Tag Archives: historical fiction

Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand, by Helen Simonson*****

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majorpettigrewHad this story not received such wide acclaim and been made into a movie (which I’ve yet to see, but I watched the Oscars), I would probably never have gone near it. I like working class protagonists, and I don’t read many romances, because often as not, they are corny, soft porn, or both. But I saw it at the library and decided to give it a try, and I quickly remembered, upon reading it, that some rules are made to be broken. So even if you usually don’t read romances, and even if a retired British pensioner is not your idea of an interesting protagonist, this should be the exception to the rule.

 I loved this story!

Major Pettigrew has difficulty with some sorts of change. He doesn’t want to see his village built up and the green spaces developed. He has lost his wife and his brother, and loss of any type is very difficult. His solitude is not splendid; he is a lonely, lonely man.

And in some ways, he seems to have lost his son, who has become arrogant, dismissive, and wants nothing more from him than his wallet and his bank card.

On the other hand, he has found something really precious, but what he has found is so controversial that the whole wide world seems to be against him.

Perhaps the hook for me was the interracial marriage, since mine is one also. But on the other hand, maybe the hook is just excellent writing. A really great writer can make us enjoy a genre we didn’t think we cared for; I believe this is one of those.

I hit a certain point in this story and could not go to bed until it was done. I usually read lying down before I go to sleep, but I was literally sitting upright on the edge of my bed leaning forward when this climax broke.

You have to read this story. It’s glorious, and it’s available to the public. Highly recommended!

House of the Rising Sun, by James Lee Burke***-****

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houseoftherisingsunI confess that I am a big fan of Burke’s. He’s written a prodigious number of novels over the past fifty years, and I have read almost all of them. This is why, although I get nearly all of my books free prior to publication, I put this title on my Christmas wish list when I wasn’t given access to a galley. Perhaps because my spouse paid full jacket price for it, I am holding it to a higher standard than I usually do. This book is either a three star or four star read, depending on whether we factor in the dollars. Let’s call it 3.5 and round it up. It seems like a shame to 3-star a writer who is so talented and has contributed so much to American literature.

Most of Burke’s novels are detective fiction, crime fiction, mystery, or all three; now and then he writes historical fiction instead. And his choice to send Dave and Clete, the protagonist and side kick of the Robicheaux series, is a good one. No matter how much I enjoyed it, in that fictional world where cops do the right thing and bad guys are really bad every time, there is no way the reading public would be able to continue to enjoy their vigilante behaviors between the covers of a book at the same time that the Black Lives Matter movement has made us aware of that problem—along with the throw-down weapons used to justify gratuitous brutality after the fact–that exist in real life. So, that series is over, and I’m okay with it.

Technically, House of the Rising Sun is a four to five star novel. Burke’s use of imagery is rivaled by few and exceeded by none. Here, his use of allegory, creating a personal Odyssey based on one of the author’s own ancestors, is unquestionably strong. If you love literary fiction for its own sake, this is your book.

By far the strongest writing lies in the portions are set on the battlefields of Europe. Burke’s prose is eloquent and stirring in narrative passages that speak to the class nature of imperialist warfare.

For me, the issue has to do with plot and pacing. The entire book is essentially built around Hackberry Holland’s effort to find his son. They are separated when his wife leaves him and Ishmael is still a child, and through World War I and the period that follows, the journey to find Ishmael winds its way in a way that serves the allegory, but that feels tedious to me as a reader. A fight here; a fall off the wagon and drunk in the streets; looking here, there, everywhere; writing letters; making phone calls; it seems for a long time as if he has barely missed his son. Throw into it the villains—Maggie, Beatrice, and above all, Arnold Beckman—and that’s pretty much it. I don’t want to give anything away, but there isn’t that much suspense to begin with.

A lot of the dialogue seems as if it has been recycled from Burke’s previous books; not whole paragraphs, just speech patterns with a fragment here, a fragment there that left me thinking I had read it before this.

Anytime I find a jarring racist term in a novel, I point it out so that prospective readers will know it’s coming. The “N” word gets used several times; it is within the context of establishing or emphasizing someone’s malign nature. There are also other areas in which Holland takes Caucasian characters to task for racist behavior. Still, I like to think a writer of Burke’s stature can and should develop a credible villain without resorting to this hurtful, and to my thinking, cheap and easy method.

