forward in life, and aims high. When she gets wind of a sales job at an exclusive antique shop, she bleaches her red tresses to disguise her heritage, calls herself May (“with a y”), and finagles her way into the position. There, under the guidance of the store’s English co-owner, who appreciates her ingenuity, she learns how to gear her pitch to its eccentric, wealthy customers.

However, there’s a problem. Maeve has a scandalous past, one that her mother, a respectable widow, doesn’t know about. During a recent stint in New York City, Maeve worked as a dancer-for-hire, drank too much bootleg gin, and ended up somewhere she can’t ever mention. Just when she’s getting used to her reinvented self, her past surfaces unexpectedly in the form of Diana Van der Laar.

A socialite whose family fortune comes from South African diamonds, Diana may seem like Maeve’s polar opposite, but they become friends, both women concealing the socially unacceptable parts of their lives out of necessity. But Diana is more complex and damaged than Maeve knows, and the deeper Maeve gets into her world, the more she risks losing sight of her goals.

This gutsy, absorbing story about self-deception and belonging is remarkable in its honesty. The settings exude authenticity, both the scenes of immigrant family life in Boston’s North End and upper-crust society parties, which never go as perfectly as its organizers hope.

The story bounces around time-wise in the beginning, and more details on Maeve’s future plans would have been nice. The wanting more of a novel, though, that’s a good sign. Tessaro is a natural storyteller, and her story goes where it needs to without being predictable. The result is a compelling tale that reads like real life.

Rare Objects was published by Harper in hardcover in April ($25.99, 400pp).   The British publisher is Harper UK.  This review appeared in May's Historical Novels Review; I had downloaded an e-galley via Edelweiss over the holidays last year, read the first few pages, and got quickly drawn into the story.

California’s Golden Age of Winemaking, an essay by Kristen Harnisch

In my review of The California Wife, I mentioned being intrigued by Kristen Harnisch's depiction of the characters' winemaking business; you don't often get to see the inner workings of the wine trade depicted in historical fiction.  In today's guest post, she takes us to northern California in the late 19th century, introducing us to the industry pioneers, the techniques they used to make their businesses thrive, and the hardships they endured along the way.

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California’s Golden Age of Winemaking

By Kristen Harnisch, 

author of The Vintner’s Daughter and The California Wife

Most wine lovers are familiar with the Judgment of Paris, the competition arranged forty years ago by wine expert Steven Spurrier between the best French and California wines. In a blind tasting in 1976, France’s foremost wine experts declared two upstart California wines superior to renowned French bottlings from Bordeaux and Burgundy. This event—so colorfully portrayed in the 2008 movie Bottle Shock—established Napa Valley as one of the world’s greatest winemaking regions. What is not commonly known is that the golden age of winemaking in northern California started during the nineteenth century on the heels of the Gold Rush and was in full swing before the dawn of Prohibition.

Regusci historic Occidental winery (est. 1878)

While living in the San Francisco Bay Area and traveling in the Loire Valley of France, I was struck by the beauty of the vineyards and intrigued by how generations of families had battled blight, mildew, rot, and pests to produce fine wines. These vintners approach their work with a centuries-old blend of passion, persistence, art and science. Their dedication sparked the idea for my series about the ambitions of two French-born vintners to establish an American winemaking dynasty at the turn of the twentieth century and set me on a new path of discovery.

The author, biking in Napa

Researching vineyard life in the late 1800s was exciting. Visiting a Loire Valley vineyard and touring historic Napa vineyards by bike and on foot were delightful. I snapped photos of ripening grape clusters, scribbled down notes about historic wineries, sifted the rough, porous clay loam through my fingers, and, of course, sampled the wines! I also delved into French and California history books, read years of nineteenth-century trade papers, consulted a master winemaker, and reviewed old maps and photographs at The Napa County Historical Society. Although I had a vague outline for the novels, my research fueled the stories for The Vintner’s Daughter and The California Wife.

The pioneers and economics of the wine trade in the late 1800s provided a treasure-trove of historical drama for the backdrop of the series. Many who came to California for the gold stayed for the rich soil and climate, so perfect for farming sheep, cows, fruit and vegetables. The first northern California winemakers—notables such as Jacob Schram, Charles Krug, Gustave Niebaum, Georges De Latour, Jacob and Frederick Beringer, the Nichelini family and the founders of the Italian-Swiss Colony in Asti—cultivated the first vineyards and the goal that one day their wines would compete with the finest French and European vintages. Chinese laborers, featured in my first novel, formed the backbone of the viticultural industry of California. After they helped build the railways, they found new work picking, pruning and digging cellars out of limestone with their pickaxes.

Caves dug by the Chinese in the 1870s

Late in the century, as suspicion and racial hatred toward the Chinese grew, Italian and other European immigrant day laborers replaced them in the fields.

As the century progressed, California women traded their kitchen chores for important roles in family-owned winemaking businesses. In 1886, after her husband’s suicide, Josephine Tyschon finished the Tyschon Winery (now the site of Freemark Abbey) and opened with a capacity of 30,000 gallons. She cultivated 55 acres of zinfandel, reisling and burgundy grapes. Her neighbor, Hannah Weinberger, also took over her family’s winery, with a capacity of 90,000 gallons, after her husband’s death. Weinberger won a silver medal at the 1889 World’s Fair in Paris for her wine, and was the only woman in California to bring home this prestigious award that year. The strength and determination of Sara Thibault, the heroine of my novels, was drawn from these pioneering women.

