Poison
By Sara Poole
This Book is a little bit out of my norm, though not entirely as history is an interest of mine, and Poison is historical fiction. In context, I thoroughly enjoyed "Water for Elephants" which transported readers to the era of the Great Depression in the United States and life aboard a travelling circus of that era, and read The Book Thief, which took us to World War II Germany. Poison takes us a little bit further back in history for the story that it wishes to tell. So while Poison doesn't fit into the category of science fiction or fantasy as this website usually focuses on, I am taking the liberty of including my thoughts on this book here.
The setting for the story is Rome, 1492. The main character, Francesca Giordano, works for Rodrigo Borgia, one of the most important people in Christendom as his poisoner. It is a job that she had to murder a person to get, a job that she felt it was her right to have based on the fact that her father had previously held the position. Her father had been murdered, and she demands to see justice--or is it vengeance--whereas it seems that no one seems to care about what happened to her father, and she sees fit to take it upon herself to find them. Thus enters her foray into the political and religious intrigue of 15th century Rome, and soon earns the attention of the same force that murdered her father.
This book is eloquently written from the start, with almost a Victorian flare of description and flow of the story. The prelude to the story drew me into wanting to continue reading this book and caused me to drop the other books I was currently reading to focus more on this particular book. Unfortunately, the prose that the book is written in slowed the story down in its early going, and the first 20 pages were less than exciting as I struggled to understand fully what was going on. After that, however, the story really took off on a nonstop adventure through the streets of Rome and the underbelly of the Vatican as Francesca struggled to make sure that her master became elected pope, not only for her sake and his, but the very survival of the Jewish population in Rome, which depended on Borgia's election as well.
Once it starts, the action doesn't stop through the book at all, continuing right up to the very end, making it hard to put the book down. However, the conclusion of the book does seem a bit rushed. Most of the story unfolds over the course of a couple of days, and then the four days of the sealed conclave to elect the pope was given a scant few pages at the end.
Overall, I think this is one of the better books I have read in a while and would read other books by Sara Poole, especially if they pick up the story of Francesca in her quest for vengeance.
The book will be available on August 3, 2010.
