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 Isabella d’Este, daughter of the Duke of Ferrara, is thrilled with her father’s choice of husband for her. Francesco Gonzaga, the future Marquis of Mantua, is not a wildly handsome man but their betrothal looks to lead to a love match. Just one month later and she’d have been marrying her younger sister’s Beatrice’s betrothed – the much older Ludovico Sforza, regent of Milan. Ludovico has more power, but he’s put off Beatrice’s wedding for so long that it looks like it might never happen. When it does, however, Isabella meets Ludovico and for the first time is jealous of her younger, less attractive sister, because she and Ludovico are clearly of the same mind about many things. Moreover, Ludovico’s Milan is home to Leonardo da Vinci and Isabella wants nothing more than to be made immortal by the genius artist. But all is not well in Italy as the political machinations of her leaders come back to haunt them.
I have wanted to read this book ever since I read Stealing Athena by the same author two years ago. When I started to get bored with most historical fiction, I thought I would give Karen Essex a chance to bring back my fascination with it. At first, it wasn’t looking good. The book started off slowly and I set it aside for a full week in favor of other, more immediately compelling books. When I sat down to finally force myself to read it, though, it picked up and I enjoyed it by the end.
There’s no denying that Essex’s writing is lovely. She paints a gorgeous picture of a variety of places in Italy. I loved how the book was set right during the Renaissance, but there are still plenty of reminders of the Middle Ages, like jousts, hanging around to remind me that this was a period of transition. I could definitely imagine myself feasting and dancing in the courts along with the main characters, which I did appreciate.
The focus on art was fascinating as well. Isabella’s desire to immortalize herself takes up quite a bit of the story and art remains a central focus throughout. The characters are either painted or commissioning paintings or both – while Leonardo da Vinci slowly gets on with a variety of different kinds of art. Essex also reminds us how transient art is; some of the paintings she mentions are lost or have been destroyed in the meantime. It doesn’t all lead to immortality as Isabella would like.
The story is compelling in the end; it’s far more than a simple battle between two sisters for one man, as the cover would have you believe. It’s really about all of the women who are painted, or long to be painted, by Leonardo da Vinci, and the way that politics can destroy the overambitious. I would definitely recommend Leonardo’s Swans to anyone who enjoys historical fiction.
I am an Amazon Associate. I purchased this book.
Another round of library loot this week! I don’t have too much to share, just three books. I’ve been requesting a lot of books, so I’ve been reading my acquisitions surprisingly quickly. I hope to get through the two YA books this weekend.
 The library books are the three at the bottom:
- Empress Orchid, Anchee Min – I have really been eager to read more by Anchee Min ever since I finished Pearl of China. I have her novel Katherine on my TBR pile but this one has always appealed to me, too.
- Just In Case, Meg Rosoff – Continuing my small obsession, I appear to be determined to read all four of Meg Rosoff’s books in a couple of months. Actually, the release date of The Bride’s Farewell may prevent that, but I will definitely be reading it.
- The Forest of Hands and Teeth, Carrie Ryan – I’ve been wanting to read this since release and now I finally have my hands on it.
The top two are books that came to me in the mail. I thought it would be fun to add them in for once, too, so I’m hijacking my own post.
- Under Heaven, Guy Gavriel Kay – I have Nymeth to thank for this. I don’t recall if I ever mentioned that I didn’t get a gift from the Book Bloggers Holiday Swap. My Santa never responded to emails, and when I chose one of the donations to make up for it, that person didn’t respond either. So Ana generously offered to buy me a book herself, and I’m so grateful that as a result I have the newest release of one of my absolute favorite authors. Thank you, Ana!
- Virgin Widow, Anne O’Brien – Got this one for review. It’s about Anne Neville, and I will admit that I hesitated to accept it. But it’s my thing, it’s been too long since I reviewed a medieval historical fiction novel, and it’s had good reviews. It comes out in the UK later this month and will be published in the US later this year – I imagine I’ll be seeing a good number of reviews for it around then!