Edge of Carneros Vines

Just as California wines started to gain global recognition, catastrophe struck. When the phylloxera—a louse that kills grape vines by sucking them dry of nutrients—hit California in the late 1880s, it laid waste to sixty percent of the Napa vineyards. The less hardy gentleman farmers, who’d purchased vineyards for the prestige of making one’s own wines, abandoned their farms and returned to San Francisco. The natives and more savvy newcomers (like my character Philippe Lemieux) took advantage of the cheap land, replanted with phylloxera-resistant rootstock, and grew bumper crops of grapes within five to seven years.

By the late 1890s, after having suffered through the ravages of the phylloxera, California vintners were determined to protect and bolster their wine industry with scientific innovation and creative ways to brand their wines. Most vintners now preferred gravity-flow wineries, invented in the 1870s, to move the grapes through the winemaking process using gravity instead of hoses. In place of head-trained vines, farmers now planted trellis-trained vines, which allowed for the best balance of sun, shading and air circulation through the vines—and yielded far more grapes.

Veraison (the onset of ripening) of pinot noir grapes in June

As the railway systems improved, vintners shipped their wines to other parts of California and the United States, they opted for the more expensive bottles instead of barrels. Barrels did not offer the advantage of brand identification, and thirsty railway men had been known to drink the wine inside and replace it with water or vinegar. As the supply of wine and eastern demand for it increased, large entities like the California Wine Association refused to pay the grape growers their asking price, and this sparked tensions amid grape growers, who could no longer afford the sky-high labor costs. These price wars drove the price of California wine down, and some of the smaller operations out of business. The largest growers, many who provided sacramental wine to the Catholic Church, also negotiated their own contracts with wine dealers, and found unique ways to thrive during the price wars at the end of the century.

Intertwining this rich era of winemaking with the story of my characters Sara Thibault and Philippe Lemieux was a true joy. Winemaking, I’ve discovered, is very similar to novel writing: it is an exercise in passion, patience and perseverance! Cheers!

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The California Wife was published by HarperCollins Canada in February in trade paperback (C$22.99), and the US edition is published by She Writes Press ($17.95) this month. Visit the author's website at www.kristenharnisch.com.

A return to historic Napa: Kristen Harnisch's The California Wife

Second in a series about a Franco-American winemaking family at the turn of the 20th century, The California Wife presents the next stage in life for its heroine and hero – as well as the next step in the development of their winemaking business. The Vintner’s Daughter (see earlier review) was an enjoyable romantic saga, and this new entry, which spans 1897 to 1906, is even more involving. Harnisch has hit her stride as a writer: the pacing never flags throughout this lengthy novel, and the many trials that Sara and Philippe Lemieux undergo, separately and together, add new layers to their character.

Sara and Philippe, whose families shared a painful history in France’s Loire Valley, get married and settle on their large California vineyard, planning to raise their orphaned nephew as their own. However, Sara’s desires are torn between making Eagle’s Run a success and her obligations toward her beloved vineyard back home. Competition among local winemakers is heating up; so is pressure from prohibitionists.

The story brings readers deeply into the economics of the wine industry – a unique historical fiction subject – as the couple negotiates prices, develops creative sales techniques, and secures buyers in Napa and elsewhere. Philippe’s role as primary supplier of sacramental wine to the local archdiocese causes grumblings, and that’s just one impediment to their financial goals.

Although their love remains strong, their married life is equally turbulent. Operating within a male-dominated field, Sara’s vast wine-growing experience is sometimes downplayed, and Philippe’s former mistress introduces a new complication to their happiness.

Later chapters draw in the viewpoint of Sara’s good friend, Marie Chevreau, an experienced midwife who aspires to become a surgeon – another ambitious woman whose presence complements the growing cast. Readers will enjoy being whisked back in time to Napa’s beginnings as a major wine-producing region, and the stage is set for future adventures with these warm-hearted, ambitious characters.

The California Wife was published by HarperCollins Canada in February in trade paperback (C$22.99), and the US edition is published by She Writes Press ($17.95) this month.  The review copy was sent to me by the Canadian publisher for review in February's Historical Novels Review.

On Monday, I'll have a guest post from the author about California's historic winemaking industry.

Book review: Chris Cleave's Everyone Brave Is Forgiven, plus giveaway

Loosely based on his grandparents’ WWII-era lives, Cleave’s (Gold, 2012; Little Bee, 2009) intensely felt new novel follows the soul-plumbing journeys of four young Londoners fighting their own personal battles as their world breaks apart.

They include aristocratic Mary North, who derives unexpected purpose from teaching city children after their more socially acceptable peers are evacuated to the countryside; her friend Hilda; Tom, Mary’s middle-class supervisor and lover; and his roommate, Alistair, a Royal Artillery officer.

Mary and Alistair’s mutual attraction complicates matters yet serves as a lifeline for them both. Just as transformative for Mary are her mentorship of an African American student, which almost everyone disapproves of, and her up-and-down relationship with Hilda, one shaped by their joint experiences and occasional jealousy.

Full of insight and memorably original phrasings, the story is leavened by sardonic humor, although the consistently high level of wit in the dialogue sometimes feels unrealistic. Cleave paints an emotion-filled portrait of a damaged city with its inequities amplified by war and of courageous individuals whose connections to one another make them stronger.

