The Romantic Armchair Traveller

Germany: The Glass Minstrel by Hayden Thorne

The Glass Minstrel by Hayden Thorne is the first of my Christmas-themed reads this year. While the title is marketed as young-adult historical fiction, the first half of the book has crossover appeal that made me feel I was reading general fiction. In the second half, the plot focus veers from a story that deftly interweaves several captivating character arcs to a narrower study that seems to fumble for narrative balance. Nevertheless, with its atmospheric echo of nineteenth-century romantic writers and melancholy fairytales, the The Glass Minstrel has a sensitive, refined aesthetic that feels unique these days. Its loveliness left me with misty eyes and a wish to see more historical fiction from its author.

 

1850. Two young lovers have died, but instead of supporting the grieving families the small Bavarian town of Zirndorf gossips and points fingers. When the rumours reach fifteen-year-old Jakob Diederich, his reaction is very different, for he carries the burden of a secret that unites him with the couple in ways no one suspects.

During the busiest Christmas season in years, toymaker Abelard Bauer tremulously fashions a minstrel of blown glass, paints it to look like his lost son, then destroys the mould. Across town, Andreas Schiffer struggles to make sense of the brief life of his own, favourite child through a journal that was left behind. It chronicles the growth of a love story that should bond the two fathers but instead divides them in horror and bewilderment.

As a snowy Holy Eve draws near, its message seems lost upon the men who, blinded by pain and regret, seem only to drift farther from those around them. Tormented by feelings that by turns confuse, scare, and elate him, is there any hope for Jakob in a world where even family and friends condemn boys like him and feel shame for the kind of love that Stefan Bauer and Heinrich Schiffer shared?

 

A review of The Glass Minstrel by John at Dear Author inspired my interest in the novel. A slim trade-format book with just under two hundred pages, it explores profound themes with an acuity and delicacy that kept me engaged even when my enchantment waned into “mere” enjoyment.

While the prose is simple, even slightly repetitious at times as it details business in the toyshop or Jakob’s duties at the inn where he works, and while a few awkward paragraph transitions could have been smoothed out with sharper editing, Thorne’s writing style is to the point and beautifully readable. The tone it sets enhances the period mood and gives the setting a mythical quality. The alpine landscape and town details are sketched in with only the lightest of generic touches, furthering the impression of a place that owes less to any real location than to the villages of old, German fables and vintage Christmas cards.

Likewise, the political upheavals taking place during this period in the German states – including the Kingdom of Bavaria, where the story takes place and where King Ludwig I had been forced to abdicate in 1848 – are fleetingly noted in The Glass Minstrel but not incorporated into the plot. There seemed to be fertile potential in these rumbles, but as indicated above, the author elects to keep things universal. (The use of symbolism seems ineffectual in any case, with nothing much developing in terms of depth or meaning from the continual noting of the snowy weather or staring through windows. The description of a particular nightmare is a notable exception.) Although a plot that interacts more firmly with its social and political setting would have enriched the historical aspect – which if not wallpaper-y is still very thin – on a storytelling level it simply means that the novel’s mood stays true to that of a fable. Manners and in particular attitudes are appropriately attuned the era, however, so I never felt I was reading a dress-up contemporary or fantasy.

Nor should the absence of a strongly-defined setting be mistaken for shallowness. I have read countless books double the length of The Glass Minstrel, books targeted for adults, that achieve not half of its emotional realism, sensibility, and insight into grief, longing, pain, and love. The conflicts arise from a social context that is still familiar today, but the historical context raises the stakes further and trenchantly exposes the vulnerabilities of the situation and the gravity of the character dilemmas. These are explored with compassion that has room both for sympathetic understanding of the parents’ grappling with a sense of betrayal and for hope that bridges can be built over even the deepest abysses by love. Since I have emphasised the fairytale qualities of the novel, I would like to make it clear that no magic wand is waved here: while redemption and reconciliation is achieved by some of the characters, scandal, social ostracism, and intolerance remain issues in society at large.

