Joan by Katherine J. Chen

If you write an historical fiction novel that has praise from Hilary Mantel on the front cover, then I think you can be safe in the knowledge that you have done a good job.

Katherine J. Chen certainly has done a good job, and right from the start, the writing draws the reader in, and Joan of Arc becomes a living person and not just a stylised portrait from the history books. The author tells us at the end of the book that she created a version of Joan who was personal to her, and not everything in the book actually happened, but true historical events are there as the backbone and certainly the lives of the people of the time are well researched.

It's easy to forget how young Joan was when she strode into battle and even when she was put to death in 1431, she was still only nineteen. France had been at war with England since 1337 and both countries laid claim to the French throne. This series of armed conflicts became known as the Hundred Years War and the English had advanced as far as Paris with the help of French Duke of Burgundy who was an enemy of the uncrowned Dauphin.

Joan was born a peasant girl and obviously had no military training, but she led an army to retake Orleans and later insisted that the Dauphin was formally crowned Charles VII of France. It's incredible to think that such a young girl could hold such sway with the most important figures in the land, and a plot line like this would be a hard sell of it wasn't based on actual events. It seems that the French were just so tired of fighting that they were willing to put their faith in anything, or anyone, to help them overthrow the English.

I enjoyed this book more than I thought I would as I didn't think I would be all that interested in Joan of Arc, but the quality of the writing won me over. If you are studying The Hundred Years War in a history class, then it might be a bit of a distraction as so many lines of history have been changed to suit the author, but if you are looking for a good historical read, then this will certainly hit the spot.

Comments

Violeta by Isabel Allende

Published: 2022, Bloomsbury Genre: Fiction Themes: South America, family relationships, business My rating (out of 5): ❤❤❤❤ If I ever tell my life story, I will take a leaf out of Violeta's book and make sure you understand that everybody loved me, and despite all sorts of questionable behaviour on my part, I leave the world as a winner. This is the story of a hundred year life. Violeta is approaching the end, but before she goes she is determined to write out her life story for someone she loves dearly. You don't get to know who that special someone is for most of the book, but that just serves to give the narrative a little twist. I didn't much like the character of Violeta but I understand that people who don't go round upsetting the apple cart don't make for very interesting stories. With such a great time span to play with, Isabel Allende had plenty of scope for changing Violeta's circumstances and adding in references to world events to keep the reader...

Holding by Graham Norton

Published: October 2016, Hodder and Stoughton Genre: fiction Themes: Ireland, crime, secrets, relationships, family My rating (out of 5): ❤❤❤ I went into the library looking for a book by Graham Norton as I keep seeing positive comments about his books on Twitter, and I felt I might be missing something. Holding seems to be his first book, and the library copy has a Radio 2 Book Club sticker on it, and I think it's fair to say that it's a perfect book for that reading group. It's a chatty style of writing that I could imagine would be how Graham would recount a tale if he was in conversation with someone, and there are sufficient strong elements to the plot-line to keep it interesting to the end. When I first started reading I thought it was going to be a bit thin on plot, as much of the story involved character descriptions, and I was starting to wonder how it was going to pull together. Then the dramatic events began to unfold and, once I could see how everyon...

The Wolf Den by Elodie Harper

Publisher: Head of Zeus, 2021 Genre: Fiction Themes: Ancient Pompeii, slaves, brothel My rating (out of 5): ❤❤❤❤ If, like me, you spent most of your history lessons looking out the window and didn't really absorb very much about the ancient Roman Empire, nil desperandum, as you will still manage perfectly well with this book. Set in first century Pompeii, the story follows the life of Amara, a young Greek woman who has been shipped to Pompeii as a slave and then bought by the owner of The Wolf Den brothel. As the daughter of a doctor, she was bought up in relatively comfortable circumstances, but a series of terrible events turned her life upside down and she is now trapped in an endless cycle of fear and degradation with almost no hope of escape. Amara is one of a group of slaves working in the Wolf Den, and they do what they can to protect one another from serious harm, but Amara knows that if she wants anything better for herself, she must make the brothel ow...

dittybox

Search This Blog