Many families have myths about their ancestors. These often involve descent from someone historically important via the “other side of the blanket”, or illegitimacy, and there’s at least one family member who is convinced it is true without any shred of evidence. My mother-in-law was adamant they had at least two Earls in the family tree, the Irish Earl of Shannon and possibly the Scottish Earl of Bute. She even wrote to the then Earl of Shannon setting her case, and, to his credit, he replied with a gentle let down. (We still have his letter.) She remained undeterred, however, and continued to tell everyone that his ancestor had his wicked way with an innocent Devon girl resulting in her family line even after subsequent genealogical research disproved it all.
 
My father’s sister had a painting of King Charles II in her bedroom, totally convinced for some irrational reason that she was related to him and therefore somehow a member of the House of Stuart. On my mother’s side, there were whispers about an ancestor being an indiscretion of Catherine the Great of Russia. All total nonsense.
 
Why do people think having royalty or prominent individuals in their DNA is important? Is it a sign of insecurity, a need to prove they are better than others for some reason? Go back far enough and we are all related to one another, so why does it matter? I guess the psychologists can explain it better.
 
This novel is inspired by a similar story in the author’s family tree and creates quite a number of issues for anyone with a healthy dose of scepticism about such notions.
 
Throughout history, the great, good - and not so good – men have left the lives of many women in disarray. The Duke of Wellington (of boots and Waterloo fame) was certainly no exception, with a notoriously unhappy marriage and a litany of affairs with a range of women from Ireland to India and throughout Europe. He had two legitimate sons, but it is highly likely he had other descendants.
 
Mary Ann Marshall is just thirteen and a maid in the London household of the Countess of Mornington when she first encounters the youthful Arthur Wesley (later Wellesley) and over the years they become firm friends and, much later, lovers.  In time, Mary Ann gives birth to his daughter, Elizabeth. Complicating this situation is Arthur’s marriage to Catherine (Kitty) Pakenham. After being spurned several times, when he finally does marry her, he is on his way to becoming the greatest military man of his age but is no longer in love with her. His prowess on the battlefield is matched by the same in the bedroom and he has numerous affairs, including some with former mistresses of his arch nemesis, Napoleon. As their children grow up together, both Kitty and Mary Ann must deal with Arthur’s capriciousness with women and his increasing fame.
 
The modern-day narrative features Ava Washington, a Sydney journalist, who discovers she is reputedly descended from the Duke via an illegitimate line and she starts an investigation into her own family tree that includes digging in archival institutions and travel to places where he is known to have lived and the battlefields where he saw his greatest actions.
 
While Mary Ann’s story set in the early 1800s has the author's recognisable style with  evidence of meticulous historical research, the contemporary component flounders. Not only is there repetition of what we’ve already discovered from the other narrative, there is over-explanation of facts and travel details that read like tourist brochure copy.  Ava's complicated personal relationships and involvement in sideline research into property issues do little to advance the main objective.
 
As to characterisations, Mary Ann is amiable but unconvincing and naïve about the Duke’s intentions. Any chemistry in their relationship feels lukewarm at best. The seemingly empty-headed Kitty proves to be kind and forgiving in difficult circumstances. The Duke is attractive/repellent depending on your own opinion of how dynamic men treat women. Ava is annoying and silly at times; more than once she berates herself for not asking the right questions as a journalist. And as for her putting up with the truly awful Darren who gaslights her several times over, one despairs at her behaviour when any self-respecting intelligent woman would have sent him packing. (Am I expecting too much to have writers give us stronger 21st Century female protagonists with more self-respect and not be at the mercy of their fluttering hormones, easily swayed by men and therefore unable to assert themselves?)
 
At least the final resolution is probably the only feasible one. 
 
Basically, there isn’t enough substance here for a novel of 440+ pages and it falls into the trap of research padding and oversimplification. And then there are the tacky allusive chapter titles that include: “Hunger Games”, “Sleeping with the Enemy”, “Lord of the Ring”, “Finally Facing his Waterloo”, “Dangerous Liaisons”, “Root Rat”, “Bridgerton Betrayal” and many others. Is this is a case of publishers wanting an author to “dumb down” or to write in a way that will appeal to younger generations of readers who find history and family research boring?
 
A genuine, first-person, non-fiction memoir by the author of how she sought to uncover the family legend would have been so much than better than this.
 
Not the best from this usually excellent author and it is hoped that she reverts to her earlier strengths and doesn’t engage in more dual timelines with contemporary components that have proved problematic for so many other historical novelists - and their readers! - since this became a trend.
 
