December 2010
Naslund, Sena Jeter, Abundance: A Novel of Marie Antoinette
Sena Jeter Naslund has created an engaging novel about Marie Antoinette who was the daughter of Maria Therese of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and married to the dauphin of France at age 14, he 15. Thus she is married to create a political liaison while still a girl, transported to France, never to return to her native Austria again, nor ever to see her mother again. The dauphin, eventually Louis XVI, is also very young, and unfortunately their marriage is not consummated for seven long years. In the meantime, however, they become good friends. Marie charms her husband’s grandfather, Louis XV and most of the court, but vicious rumors begin spreading about her profligate lifestyle and questionable liaisons with various members of the court. Thrown into this dangerous political situation, we see the events leading to the French Revolution in 1789 and the guillotine death of both Marie and her husband, the king. Based on accurate research of historic documents, the novel is told in the first person of Marie. We are led through her life, her life at court, the birth of her four children (two of whom survived childhood), her friendships, her marriage, and the horror of her prison life at the end. Marie in this novel becomes a believable and sympathetic figure, a victim of circumstances of her time. I loved it.
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