The few problems I had with the book are minor, with one exception. In view of The Glass Minstrel being young-adult fiction, my issue may seem paradoxical. But as the first half evenly meshes the individual lives and relationships of the main protagonists with each other and the townspeople, the late-coming swing to an almost exclusive focus on Jakob did jolt me. For much of the second half I felt I had begun by reading one book and was now reading another. Since I had invested equally in the other protagonists (the fathers) I missed the one who almost entirely disappears from the story until the very end, and kept wishing throughout that the plot would remember to return to him.

Looking at the novel as a Bildungsroman, however, the portrayal of Jakob’s growth and painful maturation from boy to adult is keenly perceptive. The tenderness of innocence and the all-enveloping, all-changing experience of a first crush are shown in all their intensity, as is the offering of one’s heart only to discover cruelty that leads to anguished confusion and fear of persecution. A sensitive, daydreaming youth, Jakob has a practical side that allows him to clearly grasp the dangers and difficulties of his situation but also makes him honest with himself as he quietly refuses to deny or marginalise his feelings. Working at the local inn, he helps support his struggling family without complaint, but events open up his awareness of a larger world and excite him with the possibility of a more ambitious future. I longed for it for him, too, not always for unselfish reasons: for a longish section nothing much happens in the story except what goes on in Jakob’s head. During this time the author has him either daydreaming or interminably scrubbing and sweeping the floors at work. Since I was already missing the other characters, this is the one time I grew restless while reading the novel.

A note on the back cover (Cheyenne Publishing trade paperback, 2010) recommends The Glass Minstrel to readers aged sixteen and up. In keeping with the general tone of the book, in all but one instances any sensuality referred to is confined to excerpts from young Heinrich Schiffer's journal, and there it is sweetly hinted at rather than truly described. For this reason the one scene where Jakob’s fevered imaginings leads to a really very brief but by comparison unexpectedly explicit moment, struck a slightly jarring note for me.

The most complex character in the book is arguably the bereaved father of Heinrich, Andreas Schiffer. A wealthy man, he is the protagonist with the most to lose in terms of social standing and respect. Having groomed Heinrich to follow in his footsteps, Schiffer not only grieves the loss of a talented, favourite child but takes the youth’s homosexuality as a personal injury. This self-pitying agitation gradually fosters a paranoia that poisons his relationship with the rest of the family without him understanding why things are going wrong. His multiple flaws and the direct access the reader is allowed into his feelings and thought processes made him a highly interesting character to me: he was the least predictable of the protagonists. Unfortunately, when he finally has a light-bulb moment, the effect it has on him seemed embarrassingly contrived to me because the build-up simply was not there to shore up his transformation. In fact, as I was nearing the last pages I increasingly worried about how the author was possibly going to have time to wrap everything up. In Herr Schiffer’s case, I feel it was not altogether successfully achieved.

Finally, I perceived a gap of logic that pushed the externals of the story even deeper into the realm of a fairytale. Zirndorf is described as a very small town that is suffering from economic depression, and its isolation from centres such as Nuremberg and Munich is stressed. Yet every day Abelard Bauer’s toyshop is shown to be full of customers and business exceeds his wildest hopes; over and over again he and his assistant grow (happily) exhausted from the hectic pace. I did not really mind, though: with his unselfish grief, warmth, and regrets, the vividly portrayed Abelard Bauer is my favourite character in the novel, and I was glad to see his shelves empty so fast. What did disappoint me a little was that although he is a toymaker and creator of blown glass ornaments he is only shown selling his wares, not manufacturing them. Even the making of the glass minstrel is described with a technical vagueness that gives not the smallest insight into glassblowing and not even a visual introduction to Bauer’s workshop. Nor was any clear mention made of the novelty Christmas ornaments fashioned from glass blown into moulds represented in 1850. From what information I was able to collect, it appears the technique had been invented only three years earlier.

All in all, however, this was a lovely way to begin my holiday-themed reading. The sparkling positives in The Glass Minstrel far outshone any shortcomings for me. The author and genre are new to me, but one of my book-related Christmas wishes will be that a large publishing house quickly snatches up Hayden Thorne. This author’s style has mainstream appeal. While not perfect, The Glass Minstrel is nothing less than exquisite. I hope it gets into many stockings and peeks out from underneath countless trees this Christmas.

 

Excerpts can be found here and in a post on the author’s blog.

