From the outset I must point out that Lauren Belfer is one of my favorite authors.  That opinion is predicated on a series of wonderful historical novels that she has written since 2003.  The first, CITY OF LIGHT, Belfer a New York Times bestselling author delves into turn of the century Buffalo, NY and evidence of a murder tied to the city’s cathedral-like power plant at nearby Niagara Falls.  She then authored the NPR Mystery of the Year, A FIERCE RADIANCE, a story centered around the uncertain days following Pearl Harbor, and the clinical testing of a new medication at the renowned Rockefeller Institute in New York. Belfer  follows with perhaps her finest work, AND AFTER THE FIRE: A NOVEL a story inspired by historical events—about two women, one European and one American, and the mysterious choral masterpiece by Johann Sebastian Bach that changes both their lives.  In her latest effort, ASHTON HALL Belfer pursues a different approach as for the first time her novel takes place in the present and does not focus totally on the past.  She still creates a strong evocative story which focuses on Hannah Larson, a frustrated academic who decides to leave New York City as she is dealing with a problematic marriage and takes her nine year old son, Nicky to Cambridge, England for a summer at a historic manor house.  She will soon be exposed to a discovery that will alter her life – her son Nicky finds the skeletal remains of a woman walled into a forgotten part of the manor.

Hannah had been working on her Ph. D in Greek art when her son Nicky was born.  She decided to put off her graduate education and take care of her son full time and relied on her husband, Kevin for support.  As Nicky grew he developed certain emotional and behavioral issues that seem to border on autism, but in the novel it is labeled “neurodiversity in children.”  Nicky is prone to violent and angry episodes at times which he cannot control.  Hannah is at a crossroads.  She wants to complete her dissertation, provide a new experience for her son, and after learning that her husband is bi-sexual decide what to do about her marriage – the offer to stay with her uncle Christopher who is dying of cancer at Ashton Hall seems like a fortuitous opportunity to recalibrate and experience the life she thought she should have, not the one she was living.

Once she arrives and gets settled at the mansion Nicky makes the skeletal discovery and the focus of the novel shifts.  Belfer has constructed a story that runs on parallel tracks.  First, we have Hannah’s personal quest to change her life’s path.  In conversations between characters, we learn a great deal about Hannah.  She comes from a family that survived the Holocaust with a self-willed and independent mother with no father to speak of.  Nicky becomes the core of her existence, but she is trying to ameliorate her situation by turning to her past to rekindle a new avocation.  Second, Belfer uses the discovery of the skeletal remains to pursue another story line and a historical character that Hannah can relate to and to whom she will develop a deep attachment.  Third, she begins to develop a relationship with Professor Matthew Varet, a Cambridge University archeologist who is assisting in trying to identify who the skeleton was and in what time period.

The model for Ashton Hall was Bickling Hall in York, England, a national trust historical mansion.  Legend holds that Anne Boleyn was born at the site and each year she haunts the estate on the anniversary of her execution.  Years ago, Belfer had visited the mansion and stayed at a nearby cottage and after years of deliberation decided to use it as a model for her current work.

Belfer carefully unravels the research process that will identify the skeleton as Isabella Cresham who lived in the latter part of the 16^th century.  Hannah identifies with Isabella in a number of ways, and it seems the two women are linked across the centuries.  By going through the books Cresham has read in the mansion’s library Hannah learns of their mutual interest in art and from genetic testing she learns that the woman is between 35-45 years old, is physically healthy, is of a high social class, has reddish hair and never gave birth to a child.  Hannah is clearly haunted by the discovery of Cresham, and she sees parallels between their lives with a nagging question: did Cresham choose this life, or was she locked away?   The undercurrent for the Cresham discovery was the reappearance of plague, and the religious conflict between Protestantism and Catholicism in England during her lifetime, a theme that continues to reappear throughout the novel, and evidence that points to Cresham’s devotion to Catholicism.  Intolerance, murder, death, and violence, characteristic of Elizabethan England has similarities for Hannah because of her families’ experiences during World War II.

The physical structure of Ashton Hall is on full display with moats and priest holes along with the architecture  of the castle.  Different personages from the period, i.e., Mary Queen of Scots, Henry VII, and VIII among a number of historical personalities appear.  Belfer employs account registers, library records and key 16^th century documents to provide Professor Varet and his academic partner, Dr. Martha Tingley’s tools research in reconstructing Cresham’s life.  Belfer writes with a light touch and digs up fascinating details of the period.  For example, the role of mothers in 16^th century England included that of a medical practitioner applying various herbal remedies.  For instance, during his reign Henry VIII suffered from gout and used the homeopathic remedy, colchicum, a remedy that is still used today by homeopathic practitioners and some MDs.