Everyone Brave Is Forgiven was published by Simon & Schuster in hardcover this week ($26, 432pp).  This review first appeared in Booklist's March 1st issue, and I covered it from an ARC provided by my editor.

Since then, the publisher has sent me a nice new hardcover copy, so I have an extra that I thought I'd give away to another blog reader.  Just fill out the form below if you're interested.  One entry per household, please; void where prohibited.  Deadline for entry Friday, March 13th.  I'll announce the winner here (and notify them) shortly thereafter.  Good luck!

Update:  The giveaway has ended.  Congratulations to Noreen!  Thanks to everyone who entered.

Reading historical fiction in search of meaning, a guest post by Linda Kass, author of Tasa's Song

Author Linda Kass has contributed an essay about her methods and intent in writing historical fiction, and what readers can gain from reading in the genre.  Her debut novel Tasa's Song is published today by She Writes Press.

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Reading Historical Fiction in Search of Meaning
Linda Kass

In historical fiction, the details of an era, and the particularities of settings during that time period, must ring true. All the more necessary when the context is universally known, such as a major historic event. Certain facts need to ground historical and realistic fiction, but those facts cannot overpower the story itself.

My novel, Tasa’s Song, is based on the true events of my mother’s early life in eastern Poland during the gathering storm of World War II, a backdrop that has been called the most significant war the human race has ever waged. My protagonist, Tasa Rosinski, is a violin prodigy. She has an extended family. Life amid war produces movement for all of the characters from one place to another. My challenge was to portray Tasa, a fictional and unique character, in a specific historic context and setting while she faces known circumstances.

As a journalist, I am attached to facts, but as a novelist, I can only use them to create a verisimilitude on the page. For Tasa’s Song, I researched facts in order to write authentic scenes and dialogue and action. What did Tasa’s small village in Podkamien look like? What foods did she and her family eat? What clothing did they wear? How did people get around then? What did Polish farmers grow on their land? How did people learn about what was going on at that time? What did they listen to on the radio? What books did they read? What musical compositions might Tasa have played as her talent developed? What historical events would be topical to Tasa’s family in 1935, 1941, or 1944?

author Linda Kass
(credit: Lorn Spolter Photography)

As a writer of historical fiction, I needed to understand the concrete world in which my characters lived and interacted. But the writer’s task when creating a story set in a particular time and place is not to be true to the facts as recorded in source material. That’s the role of the historian. The historical novelist exposes the reader to the inner lives of people across time and place, and in doing so illuminates history’s untold stories, allowing the reader to experience a more complex truth.

The essence of any fictional story is its characters. They are vivid because, while participating in the flow of historic events, they make their own choices, have their own thoughts, experience joy or suffering in their own way. For Tasa, she endures through the solace of music, the love for her family, and the memories she holds inside. The fact of history tells us that many people suffered during World War II. The character of Tasa reveals her unique emotional suffering.

Reading history allows us to understand what happened. Reading historical fiction allows us to be moved by what happened. Yet, even after we know the facts, we continue to search for sense and meaning. That is at the essence of our humanity.

~

Linda Kass is a writer who worked as a magazine reporter and correspondent for regional and national publications early in her career. In her community, Ms. Kass is a strong advocate of education, literacy, and the arts, and is a long distance road cyclist who rides in an annual event to support cancer research. Her past experience as a trustee and board chair of the Columbus Symphony Orchestra fed into much of the music that fills the pages of Tasa's Song (She Writes Press, trade pb/$16.95). She is at work on a second novel. You can learn more at http://www.lindakass.com/.

A guide to the historical novels at BEA 2016

Here’s my 7th annual guide to the historical novels at BEA. This is a work in progress, pieced together from BEA’s autographing schedules, Publishers Weekly’s adult “galleys to grab” guide, posted schedules from publishers, Twitter, etc.  I've added booth numbers, book descriptions, release dates, etc.  It will be updated periodically up until I leave for Chicago on May 10th, so if you plan to print it out, I suggest waiting until just before the show.

Additions and corrections are welcome.  Leave a comment below or tweet me @readingthepast.
Last updated:  Fri 5/6, including some giveaway times mentioned in Library Journal's galley guide. New entries since the original posting date are marked with ~new~.

~Galleys to Grab~

Algonquin (Workman) - booth 1829

Caroline Leavitt, Cruel Beautiful World - novel of sisterhood, family, and responsibility in the late 1960s.  Oct.
Susan Rivers, The Second Mrs. Hockaday - love, the desperation of wartime, and a mysterious crime, set during the Civil War.  Jan 2017.

Bloomsbury - booth 1859 (see full schedule)

John Pipkin, The Blind Astronomer’s Daughter - love and scientific discovery in late 18th-century Ireland.  Giveaway Thurs 5/12, 3pm.  Oct.
Kate Saunders, The Secrets of Wishtide - crime novel featuring a widow in 19th-century Lincolnshire. Giveaway Thurs 5/12, 1pm, and Friday 5/13, 10am.  Sept.

Europa - booth 1945

Joan London, The Golden Age - a convalescent hospital in Perth, Australia, is the scene for healing, love, and dislocation in the postwar era, from a well-known Australian novelist. Aug.

