a net for small fishes is the antithesis of my typical preferences as centres on a true story of imagined relationship between two women in the court of king james.

So I'm glad I picked this one up and it didn't take me very long before I was fully engrossed in the story and the lives of the two women. We follow Ray Eccles and his unlikely muse, their lives becoming intertwined with others as they advance on their bizarre journey through the London art scene. This book did scratch my Wolf Hall itch and while it doesn't have quite the same psychological intensity, it does have complex characters and fully immersed me in the world of the Jacobean court, its ruthless intrigues, arbitrary power, and the ultimate vulnerability of everyone, from maid to king, in the face of it all. As the enemies of the Howards grow stronger, Frankie and Anne face the gravest of dangers in a society determined to crush women daring to challenge the limitations placed upon them.From the communal highs of pitched night battles against the police in Cairo to the solitary lows of defeated exile in New York, Omar Robert Hamilton’s debut is a unique immersion into one of the key chapters of the 21st century.

Bringing to life the 2011 Egyptian revolution, The City Always Wins conveys with extraordinary intensity all the stages of that place and that time through the lives of its two main characters Mariam and Khalil, ordinary young people caught up in an extraordinary moment. Like all the best historical fiction, A Net for Small Fishes is a gloriously immersive escape from present times, but it’s not escapism: the outrage with which Anne is told at her trial that “you have acted of and for yourself, which is itself against the proper bounds of womanhood” is a sentiment that echoes down the centuries. But as Anne starts to rise in the world of the elite, accompanying Frankie on her journey of wanting to be rid of her abusive husband, will they be able to stay friends or will dark forces and those who only want to see them fail bring an end to them both?Likely to be a big hit with fans of Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall series, this book has shady political dealings and warring factions driving the action in the cutthroat atmosphere of a court in which everyone’s livelihood depends on the favour of a whimsical monarch. a sumptuous feast of plotting and intrigue' Mail on Sunday 'A complete joy' Bettany Hughes 'Gloriously immersive' Guardian ------------------------------------------------- Frances Howard has beauty and a powerful family - and is the most unhappy creature in the world. From another source, I learn that the title is inspired by the quote in a document “make a net to catch little birds and let the great ones go”. Embarrassingly, I was not familiar with the Overbury Plot which occurred during the reign of James I and is the subject of this book. The Thelma and Louise of the seventeenth century: two mis-matched heroines, two grittily textured lives, an outrageous plot (true!

When Anne meets Frances for the first time, she is married to the Earl of Essex, an abusive man who is unable to consummate their marriage. The story is compelling and Jago uses a lot of literary devices throughout the story to engage the reader and hold that engagement.We have the story of a female friendship that crossed social levels, bolstered by the strong character of two women of strong character who defied their surroundings, and who, despite wearing yellow, were deeply loyal. Però ci rende anche una donna che ha vissuto e osato, finendo schiacciata sotto una sorta di condanna perenne, per essere stata (non da sola) coinvolta in uno scandalo di nobili, e quindi non perdonata per il suo essere una donna del popolo e sicuramente "strega, papista e fattucchiera".

Anne has gained a notoriety for her fashionable yellow starch lace and has a fine eye for dressing women for court. As Frankie is continually rejected by her young husband these two women resort to obtaining powerful medicinal potions from undesirable sorcerers and Frankie inevitably seeks solace with another man, in this case Sir Robert Carr, a handsome Scottish knight who has become the King’s favourite, a relationship inevitably fraught with danger. Enter Anne, a mother of five, wife of an elderly physician, she had some status but only based on her husband's profession.

Anne's desperation for more than her hard lot, and the chance to seize it through this society connection, will put her very life on the line. From that moment on he is obsessed, a crazed visionary repeatedly depicting the scene and the unknown figure within it who filled his view at the moment of impact. Also, because my complaints would outweigh my general response, which is that this was a likeable read and the author deserves encouragement. Frances’s companion Anne Turner, a doctor’s widow, was also implicated; she was Frances’s dresser and fixer, obtainer of both love potions and poisons, and much more vulnerable than the aristocratic Somersets to ruin and social censure. This created a sense of distance to the events that wasn’t overcome by Anne and ‘Frankie’s’ supposed close relationship.