Heretic Dawn: Fortunes of France 3

Fortune de France #3

by Robert Merle, T. Jefferson Kline (Translator)

<p><strong>The third book in the swashbuckling <em>Fortunes of France</em> series - devious courtly intrigues build to a horrific and bloody climax in the most powerful instalment yet</strong></p><p>1572: Returning from his studies in Montpellier, Pierre de Siorac is ambushed by a jealous PŽrigord nobleman. A duel ensues, and Pierre must subsequently travel to Paris, to seek his pardon from the King. The capital city and the royal court are a disorienting new environment for Pierre: a world of sweet words and fierce pride, where coquettish smiles hide behind fans, and murderous intents behind elegant bows; a world of genteel tennis matches and deadly swordplay, whose elaborate social graces mask a simmering tension that will soon explode to engulf the entire city in one of history's most infamous bouts of butchery - and signal the dawn of a new and bloody era in the history of France.</p><p>Here, Pierre faces the greatest challenge of his young existence - to make his way through this deceptively dangerous milieu, to win a royal pardon, and finally to escape from Paris with his life, and the lives of his beloved companions, intact.</p><p><em>Heretic Dawn</em> is the third book in the swashbuckling <em>Fortunes of France</em> series, after <em>The Brethren</em> and <em>City of Wisdom and Blood</em>.</p><p><strong>Robert Merle</strong> (1908-2004) was born in French Algeria, before moving to mainland France in 1918. Originally an English teacher, Merle served as an interpreter with British Expeditionary Force during the Second World War, and was captured by the German army at Dunkirk, the experience of which served as the basis for his Goncourt-prize-winning <em>Weekend at Zuydcoote</em>. He published the 13 volumes of his hugely popular <em>Fortunes of France</em> series over four decades, from 1977 to 2003, the final volume appearing just a year before his death in 2004.</p>

Genres: Historical Fiction, Historical, France, Fiction, Adventure, French Literature, Novels

609 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1980

About the author

Born in Tebessa located in ,what was then, the French colony of Algeria. Robert Merle and his family moved to France in 1918. Merle wrote in many styles and won the Prix Goncourt for his novel Week-end à Zuydcoote. He has also written a 13 book series of historical novels, Fortune de France. Recreating 16th and 17th century France through the eyes of a fictitious Protestant doctor turned spy, he went so far as to write it in the period's French making it virtually untranslatable.

His novels Un animal doué de la raison (A Sentient Animal, 1967), a stark Cold War satire inspired by John Lilly's studies of dolphins and the Caribbean Crisis, and Malevil (1972), a post-apocalyptic story, were both translated into English and filmed, the former as Day of the Dolphin. The film The Day of the Dolphin bore very little resemblance to Merle's story.

He died of a heart attack at his home La Malmaison in Grosrouvre near Paris.

Reviews

[Daphne Sharpe · Rating 5 out of 5]

The history of 16th/17th century France as seen through the eyes of one family and told in 13 volumes is a 5 star read. It is well written, fast paced, humorous , rollicking , bawdy and considering the times this book is set in, is very tolerant of religious differences. The characters are down to earth, full of humour and inquisitiveness . There is a strong sense of noblesse oblige towards servants and retainers, bastard children are welcomed as a gift from God whether the father be a noble or priest!!
Pierre de Siorac is the central character and is now 21 years old and has qualified as a doctor. He and his father have always been interested in the study of bodies and dissection following the trend in France at this time and religious wars have given them both plenty of opportunities to do this research. Pierre is a Huguenot when most of France is Catholic and this volume concerns the horrific events of the 23/24th of August in 1572, a date of infamy, known as St. Bartholomew's Massacre, whereby thousands of Huguenots were murdered by Catholics in Paris when all were gathered there for the wedding celebrations of Margot to the Duke of Navarre.
The pride of France is self evident and proudly conveyed throughout this book. The descriptions of the cruelty and religious hatred is well described and is relevant to its history.
This is book 3 of the series and is an absolute joy to read and I cannot recommend this series too highly.

[Lucardus · Rating 3 out of 5]

Der dritte Band, der ja eigentlich die bisher dramatischsten Ereignisse enthält, die Bartholomäusnacht, leidet etwas darunter, dass der Ich-Erzähler natürlich nie ernsthaft in Gefahr geraten kann. In der Mitte hatte ich leichte Anfälle von Langeweile, da sich alles doch recht ereignislos hinzog und erst mit dem letzten Kapitel die Handlung deutlich dynamischer wird. Durch die auf die Dauer doch etwas redselige Art des Ich-Erzählers verlieren die zahlreichen Erwähnungen weiblicher Reize und mehr oder minder amouröser Abenteuer schnell ihren Reiz. Und das leider auch oft stereotyp als häßlich geschilderte Äußere von Räubern, Schurken und Bösewichtern ging mir irgendwann auch auf die Nerven. Da zudem die historischen Ereignisse bekannt sind und Merle dem, der sie nicht kennt, mehr als einmal vorab deren Verlauf schildert, bleibt von einem echten Spannungsbogen zumindest in diesem Band oft nicht viel übrig.