Hachette - booths 1716, 1717

Emma Donoghue, The Wonder - a mysterious child who claims to live without sustenance in 1850s rural Ireland may be a fraud.  Little Brown, Sept.
~new~  Emma Flint, Little Deaths - psychological thriller set in '60s NYC.  Giveaway Wed 5/11, 1pm, also Thurs 5/12, 10am.
Robert Hicks, The Orphan Mother - the story of Mariah Reddick, former slave of the heroine from The Widow of the South.  Giveaway: Wed 5/11, 1pm.  Grand Central, Sept.
~new~ Affinity Konar, Mischling - see below under signings.  Giveaway Thurs 5/12, 9am.

HarperCollins - booths 2140, 2141

Jessie Burton, The Muse - the Spanish Civil War and 1960s London intertwine in a tale of art and mystery.  Ecco, July. Giveaway Fri 5/13, 10am.
~new~ Paulette Jiles, News of the World - a former soldier returns a Kiowa captive back to her people.  Morrow, Oct.  Giveaway Wed 5/11, 1:30pm.
Helen Sedgwick, The Comet Seekers - the past, present, and future of two lovers in modern Antarctica; literary, centuries-spanning epic. Harper, Oct. Giveaway 5/11, 1:30pm.

Macmillan - booth 1958 (see full schedule)

Ronald Balson, Karolina’s Twins - giveaway 5/13, 11:30am - a modern search for two Polish sisters lost during WWII; multi-period.  St. Martin's, Sept.
Andrew Gross, The One Man - giveaway 5/13, 11:30am - historical thriller set during the Holocaust.
Lian Hearn, Emperor of the Eight Islands - giveaway 5/11, 3:30pm. First in her new Japanese historical fantasy quartet.  FSG, April.
Rae Meadows, I Will Send Rain - giveaway 5/11, 4:30pm - a woman fights to save her family in Dust Bowl Oklahoma.  Henry Holt, Aug.
Steven Price, By Gaslight - giveaway 5/12, 2:30pm - American detective William Pinkerton investigates a murder in 1885 London.  FSG, Oct.

Other Press - booth 1953

Jonathan Rabb, Among the Living - a Jewish refugee's life in postwar Savannah.  Oct.

Penguin Random House - booths 2433, 2441

Jennifer Chiaverini, Fates and Traitors - a novel of John Wilkes Booth, as seen from four women’s perspectives. Dutton, Sept.
Amor Towles, A Gentleman in Moscow - in 1922, a Russian aristocrat endures house arrest in a hotel across from the Kremlin. Viking, Sept. See also under signings.

Sourcebooks - booth 2333 (see full schedule)

Marie Benedict, The Other Einstein - the little-known story of Mileva Maric Einstein, a physicist in her own right. Oct.  Giveaway Fri 5/13, 9am.
Cuyler Overholt, A Deadly Affection - historical mystery set in early 20th-c NYC.  Sept.  Giveaway Wed 5/11, 1pm.
Greer MacAllister, Girl in Disguise - Kate Warne, the first female Pinkerton detective, and her adventurous life during the Civil War years. Mar. 2017.  Giveaway Fri 5/13, 1pm.

WW Norton - booth 1840

~new~ Winston Groom, El Paso - historical epic centering on the Mexican Revolution of the early 20th century. Liveright, Oct.  Giveaway Thurs 5/12 at 11am and Fri 5/13, 11am.

~Author Signings~

Wed May 11

~new~ 3pm, Booth 1729-1829 (Workman)
Larry Watson, As Good As Gone - one of the last cowboys, an elderly man at odds with the world in the '60s West. 

Thu May 12

10 - 10:30am, booth 2433 (Penguin Random House)
Graham Moore, The Last Days of Night - historical thriller about the battle between Edison and Westinghouse to electrify America, from the author of The Sherlockian. RH, Sept.

10:00-10:30, Table 1
Jennifer Chiaverini, Fates and Traitors - see above under Galleys. Dutton, Sept.

10 - 10:30am, Table 6
Affinity Konar, Mischling - twin sisters endure Auschwitz, Mengele’s experiments, and the aftermath of war. Little Brown/Lee Boudreaux, Sept.

~new~ 11am, Booth 2016 (Simon & Schuster)
Thomas Mullen, Darktown - a police procedural set in postwar Atlanta as two black policemen pursue justice for a murdered woman. Atria, Sept.

11:30am, Booth 2333 (Sourcebooks)
Marie Benedict, The Other Einstein - see above under Galleys.

2-2:45pm, Booth 1204-1205 (Grove Atlantic)
Andrea Molesini, Not All Bastards Are From Vienna - a family in a northern Italian village has their villa requisitioned by enemy troops during WWI. Grove, Feb.

2-2:30pm, Booth 2366 (Counterpoint)
Kim Brooks, The Houseguest - in 1940s America, a Russian immigrant takes in a glamorous refugee. Apr.

~new~ 3:00pm, Booth 2016 (Simon & Schuster)
Chris Cleave, Everyone Brave is Forgiven - ordinary people trying to survive the London Blitz and its aftermath.  S&S, Apr.

3:30-4pm, Booth 2433 (Penguin Random House)
Colson Whitehead, The Underground Railroad - one woman’s quest to escape the bonds of slavery in 19th-century America. Doubleday, Sept.

4-4:30pm, Booth 2433 (Penguin Random House)
Amor Towles, A Gentleman in Moscow - see above under Galleys.

Fri May 13th

10-11am, Table 4
Robert Hicks, The Orphan Mother - see above under Galleys.

