A few years ago I read and loved Kate Quinn’s Mistress of Rome, but it had taken me some time to pick up this prequel. I really enjoyed the central love story in Mistress, so the larger and more scattered cast left me feeling less invested in Daughters. Daughters of Rome takes place during the Year of Four Emperors, around 69 AD. Our main characters are the “four Cornelias”; four young women from a very prominent patrician family. Cornelia Prima is well- and happily married […]
“But you’re— you’re—” “A virgin? True. But just because I don’t believe in poaching out of season doesn’t mean I can’t hunt.”
In Turner #1 (reviewed here), we are introduced to Mark Turner as the baby brother of the Turner family, completely absorbed in writing the definitive tome on chastity. Fast forward a few years and Mark is now Sir Mark, knighted by Her Majesty for his work, titled A Gentleman’s Practical Guide to Chastity. The work has been incredibly successful and Sir Mark is hounded by the press (in some fun commentary on paparazzi) and pursued by every Mama in London for their daughter. Then there is the […]
The book that would never end.
This book covers the adventures of the extended Fraser-McKenzie clan through the years 1772-1776, and oh God, you feel every one of them. I picked up this book in late August 2015. I just finished it last week. For those of you as bad at math as I am, that is NINE MONTHS. I coulda grown a whole baby in the time it took me to read this book. If I was a cat, maybe dozens of babies. A rabbit . . . at least a […]
Side character gets a starring role
Continuing my New Year’s historical fiction binge, I decided that Turner #1 was enjoyable enough to read the rest of the Turner series, and did so in fairly short order – about a week, I believe. Unlocked is book #1.5, strictly speaking a novella and a quick, fairly enjoyable read. Unlocked takes a helpful but dimly-painted secondary character from another book in the series (her major feature in her first appearance appears to be her spinsterhood and to be honest was so forgettable that I […]
When you are imagining, you may as well imagine something worth while
Marilla and Matthew Cuthbert are a middle-aged brother and sister who live together and manage the farm of Green Gables on Prince Edward Island in Canada. They intend to take in a small orphan boy to be of help to them on the farm, but due to a mix-up, little eleven-year-old Anne Shirley is sent to them instead. Matthew, who is extremely shy, especially around women, nonetheless warms to the loquacious and imaginative child and after hearing a bit about the hardships the orphan girl […]
Too many subplots that could have been novels themselves
Seems like books about orphans are a “thing” lately. Well, I can only think of Orphan Train, which I read last year, and of course the main character in A Little Life, also read last year…but I digress already. This orphan is a Jewish girl in a New York City Jewish orphanage system in the 1920’s and onward, placed there with her brother after her father accidentally murders her mother and takes off for the road. Early in her life, Rachel Rabinowitz and her other […]
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