Whether this novel is for you probably depends most on what you look for in a novel. Lush descriptions and horrifically real violence abound, but there isn’t the kind of suspense you’d expect a missing-kid story to employ.

When push comes to shove, I recommend you read this, if you are still interested after reading the reviews, but get it once it goes to paperback, or wait for it to be available used; don’t pay full cover price for it unless your pockets are deep and your interest strong.

Chasing the North Star, by Robert Morgan****

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chasingthenorthstarChasing the North Star is a compelling narrative of two teenagers escaped from slavery on their flight toward the North. Thank you to Net Galley and Algonquin Books for the DRC, which I received in exchange for an honest review. This book becomes available to the public April 5, 2016.

Morgan begins with the story of Jonah, a man who leaves the horrific plantation on which he has been kept. His story is told in the third person omniscient, and so there is virtually no dialogue for a long time. I waited to see how well it would hold up; it isn’t easy to keep a reader’s attention for long passages in which everything is told within a narrative, and even more so when it is told in the third person, as opposed to first person, where the character himself tells us the story. And because the narrative combined strong character development, near-tangible setting, and a series of brilliant moves to elude pursuers, I found that my attention was held quite well.

The book is in fact both accessible and a surprisingly quick read.

Part of the way into the story, Angel, our second protagonist, joins Jonah, and she tells us her own story through the first person. I found this device—of switching from third person for Jonah’s story to first person when telling Angel’s—both unusual and congenial. We watch him and cheer for him, but then she talks to us and just lays it all out. And Angel is nobody’s helpless damsel. She tells us up front that it’s a good thing for Jonah that she loves him, because he is going to need her to save his butt, and she does so more than once.

The sparseness of the dialogue makes sense when one thinks about it. Two escaped slaves that do nothing but talk, talk, talk all the way north are going to be caught in a hot minute. The writer takes an intelligent risk in using so much narrative and so little dialogue, and it pays off.

Stories involving slavery are often really painful for African-American readers to mow through, because they recall a time that was so demeaning, not only a physical horror but one that assaulted their dignity. The “N” word appears here, but is used sparingly considering the time in which it is set, and the topic. I appreciated the autonomy with which Jonah and Angel operate. Too many stories of freedom from bondage feature white saviors more prominently than are appropriate.

In fact, my sole criticism of this story is that it does not portray the extent to which the Underground Railroad was run by free Black men and women in the north; but then, this isn’t a story of organized escape, but an independent one, and it is possible that the region in which our characters travel was different in that respect.

Those that love good historical fiction should read this book. Morgan has done a fine job with a difficult topic, and the story is one of triumph and glory.

The Longest Night: A Novel, by Andria Williams***-****

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This one’s been a long time coming, and today it has been released to the public, so I’m reblogging it. Enjoy!

seattlebookmama's avatarSeattle Book Mama

thelongestnightanovelIn her debut novel, Andria Williams gives a fictionalized account of a meltdown that occurred (in real life also) in Idaho Falls, Idaho. The narrative is intimate, the characters palpable; all told, this was a strong read. Many thanks go to Random House and Net Galley for this galley, which I was given free of charge in exchange for an honest review; I rate this novel 3.5 and round it up. The book becomes available for purchase January 12, 2016. You’ll see this post again sometime nearer publication.

Those of us that lived through the 1960’s will recognize how authentically Williams renders even the smallest details in setting, both the physical and social, of the Unites States during that time period. Home, clothing, and point of view are rendered expertly. This writer personally loved the depiction of a blend of meat, starch, and dairy with some canned fruit tossed in…

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The Two-Family House, by Linda Cohen Loigman*****

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TheTwoFamilyHouse What an amazing book! Once I began reading Loigman’s masterful historical fiction, my other galleys waited, meek and neglected until I was done with this one. Thank you twice, first to Net Galley and second to St. Martin’s Press for giving me a DRC in exchange for this honest review.