10:30-11:30am, Booth 2433 (Penguin Random House)
Yaa Gyasi, Homegoing - a literary epic spanning centuries in Ghana and America. Knopf, May.

On Romney Marsh: a guest post by AJ MacKenzie, author of The Body on the Doorstep

The authors who write as A.J. MacKenzie are stopping by with an essay (accompanied by some gorgeous photos) about the beautiful and atmospheric Romney Marsh.  This landscape figures in their new novel The Body on the Doorstep (Zaffre, hb and ebook), first in the appropriately-titled Romney Marsh Mysteries set in the south-east of England in the 1790s.

~

On Romney Marsh
A.J. MacKenzie

‘The Fifth Continent’ is how a nineteenth-century clergyman once described Romney Marsh, and even today that sense of separateness and isolation is still there. A major road now crosses the Marsh, and you can drive across it from Rye to Hythe in just a few minutes. But the Marsh is still a distinct place. The hills of the Weald of Kent close off one side of the triangle of the Marsh, marking the beginnings of a distinctly different landscape; on the other two sides is the sea, sweeping up onto beaches of sand and shingle.

Get off that main road, and Romney Marsh is quiet. Inland, the villages are small and peaceful. Many are little larger than they were in the Middle Ages; some are actually smaller, and some of the old settlements have disappeared entirely. Hope was once a thriving village not far from New Romney; now, only the crumbling remnants of its church still stand. St Mary in the Marsh, the central location of The Body on the Doorstep, is mostly new buildings; only the church and the Star Inn still survive from earlier days.

St. Mary in the Marsh churchyard, looking west to Hills at Appledore

There is of course much new building on the Marsh. You only need to turn your eyes south, to the great blocky shape of Dungeness power station and the white towers of the wind farm on Walland Marsh, to see this. But it is also quite easy to strip away the accretions of time. Maps help; we found several late eighteenth century maps of Romney Marsh, and with these it is easy to see how the coastline has changed and settlement patterns have shifted.

St. Mary in the Marsh tower

And apart from that main arterial road, the Marsh is also quiet. The roads are empty. It is possible, if you want to drive at the speed of a trotting carriage to see how long it will take to ride from Appledore to St Mary, to do so, and no one will bother you. You can abandon your car and walk the tracks and footpaths where Hardcastle and Mrs Chaytor walked, and the loudest sound you will hear is the twittering of birds or in spring, the baa-ing of lambs. Behind the roads and houses and power stations, the Marsh’s past is there, plain to see.

Romney Marsh, with Hills of Lympne in the distance

The weather impacts on Romney Marsh like few other places in England. The flat land offers no breaks from the wind; storms from the Channel roar over the Marsh with nothing to stop them. In the heat, there are few trees to offer shade from the sun. When it rains there, it really rains. The weather is dramatic, and it sets the mood. It will be no surprise to anyone who know Romney Marsh that weather plays a big part in The Body on the Doorstep.

St. Mary in the Marsh, taken from the West

Most of all, the Marsh is beautiful. We don’t know whether JMW Turner ever painted there or not, but it would not surprise us; it is the sort of austere space of land and sky and sea that he loved. In The Body on the Doorstep, Turner went to Romney Marsh seeking inspiration; Hardcastle went seeking peace; Amelia Chaytor went to find solitude. We went, and found a story.

~

A.J. MacKenzie is the pseudonym of Marilyn Livingstone and Morgen Witzel, a collaborative Anglo-Canadian husband-and-wife duo.

Between them they have written more than twenty non-fiction and academic titles, with specialisms including management, medieval economic history and medieval warfare.  See their website at http://www.ajmackenzienovels.com.

This essay forms part of the authors' blog tour; see the other stops as listed below.   (photo credit: Vicky Stottor/Shuv Williams)

~

Interview with Mary Sharratt, author of The Dark Lady's Mask

Today I'm speaking with Mary Sharratt about her newest work of historical fiction, The Dark Lady's Mask: A Novel of Shakespeare's Muse, which delves into the life and times of Aemilia Lanier, England's first professional woman poet, and imagines her relationship with William Shakespeare.  I've known Mary for many years through the Historical Novel Society and have spoken with her twice previously for this blog, in 2010 (about Daughters of the Witching Hill) and in 2012 (for Illuminations: A Novel of Hildegard von Bingen).  She always has interesting insights into writing historical fiction, specifically about women's lives.  The Dark Lady's Mask is published today (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 416pp, $26 hb/$12.99 ebook).

How did Aemilia Lanier and her work first come to your attention, and later compel you to write a novel about her?

My motto as a historical novelist is “writing women back into history.” I’ve long been frustrated by the fact that the average intelligent, literate person can’t name a woman writer before Jane Austen. The Dark Lady’s Mask is my love letter to literary pioneer Aemilia Bassano Lanier, England’s first professional woman writer. I want to draw her out of the shadows and into the spotlight.

I first discovered her when researching the lives of Renaissance women. The daughter of an Italian court musician who may have been a Marrano, or a secret Jew living under the guise of a Christian convert, Lanier was one of the most highly educated women of her era. She certainly had the talent and expertise to write plays or secular poetry. However in England at that time, the only genre considered acceptable for women was religious verse. Lanier’s female literary predecessors like Mary Sidney wrote poetic meditations on the Psalms.

