Book Review: A Master Passion by Juliet Waldron & Tour Wide Giveaway

A Master Passion: The Story of Alexander and Elizabeth Hamilton by Juliet Waldron
Book One: Love and Liberty

ARC, E-Book, 428 pages
Books We Love
March 25, 2015
★★★½☆☆

Genre: Historical Fiction

Source: Received for Review as part of HFVBT tour

THE MASTER PASSION is the story of the marriage of our brilliant first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, and his courageous wife, Elizabeth Schuyler. It begins with a whirlwind Revolutionary War courtship at Washington’s headquarters. Conflict, however, is built into this marriage.

Betsy’s passion is Alexander. While Hamilton adores his wife and children, there are times when he loves America more.

“…And hence one Master Passion in the breast
Like Aaron’s serpent, swallows up all the rest…” ~~Alexander Pope

Alexander Hamilton has always been a man that I admired among the Founding Fathers of the United States and I have always felt that he was a man taken during his prime due to petty jealousy. The promise that he had that was left undeveloped… Of course, as with many things not learned in high school, I had NO IDEA that he was born and raised on a Caribbean island and came to the United States in the 1770’s. I just knew of him as the honorable revolutionary man and Secretary of the Treasury. And of his wife Betsy, I knew absolutely nothing (I didn’t even honestly realize he was married!).

So, the early parts of this novel were a little surprising to me and honestly a bit of a struggle to get through. While I know it was important to build up that early life story for Hamilton as a way to create his personality and rationalize his decision-making in the future, I found that it failed to lock me into the story. The entire section on Hamilton’s island life I found uninteresting, dry, and it almost made me put the book down a few times. It was just…boring. And, while I don’t really know much about Hamilton’s personality, I found that I didn’t like this portrayal of him at all. He is by turns, a little mean, womanizing, and insecure. By contrast, I found the early life story of Betsey Schuyler much more intriguing. I enjoyed learning more of the Dutch customs (I’m still confused however about the Blues, Reds, and Greens?) as well as life in the time leading up to the Revolution. I found the members of her family and other friends to at least be likable and interesting. Once we got into the war, courtship, and marriage part of the story I found that the plot picked up a bit in pace – and I’m not sure if I enjoyed it more for purely that fact or because the more likable Betsey helped balance my frustration with Hamilton.

In terms of the characters, overall, I found them very well written and each having a distinct personality. Even some of the side characters were not at all cookie-cutter and vague. One of the author’s strong-suits I feel is with crafting setting. No matter where the story took place I found the setting to stand out vividly and be almost touchable. There are two scenes that stand out in my mind as some of the author’s best for imagery – first when Hamilton and his men are trudging through snow and ice and are absolutely freezing on the way to attack Princeton and also when the men are downstairs celebrating the wedding of Hamilton and Betsey in the Schuyler parlor. Very well crafted.

While this book might not have been a favorite of this time period, I think my issue has more to do with my personal views vs. the author’s depiction of the character and I would encourage you to check this book out if you like reading about the early revolutionary period of the United States.

Check out this book trailer for a brief overview of the book:

 

Reviews of this book by other bloggers:

• Celtic Lady’s Reviews

Buy the Book: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Book Depository

 

Also by Juliet Waldron:

Mozart’s Wife

Roan Rose

Genesse

Nightingale

 

Find Juliet Waldron: Website | Facebook | Pinterest

Follow the Tour!

On the HFVBT Webpage

On Twitter using the hashtags: #AMasterPassionBlogTour    #HistoricalFiction

 

Tour Wide Giveaway!!

I have the opportunity to share a tour wide giveaway with you all on my tour stop.  Please note the rules below which were put out by the tour coordinator.  I am not responsible for this giveaway in any way.

To enter to win a paperback copy of A Master Passion & $5 Amazon Gift Card, please enter via the GLEAM form below.

