68. The Lost Sisterhood - Anne Fortier

2014, Ballantine books

585 pgs.

Adult CRF/HistFict/Mystery

Finished 11/2/2014

Goodreads rating: 3.80

My rating:  (5) Awesome 

TPPL

Setting: Contemporary Oxford University, Algeria, Turkey, Germany, and Finland, Ancient Algeria, Turkey, Troy

1st sentence/s: "In her own obscure fashion, my grandmother did what she could to arm me for the carnage of life.  Stamping hooves, rushing chariots, rapacious males . . . thanks to Granny, I had it more or less cased by the age of then."

My comments:  For me, this was in incredible piece of storytelling.   Yes, it was a little long, especially through the middle, but the first third and the last third made up for the middle third.  Told in alternating voices in two very different time periods - Myrina of the Amazons and Diana of contemporary scholarship - exploring the world of 3,000 years ago and today; it included strong females, a great grandmother-granddaughter relationship, a bit of sexual tension, and loads of mystery.  I've never been an Odyssey fan, and I still loved the story. The ending went in a direction and to a locale that I never expected.  This was a great read for me.  It even tapped into my Nordic genes!

Goodreads book summary: The Lost Sisterhood tells the story of Diana, a young and aspiring--but somewhat aimless--professor at Oxford. Her fascination with the history of the Amazons, the legendary warrior women of ancient Greece, is deeply connected with her own family's history; her grandmother in particular. When Diana is invited to consult on an archeological excavation, she quickly realizes that here, finally, may be the proof that the Amazons were real.
          The Amazons' "true" story--and Diana's history--is threaded along with this modern day hunt. This historical back-story focuses on a group of women, and more specifically on two sisters, whose fight to survive takes us through ancient Athens and to Troy, where the novel reinvents our perspective on the famous Trojan War.
          The Lost Sisterhood features another group of iconic, legendary characters, another grand adventure--you'll see in these pages that Fortier understands the kind of audience she has built with Juliet, but also she's delivering a fresh new story to keep that audience coming back for more.

65. A Discovery of Witches - Deborah Harkness

Viking, 2011
43 chapters, 580 pgs.
HC $28.95
for: adults
Rating:  5 (I really don't want to give it a 5, but it was lovely writing, a hard-to-put-down plot and storyline, characters that were so well defined I felt as if I knew them,  and a strong, smart, librarian/scholar protagonist.  Everything I love in a book.  And I loved this book.....)

First line/lines:  The leather-bound volume was nothing remarkable.  To an ordinary historian, it would have looked no different from hundreds of other manuscripts in Oxford's Bodleian Library, ancient and worn.  But I knew there was something odd about it from the moment I collected it.

Setting: Contemporary Oxford, for the first third of the book; in the countryside near Lyon, France for the second third; and upstate New York for the third third.
OSS:  Diana Bishop, a noted American historian and college professor who has always tried to ignore her roots as a witch, becomes involved with a vampire while trying to unravel the secret of an ancient book of alchemy.

As I read the last page, I was quite disappointed that I didn't know the final, "final," outcome, but decided to like the ending because of the hugely entertaining possibilities, and started to examine the fine print of the book.   A DISCOVER OF WITCHES IS PART ONE IN THE ALL SOULS TRILOGY.  LOOK FOR THE NEXT NOVEL IN 2012.  NO NO NO NO NO !!!!!

How will I ever remember every character and their part in the story between now and when a sequel comes out?

Witches and vampires and daemons.  All hate each other and have for millenniums.  Humans factor very little in this book (if at all), all the main players are creatures - namely witches, vampires, and daemons.  They are not supposed to mix, to fraternize, and a natural animosity usually even keeps them from being friends.  Until Diana Bishop and Matthew Clairmont meet.  KABOOM!  Sparks fly.  Literally.

Diana has always suppressed her witch tendencies.  She wants to be ordinary.  But a subhuman amount of adrenaline keep her running, rowing, and doing yoga whenever she's not researching.  She has no close friends (oddly), and the two aunts that raised her after her parents' murder worry obsessively about her. Although she is very attractive and has had lovers before, there are no males in her life. She has kept herself aloof emotionally, which is the perfect for what is about to happen.

Diana is no wimp.  She is no Bella - thankfully.  She is more of a Hermione, with a touch more determination and spunk (though Hermione did gather those possessions as she matured.)  Diana comes from a long line of Bishops, originating, she thinks, from Bridget Bishop who was killed during the Salem witch trials in the late 15th century.

I loved the first third of the book, the part that took place in Oxford.  The French part was really interesting, the American third had so much change and new information to absorb that I didn't enjoy it quite as much.  I can't believe that I decided to read an almost 600 page novel, but I'm really glad I did!