Selected Product:
| In the Company of the Courtesan: A Novel
Paperback
Author: Sarah Dunant
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
Release Date: 2007-02-06
ISBN-10: 0812974042
ISBN-13: 9780812974041
List Price: $13.95
Average Customer Rating:
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Summaries and Customer Reviews are supplied by Amazon.com
My lady, Fiammetta Bianchini, was plucking her eyebrows and biting color into her lips when the unthinkable happened and the Holy Roman Emperor’s army blew a hole in the wall of God’s eternal city, letting in a flood of half-starved, half-crazed troops bent on pillage and punishment.
Thus begins In the Company of the Courtesan, Sarah Dunant’s epic novel of life in Renaissance Italy. Escaping the sack of Rome in 1527, with their stomachs churning on the jewels they have swallowed, the courtesan Fiammetta and her dwarf companion, Bucino, head for Venice, the shimmering city born out of water to become a miracle of east-west trade: rich and rancid, pious and profitable, beautiful and squalid.
With a mix of courage and cunning they infiltrate Venetian society. Together they make the perfect partnership: the sharp-tongued, sharp-witted dwarf, and his vibrant mistress, trained from birth to charm, entertain, and satisfy men who have the money to support her.
Yet as their fortunes rise, this perfect partnership comes under threat, from the searing passion of a lover who wants more than his allotted nights to the attentions of an admiring Turk in search of human novelties for his sultan’s court. But Fiammetta and Bucino’s greatest challenge comes from a young crippled woman, a blind healer who insinuates herself into their lives and hearts with devastating consequences for them all.
A story of desire and deception, sin and religion, loyalty and friendship, In the Company of the Courtesan paints a portrait of one of the world’s greatest cities at its most potent moment in history: It is a picture that remains vivid long after the final page.
From the Hardcover edition.
It was not The Birth of Venus
| Customer Rating: | | I was thinking this book would be as good as The Birth of Venus and was sort of let down. The characters were not as strong or as easy to connect to and some of the characters were not that important and left me floating out on a tangent. |
Company Worth Keeping
| Customer Rating: | | While reading this book, my first by Sarah Dunant, I could not believe how fast I was charmed and held by it. I don't think I did much else for a day or so while I read through it. It was a wonderful visit with these characters and their world. BRAVO Sarah Dunant. I have since read everything of hers I could lay my hands on. I have not been disappointed. |
i enjoyed it
| Customer Rating: | | This book is about a a dwarf as a pimp whoe's best friend is a beautiful courtesan and their adventures through Rome and Venice. This is my first book by Ms. Dunant and I throughly enjoyed her writing. I found her descriptions vivid, engaging and through. I could envision the story, even though the culture was so alien to me. As some writers mention, the characters lacked depth, but personally I believe that is all they were meant to be. This is a great read and I recommend it if you are looking for something engaging and interesting. |
Well, at least I finished it.
| Customer Rating: | | I truly wanted to like this book, especially after the delicious book "The Birth of Venus" which was one of the best books I had read in ages. Unfortunately, my affections began to wane about fifty pages into the book. It's well-written, of course--Sarah Dunant does not disappoint in that area. It's just that the characters are most unlikable, this period in history is violent & corrupt, and the characters didn't have any redeeming features. I loathed the dwarf by the end of the book--he was intelligent enough to know what he doing but totally unrepentant and never used any of his good fortune (purchased at the expense of his best friend/love interest's abilities as a courtesan) to help anybody but himself. The only time they tried to do anything remotely helpful to anyone was to save La Draga, which they failed at. Overall, they struck me as completely deserving of one another in their greedy and selfish little world and totally devoid of any good peronality traits. I did finish the book, mainly to find out how the author could bring the story to a satifying end, but would not recommend it to anyone. |
A Fun Read
| Customer Rating: | | Not one of my favorites, but it's a good summer/beach read. The characters are engaing, but I expected a little more depth. I enjoyed the historical context, but the story left me looking for a bit more. |
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