95 of 99 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Not Rutherfurd's best work, but still a good read., April 22, 2004
Having read and immensely enjoyed two of Rutherfurd's previous books - 'Sarum' and 'The Forest' - I was really looking forward to this book. It was slightly disappointing in comparison with the author's other work, but not too much so. Those who've read Rutherfurd before will know that he writes in a style very much like that of the late James Michener (though I find him much more readable than Michener). His books focus on one particular area and trace the lines of several fictional families down through time. This particular novel, the first of a two-book work, is centered around Dublin, Ireland.
There are five basic sub-stories which serve as 'windows' into history. The first begins in AD 430 and tells the love story of an Irish prince and the woman whom he wishes to marry. The king himself wants the girl for his bride, so the prince and his girl are forced to flee and live in hiding. Rutherfurd weaves many real historical events into the writing, which gives the story a great richness. Toward the end of this first section we witness the arrival of Christianity in Ireland, the coming of St. Patrick, and the effect of the new faith upon those who uphold the old druidic traditions.
The second story brings us forward more than five centuries to AD 981, and focuses on the events sparked by the coming of the Vikings to Ireland. The main characters here are direct descendants of those in the first story, and we see some things passed down through the generations. One Irish family carries an old, gold-rimmed drinking skull all the way down to the end of the book. As time passes, Rutherfurd brings in the famous Brian Boru, and we see the way the power balance works in Ireland - an important theme throughout the book.
The middle two stories are where I found most of my disappointment. The first unfolds under the rule of the English Strongbow beginning in 1167, and the second leaps to 1370 and focuses briefly on the ongoing English / Irish struggles. Both of these two sections span only one chapter each and seem extremely underdeveloped, especially the second one. Character development is minimal, a few families are nearly entirely ignored, and the plot is brief and not memorable. The writing seems rushed as well, as if Rutherfurd himself couldn't wait to be finished with it.
The final story, however, redeems the book, and I did enjoy it. Set in the 16th century, it recalls the influence in Ireland of the infamous English king, Henry VIII, his dissolution of the monasteries, and the ill-fated resistance movement of 'Silken Thomas,' the 10th Earl of Kildare. There are several interwoven and well-developed stories here, and the characters are also more fully rounded. The ending is not quite as satisfying as I would have liked, but of course one must remember that there is a second book coming, so perhaps that will give it the needed resolution. Nevertheless, the last few lines of the book are quite well done and are sure to leave the reader with a smile.
Overall, it's a very good book, though not Rutherfurd's best. I wish he'd put a little more emphasis on family ties, as he has done previously. We see the drinking skull passed down, but it isn't ever used (save for the very first story, and then its demise as the end of the book). It just sits there. In Rutherfurd's other books, a passed-down object is used and loved (or sometimes abused) by the family members that possess it through the generations.
Similarly, the green eyes of the Fergus descendants and the red hair of the Harold family are common themes, but there just isn't a real feeling of connectedness within the families from one period of history to the next. I found myself having to constantly flip to the geneology tables to remember who was descended from whom. In addition, not all the families trace back to the beginning of the book. The Tidy family shows up for the first time in the fourth part of the book, and only plays a major role in the final section. There is no real feeling of history behind them.
I did, however, very much enjoy the historical context of the book. Rutherfurd has done a tremendous amount of research and it shows. He has done some tweaking here and there for the story's sake - this is fiction after all - but the basic framework is all there. All the major events in Irish history are wonderfully laid out here, and I even learned many new things. Rutherfurd includes a note at the end that distinguishes the factual elements of the story from the fictional. Solid fans of Rutherfurd's books may be slightly disappointed, but this is still a very good book. I'd recommend it to anyone interested in Ireland, historical fiction, or both.
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69 of 78 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Benefit of the Doubt, May 30, 2004
Edward Rutherford has a particular style of writing historical fiction that seems to be completely his: he picks a very specific location and writes a story starting at the dawn of civilization peeking in at the place at important periods as history moves forward. Using family lines and maps and a good helping of historical figures, he works to give you a sense of a place through time. He's done this for Salisbury, England in the novel Sarum and for London in the novel of the same name. Now he's done the same for Dublin in this novel, the first of a proposed two novels on the city.
I enjoyed both Sarum and London. There is much about Rutherford's style I like. He writes big novels with a huge cast of characters. He explains things so that you get not only a sense of how the place developed but also how things like language, names and people changed through the centuries. On top of that, he tells a story with enough intrigue and fun to keep you going.
However, it may be that Rutherford's gotten a little too comfortable with what he does or I've read too much of him, but the worst of his tendencies are on display here. His need to explain history was more obvious than usual in the opening chapters. Unfortunately, I think the better chapters of this novel are the later ones where the plot of the story seems to come to the fore over history. And, even though he doesn't let any of the main characters get the comeuppance they deserve, at least he sets-up readable intrigues--the best of the novel if you make it 500 pages in.
I think I'm most irritated by the immutability of his families from generation to generation. Reading Rutherford, you get the sense that he believes there are "good" families and "bad" families whose nature is passed on as much as hair and eye color which Rutherford puts on prominent display. (In fact, there is even an eye "squint" that gets passed on in this novel.) In his other novels, families didn't seem so entirely unchanging though the threads are there.
Perhaps what I'm missing most is the closure of his previous novels. This novel ends in the 16th century. Unlike his previous novels, we have to wait for volume 2 to get up to modern times. Maybe some of the surprises await us there. I just hope enough readers are interested in The Princes of Ireland to bother with volume 2. I like Rutherford enough to give him the benefit of the doubt. I hope other readers do too.
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14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Batting Average Is Still Good, January 6, 2006
Rutherfurd has done it again; perhaps not as well as before but his batting average remains impressive.
The Princes Of Ireland is not a novel you'll devour in a single night-some might; most of us are slower readers. It undertakes to give us the panorama of Irish history from the time of the Druids down to the reign of Henry VIII, replete with love, lust, battle and political intrigue.
As in his previous epics, he portrays history through the intertwining fortunes of a number of families conjoined with an interesting selection of historical figures including St. Patrick, Brian Boru, Henry II and Henry VIII. A principal player-though not a person-is the place known as Dubh Linn which becomes the country's principal seaport and center of power.
Edward Rutherfurd is a novelist, not a historian. It is characters and plot that must carry his story, particularly a lengthy one like this. In Sarum, London and The Forest it was the characters we came to love (or hate) who impelled us to read on. Here, the characters are no less intriguing. If there is fault to be found in this novel it is that in a few places he allowed a lecture on history to slow down the narrative. Some may have found that detrimental and failed to read on. For those of us who persevered, the delay was worthwhile as we learned something we didn't know before.
This is the first of two novels focusing on Dublin and Ireland. I look forward to the next installment.
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