Beth > Recent Status Updates

Outstanding. Pitts is a born storyteller.

Excellent beginning—gorgeous cover!

Fairly interesting. However, having been a young person during the 1970s, they take exception with little details that are incorrect in the writing. The Beach boys had been out of popularity for years. Most people did not casually wear jeans.
As a younger author, it indicates that research was sloppy in this regard.

Fun, very British, Venetia is 74. Author writes that she had an ultra sound while pregnant. I’m of a similar age. No ultra sounds in those days.

Excellent!

This not ordinary writing—already an extraordinary read.

64% I am struggling to continue.

325 It’s Irish so I’ll continue

53 Formulaic Romance-good historical details

Novel of nature— it’s beauty and fury.

Interesting but slow moving storyline.

Enjoyable, light romcom. Good escape novel. A break from reading nonfiction & literary novels. “ He LAYS down on the daybed..” Shouldn’t a writer know the correct grammatical usage of the verb lay, lie, laid? Bothers me, it’s LAZY!

A revelation!

Excellent literary historical fiction!

The novel is an intensive character study of a royal female raised for a single purpose. As an offering to seal a political alliance and to bear the heirs of her noble husband’s lineage. The prose moves seamlessly from one image to another creating a massive canvas upon which the internal life of Lucrezia is revealed.

The images O’Farrell creates on every page are exquisite. It’s as if she is painting with words.

I love this book!

I haven’t read a novel, this rich and intriguing and sometime. This will be on my top 10 list.

The novel is long I believe 500+ pages. I’m not sure because I’m reading it both auditorily and on a reading tablet. However, it continues to be an excellent novel, and the author keeps coming up with new ideas and new and interesting stories.

Consistently outstanding!

I have reached the second half of the book— World War II. Other readers have mentioned that this is not as good as a part one.

Only a quarter way through the novel and it is clear to this reader that it is exceptional.

Excellent as always. Ms. Graham please stop using the adjective “amazing”. It is a popular adjective used these days as a descriptor, but it’s overuse is problematic for me.

I am fascinated by the Dutch golden age of the 17th century about which this historical novel is written.

This novel is beautifully written. I am reading it slowly so as to savor both the exquisite pros and rich imagery.

DNF. Terrible! Depressing, sloppy writing. Who needs it?

This novel is driving me crazy! The author compresses the events of COVID 2020–the inaccuracy of her timeline is problematic. Since it is recent history, other readers may be distracted as well.

Interesting premise. Totally unrealistic. In March 2020, people didn’t know of anything about social distancing or the lack of toilet paper or how serious the Covid-19 virus was. How dizzy do you have to be to reach for a green poison apple? Nonetheless it’s easy reading. I would quit but it’s for book club. Why is this author so popular?