Customer Reviews

The Rose Of Sebastopol

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Of its surface "The Rose of Sebastopol" is an adventure story-the tale of a cousin gone missing and a young woman searching for her in the battlefields of the Crimea. But really it's much more. It's a tale of suspense, of family secrets and unknown strength, of how we fall into traps of believing the very worst of people because they have come somewhere near to taking what is deemed ours. It's a very interesting book for two reasons-one, it's a good story and two, the timeline in the book is in no way linear so the continues back and forth of about twelve years gradually revels secrets until the very end.

The author of "The Rose of Sebastopol" is a master at the kind of manipulation any writer needs to be able to use in order to make readers think the way the main character is. So it's no surprise that I identified with Mariella (the main character) and saw in little nuances how her cousin Rosa (who came to live with Mariella's family in London) was gradually stealing, bewitching, Mariella's fiancé.

But not everything is how it seems. Rosa is determined to make something of her life and she wants it to be in medicine. But at this point in history a female doctor is practically unheard of-even female nurses are rare enough. So when Rosa has a chance to meet Mariella's beloved Henry-a doctor-she jumps at it.

But war is about to break out and soon Henry is gone-doctoring soldiers in the Crimea. Then Florence Nightingale's team of nurses is dispatched to help with the terribly planned war and Rosa is determined to go. Mariella is soon left all alone with her sewing, waiting for letters from the two people she loves most.

But then Rosa stops writing and Henry turns up sick in Italy. On a mission to rescue her fiancé Mariella learns that he saw Rosa during the war-and is now obsessed with her. Seeking to help his troubled mind she decides to go find Rosa.

But the battlefield is no place for Mariella, who has never been anything but perfectly dressed and proper. Soon she learns her unknown strength in the face of terror and emerges from the cocoon she has been swaddled in her whole life. But can she find her cousin?

A great deal of this book is descriptions of what the characters are wearing but seeing that the narrator is a needlewoman that makes sense. The back and forth in the time line can get a little confusing-especially since the chapters are so short, but in the end it does make sense. I was unable to put this book down once I made it past about page 20. Unfortunately, the ending in no way lives up to the rest of the book.

Three stars.

Mariella Lingwood and Rosa Barr seem like total opposites in personality, yet there's an alter ego quality readers will slowly begin to appreciate in these complex characters. Mariella thinks of Rosa as possessing "fatal magnetism," and Rosa finds peace in the stability and hidden courage waiting to emerge in her best friend, Mariella. The story begins innocently enough in Mariella's staid, peaceful home where Rosa and her companion, Nora, come to live after being banished by her late stepfather. Mariella is an expert seamstress who gradually is forced to accompany Rosa on her wild, adventurous journeys, to see the uglier side of English factories and their polluted environment where poor laborers are forced to reside. Rosa's goal is to become a nurse, a brave quest in light of the social constraints on such a profession for females in the mid-1800s. She initially attempts to engage Mariella's fiance, Henry Thewell, to teach her all she needs to learn, but her first impulsive, uninvited visit to watch an amputation surgery repulses him and that avenue seems doomed to failure. Romance evolves with several characters, sometimes with the most engaging, innocent progress and others with suggestions of most inappropriate character.

The story builds to a crescendo when Henry and Rosa's brother, Max Stukeley leave for service in the Crimean War. While the press is reporting fabulous victories, Rosa realizes it is her mission to follow them into battle. Rejected by Florence Nightingale's group for lack of training and significant experience, Rosa decides to journey to Europe on her own and find a place for her "destiny." After a very short time, Mariella learns that Henry is very ill and travels to Italy to nurse and comfort him. Her initial visit is shocking in the extreme as she hears something she never would have imagined in a million years. Now Mariella has a new quest, to find Rosa. As she proceeds on this enigmatic search, she serves the British Army with her seamstress skills, keeping accounts of linens and supplies and finally is called to nurse wounded soldiers. The graphic descriptions within this novel of the casualties, deaths, disease and horrors of the British, French, Slovakian and Russian troops is realistically described, giving the reader a brutally honest picture of the Crimean War which gets very little coverage in present media accounts of notable historic battles. The author demonstrates considerable talent in the way she paces the conflicts and reactions to a crescendo. The ending of the novel leaves room for a follow-up as the reader learns what happens to only one of the many characters in dire straits by the last page turned.

