Customer Reviews

Pargeters

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Norah Lofts wrote the best historical fiction, not cheesy historical romance, just good history stories...her books are mostly centered around a town in northern England, Baildon, and the villages surrounding it; this novel, Pargeters, will catch you in its spell; you will become so engrossed in the characters & their lives, that you will forget they lived 400 years ago, & are fiction anyway, you'll be sorry, as I always am, when Norah Loft's stories end!!

This story that takes place in England immediately before, during and after the Commonwealth period is excellently written. There are characters to love and to despise, along with lots of history and cultural information, and even a couple of mysteries woven in to the story. Some of the events I was able to guess ahead of time, but several were completely unexpected. Sarah's determination and fortitude reminded me a bit of Scarlett O'Hara, although Sarah certainly had a more realistic view of herself and others than Scarlett ever managed. The ending was such a combination of sadness and joy, and it was very much a suprise. I would have wished Sarah more periods of happiness in her life, but other than that, I could not have wished for the story to be any different than it was. Outstanding!!

I have read this book 5 times and its great if you want to forget about everything and escape into the historical world of ancient Suffolk. I love Norah Lofts books and this is one of her best ones. I am trying to collect them all.

I think these kinds of novels are often ignored by younger people but this novel is great for young people (20's to 30's -I'm 26 y/o) who are curious about how people used to live in the past. The story takes place back in the 1600's in the England countryside during the war. The author clearly communicates how the war affected people's lives back then. Also, how people lived in general at that time.
If you like to read Phillippa Gregory (The Other Boleyn Girl) you will most likely love this book. I think it had more depth yet a little less drama/intrigue compaired to Gregory. There is also a mysterious if not metophysical element to the story.

I will read more books by this author.

I am a big fan of Norah Lofts and this is one of my favorite books. If you like reading about typical people in Old England you will love this book. I read her books over and over again. She is classified sometimes as a Romance writer but she is not... whoever gives her this classification has not read her books. She is a GREAT Historical Fiction writer.

Ordered for wife she loved it . Fast Shipping and in perfect condition excellent seller . Pargeters/a Historical Nove... (Hardcover) by Norah Lofts

There are technical problems with this tale that make me want to wish the author could have told a tale that engaged me.

We start with the Plasterer of the house, a few decades before the English Civil War. But once this man is wed to a woman he does not love we jump forward and the entire book changes to his daughters viewpoint. In essence we have just had pages and pages of backstory. Too much backstory.

We now have a first person view of the 20 years of the Civil War and the Protectorate of Cromwell. But here is the second major problem. Time elapses in this period of misery so poorly done that my sense was that the war took place over months, not years. Charles I was a 'guest' of Parliament for weeks, not years, and Cromwell had free reign with his horrid Puritanism for a few seasons, not more than a decade.

First Person stories should engage and this does not. The tale of living under the dogmatic, unfair laws of the era are told to us, and somehow the distance that the heroine places to survive force a distance in the reading. One minute she has a baby, the next the baby is able to work in the farm.

The passage of time is very skewed.

Then my last problem is that the book is about misery. And Lofts puts in a ten page love story amidst 400+ pages of story. I just can't buy it.

I want to study the period. I want to have the derring do of the Cavaliers and the glitter of the Restoration, and instead I get the dark dankiness of Puritanism so bad that I am inclined to think of all Puritans in any form as the most close minded of people. I am led to further believe that Parliament and Roundheads are still the enemy today. And that this tale gives you three lines of happiness and all the rest anguish.

There are other parts of the writing where it looks like Lofts wanted to put a historical term in and just dropped those in to the monologue without the heroine actually using that period relevancy in their every day life. This is a never again read, and a read I would never recommend.

I think I would have to say, that this was one of the worst books I have attempted to read. It was hard to keep track of the characters because they were hard to warm up to. They were just names on paper. I could not finish it. I had to put it down, which for me, I have never done before. I usually love this type of novel, but while reading this, I just wanted someone to shoot me and put me out of my misery.