Tag Archives: fiction set in Greece

#BookReview ‘The Figurine’ by Victoria Hislop @VicHislop #Greece #historical

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It’s a rare occurrence for me to abandon a book, but I almost gave up on The Figurine by Victoria Hislop. I persevered through the glacial pacing of the first half and at 55% on my Kindle the story kickstarts. A story about archaeological mysteries is melded with dark truths about a family’s wartime history. Victoria HislopHelena McCloud is half-Greek and from the age of eight is sent every summer to Athens to spend time with her maternal grandparents in their wealthy apartment. Her mother Mary never accompanies her and doesn’t explain why. Helena sees much she doesn’t understand. When as an adult she returns to Athens, she becomes involved in uncovering a criminal gang exploiting precious Greek statues and treasures. Now her childhood recollections of those long-ago visits begin to make sense.
I struggled to connect with this story for a long time and by the end I wished it had been told in a different order and was a third shorter. Lacking a close personal perspective – admittedly, telling a story through the eyes of a child has to be one of the biggest challenges for an author – it was at times like reading at distance through binoculars.
The figurine of the title is the turning point in the story, bringing with her admiration, awe and suspicion. Helena, head over heels in love with fellow student Nick, is at first too enamoured to acknowledge what is going on around her. Gradually the story focusses on the theft of archaeological antiquities in Greece, predominantly at digs on isolated, little-populated islands, and run by criminal gangs in Athens. Helena assumes that her grandfather, a figure of imposing military force, benefitted in trade from stolen antiquities. Along with an intrepid brother and sister who are antique specialists, and a new group of Athenian friends, she digs deeper into her painful family past. This is when the story begins to buzz.
Not Hislop’s best, which for me remains The Island. The small figurine is the large heart of the story. ‘With her head tilted towards the heavens, the figurine seems proud. With her arms folded, she seems relaxed. With her diminutive ears, she seems to listen. With her pale eyes, she seems to be aware of the crowd.’

Read my reviews of other these books by Victoria Hislop:-
THE STORY
THE SUNRISE
THOSE WHO ARE LOVED

If you like this, try:-
‘My Brother Michael’ by Mary Stewart
‘The Miniaturist’ by Jessie Burton
‘The Animals at Lockwood Manor’ by Jane Healey

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE FIGURINE by Victoria Hislop @VicHislop https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-7xL via @SandraDanby 

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- frances brody

#BookReview ‘My Brother Michael’ by Mary Stewart #mystery #WW2

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‘Nothing ever happens to me,’ writes Camilla Haven on a postcard at the beginning of My Brother Michael by Mary Stewart. Longing for excitement on her solitary holiday in Greece, the inevitable happens. A case of mistaken identity takes Camilla to Delphi where statues of gods are found around every corner and ghostly lights move at night on the hills of Mount Parnassus. Mary StewartStewart has written a page-turning tale of death, art, handsome Greek gods [alive and stone], caves and smuggling. At the root of it all is what happened on these hills during the Second World War when Greek partisans were fighting the Nazis, and each other. Published in 1959, the story is set fourteen years after the war ended. This is pre-tourism Greece with goatherds on the slopes and donkeys following hillside tracks that have been used for thousands of years at a time, but when war’s mark is still evident daily. This is not a political post-war novel about a trouble, divided country, instead Stewart focuses on the people, their motivations and how history, ancient and recent, should never be forgotten.
Camilla is a cautious character in the first few chapters but as she, and we the readers, are drawn into adventure and mystery, her sense of right and wrong leads her onward towards risk and violence.
What a magical tale of mystery this is by a master storyteller. I read this first in the Seventies and this time around was just as gripped, reading into the night.

Click the title to read my reviews of other Mary Stewart novels:-
THE GABRIEL HOUNDS
THE IVY TREE
THIS ROUGH MAGIC
THORNYHOLD
TOUCH NOT THE CAT

If you like this, try these:-
‘THE COLLABORATOR’S DAUGHTER’ BY EVA GLYN
‘THOSE WHO ARE LOVED’ BY VICTORIA HISLOP
‘THE CAMOMILE LAWN’ BY MARY WESLEY

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview MY BROTHER MICHAEL by Mary Stewart https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-789 via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Verity Bright