An international bestseller since its publication, The Rose of Sebastopol deserves broader publicity and appreciation for this moving account of a significant historical period and its celebration of love and purpose in characters who struggle against and surmount the barriers of social constraints in mid-19th century England and Europe.

Very nicely done, Ms. McMahon!

Reviewed by Viviane Crystal on June 13, 2009

I spent about 3/4 of this book waiting for the plot to pick up, and then realized with some disappointment that it wasn't going to. It was all right, in the sense that it was well-reserached (almost to a fault; some details seem added in to superfluously underscore this point or make sure nothing was left out). I didn't find the main character (Mariella) to be compelling at all, and her foil (her cousin Rosa) was a bit too extreme in the opposite direction, a relentlessly virtuous, doe-eyed hippie even by modern standards, let alone Victorian conventions. She just seemed out of place in the setting. Mariella also has very little personal development in spite of the book's nearly 400 pages spanning nations and wars; she seems to hesitantly adapt to her surroundings as opposed to bravely confront them--expanding her comfort zone rather than leaving it. And when she does leave her comfort zone, it is only after chapters' worth of fluttering indecision and then assistance from a guide to prevent her from taking too much responsibility for herself. Of her two love interests, one is dull and the other, though passionate, only reveals itself within the very last chapters and even seems kind of sudden. The plot dragged often, over-loaded with detail, and then jarred to a contrastingly nondescript halt. But I need to say that it also had its good points, like thoughtful period perspectives, characters who are [generally] true to their time period, and a unique friendship.

The Rose of Sebastopol is a novel set against the backdrop of the Crimean War. The three main characters are Mariella, our over-sheltered narrator; Henry, her fiancé, who goes off to the Crimean War as a doctor; and Rosa, Mariella's idealistic cousin and best friend, whose progressive ideas lead her to become a nurse in the Crimea with Florence Nightingale. When Rosa goes missing, Mariella goes off in search of her cousin, encountering a very sick Henry along the way.

The historical detail is top-notch, but I had a slight problem with the characters: Rosa is a little too modern, and Mariella is a little boring, though I realize that McMahon may have made her so on purpose for historical accuracy. The constant references to skirts, petticoats, and corsets were a little too intrusive, and I believe that if a real 19th century woman had been narrating, she wouldn't have even mentioned her clothes, much less her underclothes. It's almost as though McMahon wanted to say, "look, look, I did my research!"

In addition, the non-linear narrative is jumpy, and the novel doesn't truly get interesting until Mariella goes to the Crimea. But even then, I thought the entire journey in the first place was a little out of character for Mariella, who seems to be the kind of person who would normally put a lot of thought into something before doing it. Also, the ending is a little rushed and inconclusive, and the book could have used a better editor (for some reason the author, or her proofreader, is afraid of commas). But other than that, I enjoyed the story and the historical details.

I enjoy historical fiction, especially the drama of war, so this book had great appeal-- right up until the end. How could an author who carefully discribes every setting, person and personality in such detail fail us in the end? I got the feeling she didn't know how to end it so she didn't. The book had 5 stars up until the last 10 pages.

This is a novel primarily set in England during the time of the Crimean War. The focus is set on Mariella, a young woman who lives a sheltered and privileged life. She is engaged to Henry, a surgeon who lived with them as a child. Also close to Mariella is her cousin, Rosa, who is much more adventurous and daring. We start with Mariella heading off to see an ill Henry who is in convalescence from the war. She is also worried about Rosa, who has gone missing as a nurse in the Crimea. Mariella is shocked to find he thinks she is Rosa and thinks of Rosa in an intimate way. We see the story primarily in a series of flashbacks that unravel the relationships of the characters. I found the story to be intriguing and as I learned different pieces I saw how things were much more complicated than they originally appeared. Mariella and her companion (the nurse of Rosa's mother) continue on to the Crimea in search of Rosa and the mystery of what happened to her. The historical details were interesting with the addition of Florence Nightingale's nurses, but the driving force of the story is understanding the complexities of the lives of Rosa and Mariella. I really enjoyed this and hope to read more by the author.