Rules

• Giveaway ends at 11:59pm EST on October 2nd. You must be 18 or older to enter
• Giveaway is open to US residents only.
• Only one entry per household.
• All giveaway entrants agree to be honest and not cheat the systems; any suspect of fraud is decided upon by blog/site owner and the sponsor, and entrants may be disqualified at our discretion
• Winner has 48 hours to claim prize or new winner is chosen.

A Master Passion

 

 

Copyright © 2015 by The Maiden’s Court

Interview with Juliet Waldron

Today I have the opportunity to welcome author Juliet Waldron to The Maiden’s Court.  She has answered a few questions about her writing to and career to help us get to know her a little better.  There is a giveaway at the end too!

You have written several novels – how would you characterize your writing style for someone who has never read one of your books?

I’ve been influenced by all the period material I’ve read, hopefully without driving the reader crazy. Style, book to book, owes a great deal to the main character. As I’ve written several novels in first person, identity is expressed through style. For instance, the artistic, vulnerable teen-ager of My Mozart requires more poetry and greater sentence complexity than does the clear-eyed servant who tells the story of Roan Rose.

How do you approach the historical elements in your novels – are they more of a framework/background for the story you are telling or is your story really rooted in the historical elements?

Mozart’s Wife represents twenty years of detailed research. It was particularly important to me to figure out what went on between Mozart and his “Best Beloved Little Wife”. Sometimes, certainly, you have to intuit events from one-sided information. (18^th Century wives who survived their great men frequently burned and/or bowdlerized personal correspondence.) On the other hand, Genesse and Nightingale have fictional characters, but actual events provide the framework. Roan Rose is roughly a 50/50 mix, although I do stick carefully to timelines. If a character died in real life, then he/she dies in my fiction, too.

A couple of your novels are set during the American Revolution (Genesse and Angel’s Flight) and a couple center around Mozart (Mozart’s Wife and My Mozart). What has drawn you to these topics in particular?

The Revolution in New York was familiar to me, both from school days and as an exciting story of family history. It always thrilled me to look around our peaceful country home and imagine when it was The Wild, Wild East, complete with Indians, settlers and marauding armies.

Mozart represents crazy time. He moved into my life in the early ‘80’s and didn’t leave until recently. His music is drop-dead beautiful, and he’s a powerful, telepathic personality. As I’m more than slightly OCD, that made a fateful combination. It was All Mozart All the Time around here for years.

Do you like to read the same style of books that you write? Or are your personal tastes very different?

When it comes to historical fiction, I’m open to any writer who can whisk me away to another place and time. However, I spend more time reading non-fiction, which means history, articles on material culture and archeology.

What do we have to look forward to see coming from your pen in the future?

I’m working on Black Magic (sequel to Red Magic), a historical fantasy with shape-shifters of a peculiarly local kind. This story is set in the Alps just after the Napoleonic wars, about the same time Mary Shelley was at work.

“Not all who wander are lost.” Juliet Waldron earned a B. A. in English, but has worked at jobs ranging from artist’s model to brokerage. Thirty years ago, after the boys left home, she dropped out of 9-5 and began to write, hoping to create a genuine time travel experience for herself–and for her readers. She loves her grand-girls and her kitties, likes to take long hikes, and reads historical/archeological non-fiction as well as reviewing for the Historical Novel Society. For summer adventure, she rides behind her husband of 50 years on his “bucket list” (black, and ridiculously fast) Hyabusa motorcycle.

You can find Juliet at the following locations: website and Facebook.

Here are some choices for purchasing the books: Amazon, B&N, RJ Julia (my fav indie bookstore).

You can follow along with the rest of the blog tour by visiting the HFVBT website or on Twitter with the following hashtag: #JulietWaldronBlogTour.

And now for a giveaway – tour wide:

To win a $20 Amazon Gift Card please complete the Rafflecopter giveaway form below. Giveaway is open to US residents only.

• Giveaway ends at 11:59pm on June 30th. You must be 18 or older to enter.
• Winner will be chosen via Rafflecopter on July 1st and notified via email.
• Winner have 48 hours to claim prize or new winner is chosen.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

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