Destination: Paris (Belle Epoque–1880s-1920s)
Book: I Always Loved You by Robin Oliveira (New February 2014)
Mary Cassatt and Edgar Degas–(shown here in portrait and self-portrait by Degas) a dysfunctional romance if there was one. That is not a typo. (I did not mean to type “if ever there was one”.)
It is clear in reading I Always Loved You: A Novel
Talk about adventure travel! Robert Lyndon’s book of adventure travel in the Middle Ages will have you holding your breath as you flip through the pages. I found myself diving headlong into the adventures of French mercenary, Vallon, as he roamed through Medieval England, Scotland, Norway, Iceland, Greenland, Russia to Greece to Anatolia (modern Turkey) surviving one hair-raising adventure after another. And to add to my awe, this is a first novel, although Lyndon is an experienced non-fiction writer. Continue reading Medieval AdventureTravel Comes With Breathtaking Adventure
Destination: Istanbul and Anatolia Turkey (Early 20th Century)
Book: The Dervish by Frances Kazan (NEW February, 2013)
Frances Kazan bases her historical novel on a fairly well-known period of history–post World War I, but it concerns Turkey–whose history is not widely known in the West. Because Kazan has devoted years to the study of Turkish history, and has written an academic book about Halide Edip, a woman who played a key role in Turkey’s Nationalism movement, the reader will learn the actual details of the struggles between Allied powers, Greeks and Turks as modern Turkey took shape and the Ottoman Empire ended. Continue reading Two Women and the End of the Ottoman Empire
