Reader Review: "Isola"
by Cathryn Conroy (Dublin, Ohio): Oh, this book is horrifying. Not because it's a horror story or a terrifying thriller, but rather because the premise of the story is grounded in one human being's horrifying, reprehensible treatment of another. It is evil personified. And we readers cannot even comfort ourselves with the thought that it is total fiction because it's based on a true story.
Horrifying though it may be, this is a must-read book!
It is 1531 in Périgord, France. Marguerite de La Rocque is orphaned at age three, and her great wealth is legally placed into the hands of her guardian, Jean-François de la Rocque de Roberval, who was her father's cousin. This duplicitous and devious man barely provided enough financial resources for Marguerite to live with her beloved nursemaid Damienne, while he proceeded to spend and then lose her vast fortune.
When Marguerite is 20, Roberval sold the estate in which she and Damienne were living and forced her to accompany him on his ship that was setting sail to New France, a vast territory in North America, including parts of Canada, where he was determined he would make his fortune. While on board the ship, the mercurial Roberval decides that Marguerite has betrayed him by having an affair with his secretary, Auguste Dupré. So he brutally punishes the couple, along with Damienne who will never leave her mistress, by abandoning them on an uninhabited island in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, off Newfoundland. Of course, he assumes the trio will die miserable, long drawn-out deaths when the brutal snowy and icy winter comes—if they live that long.
Beautifully written by Allegra Goodman with vivid characters and a jaw-dropping plot, this is a remarkable tale of one woman's resilience, perseverance, courage, and stamina in the most appalling of circumstances. It is an historical fiction page-turner, a gripping, unflinching tale that is haunting and gritty.
https://www.bookbrowse.com/reader_review...4993/isola
by Cathryn Conroy (Dublin, Ohio): Oh, this book is horrifying. Not because it's a horror story or a terrifying thriller, but rather because the premise of the story is grounded in one human being's horrifying, reprehensible treatment of another. It is evil personified. And we readers cannot even comfort ourselves with the thought that it is total fiction because it's based on a true story.
Horrifying though it may be, this is a must-read book!
It is 1531 in Périgord, France. Marguerite de La Rocque is orphaned at age three, and her great wealth is legally placed into the hands of her guardian, Jean-François de la Rocque de Roberval, who was her father's cousin. This duplicitous and devious man barely provided enough financial resources for Marguerite to live with her beloved nursemaid Damienne, while he proceeded to spend and then lose her vast fortune.
When Marguerite is 20, Roberval sold the estate in which she and Damienne were living and forced her to accompany him on his ship that was setting sail to New France, a vast territory in North America, including parts of Canada, where he was determined he would make his fortune. While on board the ship, the mercurial Roberval decides that Marguerite has betrayed him by having an affair with his secretary, Auguste Dupré. So he brutally punishes the couple, along with Damienne who will never leave her mistress, by abandoning them on an uninhabited island in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, off Newfoundland. Of course, he assumes the trio will die miserable, long drawn-out deaths when the brutal snowy and icy winter comes—if they live that long.
Beautifully written by Allegra Goodman with vivid characters and a jaw-dropping plot, this is a remarkable tale of one woman's resilience, perseverance, courage, and stamina in the most appalling of circumstances. It is an historical fiction page-turner, a gripping, unflinching tale that is haunting and gritty.
https://www.bookbrowse.com/reader_review...4993/isola