Finished this last night:
Queens' Play by Dorothy DunnettMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
I feel fairly inarticulate and incompetent to review a Dorothy Dunnett book except to say that they are complex, difficult reading, rich, fantastic, funny, sad, lovable and thoroughly worth the effort.
An example of her rich and original prose: It had been a sharp night; but now the early sun, glaring cross grained through the branches, laid fresh black contours, thinly prowling, over the people below.
And a blurb from a book jacket: "Her hero, the enigmatic Lymond, [is] Byron crossed with Lawrence of Arabia... He moves in an aura of intrigue, hidden menace and sheer physical daring."
---Times Literary Supplement (London)
How could I improve on that? He's also utterly handsome, blonde, artistic, thoroughly accomplished, brilliant (much more so than I), and a gentleman.
Her books are romance literature in the original sense - a style of heroic prose and verse narrative current in Europe from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance. Although there is a love story in this one, it is not the kind of 'romance' that is lately popularized. Far from it, thank God. Although I can enjoy a cheesy romance novel at times, a steady diet of them has turned me into a voracious reader of novels with some meat, some deeper meaning, some difficulty, and that make me think.
In this episode of Lymond's career, he learns a bitter lesson about what his ability to influence and inspire people can do when he is careless of their vulnerability and weakness.
View all my reviews
No comments:
Post a Comment