Robert S. ElegantRezensionen

A brave effort to come to grips with this enigma of a British protectorate on the edge of the massive Chinese mainland, a little piece of rock and jungle with no resources of its own except its people and their native adaptability and sense of enterprise. Of course the situation has changed since the People's Republic resumed its possession in 1997, but this objective but loving portrayal of the island and its inhabitants gives us as good a background as any to help understand their current problems. As all others in this series of slightly over-sized volumes from the Time-Life stable, it is written by an accomplished writer and correspondent, the production qualities as usual are outstanding, and it is a serious work of ethnography and social history, not really a "children's book" of knowledge.

One of the first accounts of the Cultural Revolution. It is basically a blow-by-blow recital, beginning with the attempt of the pragmatics in 1959, distressed by Mao's disastrous Great Leap Forward, to shear him of effective power. Mao had no illusions about the prospect of being dictator emeritus, so fought back craftily, unleashing a destructive convulsion. The image in the public mind of one million youths wearing red armbands and waving aloft booklets with the thought of Chairman Mao was only one aspect, though. Elegant perceptively describes how sweeping away the structures from the first decade of Communist rule risked leaving a vast, nuclear-armed nation ungovernable. Into the vacuum stepped the army, paving the way for developments that continued to unfold in the decades since.

Interesting topics (17th c China, Jesuits, Portuguese colonization in Asia) that I had known nothing about, so acquired knowledge on the plus,. Bit too long and descriptive --yawn-- but easily rectified by skimming over these bits; though at times the description made the scene vivid, and beautiful. Characters rather artificial.

"Bianca" is a novel loosely based on the life of Francesco de Medici and Lady Bianca Capello. Francesco was a member of the long line of Italy’s famous ruling family and was in power for a little over 20 years in the 1500s. According to historical sources, he was not a popular leader of the people of Florence. Furthermore, Bianca did not help redeem his negative image.

Bianca was a feminist- strong willed and defiant. She came from one of the richest and most noble families of Venice, though no one in Florence was impressed. Venice was a city the Florentines found to be course and repulsive. She ran away from home at the age of 16 to avoid an arranged marriage, opting to elope with a virtual stranger. But Bianca’s real claim to fame was her very public torrid affair with Francesco de Medici that lasted over a decade and her eventual marriage to him following the death of his wife. Not that infidelity was frowned upon… rather quite the opposite. But being in love with your mistress, especially a “manipulating” Venetian woman, that was taboo. And then marrying her? Heaven forbid!

But this is Bianca’s story, told from her point of view. And she does draw sympathy from the reader. Her first husband turned out to be a scoundrel who was only after her money. He used her and abused her, and had no problem playing the role of a pimp and financially dependent husband. Bianca’s one true love was Francesco and she devoted her life to him.

Robert Elegant is a British American journalist and author of both fiction and non-fiction.
One of the appealing things about Bianca is the rich descriptions about life in Italy during the Renaissance. Elegant offers many details about the social life and cultural attitudes, the cut-throat politics, the diplomatic ties, and military exploits.

The plot is enthralling. There is an abundance of mystery involved in the true story of Francesco and Bianco. No one knows if they were murdered or died of natural death. The circumstances surrounding their deaths- just one day apart- were very suspicious. And there doesn’t seem to be clarification of their having children together. Some sources suggest one son, other sources say she may have “faked” a pregnancy to provide an heir for Francesco, and yet the family tree shows no children. Robert Elegant offers a compelling theory filled with suspense and intrigue.

For anyone who has read James Clavell's "Tai-Pan" and "Shogun" this book is like slogging through a muddy rice field. Give it a miss.

I received a review copy of "Manchu: A Novel (The Imperial China Trilogy Book 1)" by Robert Elegant (Open Road Integrated Media) through NetGalley.com.

Sometimes a book wears you down. You find yourself plodding away at it, determined to finish but finding that the number of remaining pages never seems to get any less. This, I'm afraid, was one of those books. A sweeping epic following the Jesuit mission in China in the mid 17th century, and told through the eyes of an ambitious young Englishman, it had scope to be very engaging. And it isn't screamingly bad. It's well-informed and detailed to a fault. But one is left with the powerful sense that 200 of its 634 pages could have been cut without any great loss to the story - in fact, probably to its advantage...

For the full review, due to be published on 11 April, please see below:
https://theidlewoman.net/2017/04/11/manchu-robert-elegant

Epic historic fiction of the fall of the Ming dynasty to the Ching (Manchus) from the perspective of the European churchmen & traders there at that time (1624 - 1652). Starts a little didactically but ends up as a good story well told.
Read Oct 2006

I'm fond of the book because it is set in an area where my knowledge is weak, and manages to create a narrative that hovers between historical fiction and outright fantasy. It's great entertainment and allows one to wander in Central Asia after Alexander the Great, but before the Great Game of the 19th Century. It deserves more exposure to readers of historical fiction set in unusual places.½

Written by a former American ambassador, Bianca is a retelling of the life of Bianca Cappello, a sixteenth-century Venetian noblewoman who went from being a fugitive and outcast from her society when she eloped with a penniless Florentine, to becoming a Venetian heroine and the mistress and, later, wife of Francesco de Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany.

The novel is definitely not a great piece of literature; with events sometimes clunkily shoehorned in to accomplish the plot points author Robert Elegant needs despite all dictates of logic or consistent characterisation. An example from very early on: the book's male protagonist, Bianca's (fictional) cousin Marco, begins the story as the youngest ship's captain in the Venetian navy, with a bright career ahead of him. But the book's plot demands that early on he be given significant responsibility, fail, and therefore spend the rest of the novel as an aging captain who never managed to achieve his potential. In order to give Marco his opportunity to fail, however, Elegant has to give him more responsibility than a simple ship's captain could have--he places him in command of a squadron of several ships. And an officer who commands both his own ship and the other ships of his squadron is, of course, no longer a captain--he has been promoted to commodore. But Elegant still needs Marco to spend the rest of the novel as a captain--so, for no particular reason, Marco isn't promoted to commodore, he's simply made "a captain in command of the other ships' captains".

But Elegant's obvious love of Venice is infectious, and he really captured my imagination with his description of the city and her Renaissance empire. An entertaining if sometimes flawed read.

Rather dreary account of the wars founding the Ming Dynasty.