Positiv zu vermerken bleibt die sympathische, selbstironische Stimme des Ich-Erzählers, man erhält nebenbei viele Einblicke in die Zeit der Religionskriege und die Handlung ist vor allem dann interessant, wenn es um kleinere Ereignisse geht, auch wenn natürlich nie außer Frage steht, dass Pierre de Siorac aus allem herauskommt. Insgesamt ein unterhaltsamer Band, aber als Leser zeige ich in diesem Band Ermüdungserscheinungen, was die Erzählform und die Varianz der Handlung angeht. Erstmal reicht es, auch wenn ich die Serie sicher weiter lesen werde.

[Toralf Saffer · Rating 2 out of 5]

Im Strudel der Bartholomäusnacht

Der dritte Band der Romanfolge "Fortune de France" von Robert Merle führt seine jungen Helden ins Paris des Jahres 1572.
Die Hugenottenkriege haben das Land gespalten und überall lodert der Hass der verfeindeten Religionen, besonders in Paris, wo die Hochzeit der Schwester des katholischen Königs von Frankreich mit dem König von Navarra, welcher dem reformierten Lager angehört, viele Parteigänger beider Seiten anzieht.
In der berühmten Bartholomäusnacht erfolgt den das Blutbad an den Hugenotten, wohl auf Befehl des französischen Königs.
Dieser geschichtliche Hintergrund verspricht eigentlich eine spannende Geschichte, doch leider verliert sich der Roman in schwülstigen Dialogen, langatmigen Beschreibungen von Personen und unbedeutender Ereignisse. Auch lässt einen die unüberschaubare Anzahl von Namen, Titeln und Verwandtschaftsgraden schnell die Übersicht verlieren.
Schade, nachdem der erste Band mich noch gefangen nahm, deutete sich im zweiten Teil schon der Wandel von der Erzählung zur Schwafelei an und auch bei diesem Band waren mehr als die Hälfte der Seiten vergeudet. Hinzu kamen endlos lange Kapitel und auch das Seitenlayout der TB Ausgabe von Aufbau war alles andere als lesefreundlich. Für mich endet die Reise an dieser Stelle, ich werde auf die Lektüre der restlichen 10 Bände verzichten, wobei Robert Merle trotzdem einer meiner Favoriten bleibt.

[Tracey · Rating 2 out of 5]

This has been a to be honest a dull read. I don’t know if that due to the novel being translated from French to English, but if that is the case then it made the story boring. There was so much potential with the story of the Huguenot Timeline so I’m quite disappointed by this.

[Keith Currie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Madame La Cause

Pierre de Siorac’s adventures continue in this the third volume of the Fortunes of France series, and the last currently available in English. It is the best of the three.

Pierre has scarcely completed his medical training in Montpellier when he kills a family enemy in a duel. Accused of murder on the evidence of a prejudiced Catholic priest, he must travel to Paris to obtain a pardon from the king. He arrives in Paris in mid-August 1572, a week or so before the infamous St Bartholomew’s Day massacre, when the Catholics of Paris organised the sectarian killings of thousands of Protestants gathered in the city to celebrate the marriage of the prince of Navarre to the princess Margot.

Heretic Dawn is an immense novel, over 600 pages long, but the narrative never flags: it is funny, thrilling, informative, humane, entertaining and tragic. The reader is bowled along in the company of Pierre throughout, an intelligent, often impulsive, but thoroughly charismatic companion.
There is rather less emphasis in this volume on Pierre’s amatory adventures. This may be an indication of his growing up, but it is fair that other events give him less opportunity – his passion for female beauty remains undiminished, if less fulfilled.

The final quarter of the novel presents a sustained narrative of the horrors of the massacre, which offers real danger to Pierre and his Huguenot companions. Merle skilfully melds the real and known events of that awful time with an exciting, but appalling, fictional escape story. There is no attempt to underplay the rabble rousing rhetoric of the Catholic priests, the duplicity of the king and the royal family and the savage butchery by the Parisian citizenry.

This is a remarkable novel of an epoch making event in French history. I do hope that further volumes in the series become available to the reader in English.

