Grade: A-

I’m a reader of simple taste. This means that I tend to enjoy book that are not too complicated or require a diagram for me to make sense of it. I don’t like having to set my book down, so I can look up something on Wikipedia to help me understand what the author is even talking about. This doesn’t make me an idiot. It just means I’m lazy. If I have to look shit up to understand something insignificant like, let’s say, a plot point, I ain’t picking up that book again. Imagine my surprise when I began reading this book about a witch living in sixteenth century France and enjoying the shit out of it. I mean, we’ve got witches, Protestants, Catholics, Huguenots (what the fuck are they?), political intrigue, Catherine de Medici, all wrapped up in a love story… and none of it hurt my poor little head. As for those assholes on Amazon complaining that the cover of this book tricked them because it’s “bodice-ripper” and not a “true historical fiction,” who gives a shit? It’s a book that got me interested in sixteenth century France!

This is the story of Ariane Cheney, the Lady of Faire Isle, and the leader and protector of a lesbian commune on her island. I’m just kidding… they’re not lesbians. A good lot of them, however, are “wise women,” which is really just a nice name for “witches”. Ariane and her two sisters are all “wise women” and particularly powerful because they are true Daughters of the Earth. At this point, I should already be rolling my eyes or throwing the book across the room, but I surprised even myself when I only continued reading. Ariane is a fascinating creature: she is a familiar character because she is an orphaned woman who is forced to take care of her younger siblings on her own, has an entire town dependent on her, and likes to dabble in herbs (how many times have we encountered this girl in a romance novel?). At the same time, there is something fresh and new about her. She is stubborn, but not to the point of idiocy, genuinely cares about her people, but not to the point of martyrdom, and best of all, she is intelligent, has a good head on her shoulders, and brave as all hell.

Oh, and by the way, even though this book is about three sisters who happen to be witches, there’s none of that Charmed bullshit here.

Ariane is generous in all things, except when it comes to her love-hate relationship with Justice (not Justin) Deauxville, the Comte de Renard. Renard wants to marry her (mostly because she owns ancient manuscripts that contain very powerful spells), but Ariane has commitment and trust issues that stem from her mother’s relationship with her father. Renard, as a romance hero is wont to do, won’t take this shit lying down and demands that Ariane marry him. Fortunately, Renard is not your average romance hero jerk. Although he appears at first as a regular alpha male type who’s all growls and testosterone and lets his penis do all his thinking for him, as the book unfolds, we are shown different sides of him, and he is revealed as this awesome alpha-beta hybrid that just swept me off my feet. When he rescues Ariane’s little sister’s cat? Tears! I mean, he’s this great, powerful warrior and lord, but when it comes to Ariane and her family, he becomes this big, adorable oaf who’d protect them with his life. He’s almost too good to be true, but he also has some darkness to him (all that crazy stuff with his grandmother) that makes him a more believable character. To wit, he manipulates Ariane into accepting a ring from him, only it’s not just an ordinary ring. This ring would connect Ariane and Renard in ways that defy time and place and with it, Ariane only has to put on the ring and summon him, and he would race to her side, come hell or high water. She can only use the ring three times and on the third time, she must agree to marry him.

To a more cynical reader (including me), this story might read like too much of a Disney fairy tale. I mean, we’ve got a brave and honorable heroine, who is the only person who stands between France and the screaming mouth of hell (and she can’t even get most of her spells right), her gallant suitor who would face Satan himself for her, and most importantly, a devilish, scheming woman whom everyone secretly calls the Dark Queen. We’ve even got a magic ring, people! At this point, all we need is a talking teakettle, a moving score complete with a constantly surprising refrain, and a poisoned apple (fear not, we’ve got poisoned gloves!), and we’ve got the makings of a bona fide Disney hit! Hell, Mattel’s already on the phone, asking about a possible tie-in with Barbie. Beyond all that, however, we still get a sense that these characters could have been real people with real feelings and real thoughts. Carroll does herself proud by keeping these characters down-to-earth. For example, even when Ariane has to device a plan to battle the forces of evil, she still worries about wearing an old hand-me-down dress to a dinner with Renard, and fears that he would think she looks dowdy.

What’s really powerful about this story is the friendship that develops between Ariane and Renard. Even though Renard wants nothing more than to shag Ariane any chance he could get, he doesn’t just think of her that way. He truly respects her intelligence and doesn’t presume to tell her what to do or what to think. He listens to everything she has to say, appreciates her skills and talent, and when Ariane tells him that she needs some time and distance away from him, he respects her decision, and doesn’t try to bully her into changing her mind. Ariane, on the other hand, is understandably wary of Renard because he’s a strong-minded man, and she’s afraid that if he became her husband, she wouldn’t be able to perform her duties as the Lady of Faire Isle anymore. She’s also traumatized about romantic love because her father cheated on her mother and it almost destroyed her mother. Lastly, she can’t get herself to trust Renard because it bothers her that even though she’s very proficient at “eye reading,” she can’t read his eyes because he’s got “thecreth” that he’s hiding from her. Whenever she needs his help, though, she’s not stupidly stubborn that she wouldn’t call for him, especially if the lives of her people depend on it. She respects him, even admires him, and slowly but surely, allows herself to care for him. When the two of them begin to really spend time together and just sit somewhere and talk… geez, you guys, they’re so cute together!