Thanks as always to Eva and Marg for hosting Library Loot!
 Adeline’s mother died when she was a baby. As the fifth child, with three brothers and a sister, she was always going to be teased, but when she was a year old her father remarried a woman who had it out for her predecessor’s children. Adeline’s stepmother was half French, automatically placing her above the rest of her Chinese family. While Adeline and her four older siblings wore old clothes, ate cheap food, and weren’t allowed to see any of their friends outside of school, her stepmother’s children were pampered and treated with endless luxuries. They walked to school while their younger siblings were given money for the tram or driven to the most exclusive schools available. Adeline yearned to escape and distinguished herself at school, but her life often seemed like the worst misery possible.
This memoir was absolutely heartbreaking. I just could not believe anyone could treat a little girl so badly. It’s obvious that Adeline (her Chinese name is Jun-ling) is a clever child with a huge heart. She loves her grandparents and her aunt, the only people who treat her well, with an earnest devotion that I wished she could have applied to her parents. Instead, her stepmother convinces her father that his older children deserve nothing but the worst – subsistence food, hideous clothes, unflattering but cheap haircuts. They are mocked in school and at home alike.
I was amazed that Adeline could retain her sense of self despite all of the abuse. She has no self-esteem, but she is a good person and as such she makes friends. Eventually, people flock to her, leading to one of the saddest scenes in the book. It wouldn’t have been so bad even if the siblings that shared a mother with her had compassion, but they are either innately cruel, venting their unhappiness on their little sister, or seek her stepmother’s approval and then continue to mock her.
Adeline’s story is intertwined with the history and culture of China. It’s often obvious that this is a middle grade book and that the history is slightly simplified for the child’s mind, but it lends flavor to the story and Adeline’s surroundings. The book would really be perfect for a middle grade reader eager to learn more about the wider world – I know I learned virtually nothing of twentieth century China in school. There is a follow-up for young adult readers which I have already requested from the library and am very eager to read.
Chinese Cinderella was a fast, simple but absolutely heartbreaking read. It’s a memoir that will have you cheering for Adeline and hoping that she finally earns happiness in the end.
I am an Amazon Associate. I borrowed this book from my local library.
 Henrietta Lacks, a poor black woman, died of cervical cancer in the 1950’s. Her doctor had never seen a tumor like hers and scraped some cells off for research purposes. To everyone’s surprise, those cancer cells were the first to keep on living and separating outside the human body and spawned an entire research industry. Nicknamed HeLa after the first two letters of Henrietta’s first and last names, these cells caused a virtual revolution in research and led to cures and treatments for a variety of illnesses as well as a way to test the effects of various calamities on human tissue. But Henrietta’s family received no money and Henrietta received no recognition for her contribution. Rebecca Skloot puts together the facts and gets the family’s side of the story in an effort to earn Henrietta the recognition she deserves.
I have one word for this book and it is wow. I was incredibly fascinated – and at times saddened – by this entire book. I am not anything even close to a scientist and had never heard of Henrietta or the HeLa cells, but now I think that’s a shame. I’m glad Skloot finally got a book published and is setting up a scholarship fund so Henrietta can get the recognition she deserved, even if she’ll never know it.
The book flips between the past and the present, explaining Henrietta’s story and later that of her cells alongside Skloot’s quest to get in contact with the family and then her relationship with each of the individual family members. I read this for a book club and one of the members suggested that Skloot was essentially harassing the family with constant phone calls and visits. While I do think she was especially persistent at the beginning and that wasn’t right, the fact that the family wanted Henrietta’s story told and appreciated the recognition she received for me outweighed the fact that Skloot was pushy in the beginning. I wished that the family could have told Henrietta’s story instead, but the poor state of their education has prevented it all this time. I was pleased to hear, though, that the latest generation is going to college and grad school, so they’ll be moving up in the world.