[Jérémie · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Comme on dit en notre Périgord, qui se lève tôt, pisse où il veut"

[Rebecca · Rating 2 out of 5]

If I never read a book about heaving bosoms and buxom village wenches ever again it will be too soon. In all fairness I’m not sure either of those phrases are actually included but they remain my abiding takeaway, despite the main event being a massacre of the Huguenots... I started this series because I was interested in the time that it covers but I think that apart from the second half of the first book, they have been a bit of a chore so I am stopping here. Given the average ratings there is obviously a lot of love for the series but it was all a bit too much swashbuckle and sex for me and I’m obviously not the target audience.

[Kalliope · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the third volume of Piere de Siorac’s adventures during the period of the Wars of Religion, and we are now in the early 1570s. In the previous volume he had left Montpellier and gone back home to Sarlat, in the Perigord, where his family owns a château. But on his way, there he kills the enemy of his family Bertrand de Fontenac. With this he has solved one problem but opened another. The Soirac family (namely his father and uncle, the ‘frérèche’ counsel him to go to the king’s court in Paris and ask for absolution, but for this it will be advisable to visit Michel de Montaigne in his château in Bordeax and ask the thinker for endorsement. Pierre’s backing is his father good records in the reconquest of Calais in 1546.



We then follow Pierre as he visits Montaigne and arrives in Paris. There, through his cleverness and picaresque intuition he succeeds in entering the courtly circles, particularly that of the king’s brother the Duke of Anjou. Pierre succeeds so well, that he is present in the room where they have taken the injured Gaspard II de Coligny after an attempted murder, just after the celebration of the wedding between the king’s sister Margot, and the Huguenot prince Henri III de Navarre.



This attempted murder was the prelude to the infamous St Bartholomew massacre.

Pierre is in the middle of it, and as expected, survives and manages to escape. Robert Merle shows a brilliant command of a plot that is both entertaining and vraisemblable. Our hero then goes back to his hometown in the Périgord where his family had thought he must have died. At the end Pierre declares that his horrifying experience in Paris has convinced him that if still of the new religion, he will never again use his arms for the sake of religious conflicts.

As the second son, with no fortune of his son, he soon begins to feel the ache to take to the road again and find there, supported by his profession as a medical doctor, his own life path.

This volume was highly entertaining, as our hero has taken us to the very centre of French politics during a frightfully complex and tragic period. Merle continues to excel in recreating the ‘ambiance’ of the period, offering a topographical description of Paris together with an engaging description of the wedding of the decade, expanding on the debate that opposed at that time the practical versus theoretical practice of medicine.

The next volume, I suspect, will take us back to Paris, but when the political, and monarchical, circumstances will have changed.


Le Prince que voilà

[Jonathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

The adventures of Pierre de Siorac, younger son of a royalist Huguenot baron, continue with all the larger-than-life rogues and perils of the first two installments. The first two-thirds show off Paris as a place of worldly pleasures sought by young 16th Century gentlemen: food, wine, clothing, courtly intrigue, lawn tennis (the law court of highest appeal, apparently), and women, all recounted in compelling historical fictional detail.

But the final section was memorable. The massacre of Protestants on the feast of St. Bartholomew is treated as a horror movie nightmare: the hero and his companions use all their guile and prowess to escape bloodthirsty bands of burghers and aristocrats, and in the process witness the infamously gory assassinations of several prominent figures, including Admiral de Coligny. De Siorac, narrating this story later in his life as an old man, foreshadows this attack throughout the first sections of the book, so that particular streets and individuals are highlighted in prosperous moments of peace to be recalled during torchlit scenes of murder and cruelty. The effect is reminiscent of Dickens' asides to the reader in "A Tale of Two Cities" to remind them of the seeds of revolution growing before 1789 -- Merle is less poetic than Dickens, but more forthrightly angered by his subject, murder incited by religious zeal.

[Fanja Evers · Rating 4 out of 5]

Toujours aussi savoureux ! Quel régal d'écriture ! On croirait presque que Robert Merle a vécu à cette époque tant on a l'illusion de la langue de l'époque, parfaitement maîtrisée, fluide, comme si c'était tout naturel pour lui d'écrire ainsi. J'ai beaucoup aimé ce tome en particulier pour ce qu'il se déroule à Paris (ma bonne ville^^) et que c'est plaisir que ce saut dans le temps, de voir le Paris de l'époque, les moeurs des Parisiens (toujours aussi désagréables^^), leur quotidien, et puis bien sûr, cette épisode de l'Histoire autour du massacre de la Saint-Barthélémy est très intéressant et retranscrit avec brio. Mon étoile en moins, c'est pour tous les poutounes de trop (aucune limite les gens, ça se poutoune à tout-va^^), et cette obsession du narrateur avec les garces qui semblent toutes aussi obsédées que lui, c'est un peu lassant, mais bon, heureusement que l'intrigue et l'écriture prennent le dessus.