But Lanier turned the tradition of women’s devotional writing on its head. Her epic poem, Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum (Hail God, King of the Jews), published in 1611, is nothing less than a vindication of the rights of women couched in religious verse. Dedicated and addressed exclusively to women, Salve Deus lays claim to women’s God-given call to rise up against male arrogance, just as the strong women in the Old Testament rose up against their oppressors.

The possibility that Lanier may also have been the mysterious Dark Lady of Shakespeare’s Sonnets only adds to her mystique.

My intention was to write a novel that married the playful comedy of Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard’s Shakespeare in Love to the unflinching feminism of Virginia Woolf’s meditations on Shakespeare’s sister in A Room of One’s Own. How many more obstacles would an educated and gifted Renaissance woman poet face compared with her ambitious male counterpart?

In The Dark Lady’s Mask, I explore what happens when a struggling young Shakespeare meets a struggling young woman poet of equal genius and passion.

In the afterword, you mention the research you did on site in Venice and in Bassano del Grappa. What insights did you take away from your visits there?

My Italian visit was absolutely essential for me in both understanding Aemilia’s character and Shakespeare’s “Italian” plays. Italy was the cultural epicenter of Europe. Shakespeare’s comedies owe a huge debt to the commedia dell’arte. Many of his most popular plays are set in the Veneto region of northern Italy—Aemilia’s ancestral homeland. In Romeo and Juliet, the nurse’s plea, “Give me some aqua vitae,” (Act 3, Scene 2) is a direct reference to the famous strong spirits distilled in Bassano del Grappa, the birthplace of Aemilia’s father. Italy was literally her patrimony.

My novel explores the scenario that Aemilia and Will traveled through Italy together and fell in love.

But, alas, Italy is not all romance. There’s strong circumstantial evidence to suggest that Aemilia’s father and his brothers were banished from their hometown of Bassano because they were Jews. Fleeing to Venice, they assumed the guise of Marranos, or Christian converts, which was an uneasy and not particularly safe existence. Deliverance came in the form of Thomas Seymour, brother to Jane Seymour, that short-lived queen. The highly talented Bassano brothers became royal musicians for King Henry VIII and later for Elizabeth I.

I believe that Aemilia’s double identity as an Italian Jew compelled her to write so boldly in defense of the oppressed. Her Italian background also provided creative female role models that her English sisters lacked. Italian women enjoyed much greater artistic freedoms—they acted on the public stage, unlike in England where boys performed the female roles. Italian women wrote in a wide variety of literary genres. There were even women playwrights, such as the famous and successful Isabella Andreini whose patrons were the Medicis.

You’ve brought a number of historical characters to life in your novels, but William Shakespeare must be the most famous. Did you find it at all daunting to imagine his personality and part of his life on the page?

Daunting doesn’t even begin to describe it! Readers can get very, very contentious when you write fiction about a historical icon like Shakespeare. Because, in essence, writing believable fiction means taking great cultural icons off their pedestals and humanizing them, giving them the same yearnings and foibles as the rest of us mortals. I hope I’ve also made him damn sexy.

Beautifully incorporated into the novel was the possible background to the writing of many of Shakespeare’s plays. Do you have favorites among them? 

I adore Shakespeare’s sunlit Italian comedies with their strong, free-spoken heroines. I never get tired of following the adventures of Rosalind in As You Like It, or listening to Beatrice and Benedict spar in Much Ado About Nothing.

For me, as an educator, it was refreshing to read a novel that celebrates not just women’s learning but a humanist education and the value of the liberal arts. Did you have this contemporary resonance in mind as you were writing? 

Yes, indeed. I’m very saddened by the funding crisis at your university and the way good teachers in the UK are being pressured to tick government boxes instead of pouring their soul into educating and inspiring their students. In Aemilia’s day, education was the preserve of the elite. Let us not allow it to become so again. The foundation of Western civilization was built on the liberal arts. Yes, vocational training and business studies are important, too, but if we don’t teach our children to love literature, art and theatre, we have only ourselves to blame if they never put down their iphone or read a single unassigned book.

For a good part of the novel, Aemilia’s observations on her environment are those of an outsider, whether she’s either being educated or serving as a teacher in noblewomen’s homes, or when paying a visit to Italian relatives. Did your own experiences living outside your home country inform your writing of Aemilia’s experiences?

Very much so. Being a lifelong expat made me a writer. I left the USA to study in Freiburg, Germany in 1986 and never came back to live permanently in the US. Now I’m a dual US/UK citizen. I will always be an outsider wherever I live—even if I return to the US. I’ve lived abroad so long that I’m forever changed. I believe those who are “foreign” glean insights on a culture that its native born inhabitants might miss—we tend to take the familiar for granted.

As an Anglo-Italian, I’m sure Aemilia felt the same. I imagine she stood out as different and “foreign” wherever she went. Her father’s secret Jewish identity would have weighed on her heart, as well. In my novel, when she visits the Venice Ghetto and disguises herself as a man to go inside a synagogue, she feels even more exiled from her father’s culture and religion when she realizes that she could never truly fit into this world either. Caught between faiths and cultures, she is fated to be eternally betwixt and between.

This is why masks play such a huge role in the novel. Everyone in the book is wearing some kind of metaphorical mask. But because Aemilia is the eternal outsider, she can see through these masks in a way that others can’t.