Two stars for the contemporary narrative, three-and-a-half for the historical.

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​The infamous Mitford Girls have had numerous outings, both in fiction and non-fiction, but this is the first biography dedicated to their mother, Lady Redesdale (born Sydney Bowles) and it helps to fill in the background to the extraordinary chequered lives of her infamous six daughters.
 
The book’s cover shows “Muv”, as she was called by her family, as a young woman. There is much to be gleaned from the haughtiness of that image; this was not a woman to be messed with, someone who had fixed ideas about social behaviour and, as it turns out, was uncompromising, hypercritical and rigid in her political opinions. In turn, one learns about her father, Thomas Bowles, a man of his own convictions, self-made, successful and also a “maverick”, and the greatest influence on her life.
 
Muv married the eccentric David Freeman-Mitford (“Farve”), who later inherited the baronage of Redesdale, and they had six daughters and just one son. The couple were parodied by three of their daughters in a number of famous novels but they also created controversy through their support of fascism in Europe, and a close connection to Adolf Hitler.
 
For anyone who has read extensively about the Mitford Girls, much of this will already be familiar territory, but it is interesting to observe the dynamics of a family that clashed violently with one another over a range of extremist views, be it racism, antisemitism, communism, or fascism.
 
Although there were estrangements, it is extraordinary to see how Muv did her best to juggle her unruly family.  Unity – whom she looked after for several years after a failed suicide attempt - is perhaps the most tragic figure. Given the full name of Unity Valkyrie Mitford and conceived at a place called Swastika, Ontario, Canada, it seems she was doomed by some bizarre fate to be linked to Hitler!
 
Muv isn’t likeable, and her unwavering support of Hitler, her views on “ugly” Jews and poor people can make one wince. One might even think of her as stupid when she simply refused to ever have her mind changed by events, even the deaths of two of her children linked to the Second World War. As the author states:
 
“Sydney was not stupid; it was her judgement not her intelligence which was at fault. Her obstinate refusal to reassess situations in the light of incontrovertible evidence, alongside her entrenched prejudices and her misguided loyalty, made her hold onto pernicious attitudes which had proved catastrophic on both a global and personal scale. As so often in her life, she only saw what she wanted to see and tightly shut her eyes to anything which might contradict her worldview.”
 
A most intriguing woman, and a book definitely recommended for anyone with a curiosity about who influenced the Mitford Girls and made them into such memorable figures.
 
(My only quibble is the naming inconsistency in the narrative, with paragraphs calling her Muv in one sentence, Sydney in the next, and Lady Redesdale in the following.)
 
Four-and-a-half stars.
 
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Tan Twan Eng’s House of Doors (review here) was one of the best novels I’ve read in recent years. He’s not a prolific author, with only two other major works in print at present, this one being his debut novel, and I admit to a delay in reading it as I’ve felt World War II novels have reached saturation point, although the majority of them is based around the Nazis and Europe and the war with Japan is largely overlooked, certainly as it pertains to its effect on non-Western countries.
 
In the 1990s, a sick Japanese woman, Michiko, comes to the island of Penang off the coast of Malaysia, hoping to solve a mystery about a man she cared about a life time ago and she stays with the elderly Philip Hutton, who tells her his story.
 
Half-English, half-Chinese Philip is 16 when the war breaks out in late 1939. His wealthy merchant father and siblings are in Europe and he remains behind at the family’s lavish estate Istana. While they are away, Philip makes friends with Endo-san, a mysterious Japanese man who lives on a nearby small island. Endo-san begins to teach Philip the art of aikido, and the two form a strong bond, often travelling together around Malaya. After the family return and invasion by the Japanese seems inevitable, Philip is conflicted over duty and loyalties. The decisions he makes before, and during, the occupation of Penang will challenge him and make him ponder deeply on his place in the world and the highs and lows of human existence.
 
This powerful and confronting novel with its doomed characters and moral questions took me a long time to read, often having to put it aside after a few pages, but it is searingly memorable. The prose is intricate and thoughtful; some descriptions are graced with beauty, stoicism and philosophy, while others display in agonising detail all the horrors and depravity unleashed by war.
 
Some readers may find the reincarnation ideas a distraction from reality, but one has to bear in mind this is the East where spirituality and ways of thinking are often quite different from the more pragmatic Christian West. As Endo-san says, “Accept that there are things in this world we can never explain and life will be understandable. That is the irony of life. It is also the beauty of it.”
 
Five stars




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amazon.co.uk (the collected novels)

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