Customer Reviews

Isabella: Queen Without a Conscience

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I really enjoyed Rachel Bard's first novel, "Queen without a Country," which focused on Berengaria of Navarre, and was looking forward to this one. Isabella of Angouleme, the wife of King John of England, is another interesting medieval queen who tends to get somewhat overlooked in historical fiction (when I first saw the title I initially thought it referred to another notorious Isabella, Edward II's Queen). I'm only aware of Jean Plaidy's novels that featured her, so I had high hopes for a new retelling.

The language is accessible and it is an easy read, with some sense of the period, although the style of writing was not as visually evocative as it was in Bard's first novel. The dialogue is modern English, but not ridiculously so.

However, while this was not a *bad* book, it read more like a first draft than the finished product. The use of alternating first person narratives, when done well, can be very compelling; however it is a risk, and extremely difficult to get away with. Unfortunately, it really did not work. There were far too many narrators - Isabella herself, a lady in waiting, King John, Hugh de Lusignan, and so it went on - with little distinction in style between the different voices. Bard would have been much better advised to stick with Isabella's POV, or use alternating limited third person or third person omniscient.

The opening of the book has Isabella telling us that her life was nothing like the way the hostile chroniclers have portrayed her, but we're not really *shown* this (to be honest, there were times when it comes across as though the chroniclers were right!). In fact, telling rather than showing, and a great deal of exposition, is one of the main issues I had with it. Further, the latter part of the novel, dealing with Isabella's life-after-John, is extremely rushed. At the end of it, I still did not have a clear picture of Isabella as a character, as opposed to Isabella-the-myth.

I didn't dislike this novel, but I was somewhat disappointed. For anyone interested in this period, I don't seek to discourage you from reading it, but suggest borrowing it from the library and then buy it if you love it.

I loved Isabella. In particular, I appreciated Bard's cuing me at the beginning of each chapter as to whose voice I would be hearing. It's a complicated book about a complicated time in medieval history when battle lines and loyalties seemed to shift with every season, but Rachel Bard has made these shifts seem inevitable.

I was recently traveling by train from Paris to Bordeaux and so passed many towns that were part of Isabella's life. It was wonderful to be able to look at them and remember what went on there all those years ago when a headstrong young princess was growing up, defending and defining herself.

I understand that there will be a third medieval queen book coming out soon and I can hardly wait to dive into it.
Hurray for making stodgy European history into a vivid, lively tale!

This book has been the answer to my gift-giving quandaries. I have given copies to travelers, history buffs, readers looking for a good tale, and girls and women who love a woman's story.
Author Bard shows that Isabella and other royal women (even today) live three lives at once, all interacting, none independent. The intertwining lives involve Isabella's own selfhood, her family, and her country. Bard does this exploration well. No act on Isabella's part is free of these three responsibilities, and the consequences can be joyful, tragic, but most are mixed. We follow Isabella as a virgin girl, wife to English King John, mother, adulterer, again wife, and finally widow.
Skillfuly helping this exploration, the story shifts first-person narration among the players while artfully keeping Isabella as our focus. As the plot progresses, story sections are told by Isabella, King John, a lady in waiting, lover, mother-in-law Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine, second husband, and her son, English King Henry. What the multiple points of view allow is clarity of motivation, humor, plot complexity, reversals, foreshadowing, tension, and easily and concisely accessed historical and cultural details.
The read is smooth--enabled by the layout and type face as well as by being impeccably edited and proofed. Major publishing houses could learn from Bard.

Rachel Bard may be a decent author but as a researcher she overlooks far, far too much.

Isabelle was abducted, yes, kidnapped, by King John, who already carried the weight of three murders upon his head. She was 12 he was 32. (It is almost impossible to paint John, a man of larger-than-life pathology, black enough.) Isabelle had no choice but to marry him. The example of Alys, Countess of the Vexin, was before her and if that could happen to the daughter of a king, the daughter of a count could expect nothing better. Isabelle also did not commit adultery, which was the capital crime of treason. Today we have little idea of how confined girls and women were back then and how cruel the punishments meted out to those thought unchaste.

Next, there is this 'marry for love' thing going on in this book and that is something that simply did not occur at this level of society where marriages were political or dynastic and a daughter, little more than a political tool, had no choice, no choice at all. Chivalry was fine for poets and troubadors but it was a code more often observed by its absence. Life at this time, at this societal level was a snakepit and families were little more than wolfpacks feeding upon eachother. It does no good to romanticize history.

The facts are that Isabelle had to walk very carefully and choose her battles wisely. That she could remain alive and well while in John's hands and then return to marry her original betrothed, Hugh X, bringing her dowery with her, with her reputation intact, proves that she was quite a gal.

Without a Conscience is not a book worthy of Isabelle.

Isabella: Queen Without A Conscience, By Rachel Bard
This was a book we looked forward to reading every night. A well
researched novel that brought to life what were previously just names in a history book. One wishes that the book could be recorded with multiple
readers for each character. We thought that the different perspectives
created a more interesting accounting of the times and events than is usually the case with most historical novels. Sometimes second books can be disappointing, but we loved this one as much as her first one, Queen without a Country. We are looking forward to the next story by Ms Bard

Ms. Bard's latest, "Isabella: Queen Without a Conscience", was a tasty read. I loved the author's ability to combine historical fact with unhysterical fiction. It takes true talent to bring such an important figure to life. I eagerly await the third book in this trilogy (the first was "Queen Without A Country" about Berengeria, Richard the Lion Hearted's bride...)

Though not at the level of Ms. Bard's non-fiction histories or her previous novel, Isabella: Queen Without a Conscience is an enjoyable well-researched book.

The title is slightly misleading, as Isabella is portrayed as spoiled, self-centered, manipulative, and rather unintelligent, but never as cruel or evil. My primary disatifaction stemmed from the constantly rotating first person narrative, which tended to break up the continuity of the story.

I also am curious as to why Ms. Bard did not include any of John's numerous illegitamite children as characters, as at least three were part of the court during the time Isabella was Queen.