The marriage portrait by Maggie O'Farrell

Another historical novel from Maggie O'Farrell, who also wrote Hamnet that I reviewed about a year ago. This one is set in Italy during the renaissance period and is the story of a high born young girl, Lucrezia, whose family arranged for her to marry the Duke of Ferrara when she was only fifteen.

The book was shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2023, and focuses on the difficulties faced by women of noble birth. Although they are surrounded by luxury, wearing the finest clothes and eating the best available food, there is no freedom for these women. From the moment of birth they are in training to become the bride of a man from a similar lineage, and before marriage they obey the will of their father, and then must accept whatever befalls them when they go to live with their husbands.

Lucrezia was an awkward child who spent her time painting and always had a great fascination for animals. If she was the eldest daughter, much of her behaviour would not have been allowed, but she is the fifth child and third daughter so not expected to marry anyone of particular note and is mostly left alone. Her eldest sister Maria was originally engaged to be married to the Duke of Ferrera, but when she died suddenly from a fever, the Duke was still interested in a marriage that linked him with the Medici family from Florence, and a message was sent enquiring about other daughters. The second daughter Isabella was already betrothed to another so the only other girl was Lucrezia who was still only thirteen years old.

The Duke of Ferrera was around twenty seven at that time but he agreed to take Lucrezia as soon as her monthly cycles began. With the help of her nurse, she was able to conceal the truth for another year to allow her to get a little older, but by the time she was fifteen the Duke arrived for the wedding, and once the ceremony and celebrations were complete she was taken away from her home and family never to return. At first, it seemed as though she would be happy with her new husband Alfonso, but very soon a different side to him appeared and she was suddenly afraid for her life.

The time line of the book flips from the period in 1561 when Lucrezia realises her life is in danger, to her early life growing up with her family in Florence. This is quite a common writing style but I found it happened so often that for the first half of the book I found it a little distracting. However, once the main focus moved onto the marriage and Lucrezia adapting to her new life as a Duchess, I felt the book got into its stride and became more enjoyable.

I don't think it is quite as good as Hamnet, but it is an interesting period in history and worth a read. Maggie O'Farrell based the story on real people from history but there are many changes to people and places in order to construct the plot. Near the end I did see where the plot twist was going to take the ending, but the clues came quite late on and it didn't spoil the book.

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...

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