I TOOK MY TIME AND WROTE ABOUT OUTLANDER

Descent to Hell

It’s been a long ride, a journey in which I didn’t expect I would invest so much emotionally. It’s only a TV series I know, but it is Outlander, the show acclaimed as the bravest on TV this year, as a milestone which will change the history of TV series. Love it or hate it, what you can't do is ignore it. 

To know in advance and in detail what was going to happen was no protection, didn’t help, didn’t save me from the overwhelming wave of powerful emotions that swept me off my feet. That was more Sam Heughan, you say?

Seriously, now.  It was such a gripping experience! It had been some time since I was last so enthusiastically committed and involved in a TV series.   

PERIOD & MORE PERIOD - WHO'S THE ROMANTIC HERO OF YOUR HEART? JAMIE FRASER OR ROSS POLDARK?

Sighs and swooning out there? Yes, I know. I've seen polls spring up all over the Net and wasn't surprised at all.  Ross or Jamie? Aidan or Sam? Poldark or Outlander? Cornwall or Scotland?
Starz Outlander and BBC One Poldark are the two hit period drama series of the moment. Blending adventure and romance, historical fiction and stunning locations, talent and beauty they have got legions of passionate fans all over the world. These fans are quite vocal and convey their enthusiasm in their tweets, facebook pages and their blogs, they read or re-read the books on which the series are based, they discuss them in groups, they create fan-fiction and gadgets, they make friends and have fun gathering together. They love the stories and all the characters in them, they are fond of the locations and costumes, they are intrigued by the twists and turns, watch and re-watch their favourite scenes, learn by heart their favourite lines but ... let's be honest ... the main reason of their passionate interest is their fondness for the two gorgeous, fascinating, dashing heroes: James Alexander Malcom MacKenzie Fraser and Captain Ross Poldark.

PERIOD & MORE PERIOD: TURN, THE STORY OF WASHINGTON'S SPIES

Jamie Bell as Abraham Woodhull

AMC Turn

This was an amazing series! The season finale was broadcast last Sunday 8 June, with an amazing crescendo of emotions but no news of a second series.  I think this story deserves a second season, I would be more than disappointed if it didn't get it. 

An excellent historical fiction drama series,  starring a blend of great British and US actors, TURN  is a period piece that reveals the story of America's first spy ring. 

A historical thriller set during the Revolutionary War, this TV show is based on Alexander Rose's book Washington's Spies. It was developed and written by Craig Silverstein (Nikita), who also serves as showrunner. It stars, among others, Jamie Bell (Filth, Jane Eyre, Nicholas Nickleby, Billy Elliot) , J. J. Feild (Northanger Abbey, Austenland, The Ruby in the Smoke), Seth Numrich (The Good Wife) and Heather Lind (Boardwalk Empire).

ROME - HOGARTH, REYNOLDS, TURNER: BRITISH PAINTING AND THE RISE OF MODERNITY

Easter Holidays have been an occasion to catch up with things I love, like going to Rome, visiting friends and play the tourist. Besides walking around the city centre in sunny, stunning Rome and have a good time with my friends, I could visit an interesting exhibition promoted by Fondazione Roma: Hogarth, Reynolds, Turner - British painting and the Rise of Modernity. The Foundation presents a fascinating itinerary to discover the characteristics and originality of 18th century English art which has not been shown completely in Rome since 1966. The exhibition offers to the public a comprehensive overview of the social and artistic development that took place during the XVIII centruy in step with the hegemony gained by Great Britain at the historical, political and economic level.

SALT REDUX BY LUCINDA BRANT - BOOK REVIEW + DOUBLE GIVEAWAY

Book Blurb 

Jane and Salt—four years of Happily Ever After
Sir Antony Templestowe—four years of Exile
Lady Caroline—four years of Heartache
Diana St. John—four years plotting Revenge
The time has come...

How does a brother cope with life knowing his sister is a murderess? How can a nobleman have the life he has always wanted when a lurking evil consumes his thoughts and haunts his dreams? What will it take for good to triumph over evil?My review

Salt Redux is the sequel to a previous book by Australian author, Lucinda Brant, which I really loved and reviewed a couple of years ago. This means that for readers who like me enjoyed Salt Bride, the story continues…

Magnus and Jane, the Earl of Salt Hendon and his beautiful wife,  have been married for four years now and been blessed with the birth of beautiful children. Just when they feel safe and happy, Diana, Lady St John, reappears in their life. Four years ago Diana attempted to take Jane's place in Salt's life at any cost and by any means (see Salt Bride), and for her villainy was locked up and kept prisoner in a Welsh castle. However,  the real reason  of her absence from Polite Society has been kept secret as a mark of respect for her position, for the sake of her two young children and for  the bonds between families.

