This was a pretty huge slog until about 60% into it for me. Historical fiction is a tricky beast, for me. You can pretty much set your watch for the tropes, which definitely show up en masse in this one. 6-7 rapes, karmic Justice, evil bishops. I wonder now if this influenced a lot of historical fiction? Wouldn’t be surprised if this was the blueprint for a bunch of it, to be honest.

There is some satisfaction in the excellent plotting, which built up nicely. No doubt the thematic through line mirroring the starting and stuttering with interventions of antagonistic forces to Tom’s dream; so powerful, apparently, his fairly loveless ex wife felt it needed to be on her tongue at death. A Bold Statement. And it IS satisfying that everything comes around and we circle back to each event so that it gives more context, plot wise. But it also makes the fiction feel slightly manufactured as well.

Things are a little to clean, even the dirt.

It’s difficult to prioritize accuracy and then have multiple rapes and wild, random acts, many of which are sexual in nature and trite, such as the gratuitous, obligatory sadist. People really like to show “evil” dudes with that trope. But yet all this mess ties up into a neat bow. It’s a readers satisfaction, and what bumped it up to 3 stars.

Though long, it did clip along pretty well, I found. Something I hadn’t expected, actually. The first chapter was a bit long, but I mean, it’s historical fiction and we need to be situated, so I don’t mind. It took me a long, long time though, to find something to care about. Especially after the very convenient plot points at the beginning that come ‘round. It’s so tropey at the times that you can pretty much see every character arc and plot point in the distance. You just trot on to see how nice the thing you’re about to witness has been constructed, pretty much.

Once I did, and things started to come together - albeit with the feeling of a jigsaw puzzle, rather than a painting trying to capture a historical moment - it did start to carve out some agency for the people I liked. I think every woman only got agency after being dominated, and I can hear the men shout about historical accuracy—in fiction. Where the cathedrals aren’t real. And the characters never existed. The writer can choose to decide what is important and what isn’t.

The verisimilitude isn’t that granular. We don’t follow the characters during plenty of events. So the choice to have gratuitous sex and sexual assault and what not, is the author saying this is important for the overall story. This means it’s fair for the reader to judge them within the fiction as established. And at the very least I can say I’m not interested in seeing that and I’m 100% sure women achieved agency through other means, even “historically”.

Power through surviving is all well and good, I was just so tired every time a chapter started happily and knew that the plotting demanded it’d end shitty for them, and if it was a woman, well assault was probably going. I understand that the guy is shitty and bad. We’ve seen him be that way the whole time. Not everything has to be cyclical and directly opposing to their initial action. No one really changes, they just wait for their own karmic Justice. If you’re bad, anticipate the down fall. If you’re good, you’ll earn it, but you’ve got good odds. Unless you’re a minor character.

I feel like this is the epitome of a 3 star book. Had I read it ten years ago or more, my mind probably would have been blown. These days, though, I am looking for a bit more than what all historical fiction has to offer and exceptional plotting.