 

Roman Empire: The Light Bearer by Donna Gillespie

It is not every week I close an 800-page trade paperback with the thought, I wish it had been longer. The Light Bearer, Donna Gillespie’s richly imagined odyssey of an extraordinary 1st century woman at the historical turning point when the might of Rome clashed with the tribal cultures of Germanic Europe, is one of the most gripping page-turners I have read. Notably, even a sense of incompleteness at the story’s conclusion did not seriously mar my enjoyment. What did throw me off, in the second half, was the contradiction between the admirable research that has obviously gone into recreating a civilisation about which few written records have survived, and the wholesale sacrifice, for dramatic effect, of historical chronology.

 

51. At the birth of Auriane, daughter of a Chattian chieftain, seeress Ramis prophesies the girl will rise to prominence in a time of war but slay her father – the greatest of all crimes. Resisting Ramis’s claims she belongs to the priesthood, Auriane is driven by tragedy to forgo the normal path to a family of her own, and instead takes up the life of a warrior with a duty to exact revenge.

In Rome, a runaway slave boy is about to be put to death when he is discovered to be Marcus Julianus, the long-ago kidnapped son of a prominent Roman senator. Left to his own devices, Marcus would prefer to immerse himself in a scholarly life, but his sense of justice and responsibility forge him into a statesman.

Through treachery, violence, and love, the lives of Auriane and Marcus become inseparable from the fate of their people, yet, unknown to each other, each has also been given a sacred amulet which in the darkest days will bind their lives together.

 

Warning: my discussion of The Light Bearer contains elements that may be viewed as spoilers by those unfamiliar with the history of the second half of the 1st century. The Chatti actually existed, and the historical dates and events associated with their fight against Rome make certain plot developments obvious. The same goes for the reigns of the Roman Emperors who figure in the story. I do not necessarily treat these events as secrets to be side-stepped.

The Light Bearer languished on my shelves for a long time before I picked it up, read about thirty pages, and then set it aside for months. Although I immediately liked the author’s writing style, the tense dynamics in the first chapter created a negative reaction in me. When the second chapter switched to another character in another part of the world and jumped six years, I grew too restless to continue.

But the impressions I had gathered stewed in the back of my mind, and after checking out a few related articles I found my interest renewed. This time, I withheld judgement until I was on firmer ground with the characters, felt enchantment rise , and devoured the story in five days. It took me longer to process what I had read.

When I call The Light Bearer a page-turner it is because I read much of it in that blissful state where constant thrills fuel a pulse-raising compulsion to find out what will happen next. The narrative tension rarely slackens, calmer episodes being as suspenseful, conflict-filled, and forward-moving as the fiercest action scenes. One of the biggest wonders is that, to me, there were no dead or irrelevant moments; there was over-arching purpose and meaning in every scene.

Some readers have found the prose ponderous and meandering, and it is true that Gillespie’s wielding of language as an artistic tool is particularly observable in the spiritual mysticism which pervades the customs and beliefs of Auriane’s tribe. On the other hand, the different tonal quality of the sections set in Rome just as effectively underscores the pragmatism of a more “modern” populace. My stylistic tastes have been shaped by a love of nineteenth-century literature and poetry, and so spareness is not exactly a requirement for my literary enjoyment; I drew aestethic pleasure from the lyrical rhythm of Gillespie’s writing.

If you are wondering about the mysticism, Gillespie simply illuminates a belief system rooted in Northern European mythology (see, for example, the Icelandic sagas). While the Chatti along with the other Germanic tribes believe in magic and there are a few instances of visionary trances and portentous dreams in the story, The Light Bearer here treads the path of historical fiction as carefully as slender archaeological and written evidence combined with anthropological studies of similar cultures allow, choosing not to diverge into fantasy literature.

The book is well titled, I think. Freya, or Fria as she is called in this story, is the Germanic goddess who animates all living things; she is a loving Mother Earth, and also revered as the bringer of light. In a society where women are considered closer to the gods than men and exercise both spiritual and political power – as priestesses, ambassadors, landowners, and war councillors - Auriane’s relationship with the goddess is both nurturing and empowering, offsetting the fatalistic aspects of her culture. It is another woman, the seeress Ramis, whose seemingly magical powers and stern prophesies instill fear-mingled respect in the Chatti and neighbouring tribes, who sets the riddle-like challenges for Auriane that inspire her growth into the (symbolic) light bearer for her people.

I thought Auriane a convincing character of her time and culture as well as an immensely admirable heroine. The role she inhabits in the story is one that is typically reserved for a male protagonist: a chieftain’s daughter, her skill as a warrior and ability to inspire others earn her the status of a Boudicca of the Chatti. Happily, she is anything but a clichéd superwoman. Her honesty and self-doubts engaged my sympathies and her stubbornness and cautious curiosity kept her very real. Also, relief of reliefs, there is no nervous attempt on the author's part to make Auriane "more feminine" by having the male protagonist be physically abler than she.

The active participation of women in Chattian society is contrasted with their lack of standing in Rome. Among her own people Auriane’s achievements as a warrior cause men and women to honour her as a leader blessed by the gods; her battle-scarred body is a badge of honour, her courage gives those she leads and protects comfort. In Rome, forced to become a gladiatrix (a modern word), her physical prowess singles her out as a freak: female gladiators are a suspect amusement, the frivolous indulgence of decadent Emperors. For the first time in her life, she becomes ashamed of her body which does not fit Roman standards of beauty, and her attempts to safeguard the welfare of her Chattian co-captives get her ridiculed.

The legends that grow up around Auriane capture Marcus Julianus’s attention before he ever meets her. Reading the reports and correspondence left by his father, who served with the Roman army in Germania and even conveyed his son a strange amulet from there, he becomes increasingly intrigued. “[...]she was the spirit of streams breaking through rock, the numen of primeval places. [...] She was a wild ghost, fighting nearby, and despite the vast space between them and the distance between their customs and ways, he sensed their enemy was the same” (pages 181-2). As someone who honours love over duty, and truth over safety, Marcus, too, eventually sees himself forced to resort to violence to oppose the rulers of Rome.

Does The Light Bearer paint the Germanic tribes as noble savages and Rome as a barbaric civilisation? Looking at Marcus Julianus’s admiration of Auriane, his wistful longing for a closer relationship with nature, and enlightened condemnation of many aspects of Roman politics and pastimes as decadent and cruel, yes. Looking at the internal pettiness, rivalries, conflicts, and superstitions that tear the Chatti apart as much as the military aggression of Rome does, no. Without Rome, Auriane’s journey to strength and insight could not be completed. Without the tragedies and injustices she suffers among her own people, that journey could not have been started. While it is easy to imagine where the author’s sympathies lie, and a sense of inevitability haunts the fate of the Chattian struggle for survival, the picture Gillespie presents of the Germanic tribes is satisfyingly complex. Ultimately, as Ramis tells a disbelieving Auriane, whose sense of failure as she fights to find safety for her family, her people, and herself poisons her with feelings with sorrow and unworthiness, catastrophe is fertile: it brings forth new worlds.

Throughout The Light Bearer, catastrophe certainly forces Auriane to re-examine the things she holds to be true. The conclusions she draws repeatedly put her choices at variance with customs and traditions. An independent thinker who at the same time is a creature of a specific culture, her encounters with the different behaviour and values of the Roman aggressors spark off ideas and actions that increase her internal conflict and alter how she deals with the world. Thus a Roman thrall, Decius, a former soldier taken prisoner by the Chatti, goes from somebody she has despised for years to a reluctant ally and finally, dangerously, to more than a friend. Yet even as he becomes her key to unlocking the mysteries of this alien race and to turning their strenths into weapons for the Chatti, their association flies in the face of tribal laws. And so, in her very quest to honour and fulfill what is required of her, she constantly risks being made an outcast, or worse, be punished by death. Whether her questioning of tradition strengthens or weakens the tribe is a tense issue both for herself and her people.

The fascinatingly lively depiction of Chattian society in a period of transformation is one of the greatest strengths of the book. Once all the action moves to Rome in the last third of the novel, I thought the story weakened. I attribute it to five major causes:

Firstly, Gillespie’s Rome is almost as detailed as her Germania but the overly familiar emphasis on its corruptness, decadence, and tyranny lacked freshness. The epic scope of the first two thirds of the novel also shrinks to a story mainly concerned with love, personal survival, and political assassination. It is not a bad story at all, and as part of Auriane’s personal odyssey it makes sense, but the execution and focus fell short of my expectations.

Secondly, this is the section where Gillespie tampers with history to serve her plot purposes, shortening Emperor Domitian’s actual reign (81-96) by a decade or more. The political and social acts which for a long time rendered Domitian reasonably popular among the general populace (even while he remained at loggerheads with the senate) are completely disregarded, and the reader is told that any worthwhile accomplishment slips in only due to Marcus’s influence as First Advisor. The plot reduces Domitian into a childishly willful, insecure madman who is hard to distinguish from the novel’s earlier portrayal of Nero. Recent historians have suggested that evidence points to Domitian’s wife remaining loyal to his memory for the rest of her life. The Light Bearer adheres to the juicier, hostile sources that claim Domitia Longina participated in the conspiracy to murder him. The result is a well-paced thriller of an ending that nevertheless frustrated me as someone who until then had been reading an excellent historical.

Thirdly, Marcus undergoes a change from the intensely loyal boy and kind, intelligent young man of the first half of the novel to a character so self-righteous that I eventually began bristling with annoyance whenever his thought processes were shown. Unlike Auriane, he never doubts himself or his judgement, and apparently is free of human flaws or vices. His enemies envy him. His intelligence, education, and integrity cause every other character except Auriane to defer to his superior wisdom. His library and school are internationally renowned, but he seems to have nothing to learn from anyone. He sways tyrants away from monstrosities, advices military veterans on siegecraft, secretly ensure banned texts continue to be available, declines offers of the Imperial throne but picks the successor. As Domitian becomes uncontrollable, dispatching suspected enemies left, right, and centre, Marcus coolly concludes, “Here I am on the border of dark and light, the one check on a rational madman [...] You leave me no choice but to plan your death” (page 397). On at least two occasions after that he considers killing others, but naturally he is not being hypocritical because his motives are pure. At this point only his relationship with Auriane, which shows him from an emotional, kind, and protective side, redeemed him from near insufferability.

Fourthly, the grand scene which finally brings Auriane and Marcus together and sees them professing their love for each other is exasperatingly silly and unbelievable. Granted, Marcus is already familiar with Auriane and has even committed treason to protect her from harm, and Auriane has once, back in Germania, sensed what I guess is his presence in a trance with Ramis. But she has never clapped eyes on him or heard of him before the night they meet in Domitian’s garden after a violent incident. She is half-naked, restrained by Praetorian guards, and has just dealt with a lecherous Emperor. Then she sees Marcus and looks into his eyes: “She sensed the soul that uncannily matched her own” and that he, too, “loathed Domitian” [485]. It is love at first sight. When the Emperor leaves, Marcus dismisses the Praetorians. “She came close then, moving her head inquisitively against his chest, nuzzling him like a pony, and then was still, resting against him contentedly” (491). Right. In fairness, their scene together is quite sweet, but the context makes the whole thing ludicrously unbelievable for me. Furthermore, it was impossible for me to accept with a straight face the repeated reveries about how deeply she loves him after that one meeting. Earlier in The Light Bearer Gillespie proved she can write about love and sex in the most natural, character-revealing manner, so the unsuccessfulness of Auriane and Marcus’s first proper scene together was a surprise. Things do improve, however. Auriane regains her personality and she and Marcus have some interesting scenes together which make it clear that if Marcus wants her he will have to accept that, unlike Roman women, she will always make her own decisions about what is right for her. I was also pleased with the plan Marcus ultimately suggests for their common future.

Finally, loose ends. In 89 the Chatti revolted again, this time with the co-operation of the disgruntled Roman legions stationed in Moguntiacum (now Mainz). With the muddled chronology in The Light Bearer this event is instead pushed forward to early in the year after the Chattian defeat when Auriane was captured (historically, around 83, although Auriane is said to be no more than twenty-five when Marcus speaks with her in Rome despite the reader having been told she was born in the eleventh year of Emperor Claudius’s reign (page 3), which would have made her thirty-two in 83). Even so, the revolt (which failed) is noted only in relation to its consequences for Emperor Domitian. What effect the news has on the captive Auriane is not shown. Indeed, not only have Auriane’s priorities quickly shifted from thoughts of home to the discovery of love, but the reader receives no further information about the many characters left behind. While such knowledge is in no way vital to the plot, the complete silence did bother me as a reader invested in their individual lives and their destiny as a people. Interestingly, Gillespie did not intend to write a follow-up to The Light Bearer until her German publisher persuaded her to do so (link), and so, fortunately, there now exists a sequel, Lady Of The Light. Unfortunately, Lady Of The Light reportedly ends on a major cliffhanger, and a third volume is still being written. I intend to content myself with the ending of The Light Bearer until the third, concluding (?) part has been published.

The above caveats may seem overwhelming, but really they only apply to the last third of the book. Even there, Gillespie’s exceptionally vibrant, intelligent storytelling overcame most of my grumbles. Taken as a whole, The Light Bearer is so much more than the sum of its parts, and in many ways I agree with the praise this longtime bestseller (originally published in 1994) has earned from reviewers and readers. Auriane, for example, instantly became one of my top favourite fictional characters. How I wish there were more heroines like her! My final thought: for a first novel, The Light Bearer is a tour de force.

 

Books of related interest: Gillespie’s rendering of the Veleda, Ganna, the Bructeri - the tribe of Auriane’s mother, and Legio XIV Gemina, stationed at Moguntiacum, invite comparisons with their characterisations in Lindsey Davis’s Falco series, which presents slighly earlier events from the Roman point of view. Veleda, the Bructeri, and the Fourteeenth Gemina appear in The Iron Hand Of Mars (one of my favourites in the series),and both Veleda and Ganna (in the Falco series, Veleda’s successor) have their moments in Saturnalia. Vespasian, Titus, Domitian, and Caenis can be glimpsed in several of the books. Domitian plays a particularly significant role in the first, The Silver Pigs. The Course Of Honour, also by Davis although not part of the Falco mystery series, is all about the life-long love between Vespasian and Caenis.

Teaser Tuesday: The Light Bearer by Donna Gillespie

Teaser Tuesday is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

 

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• Be careful not to include spoilers! (Make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away. You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title and author, too, so that other Teaser Tuesday participants can add the book to their TBR lists if they like your teasers!

 

My teaser

(Berkley trade paperback, 2006, page 104):

“At a turn in the path Auriane saw, half hidden in the trees, a lichen-covered stone tall as a man and carved with rune-signs traced in blood. And as they traveled on, suddenly all about them, hung from every bough, were myriads of bronze chimes shivering with each wind-breath; their thin ghostly chorus filled her with an aching, dreamy sadness.”

Set in first century A.D./C.E. Germania and the Roman Empire during the reigns of Nero and Domitian, Donna Gillespie’s The Light Bearer features a Teutonic warrior woman who is captured and taken to Rome where she is trained as a gladiatrix. Tribulations and romance follow amid the dangers of political intrigue.

At nearly 800 pages the novel qualifies as the heftiest tome of historical fiction I have selected from my bookshelves this year. Since I am merely an eight of the way into the book I am reserving judgment about the characterisations and plot, but so far lyrical prose and a mystical mood (reminiscent of Marion Zimmer Bradley’s The Mists Of Avalon) are anchored to action-filled, historically detailed storytelling.

 

Please feel free to share a link to your own Tuesday teaser!

Food In Fiction: It Can’t Always Be Caviar by Johannes Mario Simmel

 

Being a high-wire secret agent during World War II and its aftermath is particularly tricky if you happen to be a firm pacifist.

 

The hard-to-find* gem, It Can’t Always Be Caviar (Es Muß Nicht Immer Kaviar Sein), was an international bestseller in the Sixties. In 1961 the novel was even adapted into a film. The back blurb of my 1967 Mayflower-Dell paperback shouts out in bold orange and turquoise lettering, “Fleming? Deighton? Le Carré? This is Europe’s answer”!

Those comparisons really do not do Johannes Mario Simmel’s book justice. For one thing, the tone of the story is that of a caper, humorous and irreverent, and for another, the main protagonist really, really does not want to have anything to do with government institutions or killing.

Unfortunately for Thomas Lieven and luckily for us readers, the vagaries of fate and raw talent get him recruited by the intelligence organisations of one country after another. He has to figure out not only how to stay alive in the cut-throat game of espionage, but how to get out of the deplorable messes that governments create for each other and their citizens - without resorting to violence. How, exactly, he manages to outwit his German, British, French, and American superiors while simultaneously aiding his fellow human beings through methods that satisfy his own ideas about morality and honour provides one of the most amusing and original spy thrillers – or books of any genre, come to think of it – I have ever had the pleasure of reading.