I loved this book. Really loved it. But what led to my enjoyment of it was the knowledge I already have regarding the Crimean War (thanks to author Emma Drummond). If you don't have a good working knowledge of this war, your enjoyment will fall far short of mine.

That said, the story revolves around Mariella and Rosa, two pampered cousins from England who, although close, couldn't be more different from each other. While Mariella conforms to the English ideal of a proper young woman and longs for nothing more than to marry her doctor paramour Henry, it's Rosa who longs for social change. Influenced by her family friend Florence Nightingale, Rosa dreams of nursing the war victims.

While Henry leaves for the Crimean, Mariella is left behind and Rosa finally kicks off her traces and heads off to become a nurse. Mariella's world is sent into a tailspin when she receives a letter from her very-ill fiance. Impetuously (very unlike her) rushing off to Henry's side, Mariella discovers she has been betrayed by Henry and Rosa. Worse yet, Rosa has gone missing.

And so it is that Mariella finds herself smack in the middle of the Crimean War. The novel deftly (and brutally) covers everything from the horrors of the wounded, the lack of medical care and the brutality of the fighting itself, all the while the mystery of what happened to Rosa intensifies throughout.

Without a good working knowledge of the Crimean War, much of the novel is apt to bore. The author doesn't waste pages explaining too much of the background. But if you have that general knowledge, this novel is simply riveting. I couldn't put it down.

If you'd like to gain a better understanding of the war, Google historical fiction author Emma Drummond and read some of her books first....it's a great introduction to that travesty of a war.

This vast and sweeping Victorian drama crosses the decades moving between Italy and London, the English county of Derbyshire, and onto the bloody battlefields of the Crimea where the two heroine of this novel are determined to find love and connections amongst a bloody and body-littered landscape. Filled with the graphic details of the most horrific war fought between the Russian Empire on one side and an alliance of France, the United Kingdom, the Kingdom of Sardinia, and the Ottoman Empire on the other, The Rose of Sebastopol is a indeed stark testament to an age of social and medical uncertainly. Ever since her impetuous and free-spirited Rosa Barr came to London to stay with her more conventional cousin Mariella Lingwood, Mariella seemed to be similarly repelled and attracted by Rosa's penchant towards rebellion. Ever since childhood, Rosa has a fierce altruistic streak and dreamed of becoming a proper nurse, or even a doctor if only that were possible in this day and age. Certainly Rosa is like a sudden burst of sunshine in Mariella's life even though Mariella is appalled when Rosa takes her to spend an afternoon with Barbara Leigh Smith, a notorious artist who considered by proper society to be one of "the wild people of London."

A somewhat stuffy girl, Mariella spends much of her time stitching and mending and tucking. Up until now she has found satisfaction in her exquisite sewing, playing the role of the young-lady-waiting betrothal to Dr Henry Thewell, one of the country's most promising and ambitious surgeons. Yet Mariella, like Rosa, cannot escape danger, her journey beginning when a letter arrives at her home telling her that Henry has survived the first wave of battle and is convalescing in the Italy after a bout of illness. Traveling to the town of Narni, Mariella endures the smell of fever still on Henry's breath even as he murmurs the word Rosa. Although Henry is too ill and too insistent to resist, there could be little doubt that Mariella is answering the wish of a dying man - and that of his frantic concern for Rosa who pig-headily vanished off to the Front, thinking that she could be everyone's savior.

Determined to find out the truth of Rosa's whereabouts Mariella makes hasty plans, bound for the Crimea with her trusted maid Nora McCormack, who becomes an indiscernible traveling companion and who surprisingly finds her own value after becoming a victim of a cholera outbreak. Mariella's eventual goal, of course, is to revisit the place where Rosa was last seen in Sebastopol, but she has no way of knowing all of the difficulties and problems that await her on this momentous adventure, nor the value of those she meets along the way, especially her friend, the tall and board dark eyed Captain Max Stukley, all flashing braid and gilt buttons, with his ostentatious moustache. A soldier from youth who has been guided by the battlefield, perhaps it is Max who can finally unlock the door to Rosa's whereabouts.

