Queen of Swords
Queen of Swords
It is the late summer of 1814, and Hannah Bonner and her half brother Luke have spent more than a year searching the islands of the Caribbean for Luke’s wife and the man who abducted her. But Jennet’s rescue, so long in coming, is not the resolution they’d hoped for. In the spring she had given birth to Luke’s son, and in the summer Jennet had found herself compelled to surrender the infant to a stranger in the hope of keeping him safe.
To claim the child, Hannah, Luke, and Jennet must journey first to Pensacola. There they learn a great deal about the family that has the baby. The Poiterins are a very rich, very powerful Creole family, totally without scruple. The matriarch of the family has left Pensacola for New Orleans an
List Price: $ 7.99
Price: $ 3.98
Find More The Queen Products
Queen of Swords,
Queen of Swords is the fifth book of the Into the Wilderness series, where Sara Donati continues her historical fiction account of the Bonner family. Fans of the series will not be disappointed. However, you do not have to read the first four novels to get the most from this sequel. It is fresh with new setting and new characters and the author brings up what is important to know for you to understand and enjoy the novel.
Luke and Hannah’s search for their beloved Jennet, who has been abducted, takes them to New Orleans during the war of 1812. Through their adventure you will have your emotions stirred up by the situations created by war, racism, prejudice, dominating power and slavery.
The setting is so well described, that you can just close your eyes to picture it. The characters are good, convincing, strong and likable. The author is very skillful in keeping the story intriguing, suspenseful and interesting. Very well written and leaves space for readers to imagine the details.
It is a great book. I highly recommended it.
Was this review helpful to you?
|Shifting Gears,
The fifth book in Sara Donati’s excellent series is a departure from the main characters of Nathaniel and Elizabeth, focusing instead on Hannah Bonner, Luke Bonner, and his wife Jennet and their trials after the abduction of Jennet at the end of Book 4. Picking up with the party finding Jennet, we are thrown into the world of New Orleans as the group attempts to discover the whereabouts of the infant son of Luke and Jennet. The British are plotting to take the city but that is only one small part of the separate world the Bonners face far from home and the ones they love.
While this is a good entry in the series, I found myself frustrated at times with the feeling that Donati wanted to write about the Battle of New Orleans and let the situation take precedence over the characters. At times the action was fast and furious and I found myself enveloped with new characters, both real and fictitious, but at other times I felt the spark that Donati brings to her writing was secondary to getting through the siege and showing the lives of the citizens. While circumstances demanded that Jennet be shrill at times, and that Hannah be stoic and strong, there were moments when I missed their interactions with more familiar surroundings.
Overall this is an excellent book, still head and shoulders above most of the historical fiction out there. While I look forward to my beloved characters returning to Paradise and taking up their lives, this one is a worthy installment, if at times a bit frustrating in that I wanted these characters home! Still, it’s written in Donati’s usual compelling style, and can be recommended to all lovers of good historical fiction.
Was this review helpful to you?
|Book 5 is a bit different from the earlier 4,
Book 5 (this book) is a bit different from the earlier 4 books in that the entire book focuses on Hannah, Luke, and Jennet in New Orleans. You hear nothing of Paradise or Lake in the Clouds until more than half way through the book, and then it is only through a letter. Elizabeth, Simon, Lily, Curiousity, and all the others at Lake in the Clouds are only discussed in letters in this book. Nathaniel shows up in the final chapters of the book to rescue the crew in New Orleans.
The book is very descriptive – both with New Orleans scenery and battles. So if you like description, you’ll love this book. If you were more looking for finding out what happens next with many of the characters you love from books 1-4, you really only find out details on Hannah, Luke, and Jennet. I had a bit of a hard time connecting with the characters in this book – Jennet was distant and hard to understand at the start (due to her ordeal), and Hannah was in a relationship that didn’t seem true to her character.
I do look forward to book 6 to find out what’s happening back in Paradise…
Was this review helpful to you?
|