The Remedy: A Novel [Paperback]

Michelle Lovric (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 7, 2006

In this darkly beautiful and hauntingly vivid novel, Michelle Lovric, acclaimed author of The Floating Book, embarks on an unforgettable journey through the winding alleys and shadowy streets of eighteenth-century Venice and London. With vibrant prose, she weaves together the stories of three disparate yet intertwined characters who find themselves embroiled in a world of murder and secrets. There is Mimosina Dolcezza, the Venetian actress employed as an agente provocatrice by surreptitious European power brokers. By fortune and circumstance, she begins an affair with the elusive Valentine Greatrakes, a roguish fixture within London's medical underworld. Complicating matters for the pair is the presence of the eccentric and strange child-woman Pevenche, a figure whose fate and identity lie at the heart of the book's mystery.

Following this shadowy group from the dark environs of London's Bankside to the lively streets of Venice, The Remedy guides us through playhouses, brothels, and convents with luscious details that breathe intoxicating life into the era. Long-listed for the prestigious Orange Prize for Fiction, The Remedy is a seductive and suspenseful tale that stays with you long after you've turned the final page.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Set in London and Venice during the late 18th century, Lovric's labyrinthine, grandly imagined second novel (after The Floating City) follows the dramatic vicissitudes of the love affair between the Venetian actress Mimosina Dolcezza and the Irish-born Valentine Greatrakes. The narrative opens with the first-person tale of a lovely, tempestuous aristocratic girl's banishment to a Venetian convent, where her rebellious nature doesn't endear her to the holy sisters. They prostitute her to an Englishman, who impregnates and abandons her. After her baby dies in childbirth, she attempts escape, which only lands her in the clutches of a shadowy group of men: the Council of 10 and the Inquisitors of Venice. They train the young blue blood as an actress-spy and rename her Mimosina Dolcezza. Charged to seduce men of state and extract their secrets, Mimosina spends the next 16 years "warming political beds" across Europe, a career that becomes all the more unbearable when she meets her true love, Valentine Greatrakes, the handsome kingpin of London's medical black-market. Their stories alternate throughout the novel, as Lovric details in titillating but fresh, graceful prose the blossoming and sundering of their love, followed by their difficult journeys toward reunion and a final miraculous revelation. (Nov.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

*Starred Review* From a gifted novelist comes a gothic tale of love and deception in eighteenth-century Venice and London, complete with all the trappings of the genre. The novel opens with that most gothic convention of a young woman being imprisoned in a monastery, forced to take the veil. She believes her only means of escape is a man, but her affair with a handsome stranger leaves her pregnant and abandoned. After she stabs another nun in a fit of rage, she is taken from the convent by the sinister Mazziolini and offered a new life as an actress. Taking the name Mimosina Dolcezza, she spends years on the stages of Europe before meeting Valentine Greatrakes, a shady but handsome underground medical experimenter, in London. The two begin a passionate affair, but three things threaten to come between them: Mimosina's menacing patron; Valentine's dogged quest for the murderer of his business partner, Tom; and Valentine's ward, Tom's daughter, the sullen Pevenche, who resents the other woman who has come into her guardian's life. Readers might be able to guess at one of the mysteries at the heart of the book, but there is no way they will be able to predict the paths this engrossing tale will lead them down. Historical fiction at its finest. Kristine Huntley
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 448 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial (November 7, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060859865
• ISBN-13: 978-0060859862
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,872,782 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars 3 1/2 stars -- a well written and fairly absorbing read, December 12, 2005

By 

tregatt (Portland, Oregon) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Remedy: A Novel (Hardcover)

While still reeling from the brutal murder of his business partner and friend, Valentine Greatrakes goes to the theatre one night, seeking a distraction from his anger and grief. The last thing he expected was to find himself totally consumed with desire for the stage's latest sensation, the Venetian actress, Mimosina Dolcezza. Valentine immediately begins the campaign to make her his mistress. But what Valentine doesn't know is that Mimosina has desires and secrets of her own. Desires that will force him to choose between his longing for her and his obligations to his ward, Pevenche; and secrets that have to do with his dead partner...