ASHTON HALL is a well crafted novel and draws the reader into the story in a slow careful manner.  Though Belfer’s approach may be different from previous novels, in the end it is a success as one is drawn into the two parallel lives.  The story abounds with comparisons of what it is to be British, and what it is to be American.  The differences and similarities are interesting and point to Belfer’s astute observations. In the end, if you fancy Tudor England, historical fiction, the history pertaining to libraries, and a story that is a struggle for self-identity and discovery you should enjoy the story.

William Ryan burst on the literary scene in 2010 with debut novel, THE HOLY THIEF, the first of his Captain Alexi Korolev trilogy that takes place during the 1930s Stalinist regime in the Soviet Union.  His second and third volumes in the trifecta, THE BLOODY MEADOW and THE TWELFTH DEPARTMENT set Ryan apart from other historical crime writers as he continued to navigate the justice system under Stalin.  THE CONSTANT SOLDIER is a departure for Ryan as it is a standalone novel that begins with his protagonist, Paul Brandt, a Wehrmacht soldier, wounded on the eastern front experiencing flashbacks on a hospital train bound for Hamburg.  Brandt slips into unconsciousness taking him back to his relationship with his mother, and a young woman named Judith who has disappeared, for which he blames himself.

Ryan easily catches the attention of the reader with an absorbing story of a man who suffered severe injuries and wondered what he could do with the rest of his life.  The time period is late 1944 and early 1945 in the Upper Silesia part of Poland that had been under Nazi occupation since 1939.  However, as the novel unfolds Russian troops and tanks are making their way west endangering any Germans in their path.  Brandt returns home to the family farm and notices an emaciated young woman who is being held prisoner at an SS “Rest Hut” near the farm.  He is convinced that the woman is Judith, whose real name is Agneta Gruber who Brandt last saw her before the war broke out when they were arrested for anti-Nazi activity in Vienna.  Given the choice of death in prison or the army, Brandt enlisted in the Wehrmacht, but retained a guilt that he had abandoned Agneta years before.

The physically debilitated Brandt, against the wishes of his family decides to accept a job at the Rest Hut as it’s steward as a means of trying to rescue Agneta and four other woman as the SS had begun murdering their prisoners.  Ryan creates the backstory of the relationship between Brandt and Agneta and Brandt’s obsession with saving her and assuaging his guilt.  The remorse Brandt feels goes beyond his relationship with a woman he still loves to righting the many wrongs he committed on the eastern front as a soldier.

Once Ryan introduces the suicide of an SS officer named Schmidt the novel begins to branch out from the single track of Brandt’s hopes for saving the woman to the Holocaust.  It seems his commander Obersturmfuhrer Friedrich Neumann orders Brandt to destroy Schmidt’s diary and other possessions which delineates what the SS has done on the eastern front murdering Jews.  Ryan manages the Holocaust with subtlety as he does not become involved in descriptions of mass murder, but he provides a number of hints concerning the horrors that have occurred.  For example, Neumann’s comment that he did not want to remain in Kiev and sought his transfer to Upper Silesia.  He like everyone knew what was occurring as he stated, “he hadn’t planned to become a murderer, he didn’t think.  It just turned out that way.”

Ryan does an excellent job juxtaposing a comparison of Brandt’s and Neumann’s beliefs and attitude toward the war, what they witnessed, and been involved in.  Both men develop doubts and disgust at themselves as they pondered their future.  They realize the Russians are not far away when Ryan introduces a third track to the novel through the character of Polya Kolanka, a female T-34 tank driver, one of the few in the Russian military.  We follow her quest to reach Germany and her experiences as the Soviet Union is about to overrun the Germans. 

As Ryan’s plot evolves Brandt must navigate between a number of interesting characters.  There is Mayor Weber, a drunk with power who distrusts Brandt and has no compunction about killing.  Second in importance is the sadistic Scharfuhrer Peichl who reveled in beating prisoners.  Hubert, a partisan fighter in the forest who is in love with Brandt’s sister Monika.  Lastly, the four woman who are imprisoned with Agneta.

Ryan has authored a taut novel that expresses the dilemmas faced by Germans and Russians as the war winds down.  The reader wonders what will become of Brandt and whether he will be able to save the woman he loves, among others.  The novel is well written and follows the facts of World War II to a tee.  The novel is in part based on the experiences of Karl Hocker, an adjutant to the last Commandant of Auschwitz and he incorporates photographic documentation created by Hocker that had disappeared until 2005.  Many of the pictures were taken at a rest hut near a small village called Porabka, about twenty kilometers from Auschwitz.  Ryan uses this factual information to recreate a fictional account of an SS Rest Hut and introduces characters that reflect the hazards and emotions that their situation has fostered.

THE CONSTANT SOLDIER is an excellent read and I look forward to his latest standalone novel, WINTER GUEST which will be released this October.