Skloot really excels at explaining the scientific parts that are scattered throughout this book. I’m not a scientist and I have never really been interested in science, but I was surprised by how fascinating I found the various processes related in here. I was also totally astonished at how unethical the current system is. I had absolutely no idea that doctors are pretty much free to do as they like with discarded human tissue. Some do offer a consent form, but they’re not legally required to do so and it’s perfectly okay for someone else to make money off of my cells without giving a cent to me. I don’t want to hinder medical research but something about that seems very wrong. Henrietta’s family didn’t even have health insurance so they had no access to any of the treatments that their mother’s cells made possible!
This whole book is genuinely fascinating. It’s a completely readable work of narrative non-fiction that brings up a ton of issues about medical science and ethics while telling the story of a woman who should definitely be remembered and commemorated. I very highly recommend The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.
I am an Amazon Associate. I purchased this book.
 Hilary, now an old man, takes the time to reflect on one year of his life in a boarding school – the year he found love. He was a troubled child who often resisted authority, longing to be something he was not, and as a result had ended up unpopular and unsuccessful in different schools already. On a run with his entire school, he discovered a boy who lived by himself on the coast of East Anglia, where the water is slowly creeping up on the land. Hilary immediately did his best to cultivate a friendship with the boy, Finn, finding himself compelled to spend more and more time in Finn’s tiny cottage, totally unaware of the effects his friendship would have.
I am not honestly sure where to begin this review. I’ve let this book percolate in my head slightly too long, I think, for my thoughts to be coherent to anyone but me. I can say what I loved most about this book was the perfect way it captured teenage awkwardness. Meg Rosoff’s writing perfectly encapsulated everything Hilary was feeling – I could almost have been him. The fact that the book was narrated by Hilary’s older self remembering makes it all too poignant. I’m far from old, but my teenage years have already begun to take on a similar gloss, a comparison between what I thought I knew was true then and what I know to be true now. I’m sure it will only become stronger as the years march on.
There is an air of mystery surrounding the entire book. The narrator’s name is scarcely mentioned – it took a lot of searching before I found out what it actually was in order to write this review. And Finn, too, is a mystery – a character who barely speaks yet embodies virtually everything to Hilary. Hilary’s unsure whether he’s in love with Finn – and resisting his newfound homosexuality – or simply wants to be Finn, which he’s clearly more comfortable with and makes efforts to actually do. Rosoff never explicity spells this out, though, but merely gets it across with Hilary’s actions and thoughts.
I loved the book’s focus on history, too, Hilary’s awareness of the continuity of life. Things change constantly and his ruminations on history only remind us that what he’s going through will be over, too. The coast will continue to vanish and the remains of Roman forts will soon be taken away by the ocean.
There’s a twist at the end of the book which turned it all upside down, but I thought it just fit. I knew something was going to happen and I’d considered the idea at the start, but when it happened I was still surprised. I don’t want to give it away because the book’s pull won’t be nearly as powerful if you know the ending – there’s a constant, looming sense of almost dread throughout most of the book, a focus on the frailty of our lives. Ties in well with the history, doesn’t it?
Anyway, I’m not actually sure I preferred What I Was to How I Live Now, but it was certainly thoughtful and addictive. Rosoff’s writing is beautiful and perfectly emulates the teenage mind – I can’t wait to read more of her work.
I am an Amazon Associate. I borrowed this book from my local library.
 This is book five in the Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs and as such there may be spoilers for the first four books. Check out my review of Moon Called, the first book in the series.
The fae are possessive and secretive. So when Mercy Thompson’s friend, who is slightly fae but mostly human, loaned her a book, she probably shouldn’t have accepted it. But she did, and now he’s disappeared and a faery queen wants that book from her. Meanwhile, her dear friend and former love Samuel is losing his will to live, letting his wolf take over (a dangerous situation for any werewolf) and she’s still trying to navigate the murky waters of her new and uncertain mate bond with Adam, the alpha of her new werewolf pack.
