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Illumination
A powerful story of revolution, love and intense rivalry set in 1870 during the four-month siege of Paris.
1870. All over Paris the lights are going out. The Prussians are encircling the city and Europe's capital of decadent pleasure and luxury is becoming a prison, its citizens caught between defiance and despair. Desperate times lie ahead as the worst winter for decades sets in and starvation looms. One man seems to shine like a beacon in the shadows. Jean-Jacques Allix promises to be the leader the people need, to save the city itself. Painter Hannah Pardy, his young English lover, believes in him utterly; taking up arms for his cause, she is drawn into the heart of the battle for Paris. But as the darkness and panic spreads it is harder and harder to see things as they really are, and Hannah struggles to separate love from self-interest and revolutionaries from traitors. Faced with impossible decisions, Hannah must confront the devastating reality of her beloved Paris to establish what truly matters to her - and what she will do to protect it.
1870. All over Paris the lights are going out. The Prussians are encircling the city and Europe's capital of decadent pleasure and luxury is becoming a prison, its citizens caught between defiance and despair. Desperate times lie ahead as the worst winter for decades sets in and starvation looms. One man seems to shine like a beacon in the shadows. Jean-Jacques Allix promises to be the leader the people need, to save the city itself. Painter Hannah Pardy, his young English lover, believes in him utterly; taking up arms for his cause, she is drawn into the heart of the battle for Paris. But as the darkness and panic spreads it is harder and harder to see things as they really are, and Hannah struggles to separate love from self-interest and revolutionaries from traitors. Faced with impossible decisions, Hannah must confront the devastating reality of her beloved Paris to establish what truly matters to her - and what she will do to protect it.
320 pages, Paperback
First published August 1, 2012
6 people are currently reading
116 people want to read
About the author
Matthew Plampin
9 books20 followersMatthew Plampin was born in 1975 and grew up in Essex. He read English and History of Art at the University of Birmingham and then completed a PhD at the Courtauld Institute of Art, London. He now lectures on nineteenth-century art and architecture.
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
January 17, 2013
As always, Matthew Plampin brings history to life in the form of a wonderfully paced tale about the everyday horrors of life in Paris during the siege.
Illumination is a little slow to start, it took a few chapters for me to really get into it, but slowly, by inches, the plot winds itself into a tight, addictive, absorbing tale, as Clem and Hanna Pardy - a pair of not altogether likeable English twins, and their mother Elizabeth, a domineering, ambitious writer - become trapped in Paris during the Franco-Prussian War. All is set against a background of artists and café society, revolutionary communards, rabble-rousers, courtesans, balloonists and spies, to form a wonderfully twisted tale of ambition, deceit and double-dealing.
I love Matthew Plampin’s writing, and while Illumination doesn’t quite match his incandescent The Street Philosopher, it’s not too far behind. The history makes an impeccable and detailed background for the lives of his characters – wonderfully well-drawn personalities. I never once felt I was reading about imaginary characters, these people felt absolutely real.
Illumination is a little slow to start, it took a few chapters for me to really get into it, but slowly, by inches, the plot winds itself into a tight, addictive, absorbing tale, as Clem and Hanna Pardy - a pair of not altogether likeable English twins, and their mother Elizabeth, a domineering, ambitious writer - become trapped in Paris during the Franco-Prussian War. All is set against a background of artists and café society, revolutionary communards, rabble-rousers, courtesans, balloonists and spies, to form a wonderfully twisted tale of ambition, deceit and double-dealing.
I love Matthew Plampin’s writing, and while Illumination doesn’t quite match his incandescent The Street Philosopher, it’s not too far behind. The history makes an impeccable and detailed background for the lives of his characters – wonderfully well-drawn personalities. I never once felt I was reading about imaginary characters, these people felt absolutely real.
August 12, 2014
Tedious, I feel as if I had an assignment to read a book at school and had to finish it to write a book review. Why bother I was asking myself. Because I don't like leaving a book half read and having abandoned Cloud Atlas this year I could't justify it to myself to give up again. Usually a book of this size would take a couple of days read, this took 5 weeks.
The characters are either wet, annoying or pathetic, the balloon pilot was the only character I actually liked. The story was laborious and dull in so many places, by the end I didn't care who wrote the letter or why.
