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 The Hemings family as slaves are most famous for their connection with Thomas Jefferson, of course, because while he owned the family he also had a long-term affair with Sally Hemings after the death of his wife. That affair was made public while Jefferson was a very visible figure, leaving an impression of Sally that lasts up until the present day. Gordon-Reed views the Hemings family as a whole, covering multiple generations to explore who they were, how slavery affected them, and thus to look more in depth at this relationship between Jefferson and Hemings.
I’m no scholar of American history; my interests have been firmly European for a good few years now. That doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate an excellent work of American history and that is precisely what The Hemingses of Monticello is. It is very detailed and long, so not for the faint of heart, but I felt it unearthed a ton of truth in its portrayal of this family so affected by slavery. Gordon-Reed in many respects returns agency to Sally and the rest of her family, looking at how they may have been as people rather than as objects or simply as enslaved people who, despite the pain of their condition, were not all the same in other fundamental respects.
One of my favorite sections of the book took place before Jefferson was president, while he and Sally and one of her brothers were together in France. This was fascinating because, in France, they could have become free. It was a recognized possibility and Jefferson did not follow the law while they were there; instead he paid them wages and seems to have treated them more like free servants instead of the slaves they were. What does it mean that both of them returned with him, seemingly voluntarily, to the world of slavery? Or that Sally had already conceived at that point? Evidence is slim but Gordon-Reed’s case is convincing, and I did believe that she went with him because he promised her children would be free (and they were). A risky decision given that he could have died before that, and indeed his death was disastrous for the Hemings family, but not in that way.
Tied up in that is the notion of their relationship, naturally, and the fact that Jefferson clearly slept with a woman who was his slave and had a relationship with her. He could have forced her for all we know – but if he did why didn’t she flee? Slave women did flee from their rapists, as the author demonstrates. They did cry out for help. Gordon-Reed continues by questioning what options were open to them – why do we dismiss the possibility of love if there is no option for marriage? Jefferson never married again and didn’t father children (that we know of) with any others of his slave women. He treated her family and her in particular very differently than he did the rest of his slaves. It’s something we don’t want to touch because slavery is so horrific but I felt Gordon-Reed did very well in considering what was happening from all angles, not just one.
Overall I felt Gordon-Reed did an excellent job probing into many of the thorny issues surrounding history, slavery, and our ideas of the two, taking a deeper look at individuals without treating the subject of slavery like it was anything but wrong. The Hemingses of Monticello was wordy and very carefully considered but well argued and, for me, worth the week I spent reading it. Recommended.
All book links to external sites are affiliate links. I borrowed this book from my local library.
 After Brenna was mentally abused and nearly killed at the hands of a notorious murderer, she has struggled to feel safe even amongst her fellow changelings. What’s worse, she’s lost the ability to change after her abuse, making her feel vulnerable and completely unlike herself. In this state of mind, she has been trying to heal with the help of Sascha, star of Psy-Changeling book 1, and Judd Lauren, one of the coldest Psys around. Judd makes Brenna feel safe, though, and as she begins to spend more time with him the attraction between them goes. But every touch and emotion is literal pain for former Arrow Judd, trained so well that his brain begins to combust at the seams, making the fulfilment of their feelings seem like an impossibility.
I have had an interesting relationship with Nalini Singh’s work so far. In the romance blogosphere, I’ve found that she is completely revered. So many people love her books that it’s impossible to resist picking one up. For me, though, the connection hasn’t been there. I’ve enjoyed her books but so far she hasn’t catapulted her way up my favorites list. With this book, though, I could sense something starting to change, as I got so much more invested in this book than in the earlier two.
In this one, I think the difference was in the characters. Judd Lauren in particular is just the kind of hero I seem to like best. He’s tough because he has to be, the classic dangerous man who just needs a little affection. What I really loved, though, is that he doesn’t really soften. He doesn’t become like a changeling. Instead he expresses his emotions towards Brenna as best he can; he can fall in love but she can’t completely change him. They’re very clearly different types of people who bond regardless. They need healing, but their past lives can’t be erased just because they’ve fallen in love. The entire romance was excellently done, in my opinion, and had me really eager to read more, wishing I had already had the next Psy-Changeling book!