I have seldom seen such brilliant character development in a novel. Although Loigman is proficient with setting, it’s really the characters that drive this book. It begins just after World War II. Mort and Rose live downstairs with their three daughters; Abe, Mort’s brother, lives upstairs with his wife Helen and their sons. Though Rose and Helen are not biologically related, they are emotionally closer than many sisters. And what a great thing it is when they both find themselves pregnant, just when they believed they were finished having babies! Mort has wanted a son forever, and his resentment has begun to damage his marriage. He isn’t abusive, but he is cold toward Rose. When she says another baby is on the way, he becomes almost sentimental, making a deal with the cosmos that if he treats his wife well enough, she will bear him a little boy.

Helen loves her sons of course, but she sure would like a daughter; just one. Please.

And then during a blizzard, both women go into labor. Nobody can get to a hospital, and no doctor can reach their home. Instead, a midwife makes her way into the bedroom where both of them labor. Two babies are born.

This story grabbed me by the front of my shirt and wouldn’t let me go. Where I ordinarily make remarks about pacing, setting, and characterization, my e-reader is instead full of indignant comments. First I have become annoyed with Rose, and jot down notes about the things she says and does as if I were gossiping; eventually my remarks are made to Rose herself, because all of these people are so real to me, and she is behaving so badly. The author’s development of her characters, primarily Rose, Mort, and Judith, is so subtle and so sly that at first I wonder if I am imagining the change; eventually I just want to grab Rose and yank her into the kitchen for a good talking-to.

Maybe you think I have said too much, but there is oh so much more. I never saw the ending coming until we were there, and it was so cleverly done. When the story was over, I felt bereaved in a way I had not felt since I read The Goldfinch.

Those that love excellent historical fiction, strong literary fiction, good family stories or all three have to read this book. I gobbled it up early and had to sit on my hands for awhile prior to reviewing; a number of other books have passed between then and this writing, but The Two-Family House still stands out in my mind as having met excellence and surpassed it.

This book is available for purchase March 8. Highly recommended!

Target Tobruk, by Robert Jackson****

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targettolbrukMilitary history and World War II buffs will enjoy this well written third installment in Jackson’s  Sergeant George Yeoman series. I hadn’t read any of the others in the series, but it didn’t matter; it serves just fine as a stand-alone novel. Thanks go to Net Galley and Endeavour Press for the DRC, which I received free of charge in exchange for this review.

Yeoman is a pilot; Jackson served as a pilot himself in the Royal Air Force Reserve and flew many different types of planes, so he has personal experience with his topic. The story centers around the battle for Northern Africa before the USA has entered the war.

And did you know how hot the desert is? Those that are considering reading this need to know this one thing: have some water beside you as you commence. I don’t think any novel has ever made me this thirsty!

Those that are not native English speakers may find this too challenging, and so will high school students. The vocabulary, as well as the military and geographic references, calls for a solid literacy level, and those with some knowledge of World War II and the Mediterranean region will be happier reading it than those that don’t. The four star designation is for this demographic; for general audiences unfamiliar with the Africa campaign, I’d take it down to three stars.

The book would really benefit from a couple of maps and some photographs of the many different types of weapons and especially aircraft that are mentioned here.

I am slightly touchy about the racist term that was used during this time period for Japanese; I understand they were adversaries, and yet the ugly racial terms–which went so far further than anything that was said about European members of the Axis forces–turn my stomach. Because of this, I veer away from fiction that has to do with the Pacific theater of this war, because I just know it’s going to be there, probably in liberal doses. The “J” word pops up here just once. On the one hand, it really doesn’t add anything to the plot and could have been left out, but on the other, at least it is in quotation marks, reflecting a character’s mindset rather than the overall tone of the narrative. Given the nature of the story, I felt the author did pretty well in this regard.

Recommended for those with a strong interest in World War II history, this book is more of a novella in length; just 142 pages. It is available for sale digitally now.

The Complete Flying Officer X Stories*****

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thecompleteflyingofficerxHE Bates wrote these stories during WWII; he served in the British Royal Air Force and received the unusual commission of author. His whole job was to write one short story after another. He was stationed with British pilots from 1941-1942, and he sat with them when they were between flights and listened with a sympathetic ear. He listened well, and the result is a collection of nearly 30 short stories, one of which is novella length, and they are strong, resonant fictional stories whose protagonists were inspired by actual pilots. Thank you twice to Net Galley and to Bloomsbury Publishers for the DRC. This collection is for sale now.