DEADLY AFFAIR BY LUCINDA BRANT - BOOK REVIEW AND GIVEAWAY

Synopsis - Career diplomat Alec Halsey has been elevated to a marquessate he doesn’t want and Polite Society believes he doesn't deserve; his lover has decided she won’t marry him after all and the suspicion he murdered his brother still lingers in London drawing rooms. So returning to London after seven months' seclusion may have been a mistake.

Alec’s foreboding deepens when a nobody vicar drops dead at a party-political dinner; he witnesses the very public humiliation of an up and coming portrait painter, and his rabble-rousing uncle Plantagenet is bashed and left for dead in a laneway. When the vicar's true identity is revealed, Alec suspects the man was poisoned. But who would want a seemingly harmless man of God murdered, and why?

Once you meet Alec Halsey you can’t avoid being charmed, if not totally under his spell. What I most like in him is that, although living in Georgian London, he refuses to wear a powdered wig and has a passionate, free spirit. But, honestly, who could ignore his being tall, handsome, and blue-eyed, with long black curls and olive skin?

I'VE BEEN WATCHING POLDARK (1975)

Robin Ellis as Ross Poldark

In Italy it was broadcast in 1978 and I still remember how excited I was waiting for a new episode! And I can't forget my teenage crush on Ross Poldark in his elegant breeches and coat, but especially on young doctor Enys. How young I was myself at that time and already in love with everything English!  I usually don't like watching period series from the 70s, I find them so freak, awkward. I can't cope with the  old shooting techniques or the unnatural, melodramatic acting style they propose. But, was my nostalgic mood forgiving all the flaws or was this series quite good, instead? I think it was, it still  is a very good period drama. You must of course bear the grain quality so different from the  HD quality images we are accustomed to these days.

CLASSICS ON DVD - TOM JONES, A FOUNDLING (BBC 1997)

Never watching a classic period drama was more amusing. This one was brilliant. It was broadcast in 1997 first time and it is now available on DVD at a very cheap price. It is an excellent BBC 6-hours' costume drama. I simply loved watching it at the weekend. I  had added it to my TBS list after watching Faulks on Fiction in April.

The History of Tom Jones, A Foundling  (1749) is Henry Fielding's masterpiece,  which I had to read  - well, to study -  for  my English Literature Course at University when I was in my first year. I must admit I didn't have as much fun while reading it at that time.  But we grow-up, don't we? I must reread it and give Fielding's great humour another chance. It is also one of the 18th century novels I have very rarely used in my lessons. I have to correct that too: Fielding must be read. He is too clever. Do you remember the scene from "Becoming Jane" in which a fictional Tom Lefroy (James MacAvoy) suggests a fictional Jane Austen (Anne Hathaway) to read  a book of an extraordinary young man to widen her horizons and write fiction with as much knowledge of the world as a masculine writer?  He  is  in fact  suggesting her to read Fielding's Tom Jones.

THESE OLD SHADES BY GEORGETTE HEYER - MY REVIEW

“Set in the Georgian period, about 20 years before the Regency, These Old Shades is considered to be the book that launched Heyer’s career. It features two of Heyer’s most memorable characters: Justin Alastair, the Duke of Avon, and Leonie, whom he rescues from a life of ignomy and comes to love and marry”.

If you meet Satanas in a dark alley in the middle of the night and you are desperately seeking escape from a wretched life of  violence and harassment, maybe you’d be as happy as young Leòn at becoming his,  body and soul, bought for a diamond pin. Very happy to become his page and wear good clothes,  to follow him wherever his libertine life led him without complaining, without questioning.

Especially if Satanas is just a nickname for a rich, elegant, fascinating nobleman: Justin Alastair, the Duke of Avon. And mainly if he appears to you like this:

“ He walked mincingly, for the red heels of his shoes were very high. A long purple cloak, rose-lined, hung from his shoulders and was allowed to fall carelessly back from his dress, revealing a full-skirted coat of purple satin, heavily laced with gold; a waistcoat of flowered silk; faultless small clothes; and a lavish sprinkling of jewels on his cravat and breast”.

AT HOME WITH THE GEORGIANS - DISCOVERING LIFE BEYOND LITERATURE AND ARCHITECTURE

It 's been as gripping as a good period drama, as intriguing as a mystery story, as delightful as an Austen adaptation. A pleasant surprise. Living history, actually.

Watching this three-part series presented by Professor Amanda Vickery, based on her Behind Close Doors and fortunately available as a DVD, has been incredibly interesting. 

As a fond reader of historical fiction, as a student (I feel I still have so much to learn!)  and teacher of English literature, I watched it with extreme pleasure and curiosity. Professor Vickery's  descriptions of homes were mingled to the narration of real lives, through the reading of diaries and letters,  and that made everything  realistic and really involving. Professor Vickery is an entertaining, smart story - teller.
Furthermore, in my mind, the lives and experiences of real individuals found parallels in many fictional characters' lives. I  went on thinking of Jane Austen,  of course. Impossible not to think about her own real life or about the world she created in her work while watching.