Caressed by Ice is a solid, very enjoyable paranormal romance, further enhancing the Psy-Changeling world and drawing me deeper into Singh’s snare. Recommended!
All book links to external sites are affiliate links. I purchased this book.
 In one life-altering law school class, four women of different backgrounds and beliefs were christened Bradwells, and afterwards became friends for years. Though life has taken each of them down different paths, of success and of failure, Mia, Betts, Laney, and Ginger have remained loyal to one another and to their friendship since that day. Now, with Betts about to be appointed to the Supreme Court, investigators have dug up the memories of one summer where a man committed suicide. All four women flee from the truth and end up on the island where it happened, where Ginger’s family lived in the summers, to try and face the facts of their past and work out how to grow from here as women and as friends.
The Wednesday Sisters by Meg Waite Clayton was released to favorable reviews nearly everywhere, so even though I hadn’t managed to read that one yet, I still jumped to get my hands on The Four Ms. Bradwells. I wasn’t quite sure what I expected from it when I started, but what I got was a tale about four strong women who have to face demons from their past – demons that many women face in their own private lives without the spotlight placed on these four. As such, it was a compelling and meaningful read with a lot of relevance for women’s lives.
The story is told mainly through flashbacks. All of the friends are together on the island trying to face what they’ve kept from the world for so long. As they experience the familiar scenery, they are reminded of the past and forced to reflect upon their lives. I liked how the novel touched deeply on the nature of female friendships, relationships, and family, how the women can love one another yet cause each other to suffer. We’re only given the past through these flashbacks, so at the beginning I had no idea what had happened. The actual events weren’t earth-shattering but were certainly moving and I felt for these characters and the pain they’d endured over the years.
There were things I didn’t like about the book as well, unfortunately. For one thing, I found it really hard to distinguish the women’s separate voices. I never take note of chapter headings and I more than once experienced the phenomenon of confusion as it turned out the perspective had switched and I hadn’t noticed. Ginger’s poetry and Laney’s Latin helped with this some but also got old as the novel wore on. I’d find someone who quoted Latin phrases or any poetry endlessly to be annoying in real life, too, so no surprise that happened here. And, finally, I understood that the said event was a terrible event for these women and their families, but I didn’t really see it as ‘dirt’ that would interest anyone about Betts’s nomination to the Supreme Court. Is it really that bad if you’re simply at a weekend party where a suicide happens? I know I wouldn’t have thought anything of it.
Overall, though, I did enjoy The Four Ms. Bradwells and it’s certainly a worthy read for other women. I also still intend to read The Wednesday Sisters as I have for at least a year now – soon I hope!
All book links to external sites are affiliate links. I received this book for free for review.
 Told entirely through letters, The Color Purple is the story of Celie, a black girl who is sexually abused by her father, giving birth to two of his children, and who grows into a woman abused and cowed by her husband. It’s only when her husband’s long-time lover, Shug, a nightclub singer, comes to stay with the family that Celie begins to find her feet, experiencing sexual awakening, love, and a modicum of independence for the first time in her life. Alongside Celie’s story are letters from her sister Nettie, who becomes a missionary in Africa over the course of the story and discovers her own happiness in a very different way.
I knew this book was going to be good; I’ve had it recommended to me multiple times, but somehow never managed to actually get my hands on it until I read about it in The Heroine’s Bookshelf. Set alongside some of my all-time favorite books, The Color Purple finally called out to me and demanded to be read. Now that I have, I’m very glad I listened!
This is not a book for the faint of heart. These poor women have a very tough time, particularly Celie, who is beaten down again and again until she has virtually no spirit left. She’s abused as a very young girl, forced to give birth to children of incest, and not even allowed to keep those children – the only two she ever has. She’s told constantly that she is plain, worthless, and exists to do the bidding of the men around her. Her only bright spot in life is her sister Nettie, and when Nettie goes then Celie’s spirit goes with her. Even though she meets other vibrant women, it takes living with a woman with spark, Shug, to teach Celie how to embrace her own.
