Shadow of Night by Deborah Harkness
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I went straight from the first book to the second, wanting to find out ‘what happened next’. I wasn’t disappointed, the story pulled me right back in gripping me with intrigue and twisting historical context around a fictional narrative.
I admit Elizabethan History is not my forte, as a matter of fact I had to do some research into the time period and the ‘School of Night’, learned a lot about Christopher Marlow, Sir Walter Raleigh, Thomas Harriot, George Chapman, and Matthew Roydon (by the way nice use of an historical character that has no information or identifying painting).
Following Diana through Elizabethan life, learning how to navigate marriage, while all the time trying to find the secret of her own heritage made me admire her. This isn’t a ‘kick ass woman’ who can do anything, be anything and just the best. Instead she is very human, screws up, admits faults, has anxiety attacks yet keeps going. Her love for her family, husband and doing what’s right, shows through.
Now it’s onto the 3rd and last book in the series.