Book of the Week

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

Juan Garcia-Rodenas tackles Tolstoy's rollicking historical novel. 

War and Peace is considered by many to be one of the greatest novels to have ever been written in any language. The story follows three Russian families, Bolkonsky, Rostov and Bezuhov, during the Napoleonic Wars, arguably one of the most interesting periods in history. The story begins in 1805 and ends later, after the Napoleonic era.

The Power of the Historical Novel

Ned Ashcroft

“Show my head to the people. It’s worth the trouble.”

Georges-Jacques Danton: the bully-boy. His words, upon his execution, shall forever remain eternal. Trampled on by an ox at an early age, his scarred face fitted in perfectly with the burly frame and overwhelming voice, making him the natural leader of the Parisian revolutionary mob, or Sans-culottes. Maximilien Robespierre: the mastermind. Upon his withered shoulders the weight of historical disapproval falls heavily, but his mind will forever burn freely of the political suspicion and idealism that drove five years of revolution. Camille Desmoulins: the devil. Words flowed through his pen like magic, only to be stumbled over and frustrated in speech. Desmoulins’ aptitude for seduction casts him with a dark shade: long black locks flowing over his sharp features he is a phantom menace, yet one who we love all the same.

A simplistic description at best, but the achievements of Hilary Mantel’s titanic historical novel, A Place of Greater Safety, are still fairly well surmised above. Through her perfect cohesion of historical fact with entertainment value, Mantel provides 872 pages of energy, 872 pages of information and 872 pages of passion.