It did pique my interest in the events of 1870 Paris during the Franco/Prussian war to find out a bit of the history (by reading from other factual sources), it tied in nicely with the other book I am reading by Edward Rutherford on the city, that book I highly recommend.
As always this is my finding of the book, the writing did flow it was the characters lack of character that ruined it for me.
The characters are either wet, annoying or pathetic, the balloon pilot was the only character I actually liked. The story was laborious and dull in so many places, by the end I didn't care who wrote the letter or why.
It did pique my interest in the events of 1870 Paris during the Franco/Prussian war to find out a bit of the history (by reading from other factual sources), it tied in nicely with the other book I am reading by Edward Rutherford on the city, that book I highly recommend.
As always this is my finding of the book, the writing did flow it was the characters lack of character that ruined it for me.
November 30, 2016
This novel is set during the Siege of Paris in 1870, ending just after the French surrender prior to the advent of the Commune. I had rather hoped that it would cover the period of the Commune, which I find fascinating. (That reminds me, I must read La Débâcle.) The narrative follows an unconventional English family who end up trapped in Paris and dragged into the politics and danger of the city’s defense. I can’t quite put my finger on what exactly, but something about the family of Elizabeth, Hannah, and Clement did not ring 19th century to me. I found them fairly interesting as characters, they just did not seem plausible in an 1870 context. It is a subtle and difficult art to immerse a reader in historical events and unfortunately ‘Illumination’ did not quite manage to drag me into the Siege of Paris. It was rather frustrating, really, because I wanted to enjoy this novel more than I was able to. On the one hand, there were occasional great character interactions; on the other, the pacing was odd and could have benefited from division into more chapters. Actually, it occurs to me that the French characters seemed much more convincing than the English. Maybe this novel simply wasn’t quite French enough in its outlook? Or perhaps I am just especially particular about historical fiction.
April 29, 2013
I haven't read any of Matthew Plampin's other novels but I was immediately seduced by the beautiful cover of Illumination and the fact it deals with a period of history which fascinates me, the 1870 Siege of Paris. Unfortunately I was less fascinated by the narrative which was rather plodding at times and the characters failed to engage me. Like a good soldier, I persevered...but perhaps Plampin is just not for me.
December 23, 2019
Illumination is set during the Franco-Prussian War, during the Siege of Paris in 1870. Hannah Pardy is a young English painter who fled her life in London to pursue her art in the more liberal Paris. She is now the lover of the illustrious Jean-Jacques Allix, an enigma of a man viewed as a heroic symbol of the resistance. In the early days of the siege, her cunning mother and adventurous brother show up in Paris, hoping to convince Hannah to return to safety in England - but instead, end up caught up in the events to come.
This was a novel that never more than mildly interested me, and I found the driving points of the plot suspiciously convenient. The characters never seemed to add up, and I could not bring myself to care all that much what happened to them.
Hannah, the main character, seemed an unlikable heroine - particularly in her insistance on seeing the bad in people, especially in her relationship with her mother, Elizabeth.
From the very beginning, Hannah calls her mother by her name, instead of “mother” or something parental, and this is never explained. Because of this, I was confused in the beginning, assuming that Elizabeth must be Hannah’s friend or relative. I only realized a bit later that she was actually her mother.
Hannah is constantly describing her mother as something akin to an evil witch to the reader, and she is merciless in her hatred of her mother. However, although Elizabeth was certainly a scheming woman, she was the only character in the book that I found truly interesting. She is a vivacious, beautiful woman who has traveled the world and found success as a writer. I wished that the book would have filled out her character more, or very importantly, gave us an explanation for Hannah’s bitterness toward her.
I found the approach to the female characters in this book questionable: The book opens in London, with Hannah’s mother attempting to persuade her to pose nude for a famous painter. Hannah then runs away to Paris, outraged. This topic then comes up numerous times - it is suggested that Hannah should “offer herself” to a famous painter (to which she responds with heavy costernation), and later in the book, Hannah has a long debate with herself over whether or not she should consider “offering herself” to a well known artist (not someone she knows or has even met, just a random famous person). I found all of this very strange. It seemed that by going back to this point again and again, the author was trying to tell us: “Look, Hannah is not the sort of girl who will go posing nude and sleeping around, okay?!”
