Skip to main content

Quick Review: "The Lady's Slipper" by Deborah Swift

 
From Goodreads:  1660. King Charles II has returned from exile, but memories of the English Civil War still rankle. There are old scores to settle, and religious differences threaten to overturn a fragile peace. When Alice Ibbetson discovers a rare orchid, the Lady’s Slipper, growing in a wood belonging to Richard Wheeler, she is captivated by its beauty— though Wheeler, a Quaker, is determined to keep the flower where God intended it to grow. Knowing that the orchid is the last of its kind, she steals the flower, little dreaming that her seemingly simple act will set off a chain of events that will lead to murder and exile, and change her life forever…

My Thoughts:  The Lady's Slipper was not at all what I expected it to be but it wound up being a decent read.  The story took me a while to get into.  It started very abruptly and I couldn't understand what was going on and why Alice decided to steal the flower.  It was only after I had read a bit that I began to see where the story is going.

The story takes place not long after the Restoration in England.  Alice kind of seemed like a secondary character as the story mostly focuses on the battles between the Quakers and the Royalists.  Alice stealing the lady's slipper kind of became part of the background as all of the other events played out.  I don't know much about this time period so it was interesting to see how even after the Restoration, the tensions were still very high among everyday people.  I liked the characters but it felt like it took a really long time to get to know them.  I didn't really start liking Alice and Wheeler until I was about half way through the book.

Overall, the story was unique and interesting but I feel like there could have been so much more to it. 3 stars.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Review: "Oleanna" by Julie K. Rose

Synopsis:  Set during the separation of Norway from Sweden in 1905, this richly detailed novel of love and loss was inspired by the life of the author's great-great-aunts. Oleanna and her sister Elisabeth are the last of their family working their farm deep in the western fjordland. A new century has begun, and the world outside is changing, but in the Sunnfjord their world is as small and secluded as the verdant banks of a high mountain lake. The arrival of Anders, a cotter living just across the farm's border, unsettles Oleanna 's peaceful but isolated existence. Sharing a common bond of loneliness and grief, Anders stirs within her the wildness and wanderlust she has worked so hard to tame. When she is confronted with another crippling loss, Oleanna must decide once and for all how to face her past, claim her future, and find her place in a wide new world. My Thoughts:   I was very surprised by what an absolutely beautiful story Oleanna is.  The ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Review and Giveaway: "Distant Signs" by Anne Richter

Synopsis: Distant Signs is an intimate portrait of two families spanning three generations amidst turbulent political change, behind and beyond the Berlin Wall. In 1960s East Germany, Margret, a professor’s daughter from the city, meets and marries Hans, from a small village in Thuringia. The couple struggle to contend with their different backgrounds, and the emotional scars they bear from childhood in the aftermath of war. As East German history gradually unravels, with collision of the personal and political, their two families’ hidden truths are quietly revealed. An exquisitely written novel with strongly etched characters that stay with you long after the book is finished and an authentic portrayal of family life behind the iron curtain based on personal experience of the author who is East German and was 16 years old at the fall of the Berlin Wall. Why do families repeat destructive patterns of behaviour across generations? Should the personal take precedence over...
Post a Comment
Read more

Mailbox Monday (49)

It's time for another Mailbox Monday post!  Once again I could not resist the cheap ebooks that Amazon and Barnes and Noble were promoting this week.  I really need to stop!  I already have more than I can read.  I also was able to spend a little time browsing at the library and I came home with a nice stack of books.  These days, I hardly ever get to spend time at the library by myself for more than a minute or two so it was wonderful to have time to just wander and see what I could find. Purchased (for kindle): The Color of Secrets by Lindsay Ashford The One I Was by Eliza Graham House of Bathory by Linda Lafferty   Purchased (for nook): One Night in Winter by Simon Sebag Montefiore  Becoming Queen Victoria by Kate Williams From the Library: The Messenger by Daniel Silva   The Ripper's Wife by Brandy Purdy Hotel Moscow by Talia Carner Brazen by Katherine Longshore What books did you get...
15 comments
Read more