Category: HF Reading Challenge

#BlogTour #BookReview The City of Tears by Kate Mosse @RandomTTours @panmacmillan

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City of Tears BT PosterWelcome to the final stop on the blog tour for The City of Tears by Kate Mosse, which was published in paperback on 20th January 2022. My thanks to Anne at Random Things Tours for inviting me to take part in the tour and to Pan Macmillan for my digital review copy. Do check out the post by my tour buddy for today, Hayley at The Lotus Readers.

The City of TearsAbout the Book

August 1572: Minou Joubert and her family are in Paris for a Royal Wedding, an alliance between the Catholic Crown and the Huguenot King of Navarre intended to bring peace to France after a decade of religious wars. So too is their oldest enemy, Vidal, still in pursuit of a relic that will change the course of history. But within days of the marriage, thousands will lie dead in the streets and Minou’s beloved family will be scattered to the four winds…

A gripping, breathtaking novel of revenge, persecution and loss, the action sweeps from Paris and Chartres to the city of tears itself, Amsterdam.

Format: Paperback (560 pages)         Publisher: Pan Macmillan
Publication date: 20th January 2022 Genre: Historical Fiction

Find The City of Tears (The Burning Chambers #2) on Goodreads

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Hive | Amazon UK
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My Review

The City of Tears is the follow-up to the best-selling The Burning Chambers and the second book in a planned series following the fortunes of a cast of characters from 1562 to 1862. (The prologue gives a brief glimpse of the final part of the series.) If you’ve not read The Burning Chambers you need not worry because the author includes brief recaps of events in the first book and if, like me, you have limited knowledge of the Wars of Religion that are the backdrop to events in the book, the author’s Historical Note will tell you everything you need to know.

The book blends actual historical events, such as the St. Bartholomew’s Massacre, with the story of Minou and Piet Reydon, and their family. In this turbulent period of history, during which the conflict between Catholics and Protestants over religious doctrine swept across Europe, few families were left unaffected and the Reydon family are no exception.  Forced to flee France, the family become separated and Minou and Piet are left not knowing whether some of their loved ones are alive or dead. The decisions they are forced to make even threaten their previously strong relationship.  Yet, through it all, Minou never gives up hope of a reunion. ‘Even in the worst of times, it was a miracle how the human heart kept beating.’

In addition to wider geopolitical events affecting their lives, Vidal, their implacable enemy from the first book, remains in the picture. Now in a position of power within the Catholic faction, he is totally ruthless and a force to be reckoned with. A ‘malignant and vengeful man’, his actions are fuelled by a lethal combination of a desire for revenge, fanatical religious zeal and a sense of injustice. Although responsible for some unspeakable acts, one has to admit he does make a fantastic villain!

As might be expected from a series that will span three hundred years, the theme of inheritance features strongly, whether that’s by way of physical features, blood ties or ownership of assets and property. Alongside Vidal’s pursuit of relics of religious significance, objects handed down through the generations feature as well, precious memories of those who have gone before. Issues of displacement, the plight of refugees and religious intolerance remain, regrettably, only too familiar.

The historical detail in The City of Tears is evidence of the meticulous research for which the author has become renowned. The book has a great sense of place such that you can easily imagine yourself walking the streets of Paris or Amsterdam, the city of tears of the title. (To find out more about how Kate goes about research for her books you can read my write-up of her appearance at Henley Literary Festival 2021 here.) 

To plagiarise part of my review of The Burning Chambers, if you gave Mary Berry flour, butter, eggs and sugar, you could be absolutely sure she’d create the perfect Victoria sponge cake.  In the same way, in The City of Tears, Kate Mosse skilfully combines all the ingredients necessary for a deliciously satisfying historical fiction novel, including a thrilling and dramatic climax (even if, perhaps appropriately, there is the threat of soggy bottoms).

In three words: Gripping, authentic, dramatic

Try something similar: The Silver Wolf by J. C. Harvey

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Kate MosseAbout the Author

Kate Mosse is a number one international bestselling novelist, playwright and non-fiction writer. The author of eight novels and short story collections – including the multimillion-selling Languedoc Trilogy (Labyrinth, Sepulchre and Citadel) and Gothic fiction The Winter Ghosts and The Taxidermist’s Daughter, which she is adapting for the stage – her books have been translated into thirty-eight languages and published in more than forty countries. She is the Founder Director of the Women’s Prize for Fiction and a regular interviewer for theatre & fiction events. Kate divides her time between Chichester in West Sussex and Carcassonne in south-west France.

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#BookReview The Silver Wolf by J. C. Harvey @AllenAndUnwinUK @ReadersFirst1

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The Silver WolfAbout the Book

The extraordinarily rich, dark, panoramic tale of an orphaned boy’s quest for truth and then for vengeance as war rages across 17th-century Europe.

