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It is romantic and interesting - a true page turner. For historical fiction lovers, this is a must read. I loved this book beginning to end.
just thought the seller should know since they had one other for sell too. this book as advertised should be red covered with the genenology on the inside flap but i got a green covered book with no genenology. i was very disapointed but happy to have obtained a copy of a hard back that i am not eager to complain.
Anya Seton's inability to probe her characters and map out their interior realities meant for very tedious reading. if you are picky about good writing, you know who you are. So I would skip this one. And the love scenes were embarrassingly tacky in the setup and writing (e.g. So, from the perspective of writing a good novel, this book was a failure. In places where she should have been fleshing out the thoughts and feelings of key characters, she instead fills the story with an endlessly changing cast of minor characters, uninteresting (even distracting) descriptive details, and irrelevant dialogue that does little to explain the big "whys" behind the current political situation and her characters' actions.
this was a "fluffy" read and not worth your time. The concept of this novel is fantastic; what a shame that it wasn't written up by someone with more skill at writing novels. This just wasn't a novel. Katherine and John of Gaunt were not believable or likeable characters and the reasons for their love eluded me; as far as I can tell from the book, the reason for their attraction was purely physical, which is very unsatisfying.
How unbelievable, what silliness). eeeeewwwww. If name-dropping characters and dates counts, this book was "historical." But, a good historical novel should flesh out more of the "whys" behind those historical happenings. I am astonished that this book gets such excellent reviews.
I might as well have learned about what these people did by reading a wikipedia article. John of Gaunt, depressed about the recent death of his wife, asks to meet with Katherine to thank her for fetching a priest for his wife before she died of the plague. Instead, we get cardboard characters who act in predictable ways and many who act without any comment or interpretation from the author. For me, a novel must "get inside" the character's heads, there must be introspection.
And, from the perspective of writing a good historical novel, it was additionally a failure. Conveniently, there is a bed right there in the room. Frankly, the novel felt clunky and unfocused. within two pages of conversation, he is suddenly struck by how gorgeous Katherine is and starts forcing himself on her.
I highly recommend it for anyone with an interest in English history and epic novels. I first read this book when I was 15.it has not lost any of its charm or vibrancy.
The historic information was great. I read Ken Follett's Pillars and World without End. It was interesting to follow the relationships and customs of the time. After reading all three books, it is obvious that our society today is no worse than it was in the 12,14 or 15th century. I wanted to read more from that historic time and found Katherine. Our small book club read it and we all liked it.
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