Dividing her narrative up into three prime locations and interspersing two different time periods each approximately a decade apart, McMahon sets herself an Herculean task in this novel as the action gravitates between the gentle solace of England with its green fields and narrow lanes, " the benign woods full of green and golden light and wonderful shifting shadows," to the horrors of the Crimea with all of the rats and the pestilence, the death and dying, young soldiers without limbs, and the nurses who attend them while battling limited resources, even as day and night there continues the incessant boom of guns firing in the distance. The author's attention to period detail is meticulous, from the sick and the helpless that Mariella eventually begs to care for, to the lead works in Derbyshire that feed the munitions for the massive war effort, to the poor sanitation of the Victorian hospitals and the lack of clean water, both for cleanliness and for drinking, where the wards become an inadvertent breading ground for cholera. All the while McMahon's heroine morphs and changes, her Mariella steadily driven to maturity by the perpetual essence of Rosa, her smell of lemons, the fragrance of her hair and skin. Although the extended battle scenes towards the end test the reader's patience a bit, especially in terms of the framework of Mariella's complicated emotional state, the author mostly draws us totally into Mariella's epic journey as she, like Rosa before her, shimmers through hospitals, leaving her name on a dozen suffering tongues, remaining haunted by her memories of her life with Rosa in a more innocent and gentle time. Mike Leonard March 09.

"The Rose of Sebastopol" is a historical (with a bit of mystery) set mainly in 1844 and 1854-1855 in England, Italy, and the Crimea. If you like nuanced historical novels, you'll probably find this one a lovely read.

The historical details were expertly woven into the story background, bringing the society, setting, etc., vividly alive in my imagination. Yet the details served the story rather than being the point of the story. The level of detail given for the Crimea landscape made me wonder if the author had really been there (which, according to her website, she has). The settings varied widely, from higher-class home life to various hospitals to a lead mill to the war front, yet they all had depth.

The characters were complex and nuanced. I didn't particularly like any of the characters, but I understood why they acted the way they did and wanted to know what happened to them all. The novel maintained a nice level of suspense that kept me turning the pages.

The story switched between Mariella's childhood, events in 1854 leading up to Rosa going to the war hospitals, and what happened in 1855 after Henry turned up sick and Rosa went missing. I didn't find these different time lines difficult to keep track of, though, and this set-up kept the suspense up for me--how did all three time lines tie together to explain what had happened?

Though Mariella was the point of view character, the story was about Rosa--it started with Rosa ("what happened to Rosa?") and ended with Rosa (solving of what happened and why). Mariella's future wasn't neatly tied up for the reader, though it was clear where things were headed. I usually hate untidy endings for POV characters, yet I didn't feel like I was left hanging with things left unresolved. While I would have liked to know more, her ending fit what she learned in the novel--that unexpected, uncontrollable things happen so don't plan too firmly too far ahead. In a way, the story structure was that of a mystery, with the story ending when the mystery was solved.

There was a minor amount of swearing and a very minor amount of cussing. There was unmarried sex with a very small amount of explicit foreplay (removing clothes, kissing, upper body touching). There was a lot of sexual tension, but not really of the erotic type. Overall, I'd highly recommend this novel was well-written, fairly clean reading.

I received this book as a review copy from the publisher.

Reviewed by Debbie from Genre Reviews
(genrereviews. blogspot. com)

The Rose of Sebastopol is the story of the personal evolution of the main character, Mariella, from the quintessential 'unable to cope with anything' Victorian lady into a highly capable woman. In the beginning you don't like her . . . as there isn't really much there to like. You get hints there might be something there worth salvaging when she, in a fit of pique, tells off a hypochondriacal relative. It isn't until Mariella gets to the Crimea that the rose starts to bloom. Determined to find her missing friend Rosa, she is forced to endure the true horrors of war, seen mostly through graphically accurate depictions of hospital wards in the Crimea c. 1855. In the process, she is touched by those she meets and the realities of war, and in the end has bloomed into a real woman. As a long time Crimean War historian, I was astonished at how realistic the portrayal of the war was . . . it was almost like being there. The story keeps your interest, some of the characters are truly annoying (like in real life), the love story is not fully developed, but will suffice, and it is in looking back to the beginning that you appreciate the result. Highly recommended for those interested in historical fiction.