Wolf Hall, Hilary Mantel

Hans Holbein, Thomas Cromwell

(February) So I went into Wolf Hall with a certain amount of skepticism, first, because I gorged myself on Henry-VIII-and-his-wives books, TV shows and movies when I was a kid, and thought I was jaded, and, second, because of the comments at the copy-editing list and elsewhere about the sloppy pronominal antecedents.

But I really, really liked it -- Cromwell as the "good guy" and More as the "bad guy"? That was fascinating. And I thought the ambiguous-pronoun business was effective in the end. After a few backtracks to figure out whether it was Cromwell, Wolsey or Henry thinking or speaking, I decided Mantel was making the point that one of Cromwell's great talents was the ability "get into the head of" the magnate he was serving (or anyone else's, really). It was a cool effect. In fact, the narrative would have quite a different quality if the antecedence were "properly" copy-edited.

Despite the date stamp on this post, I didn't finish reading Wolf Hall till May 14. I waited in line for it at the library three times, through a 150-odd person queue each time. Which tells you: I liked it enough to wait for it three times, but not enough to buy it. I endured three long waits for it because it was compelling, fresh... even haunting. But it was not hard to wait.

"Is it me or ---?" comment: I think Mantel has Cromwell and his scholar friends inventing the internet at one point. Their dream system for organizing books was very internetty, anyway. Fun.

Lord John and the Private Matter, Diana Gabaldon

Thomas Gainsborough, Gainsborough Dupont

(January 7) Like the Outlander series, what's enjoyable is the author's attractive voice and her great love of the 18th century.

Lord John is really likable; he's gentle, genteel, honorable, enlightened; he has a dry wit: there's lots to like. He's a sympathetic point of view, for sure... different from Claire and Jamie in temperament, but equally someone whose party you want to join.

The novel is nominally a mystery, and questions do get answered, but Lord John is not a professional or even amateur detective in the usual sense. He's just able to put two and two together if enough clues fall into his lap.

Gabaldon indulges her fascination with the history of medicine once again -- it's entertaining to read how 18th-century coroners had to work out times and causes of death, given the lack of modern instruments and science to do such things as distinguish pig's blood from human and so on, and there's some interesting trivia, like the belief that a malarial fever could cure syphilis. Plus it's a bit of an exposé of the gay underworld of 18th-century London.