I felt so much for Celie throughout this book. She is treated like a slave and never stands up for herself, but as readers we know that she has a pure heart and is a woman just waiting to love and be loved. The other characters also inspire sympathy – I loved in particular Nettie’s letters from Africa – but not to the same extent. This is her book of suffering and her book of self-discovery, both in one go. Celie’s revelation is not only of this world but it’s also religious, which I could appreciate even without sharing her beliefs.
In fact, there was only one thing I didn’t like about the book; the timelines. The lives of Celie and Nettie simply don’t match up. Events that take years in Celie’s life pass by in much less time in Nettie’s life. It was confusing, but ultimately the book still has a lot to say and I didn’t let this put me off.
The Color Purple is a fantastic book that I waited much too long to read. Don’t make the same mistake!
All book links to external sites are affiliate links. I purchased this book.
 Spring has been coming on for a while but only lately have I actually started to get my rear in gear and clean my place out. I spent a lot of time yesterday sorting and cleaning and it is very nice to get rid of the winter blues! Today’s sunshine has only helped the situation.
To symbolize the coming of spring, we’ve even started up the window herb garden with two purchases yesterday. I have the total opposite of a green thumb, as pretty much every plant I touch dies, but that hasn’t stopped me trying yet. Someday I will get it right. Anyway, we have lovely green basil and coriander plants just waiting to be used in cooking:
 
I have also been continuing with a little bloggy spring cleaning. I have decided to switch over to affiliate links from The Book Depository. I have placed an Amazon banner on the side for anyone who likes to get their books from Amazon, along with an IndieBound box on the left for anyone who likes indie bookstores, so I hope this will mean an option for everyone. I personally don’t mind where anyone buys books so long as they are buying them! I’ve chosen the UK version of TBD but they will ship almost anywhere in the world for free and should switch over automatically if you’re in the US. If you’d like to support my blogging endeavours and fuel the addiction by letting me pay for my site and possibly even more books, please use them to buy online!
Unfortunately there hasn’t been much reading happening around here. I have only managed two books this week, which is pretty far from my normal 4-5, but I’m not sure I’ll be reading more any time soon as I have quite a lot going on elsewhere. All good stuff, but not really conducive to reading a lot. I am also thinking about taking a blogging break while everyone else is off at BEA to control my jealousy and give myself a little recharge. I won’t decide that though until next Sunday when I see how many books I’ve read this week.
Still making an effort, though – this morning I managed to finish up The Hemingses of Monticello by Annette Gordon-Reed, a very interesting book with plenty of detail for my little brain to chew over. Now I am getting deep into Lady of the English by Elizabeth Chadwick, due out in the UK in June and the US in September, about the Empress Matilda, Henry I’s daughter and Henry II’s mother, who was meant to be queen after his death and ended up fighting Stephen for the privilege. Very good so far, as I expected!
What are you up to this weekend? Any good books in your hands?
 Catherine Sanderson decided she was destined for Paris as a young girl and followed through on her dreams as an adult, eventually establishing herself in a solid relationship with a Frenchman, called ‘Mr Frog’, and giving birth to a daughter, appropriated named Tadpole, while living and working in Paris. But as Tadpole begins to grow, Catherine realizes that she is unhappy and starts a blog to chronicle her love affair with Paris alongside her more personal musings about the difficulties of her relationship with Mr Frog. Catherine’s blog brings her into contact with an eager reader, James, opening up a whole new world of conflicts in her relationships and catharsis to a community of worldwide readers.
I’ve heard of the Petite Anglaise blog once or twice and I’m sure I saw this book reviewed elsewhere, so when I saw it at the library I decided to read it. I have no real love affair of my own with Paris but I greatly enjoyed my visit there and, oddly, I love reading about other people who feel passionately about places that aren’t their homes, I suppose because I can relate to them.
Catherine’s life as contained in this memoir read more like a soap opera than anything else. From the minute Jim from Rennes showed up in the comments of her blog, I knew something was going to happen there, and I was proven correct. She goes from staid and ordinary Parisian life with steady partner and child to feeling like a siren again, recapturing the passion lost from her relationship with Mr Frog and coming to learn more about herself as an individual in the process. While I wouldn’t agree with her actions in that she cheats on her partner, it’s a bit like a roller coaster that you have to stay on just to get to the end. I will note that the cover description is very misleading as it doesn’t really cover what happens in this book – she’s never really ‘in trouble’ in the way I’d imagined it.
What comes across in this memoir that I found fascinating was Catherine’s relationship with blogging itself. I’m not a personal blogger; there are snapshots here and there of my life and opinions and I do share big news that comes up, but I’m blogging about books, not about my life, and Catherine experiences many of the pitfalls I would expect from putting life out on the internet for anyone to read. Writing is inherently cathartic and Catherine comes to crave the opinions of her readers. She puts love letters and exchanges out there for anyone to read and she does hurt people she loves in the process. I can’t remember ever previously reading a memoir that covers what happens when your life becomes so glaringly public and you’re not already a celebrity. (Unsurprisingly, she’s almost stopped blogging now for these very reasons).
There were a few things I didn’t like about the memoir, namely that it doesn’t really accomplish much. It’s simply a snapshot of a sensational time in the author’s life and covers quite a few of the dramas she experiences between her relationships, parenthood, blogging, and Paris; it’s not really any one thing because it has aspects of all of these, giving it a haphazard feel at times. It focuses on one person which makes it feel very self-centered, something a lot of memoirs suffer from, and at times I felt worse for the people hurt by the author’s blog than for her, who could at least control what she put out there and what she did.
Still, if you’re looking for the perspective of a very public blogger, snapshots of life in Paris, and the difficulties of relationships, Petite Anglaise is an excellent choice.
I am an Amazon Associate. I borrowed this book from my library.
 Hadley is on the edge of spinsterhood with few prospects when she meets young Ernest Hemingway in Chicago at a friend’s party. She is instantly smitten despite warnings from close friends about his unreliability and winds up marrying him with no regrets, vowing to support his writing at the expense of all else. Newly married Hadley and Ernest head to Paris, where he can hobnob with the most exciting writers of his day, but where Hadley struggles to fit in with socialites and snobs. As the couple travel the world, the tensions of society, of Hadley’s desire for family life, and Ernest’s burgeoning fame and importance start to drive a wedge between them, leaving Hadley to be forever known as the Paris wife.
I surprised myself by how much I enjoyed this book. I was predisposed to like it, shallow as this is, by the beautiful condition it arrived to me as an ARC complete with two picture postcards:
They really helped when envisioning the characters and helped me remember that these people really lived. I have only ever read The Old Man and the Sea by Hemingway, so didn’t really have any preconceived notions about him or his life other than I wasn’t his biggest fan. This book made me incredibly interested in his life and gave me a new historical figure to fixate on in the person of his wife Hadley.
To me this novel illustrated very clearly one of the peculiarities of the writer’s life at the time. Hadley and Ernest are throughout almost constantly struggling for money, pinching pennies and living in unpleasant places, but they are also free to do more or less as they wish. Ernest writes for newspapers and is sent off on excursions, but has days free to work on his fiction and Hadley of course does not work, first keeping house and then taking care of their baby. It’s hard to imagine living such a life as these early twentieth century authors, just breathing in relaxation or going off to party after a few hours’ writing work. Things ease as Hemingway gets more famous, but Hadley is mainly there at the start, when everything is uncertain, when he needs her as an anchor.
The novel also very clearly illustrated how the cracks can grow in a marriage that seems perfectly happy to others. Little disagreements become big disagreements and the magic is lost because neither half works at maintaining their relationship. Even when one tries, both are needed, and there is a clear point of no return here for them. It’s easy to feel for Hadley, who is often thrust in an uncomfortable world and loses friends due to her husband’s moods, and to hope she gets something a bit better in the end. Hemingway is mercurial, needing Hadley’s reassurance, but almost from the start we can see that his success and his selfishness will replace her in the end.
While I never had much interest in the Hemingways before, this work of historical fiction has made me very curious and provided an exceptional story besides of marriage, love, and the writer’s life in the early twentieth century. Highly recommended.
I am an Amazon Associate. I received this book for free for review from Amazon Vine.
 Mia has a fairly typical teenage life, full of big dreams and her potential as a cellist at Juilliard when she moves to New York City for college. But she’s also torn between leaving her boyfriend Adam and friends behind to achieve her dreams, knowing that things are going to change soon. On one snowy winter day, Mia learns that despite all well-laid plans life is always unpredictable, leaving her with a single choice, probably the most difficult she will ever have to make.
I purposely waited a good while before beginning If I Stay because it was incredibly hyped on its release and I didn’t want that to tarnish my own experiences with it. I always hesitate with a book everyone loves, because sometimes I don’t love it as much as they did, but with Where I Went out and clogging the blogosphere with reviews, I thought I’d better get a move on before the story was completely spoiled. With this book, I fell just as hard as everyone else. I had actually managed to avoid spoilers of any kind, so I wasn’t quite sure where the book would take me. I simply knew that a girl had to choose whether to live or to die over the course of the book.
It all starts out quite straightforward. Mia and her younger brother have been granted an unexpected snow day from school, so both of her parents stay home too. When the snow starts to clear up, they head out for an amazing free day, but the roads are still slippery, and a large truck hits Mia’s family’s car. Mia winds up in a coma with an extended out-of-body experience as she does her best to decide whether life is worth living. This approach means that we can see just how deeply everything affects her; we learn the status of her family members as she does, we witness all of her visitors, and we can see how painful her choice truly is.
I loved how, despite Mia’s circumstances, we still get a complete picture of her life before the accident, told through flashbacks that make perfect sense. This doesn’t work for some novels, but it struck me hard; Mia isn’t the drama queen or mean girl that features in many teenage novels, but neither is she a wallflower. It’s easy to get the gist of her personality from the flashbacks and begin to understand just what she’s lost and what the world would lose without her. We get to know all of her family members and the depth of their relationships to her and to one another. Although I thought her family seemed at times too perfect, they needed to be for the book to really work. As for her romance with Adam, I liked that it was already somewhat on the rocks before the accident even happened due to their potential separation. It felt more real than a simple diehard teenage love story.
If I Stay is an excellent YA novel that uses a tragedy to explore very common teenage feelings of uncertainty against the world and the fragility of life. I’d recommend it!
I am an Amazon Associate. I purchased this book.
 This anthology is composed of four stories by very prominent urban fantasy / paranormal romance authors, each of roughly equal page length and often filling the gaps in their larger series. I’ll be honest, I bought this one because it had Ilona Andrews on the cover (as I would buy anything the husband and wife team write) but I read all of the stories and will give them all a bit of time in this review. All of the stories in the anthology have something to do with big, vicious dogs, as you might imagine from the title!
First up was ‘The Britlingens Go to Hell’ by Charlaine Harris. This story begins with two Britlingens, elite bodyguards, sent into a place called Hell due to a personal vendetta. This story is loosely connected with the Sookie Stackhouse series in that the Britlingens were introduced in one of the books, but otherwise is completely separate – these bodyguards live on their own world and simply travel around the universe to protect others.
This story was probably my least favorite. I didn’t really get a feel for either of the main characters, though I did like that they encountered Amelia Earhart and Narcissus. It was fun, but also a bit strange, with giant slugs featuring alongside some odd sexual mechanics. I think it would be okay for some, but I thought it a bit out of place in an urban fantasy anthology where all of the other stories resemble our world in one way or another, and it wasn’t at all what I’d expected.
The second story was the one I was looking out for, ‘Magic Mourns’ by Ilona Andrews. Kate is out of the office due to injuries from a previous book, leaving her friend Andrea, a secret werekin, in charge when a three-headed dog starts rampaging. Andrea has to defeat not only the dog but contend with her feelings for a bouda and her secret shame at her own genetic background.
Any reader of this blog will know that I adore this series and personally felt the anthology was worth the purchase for this alone. The change of perspective was actually really nice; I adore Kate, but I had read a lot about Andrea too and was quite happy to get in that additional backstory (and of course it helped that Kate appeared at the very end!). It was just fabulous to get a little bit more of this world and there is actually a surprising amount squeezed into this story even though it never feels rushed. Andrea has to deal with a lot of her own personal issues and the romance comes out exceptionally well.
‘Angels’ Judgement’ by Nalini Singh is similarly an extension of her Guild Hunters series, of which I’ve so far read the first two. In this one we learn how Sara and Deacon got together and in the process are taken along on a hunt for a rogue vampire. I enjoyed this one and I liked having a different perspective on the world along with a romance that wasn’t headed by an irritating angel, as the normal series books have been. This is set prior to the actual books so contains no spoilers for the series itself.
Last was ‘Blind Spot’ by Meljean Brook. I’ve only read Brook’s steampunk book, The Iron Duke, and none of the Guardian series in which this novella plays a part. I’ve read that it contains minor spoilers for one of the books in the series, but it wasn’t a particular concern of mine as by the time I hit book 5, I’ll have to reread this novella! Anyway, this novella is about former CIA operative Maggie who is sent with a hellhound to find a missing woman and protect her brother Geoffrey Blake. At first, neither we nor Maggie understand how a blind man can help find his sister, but Blake’s unique talents soon reveal themselves and the hunt is on.
I was fairly surprised to find myself enjoying this one and think I’d have to pick it out as my second favorite of the anthology. I enjoyed the romance and the storyline of this and really thought it gave us a lot while fitting neatly within the confines of its length. I do actually have the first full novel of the Guardians series on my TBR and am looking forward to reading it a lot more now.
Overall, this anthology was worth the money for me and provided four stories that I enjoyed, albeit to varying degrees. I’d go so far as to call it a must-read for fans of any of the latter three authors, but I wouldn’t pick up the book for the Charlaine Harris story alone.
I am an Amazon Associate. I purchased this book.
I can hardly believe it’s already May – I’m sure it was Christmas just a week ago! April has been an excellent month with a lot of leisure time. We’ve had an extra bank holiday in the UK for the royal wedding, so I am deep into my second four-day weekend and enjoying it immensely. I think I can speak for everyone when I say that I wish royalty got married more often! It was also quite a lovely wedding. I’ve mainly ignored all the build-up and endless speculation, but found myself glued to the TV when it was happening, as it was almost like watching a real life romance. I had never expected them to look so very much in love, for whatever reason, and I find myself genuinely happy for them and hoping that this marriage actually works out.
Anyway, on to the reading! I have been doing a lot of reading with my free time, as always, plus the Read-a-thon was this month, which added up to a total of 22 books read for this month. I don’t think I’ve read so much in a month since I started working!
Fiction
- The Winter Rose, Jennifer Donnelly
- These Things Hidden, Heather Gudenkauf
- A Marriage of Inconvenience, Susanna Fraser
- Howl’s Moving Castle, Diana Wynne Jones
- Shades of Milk and Honey, Mary Robinette Kowal
- Dreams Underfoot, Charles de Lint
- Lady Isabella’s Scandalous Marriage, Jennifer Ashley
- Royal Weddings, Stephanie Laurens
- Russian Winter, Daphne Kalotay
- The Dark Enquiry, Deanna Raybourn
- Must Love Hellhounds, Charlaine Harris et al
- 13 Rue Therese, Elena Mauli Shapiro
- If I Stay, Gayle Forman
- The Paris Wife, Paula McLain
- The Color Purple, Alice Walker
- Anne of the Island, L.M. Montgomery
- The Four Ms Bradwells, Meg Waite Clayton
Non-fiction
My favorite non-fiction book for the month is easy – Heretics by Jonathan Wright is the obvious front runner! I’m struggling to choose a fiction favorite, as always, but I loved The Color Purple, If I Stay, The Paris Wife, Howl’s Moving Castle, and Russian Winter.
On the agenda for May, I am planning some book lists – I have never done one before, but with two potential European trips for later this year, I really want to ensure I get some good location based reading in. I’ll be posting about those as and when I make them up. I also have a number of books I’d like to get to:
- Madame Tussaud, Michelle Moran
- Lady of the English, Elizabeth Chadwick (an early review)
- A Discovery of Witches, Deborah Harkness
- Blood Work, Holly Tucker
- The Native Star, M.K. Hobson
- Shades of Gray, Jasper Fforde
- At Home, Bill Bryson
I hope I can fit all of those in and not get distracted!
How was your reading month? Do you have any plans for May?
I am an Amazon Associate. I received some of these books for free for review.
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