At first, I was bothered that the ring that Renard gives to Ariane is just a contrivance for Ariane to come crying to Renard whenever she’s in trouble even when she’s supposed to be this strong, independent woman, but I got over it. Ariane has a way of rationalizing it to herself that made perfect sense to me.

I also really enjoyed the secondary characters in this story. There’s Gabrielle, the middle child, who has issues of her own, but is still very staunchly protective of her sisters. At first, Gabrielle may come off as a right nasty bitch, but she’s really got reasons and when it all comes down to it, all the stupid shit she does is just really out of love. When she begins to warm up to Remy, the Huguenot soldier that Ariane is hiding from the Dark Queen, we see traces of the girl she once was before the “incident”. There’s also Miri, the youngest sister, who talks to animals. She does some really stupid shit here that pissed me off enough to start screaming at the pages, but I figured she’s just a kid, so I forgave her. When her own book comes around, I hope she’s got her head figured out. Another interesting character is Remy himself, who is really just a soldier who wants to avenge the death of his queen and protect the righteous King of Navarre. He is noble and kind in a way that reminded me of Galahad, but I got a sense that there’s more to this guy than meets the eye. The scene in the forest where he plays a knight brandishing a wooden sword at a tree that was supposed to be a dragon to save Gabrielle who is pretending to be a damsel in distress? TEARS!

The only thing that really bothered me about this story is how the Dark Queen, Catherine de Medici, just seemed so cut-and-dry evil. She’s like the stereotype of a cackling witch, plotting against our fair-haired heroines. Against one could argue that she’s doing all this to ensure that her son, Charles, retains power, but that’s not it, either. She only wants Charles to stay in power, so she could play puppet master with him and control France herself. There are a handful of scenes here that show a kinder, gentler Catherine who was once best friends with Ariane’s mother, but those scenes are too few and far between that we don’t really get a sense of her as a true character. As it is, she’s just a caricature of a Disney villain who really don’t have the good sense to leave our fair-haired heroines alone. There’s also Le Vis, the evil witch-hunter, that de Medici sends to kill Ariane, who was kind of interesting in a way that he really believes that he is doing God’s work by killing witches. He is the worst sort of fanatic who kind of reminded me of another freakishly deluded man who thinks he’s doing God’s work. I’m talking about Pat Robertson, by the way. I bet that guy would have been the vilest, most evil witch-hunter back in the day.

I thought of this book as a strong feminist love story. It is rare that I read a romance novel where the women actually band together and not do the stupid, triflin’ shit that women are always accused of doing. There is a strong sense of sisterhood here (and not just between Ariane and her sisters) and a feeling that all the women in this book really respect each other. Even the wicked Dark Queen, when she’s not plotting the death of Ariane, grudgingly respects Ariane’s powers and talent as a Daughter of the Earth. She recognizes Ariane as a force to be reckoned with and treats her as such. There’s no scorned mistress here, no slutty wenches who throw themselves at the hero, or any of that embarrassing shit usually portrayed by women in romance novels. I mean, I really enjoyed the hell out of this book. I adored the love story between Ariane and Renard, was fascinated by the thorough research that Carroll must have conducted to write this book, and look forward to the other books of this series (it’s a trilogy). If y’all want to read something different, even if this stuff isn’t your cup of tea, you should give this one a try. You might surprise yourself by actually liking it.

Oh, by the way, here’s the review on Amazon, complaining that the cover “tricked” her:

As a huge fan of historical fiction (particularly of the Medieval and Renaissance varieties) as well as of fantasy novels, I was rather excited when I found this book on the “new fiction” table of my local bookstore. The back cover billed this book as a feminist-historical-fiction-fantasy hybrid. So, I thought “what the heck!” and purchased.

About 2 pages in - upon reading the physical description of the strikingly beautiful main character, Ariane, and the subsequent physical descriptions of her strikingly beautiful younger sisters - I realized I had been tricked! This book is more a Romance novel than anything else, albeit a slightly more substantial and far more engaging read than most “bodice rippers.” (Of which, admittedly, I’m not widely read. So, perhaps they have more hidden charms than I have been lead to believe.)

Most of the other reviewers have labeled this book a decent “Summer Read.” I’d classify it more in the decent “Commuter Read” category. If you take noisy public transportation, and want to occupy yourself with some easy-reading fluff, this book is probably ideal. If you’re looking to sink your teeth into a solid novel of historical fiction, or even fantasy - this is probably not the best buy.

Asshole. How can a cover “trick” you? It’s an inanimate object!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 1st, 2006 at 10:30 pm and is filed under Books, Grade: A, Romance: Historical. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.