In contrast, there is Laure Fleurot, who is described in the book numerous times as “the tart.” The author makes her a lascivious, very over the top character, with such gratuitious and constant sexual exploits, it quickly grows ridiculous. Laure, who is of course fiercely disliked by Hannah, has zero character except for her cartoonishly overdone sexuality: rough sex, talking dirty in public, flashing random people, inviting groups of men to grope her in a bar for no apparent reason, dancing on tables, having lesbian orgies in front of an audience…
I felt as if the author had this idea that his heroine would have to be straight-laced and uptight, randomly insisting countless times that she would never pose nude or “offer herself” to strange men (okay…?), while the only other young female character in the book had to be someone out of a porn film.
I found both portrayals laughably ridiculous, and a wildly inaccurate approach to women.
Numerous other elements of the plot seemed not to add up. For example, Clement and Elizabeth travel to Paris after recieving a letter stating that Hannah is unsafe there. Once they arrive, concerned and worried, Hannah is surprised and tells them that the letter is a lie. (She is also furious and annoyed that they have showed up in her life, despite the fact that they braved the siege to reach her! But, I have already mentioned how unlikable of a character she is, I suppose.) For the rest of the book, the question “Who wrote the letter?” hangs over everyone in the group. Everyone seems to readily agree that whoever wrote it was delivering a low blow to Hannah, trying to get her out of the city, and the entire affair is treated like a dark, ominous scandal.
Huh? The city is about to be under siege and swept up in battles and food shortages. Why is the idea that Hannah leave the city so unbelievable and evil? I kept asking myself just why everyone cared so much about that letter, and why it continued to be brought up with such dark undertones.
Also, Hannah is a painter, and in the beginning of the book, her entire character seems to revolve around this descriptor. However, as the story progresses, she gradually abandons her painting and rarely mentions it anymore. Conveniently, she eventually declares that she wants to join her lover’s citizen militia, because “Paris no longer has any need for painters.” And yet, after stumbling into one skirmish, she never involves herself with the militia again.
The twist at the end was the only part of the book that sparked any interest in me, and though it was a bit cliched, I thought that it was one of the only things the author did well.
In short, I disliked the characters and illogical plot devices used here, and never found the writing good enough to intrigue me.
This was a novel that never more than mildly interested me, and I found the driving points of the plot suspiciously convenient. The characters never seemed to add up, and I could not bring myself to care all that much what happened to them.
Hannah, the main character, seemed an unlikable heroine - particularly in her insistance on seeing the bad in people, especially in her relationship with her mother, Elizabeth.
From the very beginning, Hannah calls her mother by her name, instead of “mother” or something parental, and this is never explained. Because of this, I was confused in the beginning, assuming that Elizabeth must be Hannah’s friend or relative. I only realized a bit later that she was actually her mother.
Hannah is constantly describing her mother as something akin to an evil witch to the reader, and she is merciless in her hatred of her mother. However, although Elizabeth was certainly a scheming woman, she was the only character in the book that I found truly interesting. She is a vivacious, beautiful woman who has traveled the world and found success as a writer. I wished that the book would have filled out her character more, or very importantly, gave us an explanation for Hannah’s bitterness toward her.
I found the approach to the female characters in this book questionable: The book opens in London, with Hannah’s mother attempting to persuade her to pose nude for a famous painter. Hannah then runs away to Paris, outraged. This topic then comes up numerous times - it is suggested that Hannah should “offer herself” to a famous painter (to which she responds with heavy costernation), and later in the book, Hannah has a long debate with herself over whether or not she should consider “offering herself” to a well known artist (not someone she knows or has even met, just a random famous person). I found all of this very strange. It seemed that by going back to this point again and again, the author was trying to tell us: “Look, Hannah is not the sort of girl who will go posing nude and sleeping around, okay?!”
In contrast, there is Laure Fleurot, who is described in the book numerous times as “the tart.” The author makes her a lascivious, very over the top character, with such gratuitious and constant sexual exploits, it quickly grows ridiculous. Laure, who is of course fiercely disliked by Hannah, has zero character except for her cartoonishly overdone sexuality: rough sex, talking dirty in public, flashing random people, inviting groups of men to grope her in a bar for no apparent reason, dancing on tables, having lesbian orgies in front of an audience…
I felt as if the author had this idea that his heroine would have to be straight-laced and uptight, randomly insisting countless times that she would never pose nude or “offer herself” to strange men (okay…?), while the only other young female character in the book had to be someone out of a porn film.
I found both portrayals laughably ridiculous, and a wildly inaccurate approach to women.