When I told my spouse that I was reading a collection of short stories about RAF pilots during this time period, he asked if that wasn’t a lot of stories to plow through, all on the same subject. I can understand why he—and maybe you—might think so, but the stories are all so different, and their characters so richly drawn, that it’s a bit like asking a mother of a very large family whether she might not like to trim a few sons and daughters from the herd. Although I can tell you which ones are my favorites, I also have to say there is no filler or weaker material here. Everything is very well written, and each story distinct in setting and characters from all others.

I sat down and read it start to finish, but once you have the collection, you can jump around however you like. The stories are not in any particular order. If your household has a book tucked into the bathroom or the guest room, a solid short story collection like this is a good choice, because the person that’s in that room won’t be there that long; this gives them a look at something they can finish. Most of the short stories are just a few pages, with just one toward the end in the part labeled as extra stories that might qualify as a novella.

Although I do have favorites, mine might not be the same as yours. I was drawn to “There’s No Future in It”, a story in which a father tries to dissuade his daughter from becoming involved with a pilot. It’s dark and resonates strongly. I also loved “K for Kitty”, a poignant tale about a pilot that strongly preferred one particular fighter plane; “The Young Man from Kalgoorie”, whose parents attempted to hide the very existence of the war from their son by keeping him busy on the farm and away from newspapers; and “O’Callahan’s Girl”, a young woman that loves a shy young flyer who only wants France to be restored to its previous state.

A happy surprise, given the era in which it was written, was the inclusion of a female soldier (in what is referred to as the “Russian” army, though the fact is it was the USSR and therefore Soviet Army at that time). This was a welcome addition. Unfortunately, there are two racist references, and if the stories were being written today, I would have knocked more than half a star off the rating because of them, but from the World War II generation’s Caucasians, I know (my parents having been among them) that the terms they used were thoughtless but made from ignorance rather than malice.

For example, in one story there is a brief mention made of a West Indian “boy” that used to work as a barrister. I blinked for a moment, not getting it at first. What kind of prodigy must that boy have been to have had a law career already and be out doing something else now? And then the penny dropped, and I realized this is actually a man, but he was referred to this way because of his race and ethnicity.

The second reference is to a brave pilot who nevertheless is described as being unusually ugly; his features bear some unflattering characteristics of the “Red Indian” and the “Mongoloid”.

Both of these go by in the blink of an eye, yet it’s only fair you be told in advance.

Finally, the thing that impressed me the most about these stories is that every last one of them had an unusually strong closing. The first few that left me gaping at their brilliance on the last page, last paragraph, last line were noted, but eventually it became clear that all or most of the collection was going to be like that, and of course I am not going to quote them here and ruin the stories’ endings for you. But one thing I will also say is that short stories that end with planned, maddening ambiguity are my pet peeve. For example, if a man is about to go through a door to either meet special delight or certain doom and the writer ends the story by having the man go through the door and gasp, and that’s the whole thing, he may be gasping with delight, or with horror, and we will never know which…? I hate that! And this set of short stories has none of it. Some end poignantly, some beautifully, some tragically, but every ending is in one way or another deeply satisfying and free of ambiguity.

For those that love military fiction, highly recommended.

Coal River, by Ellen Marie Wiseman***

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coalriverCoal River is a work of historical fiction set in Coal River, Pennsylvania. A region by that name exists, and was the location of pitched battles between the United Mine Workers of America and local cops, strikebreakers, and company goons. Wiseman does a creditable job in her rendering of the setting in which it all unfolded. Thank you to Kensington Publications and Net Galley for the DRC, which I received in exchange for this honest review. It is now available for purchase.

Emma Malloy has been orphaned; a fire killed her mother and father. Her only surviving family owns the local coal mine, and she is taken to live with them. Uncle Otis is a tyrannical big boss, and spirited Emma tangles with him almost immediately when she sees the way coal miners, and in particular the breaker boys, small children that worked in the mines prior to the creation of child labor laws, are treated. She is forced to work in the company store, where she sees miners’ wives lining up to purchase overpriced goods. Once they are sufficiently behind in their accounts, they are turned away, their children hungry and undernourished, unless and until the account can be brought current. It’s a wrenching thing, and Emma refuses to be complicit.