Amidst the chaos of the Thirty Years’ War, Jack Fiskardo embarks upon a quest that will carry him inexorably from France to Amsterdam and then onto the battlefields of Germany. As he grows to manhood will he be able to unravel the mystery of his father’s death? Or will his father’s killers find him first?

Format: Hardback (560 pages)          Publisher: Allen & Unwin
Publication date: 3rd February 2022 Genre: Historical Fiction

Find The Silver Wolf on Goodreads

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Disclosure: If you buy a book via the above link, I may earn a commission from Bookshop.org, whose fees support independent bookshops

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My Review

The Silver Wolf is the first book in a planned trilogy featuring the feisty and resourceful Jack Fiskardo. He’s on a mission of vengeance and, as soon becomes apparent, it’s best not to get in his way. For those like me who’ve heard of the Thirty Years War but must have been asleep the day it was covered in their history class, the author provides a useful introduction to the political situation at the time. And, joy of joys, there’s a map as well showing Europe looking very different from the way it does today.

At first I wasn’t sure about the non-chronological structure of the book, which is divided into three parts, but it soon made sense. It’s May 1619 when the reader is first introduced to Jack. He’s a waif and stray, alone in the world but evidently capable of looking after himself if needed.  In part two, the reader is taken back in time, finding out more about Jack’s childhood and the events that shaped him. These include the origin of his proficiency with a sword or knife, and his natural horsemanship. We also learn about the events that will fuel his relentless quest for revenge, a quest that will take him across the war-torn continent of Europe.

There’s a picaresque quality to the novel with Jack encountering many colourful characters during his adventures. Some of my favourites were tavern owner Magda and her partner Paola, or to address her by her full name, Paola di Benedetta di Silvia. ‘Woman soldier. Hippolyte. Battle-bitch. Freak.’ An elite swordswoman herself, Paola plays an important role in honing Jack’s swordsmanship, building on the natural talent that is already evident. She provides him with some life lessons as well.

The Silver Wolf positively oozes period atmosphere such as this description of the cosmopolitan clientele of The Carpenter’s Hat inn. ‘As they make their way across the room the two men pass a game of dice, another of backgammon, a dinner-party of Venetian merchants crooning madrigals a cappella, a pedlar attempting to sell the dinner-party a tiny trembling monkey in a tasselled bolero’ as well as the innkeeper’s daughter with her ‘face bright with fiery rouge’ and ‘breasts bared almost to the nipple’.

The third and final part of the book, set between the years 1623 and 1630, picks up the story from the end of part one. Having attached himself to a company in the army of General Tilly, commander of the Catholic League’s forces, Jack has his first experience of battle, and a bloody business it is too. The author conjures up the sights and sounds of the battlefield through the eyes of army sutler (victualler), Cyrius.

‘Nothing of it is as he had expected…. These roiling clouds of grey and white. These whirling clots and straggling lines of men. The appalling lightning-like flashes in the smoke. The riderless horses, seeming in their terror not even to know to put the battlefield behind them. The cannon, there on the bald rise, hurling their shot overhead; the crowd at the battlefield’s edge, God above, as if this was a prize-fight at a fair; and all about him, everywhere, this terrible noise, which is both one sound and has somehow distinguishable within it every scream and detonation of which it is made up… This is hell, Cyrius thinks. This is what it sounds like down in hell.’

In the years that follow, Jack’s prowess on the battlefield, in hand-to-hand combat and his seeming invincibility earn him a fearsome reputation as a so-called ‘hard out man’, marked by the silver pendant he wears around his neck. The desire to avenge his father spurs him on, determined that nothing or no-one will stop him, even if it takes years. He has a job to do and, have no doubt, he’s going to do it.

The Silver Wolf is a rip-roaring adventure story with a fabulous central character who, with his facility for getting himself out of tight spots, is a sort of 17th century James Bond. The book is jam-packed with historical detail, has some lively touches of humour and a compelling plot. At over 500 pages, it’s a chunky read but well worth the time investment as far as I’m concerned. I shall be eagerly awaiting the next instalment, an extract from which is included at the end of the book and which has the brilliant first line ‘Now – where were we?’

I received an advance reader copy courtesy of Allen & Unwin via Readers First.

In three words: Action-packed, lively, dramatic

Try something similar: Master of War by David Gilman

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Jacky Colliss HarveyAbout the Author

J. C. Harvey is the fiction pen-name for best-selling non-fiction author Jacky Colliss Harvey. After studying English at Cambridge, and History of Art at the Courtauld Institute of Art, Jacky worked in museum publishing for twenty years, first at the National Portrait Gallery and then at the Royal Collection Trust, where she set up the Trust’s first commercial publishing programme.

The extraordinary history of the Thirty Years War (1618-48) and of 17th-century Europe has been an obsession of hers for as long as she can remember, and was the inspiration behind the Fiskardo’s War series, which begins now with The Silver Wolf, marking her fiction debut.

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