Title: Becoming Marie Antoinette Series: Marie Antoinette #1
Author: Juliet Grey
Published: August 9, 2011
Genre(s): Historical Fiction
Page Count: 453
Rating:
Summary from Goodreads:Raised alongside her numerous brothers and sisters by the formidable empress of Austria, ten-year-old Maria Antonia knew that her idyllic existence would one day be sacrificed to her mother's political ambitions. What she never anticipated was that the day in question would come so soon.
Before she can journey from sunlit picnics with her sisters in Vienna to the glitter, glamour, and gossip of Versailles, Antonia must change everything about herself in order to be accepted as dauphine of France and the wife of the awkward teenage boy who will one day be Louis XVI. Yet nothing can prepare her for the ingenuity and influence it will take to become queen.
Juliet Grey’s debut novel, Becoming Marie Antoinette, is well-written and detailed, providing readers with a glimpse into the dauphine’s formative years and early days at Versailles. While the content of this novel is not particularly ground-breaking, I still enjoyed this book.
The style with which this book is written is very informative and detail-oriented, which I personally enjoyed, because that’s how I like my novels—with lots of material. The pace and plot, as a result, are by necessity slow and dragging. I didn’t mind, because in this kind of historical fiction, one hardly expects driving action sequences.
As I said, Grey’s writing is serviceable, and effective. At times, though, things veered a little toward the purple prose end of the spectrum, which is something I really didn’t like. For example, in a single paragraph, Marie Antoinette informs readers that: “I was the embodiment of loveliness and fecundity” and “the illusion of womanly pulchritude.” I will admit that section made me laugh, not in a good way, as did the scene where Madame du Barry’s breasts are described as “pulchritudinous”.
So: Becoming Marie Antoinette is well-written, but might be a little over the top in spots.
I think, also, that when one reads books about controversial historical figures, there is the silent expectation that the author will bring something new to the table, something that will adjust the reader’s view of such a well-known personage. I, sadly, did not get that from this book.
My own previous exposure to Marie Antoinette is very limited. I’ve read Kathryn Lasky’s Marie Antoinette novel, which is geared towards children, and I’ve seen the Sofia Coppola-directed film. In Becoming Marie Antoinette, Juliet Grey delivered no information that I had not already learned (and we can all agree that neither the children’s novel nor the film are exemplary sources), nor did I gain new insight on Marie Antoinette the human being.
Essentially, Becoming Marie Antoinette was a good novel that I found interesting but was not particularly impressed with, as it rehashed everything I already knew.
