Lucrezia Borgia and the Mother of Poisons

Rating:
Summary: Lucrezia Borgia, Detective?
Review: It is a trend today in the mystery genre to make historical persons into some kind of detective. Now we have LUCREZIA BORGIA AND THE MOTHER OF POISONS by Roberta Gellis. I borrowed this book from a friend because of my interest in Lucrezia Borgia and the Renaissance in general, but having read this book, I don't think I will return to read any more books. It wasn't that it was a bad book, but it wasn't a compelling read. Gellis gives particulars of life in Renaissance, but the pace is slow and extremely repetitious. It is set in Ferrare. She is at this time married to her third husband, Alfonso, the son of the Duke. When a lady-in-waiting Donna Bianca Teobaldo is poisoned, Alfonso d'Este, Borgia's husband announces that Lucrezia had something to do with it in front of the entire court. It takes 77 pages for Lucrezia to tell everyone that she has to solve the murder to clear her name, over and over again. Why the Duke announced this in the first place is not made clear. The reader, on the other hand, knows the murderer by what the culprit does to make money. Nonetheless, the reader must go through tedious and rigorous plot points, because for some reason the intelligent heroine can't deduce that a person who had access to potions might be the murderer. But then sometimes the mystery isn't as interesting as idiosyncratic characters of the detective and her/his partners in solving crime. However, Lucrezia Borgia reads like any average romance heroine. In fact, even though she's an actual historical person, she is less actualized than some romance heroines. The whole books feels like a romance with a mystery overlay. There are endless descriptions of the clothing that the heroine wears and of her relationship with her husband, which are trademark notions in romances, and yet there is nothing in the style of writing that gives the reader genuine heartfelt thrills that a really well-constructed romance can produce. As a historical mystery and romance, it just didn't give me goosebumps.
I think those that like Robert Gellis will enjoy this book, but I'm not sure it will win her new readership. But one can never tell.

Rating:
Summary: Historical figure turns detective
Review: Lucrezia is accused by her husband, heir to the duchy of Ferrara of poisoning one of her ladies-in waiting. In her life prior to her marriage to Alfonso, Lucrezia had already lived through rumors of her being a poisoner. She does not want to live with people looking at her strangely and always wondering about her, so she sets off to find the real poisoner.

Roberta Gellis has written a well-constructed atmospheric novel set in the Italian Renaissance evoking a sense of time and place with a delightful heroine It was a little confusing at first to get used to the many characters introduced at the beginning at the novel. Hopefully, most of them will stay around for the next Lucrezia Borgia mystery so it won't be a problem again. The premise was a fairly straightforward whodunit plot, but was very suspenseful. This looks to be another outstanding series from Roberta Gellis.

Rating:
Summary: Engrossing
Review: Roberta Gellis is always a good author, whether she is
writing mysteries, romances or fantasy. She is also not an
author to be lightly taken up at will, for a pleasant few minutes. Her writing requires concentration and time.
Here she is starting on a new series featuring Lucrezia
Borgia and it is an engrossing opener. We are launched
directly into both the poisoning murder of one of her
ladies in waiting and her confusing, tentative relationship
with her husband Alfonso.
She realizes immediately that she must solve this murder,to
clear her name and be able to continue this new life that
she has found so much more pleasant than her former fraught
life in Rome.
There is a good deal of period detail that convincingly establishes the background, without becoming a history lecture.
The tortuous life of the Ferrara court is revealed through
the relationships between the characters. They all obviously have a life of their own, independant of the main plot.

Occasionally the dialogue is too wordy, the conversations sag to a too-distant point, but this does not distract permanently
from the story.
The relationship between the politically married couple, however, is far more fascinating and often I wanted the mystery to disappear, so that more would be revealed about Alfonso.
He is far more of an engrossing mystery to both the reader
and Lucrezia. The final paragraph scene between husband and wife is a dreadful teaser.
I shall definitely be reading the next installment - for just this reason.