The strength in this work is that it informs readers that may be unaware of the industry’s past as to the conditions that existed. Wiseman brings in the Mollie Maguires, a group of Irish-American anarchists, as well as famed photographer Lewis Hine, whose work is credited with speeding the creation of labor laws that protected small children from adult work in mines and other dangerous industries. Those that haven’t explored this aspect of the US’s past could do a lot worse than to learn it through this novel, which renders the setting palpable and vivid. It’s a time many people aren’t aware of, before the New Deal brought food stamps, health care initiatives, and other lifesaving aid to the unemployed and underemployed. Before that time, any who didn’t work, and whose family could not keep them, starved.
A particularly moving scene is the one in which the Black Maria comes to deliver a dead miner to the door of his widow, and everyone waits breathlessly to see at which home it will arrive.

Your reviewer had a much loved grandfather that died from Black Lung, the form of emphysema contracted by coal miners, particularly those who worked in the mines from an early age as he did. If anyone ought to see this as a five-star book just from sympathy with the material, I would be the one. This is why I requested the DRC. I wish I could rate it higher, but there are a couple of issues that I can’t ignore.

The weaknesses here are twofold. The first is in character development. Emma is not a dynamic character, and indeed, the bad guys are oh so very bad, and the brave young protagonist starts out spunky and but for a few moments toward the climax, remains that way. There is a brief scene in the climax in which Hazard Flint shows a fluctuation in character, but for the most part, our characters are on the very brink of becoming caricatures.

The second problem, which could be overlooked for rating purposes but which troubles me nevertheless, is that although small children no longer work the mines, those places are as dangerous as they ever were. The story carries with it the tacit message that all of these miscarriages of justice took place in a dark past that has no relationship to the present day. If Wiseman cares for the well being of miners and their families, she would have done well to add a post-script acknowledging that miners still get Black Lung; mines still cave in and trap scores of miners every year, and many don’t make it out alive; that union busting is alive and well in the good old US of A. By ending the story as she does, she infers incorrectly that all may rest easy. It just isn’t true.

In short, this is a great story for those new to the history of child labor in America and of those that fought to end it, but as a great literary work, or as a tangible plea for social justice in the present, it is left wanting.

Lonesome Dove, by Larry McMurtry*****

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lonesomedoveSince when do I read westerns? Since never…until a Goodreads friend recommended this title. He knew I liked history and historical fiction, and I couldn’t dismiss the recommendation, not only because this person has never steered me wrong, but because this book won the Pulitzer. That doesn’t guarantee I will like it either, of course, but it certainly enhances the likelihood. So on one of my increasingly-rare ventures to my favorite local used bookstore, I searched out the title. There it was, 857 pages bound in a beautiful hard cover, foliated-paged tome, for less than ten bucks. Sold!

It took me a long time to read, not because of its length—psssh, my readers know me better than that—but because of its physical size. A very lengthy book in an electronic reader is light weight no matter how many pages it has, but this gorgeous, old school novel was hell on a frozen shoulder. So for a long time I read it in little chunks, propping it on top of pillows on top of my lap. It took awhile, but it was worth it.

McMurtry earned his laurels, that much is certain. I was mesmerized by the way he took us to a place that no longer exists, immense swaths of nothing across the Midwestern USA and Northern Rockies. The idea that a person could travel long and hard for days and still not even be out of Texas just blew me away, and then there was still most of the journey yet to come. There are no roads; the protagonists have a kind-of, sort-of map; a list of rivers to sustain themselves, replenish their drinking water; water their mounts, with water being the equivalent of gassing up; and also water their herd.

I realized that one reason I never chose to read westerns is because I grew up during a time when cowboys were considered the enemy of the American Indian. I didn’t want to be allied with the white guys on the horses. And of course, that was one stereotype I later realized I should not have bought into, because not all cowboys were white guys; most were, for sure, but some were of Mexican heritage, some were Black, and once in a rare while there would be an American Indian riding with the cowboys. And cowboys did not always fight Indians; sometimes they were just moving cattle.

