Mailbox Monday was created by Marcia and is now hosted on its own blog.
The Second World War by Antony Beevor (purchased)
Lethal Rider by Larissa Ione (bought)
Immortal Rider by Larissa Ione (bought)
Isabella of France: The Rebel Queen by Kathryn Warner (bought)
The House of Godwine: The History of a Dynasty by Emma Mason (bought)
Aethelred II: King of the English, 978-1016 by Ryan Lavelle (bought)
The Life and Times of Edward II by Caroline Bingham (bought)
Hanging Mary by Susan HigginbothamThe untold story of Lincoln’s Assassination
1864, Washington City. One has to be careful with talk of secession, of Confederate whispers falling on Northern ears. Better to speak only when in the company of the trustworthy. Like Mrs. Surratt.
A widow who runs a small boardinghouse on H Street, Mary Surratt isn’t half as committed to the cause as her son, Johnny. If he’s not delivering messages or escorting veiled spies, he’s invited home men like John Wilkes Booth, the actor who is even more charming in person than he is on the stage.
But when President Lincoln is killed, the question of what Mary knew becomes more important than anything else. Was she a cold-blooded accomplice? Just how far would she go to help her son?
Based on the true case of Mary Surratt, Hanging Mary reveals the untold story of those on the other side of the assassin’s gun. (publisher)
I have to confess that I don’t know much about Lincoln and hadn’t ever heard of Mary Surratt before. So this was all very new for me. I don’t usually read books about US history but I’ve loved Higginbotham’s previous books and wanted to give this a chance. And I’m glad I did.
Mary Surrat is a widower living in Washington trying to make living after her husband’s death left her in debts. She started to run a boardinghouse and business has started to pic up when President Lincoln is assassinated and the whole house is under suspicion. The man accused of the murder, John Wilkes Booth, is a friend of Mary’s son Johnny and has been spending time in the boardinghouse. Johnny is also one of the accused and Mary can’t believe her son has anything to do with the murder.
Nora Fitzpartick is one of the boarders who befriends Booth and becomes a suspect because of her friends.
It started little slow but soon started to pick up the pace and I wanted to keep reading wanting to know what would happen.
I resisted googling what would happen hoping someone would believe Mary and give her pardon. I liked Mary and Nora, even if Mary was little too blind to see what her doted son was up to. Nora was loyal to her friends until the end and trying everything she could do to save Mary.
I really liked this and I learned so much more about the period.
3,5/5
Published: Sourcebooks (March 2016)
Format: ebook
Source: Netgalley
Mailbox Monday was created by Marcia and is now hosted on its own blog.
Here’s what I got in the last 3 weeks:
Magic Stars by Ilona Andrews (bought)
Magic Shifts by Ilona Andrews (bought)
An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir (purchased)
King John: Treachery, Tyranny and the Road to Magna Carta by Marc Morris (purchased)
Augustus: From Revolutionary to Emperor by Adrian Goldsworthy (purchased)
A Day of Fire: A Novel of Pompeii by Stephanie Dray, E. Knight, Ben Kane (bought)
Mailbox Monday was created by Marcia and is now hosted on its own blog.
The Dead Duke, His Secret Wife and the Missing Corpse by Piu Marie Eatwell (bought)
Fall of Night by Rachel Caine (bought)
Médicis Daughter by Sophie PerinotWinter, 1564. Beautiful young Princess Margot is summoned to the court of France, where nothing is what it seems and a wrong word can lead to ruin. Known across Europe as Madame la Serpente, Margot’s intimidating mother, Queen Catherine de Médicis, is a powerful force in a country devastated by religious war. Among the crafty nobility of the royal court, Margot learns the intriguing and unspoken rules she must live by to please her poisonous family.
Eager to be an obedient daughter, Margot accepts her role as a marriage pawn, even as she is charmed by the powerful, charismatic Duc de Guise. Though Margot’s heart belongs to Guise, her hand will be offered to Henri of Navarre, a Huguenot leader and a notorious heretic looking to seal a tenuous truce. But the promised peace is a mirage: her mother’s schemes are endless, and her brothers plot vengeance in the streets of Paris. When Margot’s wedding devolves into the bloodshed of the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre, she will be forced to choose between her family and her soul.
Médicis Daughter is historical fiction at its finest, weaving a unique coming-of-age story and a forbidden love with one of the most dramatic and violent events in French history. (publisher)
The book started really slow and I was thinking about quitting but at halfway through it changed when things started to happen. I’m glad I kept reading because the latter part was really good.
We follow Margot from her childhood when she joins the court of her brother Charles IX to St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre. During that time, she learns to get less innocent and learn to stand up to herself.
My biggest problem, especially at the start, was Margot. I didn’t like her and she was just too naïve. How Catherine de Médici could have such a naïve daughter is a wonder. She did got more likeable towards the end but for some reason I never really warmed up for her.
However, I did like how everyone else was presented in the book. Since books usually focus on Catherine de Médici, it was especially interesting to see her through the eyes of her daughter.
This book doesn’t cover her whole life, and I was left wondering how Perinot would have covered her later life. This was my first book by the author and now I’m more curious to read The Sister Queens which I own.
3,5/5
Published: St. Martin’s Press (December 2015)
Format: ebook
Pages: 384
Source: Netgalley