Numerous other elements of the plot seemed not to add up. For example, Clement and Elizabeth travel to Paris after recieving a letter stating that Hannah is unsafe there. Once they arrive, concerned and worried, Hannah is surprised and tells them that the letter is a lie. (She is also furious and annoyed that they have showed up in her life, despite the fact that they braved the siege to reach her! But, I have already mentioned how unlikable of a character she is, I suppose.) For the rest of the book, the question “Who wrote the letter?” hangs over everyone in the group. Everyone seems to readily agree that whoever wrote it was delivering a low blow to Hannah, trying to get her out of the city, and the entire affair is treated like a dark, ominous scandal.
Huh? The city is about to be under siege and swept up in battles and food shortages. Why is the idea that Hannah leave the city so unbelievable and evil? I kept asking myself just why everyone cared so much about that letter, and why it continued to be brought up with such dark undertones.
Also, Hannah is a painter, and in the beginning of the book, her entire character seems to revolve around this descriptor. However, as the story progresses, she gradually abandons her painting and rarely mentions it anymore. Conveniently, she eventually declares that she wants to join her lover’s citizen militia, because “Paris no longer has any need for painters.” And yet, after stumbling into one skirmish, she never involves herself with the militia again.
The twist at the end was the only part of the book that sparked any interest in me, and though it was a bit cliched, I thought that it was one of the only things the author did well.
In short, I disliked the characters and illogical plot devices used here, and never found the writing good enough to intrigue me.
January 30, 2017
The premise and setting of this book are interesting, and the danger and political conflicts stirring the narrative should make this a gripping read, but for some reason the characters come across as a little ghostly - not quite fleshed out.
The story centres around Hannah Pardy, a young English woman seeking to develop herself as a painter in Impressionist Paris, who becomes embroiled with a leftist political idealist with a mysterious past. As intriguing as this might sound, Hannah has a stubbornness to her character that is both relatable and frustrating as for two thirds of the book it is mostly expressed through temper tantrums and storming off. As the book escalates her narrative becomes more engaging, but in the final chapters of the book her character, rather than having an arc, has come almost full circle. Her brother Clement, although having an exotic love affair and an escapade in a hot air balloon, remains more or less a rudderless buffoon. In contrast to this, their mother twists every instance to her own advantage - effectively blinkering herself to the emotions of her children. This serves to help the reader feel the tense relationship between the Pardy's, but also places a barrier before any genuine sympathy that might develop for the protagonists.
The dark figure of Jean-Jacques Allix - Hannah's mysterious lover pops in and out of the narrative like a dark shadow, propelling the story, but never present long enough to come across as a natural part of it, which makes certain revelations about his character less than surprising.
The best thing this book has going for it is the setting: besieged Paris in the last year of the Franco-Prussian War has echos of Les Miserables and even Moulin Rouge, and is coloured in the hues of Manet, Toulouse-Lautrec and van Gough. However, its characters laboriously turn, rather than drive the narrative which doesn't take us anywhere we did not expect to go.
The story centres around Hannah Pardy, a young English woman seeking to develop herself as a painter in Impressionist Paris, who becomes embroiled with a leftist political idealist with a mysterious past. As intriguing as this might sound, Hannah has a stubbornness to her character that is both relatable and frustrating as for two thirds of the book it is mostly expressed through temper tantrums and storming off. As the book escalates her narrative becomes more engaging, but in the final chapters of the book her character, rather than having an arc, has come almost full circle. Her brother Clement, although having an exotic love affair and an escapade in a hot air balloon, remains more or less a rudderless buffoon. In contrast to this, their mother twists every instance to her own advantage - effectively blinkering herself to the emotions of her children. This serves to help the reader feel the tense relationship between the Pardy's, but also places a barrier before any genuine sympathy that might develop for the protagonists.
The dark figure of Jean-Jacques Allix - Hannah's mysterious lover pops in and out of the narrative like a dark shadow, propelling the story, but never present long enough to come across as a natural part of it, which makes certain revelations about his character less than surprising.
The best thing this book has going for it is the setting: besieged Paris in the last year of the Franco-Prussian War has echos of Les Miserables and even Moulin Rouge, and is coloured in the hues of Manet, Toulouse-Lautrec and van Gough. However, its characters laboriously turn, rather than drive the narrative which doesn't take us anywhere we did not expect to go.