Religion was a central part of daily life in history, yet this aspect is often neglected in mainstream historical fiction. As was the case with Hildegard von Bingen in Illuminations, I admired how you recreated your characters’ religious lives in a way that makes them feel spiritually rich and authentic to the era yet relevant for modern readers. How did you delve into the religious beliefs of Aemilia as well as her later-in-life mentor, Margaret Clifford?

First of all, thank you very much for the compliment. I agree that it’s impossible to truly get inside the mindset of people who lived before 1900 if you don’t address their religious beliefs as part of their core life experience. But how do you do that without alienating modern, secular readers? It’s a huge challenge, especially for someone like Aemilia. A Jew’s daughter, she was educated by Puritans, lived her life in what was essentially a Protestant police state, and wrote devotional Christian verse. Where did her true spiritual loyalties lie?

Her great friend and literary patron, Margaret Clifford, was an intensely devout Anglican who lived estranged from her abusive husband. She devoted the last years of her life to fighting for her daughter Anne’s inheritance after Anne was disinherited because of her sex, although she was her father’s only child.

Aemilia’s love for Margaret and Anne and her anger at the injustices they faced are the bedrock of her poetry. In Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum, she describes the passion of Christ from the viewpoint of the women in the Gospels. In comparing the sufferings of women in male-dominated culture to the sufferings of Christ, she upholds virtuous women as Christ’s true imitators.

Aemilia’s protofeminism is inseparable from her religious sensibilities. Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum is essentially 17th century liberation theology—a corpus of poetry celebrating female and divine goodness, penned by a poet who found her own sense of salvation in a community of women who supported her and believed in her. 

Book review: The Moon in the Palace, by Weina Dai Randel

Few could guess that the heroine of Weina Dai Randel’s debut novel, young Mei, would emerge into an illustrious future.

For readers, there are two hints. In the first few pages, a monk visiting her father, governor of Shanxi Prefecture in China of 631 AD, makes a fabulous prediction about the five-year-old child: that she would “eclipse the light of the sun and shine brighter than the moon… She would mother the emperors of the land but also be emperor in her own name.” The other is in the book’s subtitle: “A Novel of Empress Wu.”

Those unacquainted with the history should avoid googling, since Mei’s path to power is as unusual as it is fascinating to observe. Seven years later, after her father dies under mysterious circumstances, she and her family fall into penury and are forced to move to Chang’an, home of her half-brother, Qing, as well as Emperor Taizong’s glittering palace. By a stroke of luck, her late father’s wish for her is granted, and she’s given a place at the Emperor’s Inner Court as one of his concubines. She hopes to use her status to regain her family's fortunes.

More familiar with Sun Tzu’s The Art of War than delicate embroidery or facial creams, Mei hardly fits in with her fellow maidens, but her acumen brings her to the attention of high-ranking courtiers – as well as enemies who hide their guile behind masks. The many setbacks she encounters, in her quest to become the Emperor’s Most Adored, test her resolve and give her the mental stamina she’ll need for the future.

Far from a standard tale of royal intrigue, The Moon in the Palace provides entrance into a formal yet sumptuous world where the Emperor’s wardrobe is strictly regulated, his amorous pursuits are determined by the "court bedding schedule," and his many ladies are grouped into hierarchies – and Mei sits at the lowest tier.

One of the attractions of novels set in a distant place and era is the different outlook they provide on the world. Randel was born and raised in China and, to create a realistic historical background, conducted research in ancient Chinese texts. She also spices her writing with original, setting-appropriate forms of expression. One prince’s eyebrows “looked as if a calligrapher had lost control when he drew them.” An exclamation of surprise is “Holy ancestors of nine generations!”

There’s also love story, though here, too, but Mei can hardly pursue a romance with Pheasant, a handsome young man who's good with horses, when she’s destined for the Emperor. Or can she? The story is an accessible and expertly plotted introduction to a powerful woman of ancient China, the country's first and only woman to rule as emperor.  For those who want to continue Mei’s story, part two (The Empress of Bright Moon) is also newly available.

The Moon in the Palace was published by Sourcebooks in March ($14.99, trade pb, 400pp).  Thanks to the publisher for sending me an ARC at my request last fall.

The triumph of love: Péter Gárdos' Fever at Dawn

Gárdos’ concise first novel tells an incredibly moving and hopeful love story. The plot dramatizes the unusual real-life circumstances that led the author’s parents to find one another.

Miklós Gárdos and Lili Reich, both Hungarian concentration-camp survivors, are sent to different rehabilitation hospitals in Sweden following their rescue after WWII. Although Miklós is seriously ill with tuberculosis, and his doctor expects he won’t survive, he refuses to believe this diagnosis, instead choosing to grasp a chance at happiness.

He pens identical letters to the young Hungarian women from his home region who are recuperating in Sweden—all 117 of them, intending to marry one.  His letters’ flirtatious tone is delightful, and Miklós receives many replies, but his lively and humorous correspondence with Lili is clearly special.

Both have supportive friends, but some complications ensue.  The author also sensitively explores Lili’s religious dilemma, as she feels that her Jewish faith let her down. This is a beautiful tale about two young people joyfully writing a future together when their past is too painful for words.

Péter Gárdos' Fever at Dawn, translated from Hungarian by Elizabeth Szász, is published tomorrow by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt ($23, hardcover, 240pp).  This review first appeared in Booklist's March 15th issue.

Read more about the background to this novel in an article from Reuters. "I don’t think this is a Holocaust novel, it’s a story of love," Gárdos says in the interview. "I needed to tell the story of their defiant desire to live, that there’s life after death and how important love was."