I’ve said it on every single review of these books but I love them! I think they’re fantastic and Patricia Briggs has a great story in every book. She never goes too far, it’s always just the right mixture of plot and character development. In each book, the main plot wraps up but the overarching plot keeps developing – the characters grow and change over the whole series. This book isn’t an exception. I loved returning to her world and picking up the same characters’ stories.
In this particular volume of the installment, I really appreciated where the characters’ relationships went. I have always totally loved Adam and I’m so encouraged by his relationship with Mercy. It was fantastic that there was more of him in this book. And Samuel – I may not like him as much as Adam, but I was still very captivated by what was going on with him in this book. I liked how she wove in aspects from her other Alpha and Omega series, too, because I also like Charles and Anna.
I liked the plot, too. I didn’t remember the person who lent Mercy the book, but I thought enough was explained that it didn’t matter. It wasn’t entirely suspenseful because I didn’t think anything particularly bad was going to happen to the characters (although I have been shocked by that in other series) but I was definitely intrigued by what happened. In fact, the book captivated me enough that I could read it in the space of three hours while sitting in a noisy van moving furniture. Yes, it’s that absorbing.
In short, I still love this series! And now I have a really, really long time to wait for the next installment. But when it comes out, I’ll be reading. I highly recommend Silver Borne and the rest of the Mercedes Thompson series to anyone who likes urban fantasy.
I am an Amazon Associate. I purchased this book.
 Gwenni Morgan is caught between childhood and adolescence. She reads voraciously despite her mother’s disapproval, flies in her sleep, and wants to be a real detective. When one of the men from her small Welsh town goes missing, Gwenni decides that she’s going to try and find him. Her investigation leads to unwelcome truths about Gwenni’s town, family, and life. Those discoveries catapult her into an adulthood she may not be ready for.
This is a totally stunning coming-of-age story. I was surprised by how very much I enjoyed it. I loved Gwenni as a narrator. She was completely charming in her naivete about her small town life. I could see why the cover described it as heartbreaking though – with every coming-of-age, some innocence is lost, and it genuinely hurts to see this girl suffer even though it strengthens her in the end. Though her discoveries and the past make some sense, it’s still painful to discover it – and witness the consequences – right along with her. I loved the way she became a big sister figure to another character, a real manifestation of her growing maturity. It’s whimsical but realistic at the exact same time.
The way that Mari Strachan portrayed post-World War II life in Wales was absolutely fascinating. These regions are still feeling the effects of the war, as are the people. Gwenni’s father carries a limp from his own service and there are a variety of other consequences that are discovered as time goes on. It’s over but not forgotten. The conflict between England and Wales was very interesting as well; one of Gwenni’s friends doesn’t speak Welsh and there is some tension over what language the characters choose and when. I’m fascinated by this idea of Welsh pride in the face of continuous English dominance over the years. It perfectly fits with the image of a small town resisting and at the same time embracing change – Gwenni’s mother longs for new appliances but is downright superstitious about her own child.
This book is written so well, too. For me it was perfectly evocative of a twelve-year-old’s thought process while still retaining beauty and grace with some really charming passages. One particularly memorable scene here that had me longing for toast with butter:
The toast is crunchy at the edges and hot, and the butter is yellow and salty and so cold I can see the marks my teeth make in it although it’s melting by the time I’m on the last two bits and drips down my chin. I wipe my chin with my handkerchief and put a slice of bread on the fork to toast for Nain.
– p 226-7.
Doesn’t that sound surprisingly appealing?
I’m amazed that this was Mari Strachan’s debut novel. I can’t wait to see what she comes up with next. I’ll definitely be recommending The Earth Hums in B Flat to anyone who is interested in the many topics it deals with, or even just after a plain great read.
I am an Amazon Associate. I received this book for free from the publisher for review.
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