[Àkos Györkei · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tovabbra is megszokott csodalatos minosegben megy tovabb Pierre de Siorac es tarsai tortenete. A korabeli Parizs minden elonye, es rengeteg hatranya is elobujik, videki hoseink bekerulnek a fovaros bonyolult szovevenyebe. Zseni a forditas tovabbra is, csodasak a szereplok, minden tortenes.

Szegenyek nagyon rosszkor erkeznek, ugyanis a Szent Bertalan ejszakai hugenotta meszarlas kellos kozepepe csoppennek bele.

[Jb · Rating 5 out of 5]

Je ne connaissais que "La mort est mon métier", lecture obligatoire (mais appréciée) au collège.
Dans ce livre, Merle utilise un vocabulaire archaique qui passe tellement bien. Le narrateur du livre audio a un mérite fou.

[Celine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Toujours aussi agréable de lire les aventures du fils cadet du baron de Mespech cette fois-ci piégé en plein Paris lors du massacre de la Saint-Berthélmy...

[Yves Panis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Très bon tome 3/13. On nage en pleine Saint Barthélemy. Le héros Pierre de Siorac sauve de justesse sa tête de huguenot. A suivre. Toujours aussi bon. .

[Radan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Po velmi vydařených prvních dvou dílech už to upadá.

[Bernard · Rating 4 out of 5]

First novel that i read with pleasure and that was not imposed by teachers or parents. Great context about end of middle ages paris. Full of action and sentiments.

[Solange · Rating 5 out of 5]

Super bien écrit un vrai plongeon dans cette période.

[Stéphane · Rating 4 out of 5]

Toujours aussi bon et addictif

[Robyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very engaging and easy to read. It really takes you back in time. Looking forward to the next part - if I can find it in English!

[Thom · Rating 4 out of 5]

The most famous part of the religious wars of France is St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre, so I was looking forward to this novel a great deal. It seemed to take a long time to get there, but once it did, the story moved wonderfully. M. de Sirouac has accumulated a few more odd companions, including an Italian sword master and a Swiss guard behemoth. I hope Book Four is translated soon!

[Antonio Nunez · Rating 5 out of 5]

This third installment of Merle's Fortune de France series is the best one yet. Pierre de Siorac and his small household must to go to Paris to seek King Charles IX's pardon for Pierre having killed his bestial neighbor Frontenac in a duel. There Pierre must negotiate the treacherous waters of the court, and particularly the rivalry between the king and his brother the Duc d'Anjou and between Catholics and Huguenots, to culminate in the bloodcurdling barbarism of the Saint Bartholomew's massacre, the descriptions of which are bloodcurling. Particularly appealing are the debates about philosophy, theology, politics and art as well as the geographic references to Parisian landmarks in 1572, the trades, food and drink, clothing of the various classes. People were indeed much cleaner then than I would have thought: there were baths in many cities and (at least in this book) people used them often. There are many cameos of actual historical figures such as author Montaigne, Protestant leader Admiral Coligny, Catholic leader the Duc de Guise, surgeon Ambroise Paré, the very dangerous Marie de Medicis and many others. There is romance, action, suspense and humor, often of a ribald sort. I'm only sorry that volume 4 will come out only next year. This is historic novel at its finest. The translation obtained by Pushkin Books is excellent.

[E Vikander · Rating 5 out of 5]

In Heretic Dawn, the third book in the Fortunes of France series, Pierre Siorac shares his adventures traveling to Paris to obtain a pardon from the king for having slain his villainous neighbor in a duel. French court life is revealed with its scheming, shifting alliances, and ostentatious foppery. Although warned by his father that “caution, prudence and patience are the teats of adventure,” Pierre— through his big heart and lust for living—becomes ensnared in the Saint Bartholomew’s Day massacre where thousands of Huguenots were butchered by Catholics in the raging war of religion. The best paced and most interesting of this series thus far, this book left me breathless. I would advise the reader that Heretic Dawn is best enjoyed after having read the first two books in the series, The Brethren and City of Wisdom and Blood.

[Rob Prince · Rating 5 out of 5]

Outstanding - detailed description in the last 150 pages of the St. Bartholomew Massacre in Paris in late August, 1572 - a failed attempt to ethnically cleanse Protestants from the French body politic, expressed with great accuracy in a historical novel.

[✘✘ Sarah ✘✘ (former Nefarious Breeder of Murderous Crustaceans) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Un roman historique très divertissant.

[Vít · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bartolomějská noc, co k tomu víc říct. Asi nejlepší díl celé série.