For those  who are familiar with the works of William Martin you have come to appreciate his Peter Fallon mysteries.  Novels such as HARVARD YARD, THE LINCOLN LETTER, CITY OF DREAMS, THE LOST CONSTITUTION, and BOUND FOR GLORY are structured with two alternating time periods, one dating back a century or two to our contemporary world reaching climaxes when the two came together.  Martin’s focus in other novels rests on the traditional chronological approach of historical fiction that includes; ANNAPOLIS, BACK BAY, CAPE COD, and CITIZEN WASHINGTON.  After a ten year hiatus from his last novel, Martin has authored DECEMBER ’41 a supercharged work that adopts the traditional chronological timeline which develops a plot that was designed to culminate in the assassination of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Christmas Eve, 1941 shortly after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and a surprise visit of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill.

The novel itself has elements of detective mysteries from the 1930s and 40s with dialogue, scenes, and characters from that time period.  Martin blends this approach with commentary about race, ethnicity, misogyny, and the role of the United States in the world.  In a way Martin has taken a page from Philip Roth’s novel, THE PLOT AGAINST AMERICA raising the same issues but his effort is about defeating Roosevelt through assassination, while Roth focused on replacing Roosevelt with Charles Lindbergh in the White House.

Martin begins the novel as Roosevelt is addressing Congress with his “a date which will live in infamy speech” as the American people hung on every word from coast to coast.  At the same time at a shooting range in a Los Angeles County canyon a group of Nazi sympathizers and spies engaged in target practice, one of which had plans to kill President Roosevelt.

Martin has created a scenario that at the time was not out of the realm of possibility, particularly after Adolf Hitler declared war on the United States on December 11, 1941.  Martin develops three main characters; Kevin Cusack, a script reader at Warner Brother studios, Martin Browning, a virulent supporter of Nazi Germany and an American citizen, and Frank Carter, an FBI agent stationed in Los Angeles.  The three characters evolve slowly and by the end of the novel they will all come together.  Along the way there are a series of other personalities that play important roles.  Vivian Hopewell, a starry eyed Marlene Dietrich look alike; Stella Madden, a hard nosed female detective; Madden’s flamboyant assistant, Bartholomew Bennet; Stanley Smith, a Pullman porter on a cross country train; Emile Gunst, a member of the German Bund who imports German ceramics; Helen and Wilhelm Stauer, Browning’s co-conspirators, and a host of other savory and unsavory characters.

The texture of the time period is front and center.  The reader is provided glimpses into the Hollywood culture of the 1940s with cameos from John Wayne, John Huston, Hal Wallis, Humphrey Bogart, Erol Flynn, constant references to Leslie Howard, and what it took for a female to achieve stardom. 

Martin also delves into topics which are still germane today and compares them to earlier examples in American history.  For example, when discussing the inferior quality of American leadership, he points to Warren G. Harding.  His approach to the world balance of power fosters a debate as to which is the greater threat, Communism or Nazism.  The antisemitism of the period, the America Firsters, the KKK, and the Nazi ideology espoused by certain individuals is a dominant theme.  In discussing the interaction between diverse characters, American racism comes to the fore particularly the role of porters on American railroads and trains with nicknames like “Super Chief.” In summary, the first half of the novel is not up to Martin’s usual standards in developing his plot.  However, once a number of characters board a train from Los Angeles to the east coast the novel begins to gather steam.  The question is has Martin written a storyline that is feasible, the answer is yes, but has he branched out and produced an approach that is new, the answer is no.  In the end the novel is an easy read, but it is not as absorbing as his other efforts.  When I picked up a William Martin novel I had great expectations.  I anticipated something that was in the realm of previous Martin efforts, Ken Follett or Frederick Forsyth.   However, the current work left me somewhat disappointed.   Despite some exciting and heart pounding scenes, overall, it left me hoping for a plot that was more engaging with greater depth.

On May 9, 2022, Vladimir Putin stood in Red Square and celebrated the Russian victory over Nazi Germany.  As he spoke the “Special Military Operation” he unleashed on February 24^th grinds on with a death toll estimated at 26,000 for Russia and god knows how many Ukrainian soldiers and civilians, assuredly in the thousands.  The war, a term which is illegal in Russia took a turn last month when Russian forces withdrew from the Kyiv region as Moscow decided to cut its losses in the west and concentrate its firepower in the east, particularly in the Donbas region made up of Luhansk and Donetsk two areas that have been at war with the Ukrainian government since Moscow annexed the Crimea in 2014.