Michelle Lovric is a talented writer -- there is no doubt about that. I found myself becoming completely enthralled with the vivid manner in which she described places -- like the cool and dark cells of the convent with it's tree lined gardens; the warm theatre, heavy with the smells of candles and greasepaint; the noisy and odorous slums of London; and the liquid and tantalising brilliance of Venice in the late eighteenth century. And then there were the brilliantly rendered scenes where a very young Mimosina describes the temper tantrum she throws when she realises that her parents mean to incarcerate her in the convent forever. However, in spite of all these wonderfully descriptive paragraphs, "The Remedy" did not completely engage. And that was because I found it difficult to take to any of the characters in this book. Perhaps it is because my usual reading staples are mystery novels where one rather quickly identifies with the sympathetic main character. I didn't find any of the characters -- Mimosina Dolcezza, Valentine Greatrakes or Pevenche very engaging. Mimosina was far too conniving and cold for my taste. I know that we're supposed to feel some sympathy for this woman who had been cruelly used and tricked, but because this character seemed so completely incapable of feeling anything for anyone except herself, and because she spent so much time justifying her actions, I felt quite repelled by her. As for the supposed "hero," Valentine Greatrakes (what a name!), I found him to be completely ineffectual and far too easily led for the supposedly dangerous King of the London underworld; while one actually only gets to "know" Pevenche through the eyes of Mimosina and Valentine -- neither of whom can be considered to be actual pillars of unbiased partiality. We do get brief glimpses of the "real" Pevenche -- the author uses Pevenche's shorter narrations to close each of the four segments of the book. However, while I found Pevenche's matter-of-fact accounting of events refreshingly different and a little more palatable, I still found it difficult to be totally engaged by this character. Perhaps because my opinions were corrupted by Mimosina's and Valentine's points-of-view. On the other hand, in spite of the fact that I didn't take to any of the characters, I still found myself reading "The Remedy" avidly, savouring every description and turn of phrase. And there are some really wonderful bits in this book -- like the entire segment where Mimosina, after escaping her employers, returns to London and lives and works in slums with a couple of conmen. This, I think was the best bit in the book and made for wonderful reading. And while I had more or less begun to suspect who the murderer of Valentine's partner would be, the vivid and chilling manner in which Pevenche relates what she suspects at the end of the book made for good reading too. So that all in all, in spite of my reservations, I would rate "The Remedy" as a well written and very absorbing 3 1/2 star read.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Lushly detailed, January 15, 2006

By 

Andrew W. Johns "ResQgeek" (Alexandria, VA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Remedy: A Novel (Hardcover)

In eighteenth century Venice, the daughter of one of the city's leading families is locked away in a convent, against her will. In London, Valentine Greatrakes has built an underworld empire, smuggling goods into the city from the continent. When he meets a beautiful Venetian actress, he falls helplessly in love with her. This sets in motion a complicated tale of love and loss, betrayal and miscommunication across a continent. Detailed descriptions of both Venice and London provide a lush setting for this story, which alternates between these two cities. Unfortunately, the pacing of the first half of the story is slow, and it took much too long to warm up to Valentine Greatrakes. I came very close to putting this book down before the pace picked up in the middle. The second half of the book is better paced, and the plot takes a number of satisfying twists, finally drawing the reader into the story. In the end the story is satisfying, and provides a wonderful glimpse into life in London and Venice in the eighteenth century.

(This review was based on a pre-publication Advanced Reader's Edition.)

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A bit of a mystery, thriller, romance and historical novel all in one, January 20, 2007

By 

bookczuk (Charleston, SC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Remedy: A Novel (Hardcover)

I'm at a loss how to categorize this book: It much of it centers on romance and a love story of sorts, but it is not a typical romance. It starts with a murder and ends with the solution to that murder, but is not a mystery. There are spies, there is espionage in the good old fashioned sense (an actress reporting to her keepers for starters) but it in no way resembles the spy stories of today. Borne would be totally clueless with this one. Good girl gone bad, or perhaps bad girl gone good-- problem parenting (and awful child, who actually becomes one of my favorite characters-- the horrible Pevenche. I'm not sure how to pronounce he rrname but it always sounded somethig like "peevish" in my head, which suited her well.) Lovric certainly researched the story well. The problem may be that I also just picked up Fingersmith by Sarah Waters, and this book falls somewhat flat in comparison. But it still definitely brings the sights, sounds and smells of a world long gone to mind.