November 16, 2018
I really enjoyed this historical novel set in the chaotic & violent Paris of 1870-71...the notorious Franco-Prussian War...when French 'amour propre' & arrogance was cast-down by Bismarck & the Prussian military machine, into the usual, tiresome counter-productive, political sewers of revolutionary France...with a small red 'r' for revolution....& a white flag...& on to the surrender in Hall of Mirrors at Versailles! ' Guten tag, mein herr.....your signature, Monsieur le President'!
The main characters are humanly interesting in their range & colouring...artists, journalists, provocateurs, aerostiers, & vivandieres!...all adding to the well-plotted, if at times fanciful, plot.
The English family who become entwined in the unfolding drama, dovetail dangerously with the ordinary French people who are as varied as their opinions on the crumbling Empire, divisive socialism, applied technology & the considerable merits of Prussian artillery, or the vainglorious courage of French firebrand agitators against the hated bourgeoisie! A bas!
To watch a great city self-immolate is always a good read; and Paris has made a habit of such ingrained insanity throughout its bloody history. Man the barricades...the Prussians/Germans are coming!....again! Will the English bleed for them again too?! I think not, mes copains!!
Joking apart...this is a very good read...but not recommended for francophiles!!
The main characters are humanly interesting in their range & colouring...artists, journalists, provocateurs, aerostiers, & vivandieres!...all adding to the well-plotted, if at times fanciful, plot.
The English family who become entwined in the unfolding drama, dovetail dangerously with the ordinary French people who are as varied as their opinions on the crumbling Empire, divisive socialism, applied technology & the considerable merits of Prussian artillery, or the vainglorious courage of French firebrand agitators against the hated bourgeoisie! A bas!
To watch a great city self-immolate is always a good read; and Paris has made a habit of such ingrained insanity throughout its bloody history. Man the barricades...the Prussians/Germans are coming!....again! Will the English bleed for them again too?! I think not, mes copains!!
Joking apart...this is a very good read...but not recommended for francophiles!!
September 3, 2017
I could not fault the writing. The research and history is also admirable, but that word 'admirable" does hint at a shortcoming. I found the book ponderous at times. The plot was not especially convoluted and what there was was drawn out. The book title hints at something profound but is not especially relevant to anything that occurs though I did like the book's packaging. Perhaps I failed to warm to the characters? Inglis the English journalist was the character I could picture most easily, but I could not empathise with the Pardy family, who are at the centre of the story. The siege of Paris as a history is certainly 'illuminated' and I am pleased I finished the book because the author clearly put considerable effort into it. Perhaps with a little less fussiness, 100 less pages, and extra emphasis on a pacy plot this would have earned an extra star or two.
February 13, 2021
Read because of the setting in besieged Paris 1870-early 1871, this was ultimately too plodding and with less than endearing characters to sustain the 380-odd pages. Hannah is a young painter self-exiled to Paris, fleeing from an over-bearing mother, Elizabeth. The mother along with Clem, Hannah’s feckless twin, is summoned to Paris where they are trapped with an assortment of characters. Betrayal and melodrama mix with action, (a balloon ride is quite exciting), as implausible coincidences lead to an underwhelming end
June 20, 2020
Not very well written in my opinion, too many modern phrases,words, unnecessary scenes - two pages of the slaughter of the elephant in the Paris zoo - what was that for? to show he'd done his research?
Took ages to read.
Took ages to read.
May 21, 2017
Gave up after about page 50. The story just did not grab me.
May 5, 2019
2.5 really. Calling your mother by her first name in Victorian Britain, that really irked me.
January 24, 2020
A laborious plot, for the most part lacking in historical accuracy.
The dialogue, stilted and oddly unemotional to say nothing of, at times, confusing. Given that the main female protagonist (Hannah) always referred to what turned out to be her mother not as mother/mum etc the relationship wasn't clear; were they somehow related or merely friends? It took me a while to work it out.
As for the characters, cardboard cliches, the females one of two types; like the afore mentioned Hannah, as the author was constantly at pains to point out, a 'nice' girl or, like Laure a 'tart', something I think the author wasn't just happy to point out at every opportunity but I actually felt was judgemental about. Then there were the male characters who without exception I found insubstantial.