A film based on Fever at Dawn, with Gárdos (a renowned film director) directing and co-writing the screenplay, was released last December in Hungary. See the trailer below.

Book review: Modern Girls by Jennifer S. Brown, set in NYC's Jewish tenements in the '30s

Set amid the Jewish immigrant community on Manhattan’s Lower East Side in 1935, Jennifer S. Brown’s engrossing debut novel, Modern Girls, features the intertwined voices of two women, mother and daughter, who both find themselves in the family way. Neither is happy about it.

For Rose Krasinsky, worn out from raising five children, a new pregnancy at 42 means her hopes of increased involvement in Socialist activism (and for more time to help rescue her brother, trapped in Europe with his family) must be set aside in favor of more childcare and never-ending housework. And for her 19-year-old daughter, Dottie, finding herself pregnant after an unexpected one-night stand means the end to a promising bookkeeping career – and, most likely, to her future with her longtime boyfriend, Abe.

The author beautifully re-creates the vanished world of Yiddish-speaking immigrants in Depression-era America. (Rose’s husband, Ben/Beryl, shares his name and heritage with my own great-grandfather, which was an added treat; many other family names appeared in the story, too.) The Jewish tenements of 1930s New York are crowded, bustling places where cooking smells spill over into adjacent apartments, Rose’s kosher kitchen ensures her family is properly fed, and residents cart their bedding to their building’s rooftop on muggy summer nights.

Among others who share their background, these characters feel at home, but assimilation into mainstream society isn’t easy even for first-generation Americans. An intelligent career woman, Dottie may be a whiz with numbers, but her status as the only Jew in her workplace doesn’t make her popular with the other gals.

Those seeking insight into the day-to-day lives of women from the last century will find themselves fully involved in the agonizing struggles Rose and Dottie endure as they ponder their choices. Although both live in the modern era, in a modern city, the options for women with an unwanted pregnancy are limited, and it’s not a secret they can keep for very long.

Complicating matters for both is that neither understands the other’s reality. Sacrifices made by Rose, as a young woman in Russia, have shaped her character; she loves her daughter but sees Dottie’s life as luxurious in comparison. Likewise, Dottie can’t imagine that her strict mother could ever comprehend how her situation came about. Through the double narrative, readers can sympathize with both simultaneously. The way each woman handles her dilemma is not resolved predictably – another of the pleasures of reading this warmhearted yet realistic novel – but in looking back, their choices make perfect sense for who they are.

Modern Girls was published by NAL this week ($15.00/C$20.00, trade pb, 363pp). Thanks to the publisher for sending me a review copy at my request.

Book review: Death Sits Down to Dinner, by Tessa Arlen

Amid the high-ranking aristocracy of early 20th-century England, investigating a murder isn’t just mentally invigorating and quite possibly dangerous – it’s socially improper. Still, Clementine Talbot, Countess of Montfort, refuses to temper her curiosity.

Events from the first novel in the series, Death of a Dishonorable Gentleman, proved that she and her housekeeper, Mrs. Jackson, made a good sleuthing team, despite the latter’s traditionalist views about crossing class boundaries. Now, when Clementine’s longtime friend Hermione Kingsley hosts a party in honor of Winston Churchill’s 39th birthday, and one of the guests is found face down at the table after dinner, Clementine knows who to ask for help. Even if it means interrupting Mrs. Jackson’s pleasant Christmas holiday in the country and whisking her to London.

The women’s efforts complement one another, for each can operate within her social circle – that is, upstairs and below – and then compare notes on what they discover. With her paid companion ill and confined to her rooms, Miss Kingsley accepts Mrs. Jackson’s assistance in organizing an event for her favorite charity, a home for orphaned boys.  This gives Mrs. Jackson plenty of opportunity to check things out for herself at the murder scene. If, that is, she agrees to join forces with Clementine again.

Solving the “why” is the first puzzle. The victim is a pretentious middle-aged bore, but nobody knows a motive for killing him. Neither does the reader, at first, but Mrs. Jackson, proceeding discreetly, turns up some suspicious goings-on.

The lightness of the tone, and the amusing circumstances the characters find themselves in, counterbalance the serious issues that ground the novel historically. While this entry stands alone, readers continuing from the earlier story will notice a deepening of character development, for Mrs. Jackson in particular. Given her early background, some of the situations she encounters while investigating hold great personal meaning.

Arlen takes care to provide social and political context for her characters’ life choices and behavior. “Underneath the bright chatter at dinner parties,” realizes Clementine, “there was an undercurrent of unease that belied the swaggering conviction that Britain held center stage in world affairs.”  As readers of WWI-era fiction know, the times are a-changing. The Montforts’ heir has a passion for flying, which worries them both, and war looms on the horizon, though not everyone foresees it.

And as social barriers start to crumble, the protagonists’ partnership grows stronger. As the novel wraps up, Lord Montfort may still be embarrassed by his wife’s detective talents, but one can guess that if Clementine ever gets the chance to solve another murder, Mrs. Jackson won’t hesitate to join her.

Death Sits Down to Dinner is published by Minotaur this month (hb, 320pp).  Thanks to the publisher for providing me with a NetGalley copy.  This review is part of the blog tour with HFVBT.   See also my review of the first book, Death of a Dishonorable Gentleman.