For the people living in the region who did not leave for Russia or safer parts of Ukraine, war has become an almost accepted part of their daily lives.  Today the fighting has been brutal and mirrors the type of conventional battles that ground up thousands upon thousands of soldiers during World War II.  Success for either side on the battlefield has been slow as Russia launches its missiles and artillery and Ukrainian forces try to stall the Russian advance and in certain areas retake villages from Russian troops.  The people who are caught in this morass between the Ukrainian troops and pro-Russian separatists in the breakaway “people’s republics” of Donetsk and Luhansk live in what is referred to as the “grey zone.”  No one knows exactly how many people remain in the area, but for those who have stayed the chief aim is survival.  To ascertain what life is like for the residents of the eastern region, Ukrainian novelist, Andrey Kurkov has authored a haunting book entitled GREY BEES, a story about a disabled pensioner and devoted beekeeper – “one of the people of the Donbas.”

Kurkov’s protagonist is named Sergey Sergeyich who travels to Crimea where he hopes to arrange a holiday for his bees.  Instead, his trip south turns into an ordeal as he witnesses the poor treatment of the Crimean Tatars by Russian authorities.  Sergey tries to maintain neutrality between the two sides, but he develops sympathy for the Muslims and his beliefs create suspicion on the part of the Russian security service – the FSB, which is also a threat to his beloved bees.

The first part of the novel is devoted to Sergey’s life of isolation in the tiny village of Starhorodivka located in the grey zone between Ukrainian and Separatist soldiers.  Sergey’s life is one of repetition, boredom, and survival.  With no electricity and limited access to food his focus is clear – avoid snipers and travel only at night.  The only other person who lives in the village is his “frenemy,” Pashka Khmelenko who seems pro-Separatist/Russia.  Their relationship goes back to childhood and was never strong, but the situation they find themselves in draws them closer.

Sergey was married with a daughter, but after a series of disagreements his wife left taking their child with her.  Sergey had been a mine inspector before the war, but by age forty-two he retired on disability with silicosis.  Sergey’s outlook on life is clear, he must maintain his health as best he can for the sake of the bees.  If he should pass away the bees would perish – he refuses to allow himself to “become the annihilator of hundreds of thousands of bee souls.”  He believed such a sin would burden him through his afterlife.  Sergey is firmly neutral in terms of political affiliation during the war – he only cares about his bees and worries what might occur to his society of beekeepers if Donetsk were to become independent since there was no society of beekeepers in that region.

The novel provides a window into the horror of what life is like in eastern Ukraine.  The dominant emotion is how to deal with the silence between bombardments.  Military silence which is not really silence becomes the norm as the shelling can come at any time – it becomes the accepted mode of existence for people in the region.  Kurkov describes a grey area that had been consumed by mining, but Sergey looks forward to spring, whenever it arrives as it brings the beauty of nature that offsets the calamity of destructive warfare.

The second part of the novel evolves as increased shelling begins to disturb the hives, so Sergey loads up his bees in his Lada and travels from town to town finally reaching Crimea.  As the story progresses Sergey finds it difficult to remain neutral as he sees how the Russian soldiers treat his beekeeper comrade, a Crimean Tartar named Akhtem and his family.  Sergey’s commentary is enlightening as he compares the behavior of his bees with behavior during the Soviet period and wonders why his bees are acting like humans.

For the author, “civil society” could learn a great deal from Sergey’s bees.  In addition, Kurkov’s story and dialogue point to the timelessness of war.  For Sergey and others, telling time serves no purpose, only the seasons matter. 

During his journey to Crimea, time is of the essence as Russian authorities will only grant him a ninety day pass.  As he travels on, Sergey meets a number of people that will influence his journey and alter his perceptions of the human condition.  Gayla, a woman who operates a food store, wants him to stay with her.  Aisylu, the widow of his bee colleague, Akhtem provides food and emotional support.  Lastly, a series of Russian officials who seem to enjoy creating obstacles for Sergey.  In all instances the reader will acquire insights into life in Crimea and the Grey Zone and how Putin and his minions inflict tremendous psychological and physical damage on its inhabitants.

In a novel that professes neutrality the portrayal of Russian characters comes off according to Jennifer Wilson in her March 29, 2022, New York Times  book review “as eerily cold, almost monstrous – snipers, cops, Putin apologists – as the actions of the Russian government were in some ways reflective of a deeper national character.  It recalls Kurkov’s professed view of Russian and Ukrainian people as fundamentally different, each with a unique ‘mentality.’ As Putin tries to justify his occupation on the grounds of a shared history, there is indeed a strong current within Ukraine’s intelligentsia toward highlighting what makes the cultures and literary traditions distinct. Any suggestion of syncretism or co-influence feels tantamount to treason.”

The Dublin Literary Award states that Grey Bees is as timely as the author’s Ukraine Diaries were in 2014 but treats the unfolding crisis in a more imaginative way, with a pinch of Kurkov’s signature humor. Who better than Ukraine’s most famous novelist to illuminate and present a balanced portrait of this most bewildering of modern conflicts.