Apart from the almost tangible settings the author creates, we also have some complex relationships. I confess that some of the more peripheral characters among the cowboy crew were hard for me to keep straight. Which one is Dish, and which is Pea Eye? But it didn’t matter that much in terms of ability to enjoy the novel, because the main characters were so well developed, and there wasn’t a stereotype in the pack. Gus is the chief protagonist, and in my mind he was somewhere between Ralph Waite and Tom Hanks. Call, his very quiet, solitary partner, was a tow-headed version of Robert Redford. Lorena, the complicated woman that fell in love with Gus, eventually formed herself in my own mind to resemble country singer Miranda Lambert. Sometimes you just need a face to go with your main characters. Jake turned up as Dan Ackroyd without the sense of humor. Blue Duck is one of the most terrifying villains in literature!

Why go north? There was never any really good reason apart from Call’s wanderlust, and Gus’s unwillingness to be separated from his partner, with whom he had worked since their days as Texas Rangers. Gus also wanted to look up a woman from his past who had settled in Nebraska, and I loved how that played out.

And when all was said and done, I realized that this is one of those haunting stories that will forever remain in my mind. That’s saying a lot; I usually read 8-10 books per month, and often by the time I am invited to host a book giveaway or blog tour by the publisher, I have forgotten the name of the main character and all but the broadest contours of the story being promoted. They approach me 3 months after I wrote the review, and there are 30 books in between that story and the present. But that won’t happen here. In fact, because this wasn’t a galley, I waited to review it until I had the time and felt the urge. I still remember so much, and there have been several books gone by in the interim.

If you have the stamina to read a book of this length—and I have to tell you, though it’s a western it is not all actionactionaction, but rather deeply insightful in many places—and if you enjoy historical fiction, you ought to give this book consideration. It isn’t hard to find it used, and given its exalted status in literature, your local library probably also has a copy. But even if you have to pony up the cover price—pun intended—you could do much worse for your reading dollar.

An outstanding novel.

The Lake House, by Kate Morton *****

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thelakehouseAs a rule, I am not fond of British fiction; I prefer working class protagonists to the silver-spoon variety; and I like urban settings more than pastoral ones. But The Lake House is written by the author that produced The Forgotten Garden, and so when I had the chance to grab the galley, I went for it. And once more, experience proves that a brilliant writer can sell any story, in the setting of her choice, with the protagonists of her choice, and she can make it flow smooth as warm butter.

This deep, luminous story came to me from Net Galley and Atria Books, a division of Simon and Schuster. Thank you once, twice, and a third time too, because Morton has done it again. The book is a must-read for all that love mysteries and literary fiction.

Sadie Sparrow works for the Metropolitan Police, but her job hangs by a thread because she has become over-involved in the case of a missing woman. A toddler was found abandoned in her home, and Sparrow is haunted by the insistence of the child’s grandmother that her daughter would never, ever leave the child intentionally. Sparrow has been told to take some time off and stay away from the case; she retreats to her grandfather’s home in Cornwall, and becomes transfixed by an older, colder case, that of the mysterious disappearance of a child that lived in the beautiful old home nearby, Loeanneth, where a baby boy vanished many years earlier. Sadie sublimates her urge to follow up on her current, forbidden case by poking into the old mystery in Cornwall.

Morton takes us deftly from one setting, both time and place, to another so seamlessly that we cannot help being spellbound; this is literary fiction at its best. We meet the various members of the family that once summered in the once-lovely, now neglected Cornwall estate, and we watch across the years over three generations of the Edevane family that lived there, both in the years before World War II up to the present, with its elderly descendants that remain living.

Rather than a gripping page-turner, this is a well-crafted tale to be sunk into, like a feather bed or one’s favorite chair, with the phone turned off and a steaming cup of coffee (or tea, if you must) to go with it. Those without the stamina for a complex, well-developed story of the necessary length will find themselves frustrated; this one is for true literature lovers, so be prepared to give it the time it deserves.

The characters are developed so expertly that they feel like people we have known a long time. My favorite was Eleanor, who in my own mental movie appeared as a young Vanessa Redgrave; readers of a later generation than mine will choose some other face to match Morton’s description. Every possible stereotype one might create having to do with women of that time and social station has been cleverly sidestepped in a fully credible manner. Even the haughtiest among them is presented with dignity and a certain grace.

Some will find the ending a little too perfectly resolved perhaps; I find it congenial.

For those that like visuals to go with their fiction, here’s a clip of grand homes in Cornwall: