Surrounded by Treasures: Review: <i>Queen of Swords</i>, Sara Donati (Wilderness series, #5)

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Saturday, June 17, 2006

Review: Queen of Swords, Sara Donati (Wilderness series, #5)

This book won't actually be available until October. I just read it already because I'm special. Or because the author is really nice and I used to work for her and she sent me an advance reading copy out of the goodness of her heart; that's probably more like it.

Anyone who's been reading my blog for a while knows that I really enjoy this series. It's set in late 18th-/early 19th-century New York/Canada/Scotland/now Louisiana, and centers around an ever-growing family founded when Nathaniel Bonner (a character loosely based on James Fenimore Cooper's frontier novels) marries a rather Austen-ish, forward-thinking British schoolteacher named Elizabeth Middleton. The first four novels focus, more or less, on Elizabeth and Nathaniel and their life in the wilderness of New York State, branching out for longer and longer bits into the worlds their children make for themselves as they grow until, in this fifth novel, Elizabeth and Nathaniel are definitely very minor characters, and the story is taken over by Nathaniel's son Luke and daughter Hannah, and Luke's wife Jennet (whose rescue from nefarious kidnappers in the first pages felt at first like it should be the end of a story and not the beginning of one. Which shows what I know, because in actuality that beginning sets the stage for the rest of the family's adventures most effectively). Donati's genius as a storyteller is evident here; all her work over the past few novels in fleshing out minor characters was well-done and extremely necessary, because here those characters who were secondary up until this point not only have their own intriguing stories (as they have in Lake in the Clouds and Fire Along the Sky), they carry almost the entire 560 pages on their very capable shoulders, with only small (but very welcome and well-written) help from their better-known family members. Which, honestly, is probably going to annoy a few fans, but for my part I didn't mind at all. That said, there's talk of a possible sequel, and I do hope it comes to pass, and that it does include a bit more of everyone "back home".

One note: perhaps because it relies so heavily on just a few characters, I kept thinking that this book seemed uniquely capable of standing on its own for people who had never read the rest of the series. Not that I recommend starting with it -- you have a much richer experience if you've read the four that come before it. But unlike most series books, I think a person who found this on a bookstore shelf and went, 'hmm, that looks interesting' and failed to notice that it was fifth in a series could still have a ripping good read without constantly wondering who the heck these people are and why it seems like we should know more about them than we do.

So that you know I'm not biased ;), I'll go ahead and say that the book, great as it truly is, is not perfect. There are a few historical passage which are necessary and quite informative but read a bit like a (very, very good) textbook. Also, in the first section of the book there were a few moments where Donati's prose seemed to fall a bit flat, although recovery was rapid and complete.

Because this review is based on an ARC and the novel itself hasn't been released yet, my review of it has to be absolutely spoiler-free, and I don't know how far I can go into the plot without revealing major points that are (quite successfully) intended to be surprises. Suffice to say that when you reach the last page you'll feel like you've lived in wet, sultry, complicated New Orleans for six months or so, and that Creole culture and the infamous Battle of New Orleans will become real to you in a way that they may well never have been before. (Also, prepare to have Johnny Horton stuck in your head for at least a day or two. I'm just sayin'. In eighteen fourteen we took a little trip...).

Posted by Rachel on June 17, 2006 10:57 PM in nose in a book