Thomas’s twin passions are cooking and women, and all the most critical points in his life are linked to one or the other, or both. For example, on 4th September 1940, a meal consisting of “Fried Onion Soup, Veal Fillets in Madeira Sauce, and Pancakes Flambées” facilitates Thomas’s transition from “the youngest private banker in London” to an expert passport forger. “Good God Almighty! And I shall never, never, never be able to tell the story in the club!” (Page 114-115.)

His culinary adventures are laid out in as careful detail as his spying escapades, enabling the reader to recreate each recipe. As for the women? He finally meets his match and – well, read it yourself ;-)

In the novel’s pages Simmel makes the claim that the story is based on actual events and persons. I will leave the truth of that for any fellow readers to decide.

 

*A new French edition seems to have been released last year, titled On N’A Pas Toujours Du Caviar, by Robert Laffont/Pavillons Poche. German-language editions also seem to be readily available.

 

Excerpt

(Mayflower-Dell paperback, 1967, page 9, 10, 11):

“His name is not, of course, Thomas Lieven.

We shall be forgiven, in the circumstances, for changing both his name and his address. But the story of this once peaceful citizen, who still loves cooking and who involuntarily became one of the most daring adventurer’s of his day, is true.

We begin it on the evening of April 11, 1957, at the historic moment when Thomas Lieven was lecturing on the preparation of lettuces.

Let us go back, then, to the kitchen in his villa.

‘Never let a salad come into contact with metal,’ said Thomas Lieven.

Kitty gazed as though hypnotized at her employer’s slender hands and listened to his instructions with continually renewed excitement.

‘For the sauce,’ said Thomas Lieven, ‘we need a pinch of salt and a teaspoonful of strong mustard. We add a hard-boiled egg, sliced small. Then plenty of parsley and even more chives. Four tablespoons of genuine Italian olive oil. The oil please, Kitty!’

With a blush, Kitty handed him the desired article.

‘Four spoonfuls of that, as I said. And now a cup of cream, sweet or sour according to taste. I’ll settle for sour–’

At that moment the kitchen door opened and a giant entered. He wore pin-striped trousers, a jacket striped blue and white, a white shirt and a white tie. Without his upright thatch of hair he would have resembled a second, excessively large, edition of Yul Brynner.

‘What is it, Bastien?’ asked Thomas Lieven.

The manservant answered in a slightly drawling French accent: ‘Herr Direktor Schallenberg has arrived.’

‘On the dot, eh?’ Thomas commented. ‘That’s the kind of man I can work with.’

[...]

MENU

Lady Curzon Soup
Paprika Chicken
Clara Salad
Rice
Apple Hedgehog with Wine Custard
Toast and Cheese

11 APRIL 1957

This dinner brought in 717,850 Swiss francs.

[...]

Apple Hedgehog With Wine Custard

Ripe apples of equal size are peeled, slowly simmered in vanilla-flavored syrup and before they disintegrate removed to a strainer to drain. Meanwhile almonds are blanched, cut into strips, put on a baking sheet and well roasted. As soon as the apples are properly drained they are drenched with a liqueur, rum or cognac, speared with the cut almonds and placed on a dish. For the custard the yolks of two eggs are mixed till foamy with half a cup of sugar, two tablespoons of cornstarch, half a cup of water and a cup of white wine. The mixture is then stirred over a small flame until thick. The whites of the two eggs are beaten until stiff and folded into the mixture, being flavored if desired with rum, arrack, cognac or similar spirits.”

 

Wishing you mouth-watering readings!

(For another fictional, culinary feast that I highly recommend, see The Food of Love by Anthony Capella.)

Germany: On The Night Of The Seventh Moon by Victoria Holt

Toward the end of last year I acquired additional bookcases and therefore had the shelf space to unbox some older favourites. It was fun and eye-opening to sort through hoards of books I had devoured in younger years. Tucked among them were some more recent, unread finds: gothics collected for no other reason than my having enjoyed this genre as a teenager. Smiling at the signature cover art (night, young woman in forefront, a brooding castle in the distance) I dipped into a book by Victoria Holt, amused by the awkward, unfinished writing style. Three hours later, I realised I was halfway through On The Night Of The Seventh Moon and thoroughly entertained.

 

1859. Honouring the memory of her German mother, English-born Helena Trant attends a Damenstift (convent school) in the Black Forest. The legend-rich woods hold a deep fascination for Helena. When a creeping autumn mist separates her from her companions at a forest picnic her predicament brightens into a fairytale adventure through her rescue, as evening darkens, by a mysterious stranger on a white horse.

Unable to forget him, she is thrilled when their paths cross again during the festival of The Seventh Moon. The reunion leads to the revelation that he is Maximilian, Count Lokenberg - and to a secret marriage. A few days into the honeymoon Maximilian is suddenly called away. The morning after, Helena wakes up in the home of friends, feeling sick. She is told that her memories of the Count are hallucinations; that she was raped by an unknown assailant and has remained bedridden with shock since the night of the Seventh Moon. When she insists on driving out to the forest lodge where she believes she and the Count had been so happy, nothing but ruins greet her. And that is only the beginning of the nightmare.

 

Holt’s storytelling runs smoothly: her breathless prose combines with a gallery of ambiguous characters and an intricate plot to produce a fast-paced, gripping gothic. The plot of On The Night Of The Seventh Moon is closely allied with the waning of independent German principalities and duchies and the period of unification in the lead-up to the Franco-Prussian War. The political background emerges gradually and gives structure to a story that not only spans a decade but breaks with current romance convention in its prolonged separation of the hero and heroine. The latter allows for plenty of the kind of mystery and intrigue that are hallmarks of the gothic romance that had its heyday in the 1960s and early seventies (a genre of which Victoria Holt was one of the reigning queens). Helena Trant starts out as a cheerful innocent but grows into a woman who, while never letting go of hope, works to make the best of a bad situation. From the beginning, hers is a fairytale with sinister undertones, and the foreboding atmosphere is readily sustained by being told in the first person, single point of view favoured by gothic writers. While at one stage I did begin to wonder if the character I assumed to be the hero would ever return, the suspense inherent in having to puzzle out the motives and intentions of the heroine’s surroundings was one of the most absorbing aspects of the novel.

Liechtenkinn, Klocksburg, Klarenbock, and Rochenstein are imaginary places, but Holt draws on the real-life history, customs, legends, and geography of the Black Forest region for flavour, and the settings she presents are full of interest. The festival that incites the story appears made up, however.

Eleanor Hibbert was never one of my favourite authors in any of her incarnations. As a teenager I deemed the world she created as Victoria Holt grim and depressing. My intense dislike of the ‘hero’ in Menfreya In The Morning finally caused me to shun her books entirely. On The Night Of The Seventh Moon has inspired me to give her a second chance. Beyond that, the book proves that I still have a soft spot for old-fashioned gothic romance.

 

Excerpt

(Fontana Books paperback, 1974, page 44-5):

“So that was how we came to be standing in the square with the revellers all about us. It was about eight o’clock in the evening. Overhead hung the great moon – the seventh moon of the year and there seemed to be something mystical about it. It was a strange scene; naphtha flares burned from iron jets lighting the faces of the people. There were crowds in the square; people were signing and calling to each other. I caught sight of a man masked, with the horned head-dress which Ilse had described, and I recognized it at once from pictures my mother had shown me. Then I saw another and another.

Ilse squeezed my hand. ‘What do you think of it?’

‘Wonderful,’ I said.

‘Keep close. The crowd’s thickening and they may become over-excited.’

‘It’s early yet,’ I told her.

I saw a girl seized by one of the horn-headed men and go dancing off with him.

‘The excitement grows. You’ll see.’

‘What happens if the sky is overcast and there’s no moon?’

‘Some say that Loke is sulking and won’t come out, others that he’s playing one of his mischievous tricks and then one has to be especially careful.’

A group of fiddlers arrived, started to play and the dancing began.

I don’t know quite how it happened; it was the way these things do happen in crowds, I supposed. One minute I was standing there by Ilse’s side watching the laughing and dancing swirl of people and the next there was chaos.”