Largely unmemorable. Alas I fear that the only thing that will stick in my mind are the awful passages involving the zoo animals. Its true, no scenes involving harm to animals sits well with me but these scenes??? OK so historically accurate and therefore something we'd arguably expect to find within the pages of this novel but why the need to make the depictions so graphic when graphic depictions are hardly a trademark of the book as a whole?
SUMMED UP IN A SENTENCE ... Another book cover that seduced me (I really must remember to take my reading glasses with me when I go out) ... if only the book itself had done the same.
Copyright ... Felicity Grace Terry @ Pen and Paper
The dialogue, stilted and oddly unemotional to say nothing of, at times, confusing. Given that the main female protagonist (Hannah) always referred to what turned out to be her mother not as mother/mum etc the relationship wasn't clear; were they somehow related or merely friends? It took me a while to work it out.
As for the characters, cardboard cliches, the females one of two types; like the afore mentioned Hannah, as the author was constantly at pains to point out, a 'nice' girl or, like Laure a 'tart', something I think the author wasn't just happy to point out at every opportunity but I actually felt was judgemental about. Then there were the male characters who without exception I found insubstantial.
Largely unmemorable. Alas I fear that the only thing that will stick in my mind are the awful passages involving the zoo animals. Its true, no scenes involving harm to animals sits well with me but these scenes??? OK so historically accurate and therefore something we'd arguably expect to find within the pages of this novel but why the need to make the depictions so graphic when graphic depictions are hardly a trademark of the book as a whole?
SUMMED UP IN A SENTENCE ... Another book cover that seduced me (I really must remember to take my reading glasses with me when I go out) ... if only the book itself had done the same.
Copyright ... Felicity Grace Terry @ Pen and Paper
February 7, 2017
Did not enjoy this book at all, found the characters simply did not gel, overall a read that I felt I had to finish simply because I hate to admit defeat. Not really any likeable characters and Clem was a simpering childish under developed personality. The only memorable event was a vile description of the shooting of one of the zoo elephants in detail and for what purpose did they need to drain and collect its blood as it died? We are not told. Nor are we told why a leopard with its matted fur and faded black spots was slowly left to starve 'as no hunter in Paris will get in the cage'. Why a need to get into the cage when it can be shot?
August 17, 2013
Plampin's third book is something of a disappointment, especially after the preceding The Devil's Acre that I thought was an absorbing read. This time the setting may be more dramatic but the story limps along thanks to characters that are sketchy and cardboard thin and a plot twist that was obvious almost from the first chapter. The dialogue is stilted and melodramatic, the writing rarely excites and the overall effect is a story that I struggled to finish despite its brevity at a trying 380+ pages. He's a talented writer - his first two novels were considerably better than this - but this is weak.
August 18, 2015
First book by Matthew Plampin I've ever read, and I'm certainly going to read more. One thing I can't get over is some of the characters and how they were portrayed so well. I loved the kind of grime and hilarity of Laure and even though she wasn't necessarily meant to be a likeable character, I still ended thinking she was one of the best in the book.
The main plot twist too. I won't ruin it for anyone who's not read it yet, but watch out for it. Anyone who's thinking of reading it must. My poor attempt of a review has hopefully not put you off, just read it.
The main plot twist too. I won't ruin it for anyone who's not read it yet, but watch out for it. Anyone who's thinking of reading it must. My poor attempt of a review has hopefully not put you off, just read it.
July 23, 2013
The setting could have been the basis for a great story; the 1870 siege of Paris. But Plampin somehow gets the tone all wrong. Is it a comedy? It seems so at times. A mystery? There are elements of that. Occasionally he remembers that it was pretty nasty in the city at the time, and puts in a few details. But the writing never quite rises to the occasion.
April 25, 2014
Not what I was expecting at all: exciting, action-packed, drawn with lashings of lucious & luxurious historical detail. One of my favourite eras, brought to life with enjoyable dexterity, complete with a cast of richly drawn characters. There's a film begging to be made of this novel...and I can only hope a future director doesn't mess around with such solid source material.
March 5, 2013
enjoyed this historical novel based in paris as the franco-prussian war 1870/71 as its backdrop and all of the revolt after the collapse of the 2nd republic and start of the 3rd but felt wasn't as good as his other books
April 6, 2013
To be honest I found the book a bit slow and did not finish reading it. Hence the one star.
June 13, 2013
It wasnt the best. gave up reading it after the 200th page..
June 10, 2015
Booooorrrrring!
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews