In my search for books prior to vacation this year, I learned that Marie Antoinette was raised in Vienna. Since we were visiting Vienna, I decided to try a historical fiction book about her childhood.
This book was not great literature (more like a beach read), but fun to read. It followed Marie's silver-spoon childhood which comes to a screeching halt when her mother decides to marry her off. She is betrothed to Louis XVI of France who will one day be king, which will help Austria's political prospects greatly. However, Marie is scarcely more than a child, so the first third of the book is about all the training and primping and planning that goes into turning her into a proper princess.
Once she arrives at Versailles, there is a lot to get used to. There are political and social requirements and factions, there are limits to her free time and her privacy, and there is the delicate matter of getting to know her also-young husband, both privately as well as in the context of a friendship. The latter proves easier than the former, though both stump her for a while.
The book, part one of a trilogy, ends with King Louis XV's death and Marie and her husband's ascent to the throne. It will be fun to read the next book in the series when it is published.
Saturday, September 15, 2012
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
The next book I read on vacation was this one - The Historian. It is a novel about a group of people searching for Dracula - not Bram Stoker's Dracula, but the purportedly real Dracula whose myth evolved into the vampire we are familiar with today.
The book was really fun to read - it alternated between the 1970's where a young girl discovers her widowed father's fascination with Dracula and the 1950's when he was actively searching for traces of Dracula across Europe. A mix of history, adventure, and a little supernatural, the story held my attention. The narration was shared by several of the characters and various articles, letters, and other "primary sources," which made some of what would have otherwise been dry historical content easier to digest. Also keeping the book lively was the well-developed cast of characters, which included the daughter who finds her father's books, her father, father, his college professor, the professor's daughter, and many librarians, historians, monks, students, and others.
Being in Central Europe while I was reading this book was fun - there are scenes that take place in Prague, Budapest, Bucharest, and other places in the region we were in. This was a good vacation read - not fluffy by any means, but one that you need to read a chunk of at a time to really appreciate.
The book was really fun to read - it alternated between the 1970's where a young girl discovers her widowed father's fascination with Dracula and the 1950's when he was actively searching for traces of Dracula across Europe. A mix of history, adventure, and a little supernatural, the story held my attention. The narration was shared by several of the characters and various articles, letters, and other "primary sources," which made some of what would have otherwise been dry historical content easier to digest. Also keeping the book lively was the well-developed cast of characters, which included the daughter who finds her father's books, her father, father, his college professor, the professor's daughter, and many librarians, historians, monks, students, and others.
Being in Central Europe while I was reading this book was fun - there are scenes that take place in Prague, Budapest, Bucharest, and other places in the region we were in. This was a good vacation read - not fluffy by any means, but one that you need to read a chunk of at a time to really appreciate.
Monday, September 10, 2012
QBVII by Leon Uris
I hadn't read anything by Uris in years, although Exodus (about the creation of Israel) is one of my all-time favorite books. I picked this for our trip to Europe and it was a great read.
The book is about a trial - the trial of an author whose book about the Holocaust makes mention of a particular doctor's activities in a concentration camp; the doctor sues for libel. It's fast-paced, and unlike some courtroom dramas, it doesn't suffer from pages of detailed testimony. Much like Uris' other books, a great deal of the book is dedicated to the back story of each of the main characters. I did not find there to be a clear protagonist and antagonist: both the author and the doctor were characters I could root for.
I particularly enjoyed reading this while in Central Europe because in Prague and Budapest, we saw a lot of Jewish history sites from before and during the Holocaust that enabled me to better connect with some of the themes in the book. There were also several ethical dilemmas in the book (e.g., should the doctor have followed orders, should camp survivors have been asked to testify, etc...) that kept me thinking and engaged.
One note: this book was written in 1970 and in one particular way shows its age. The female characters are thin and predictable, reminiscent of Marjorie Morningstar or early Le Carre. That aside, the book still resonated with me and kept me thinking long after it was over.
The book is about a trial - the trial of an author whose book about the Holocaust makes mention of a particular doctor's activities in a concentration camp; the doctor sues for libel. It's fast-paced, and unlike some courtroom dramas, it doesn't suffer from pages of detailed testimony. Much like Uris' other books, a great deal of the book is dedicated to the back story of each of the main characters. I did not find there to be a clear protagonist and antagonist: both the author and the doctor were characters I could root for.
I particularly enjoyed reading this while in Central Europe because in Prague and Budapest, we saw a lot of Jewish history sites from before and during the Holocaust that enabled me to better connect with some of the themes in the book. There were also several ethical dilemmas in the book (e.g., should the doctor have followed orders, should camp survivors have been asked to testify, etc...) that kept me thinking and engaged.
One note: this book was written in 1970 and in one particular way shows its age. The female characters are thin and predictable, reminiscent of Marjorie Morningstar or early Le Carre. That aside, the book still resonated with me and kept me thinking long after it was over.
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