The Virgin Blue

Tracy Chevalier does it again. I was hooked after reading Girl with a Pearl Earring. This tale is haunting and fascinating. I makes you want to learn about your own ancestors. I was also a French minor in college and the French scattered throughout the book was refreshing and gave me a chance to practice. I couldn't put this down once I started. Read it one sitting. Fantastic book.

I love Tracy Chevalier's writing, it is so simple and pared down and elegant. This is a fascinating story that completely drew me in until I couldn't put the book down. The 2 stories flow seamlessly and the suspense builds until the sense of foreboding is almost too much to bear. Each character is well drawn and elicits sympathy. The gossip and narrowmindedness of a small French village is also very well portrayed. A haunting story with great emotional power. I found the story stayed with me days after I had finished it.

First of all, if you struggle with the French language, then listen to this book on tape! The beauty of the language inhances the book ten fold! I found my mind being compeled to think of the book often, making it extremely difficult to ignor. Finishing it couldn't happen soon enough, and I mean that in a positive way! After finishing the book, I still found myself thinking on the manner in which it was written, the characters, the intertwining aspects, the love, the sorrow, the struggle. I was constantly drawn to the characters of two life times and loved every minuete of it. Chevalier did an excelent job of captivating the imagination by hypnotically mesmerizing the reading ... urging the reader to proceed. If the reader is not familiar with the history of women and the history of the Reformation, then they may be likely to feel confused at certian areas within the book, but trust me when I say, that Chevalier hit it right on the mark! The historical aspects of the book were very accurate as well as believable! The present day aspect was totally understandable. I gave this book a 5 star rating for it's beauty, it's history, the way it captivated my soul, and for the way it did not disappoint me.

This is the Spanish text edition of a beautifully written debut novel. Exquisite in its imagery and clarity of language, the author tells two parallel tales. One takes place in sixteenth century France, during the Protestant reformation and religious persecution of the Huguenots (Protestants). The other takes place in present day France. There are historical ties that bind these two stories, as well as a haunting familial legacy that reaches out across time to makes itself felt in the present. The sixteenth century tale is based around a young woman, Isabelle du Moulin, who marries a boorish lout named Etienne Tournier, the oldest son of one of the more prominent families in their provincial town in France. She is a young woman upon whom the Virgin Mary made a great impression, when she was but a girl. The Tourniers, however, are believers of the new, harsh, Calvinist faith, and so Isabelle must also fully subscribe to it, if she is to survive in her husbands family and in the town in which she lives. When the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre occurs, in which Huguenots are slain without mercy throughout all of France, Isabelle is forced to flee to safety with what remains of her husband's family. Unhappy in her marriage, she goes on to have an event occur in her life that is so tragic that her pain and sorrow is made palpable in the present, touching one of her ancestors, Ella Turner. Of course, the parallel tale focuses around Ella Turner, a young, married American woman, who moves to France with her husband Rick, in order to advance his career. Ella agrees to the move, because it will take her to the region in France from which she knows her family originated. Once in France, Emma has some difficulty acclimating to life in the small provincial town to which they have moved, as well as to its denizens. Ella also finds herself having inexplicable nightmares and begins to feel herself somewhat alienated from her husband. To occupy her time, she begins a quest to discover more about her French ancestry. As Ella's story unfolds, alternating with the parallel story of Isabelle, commonalities between the past and present begin to emerge. These parallel stories then converge in a stunning denouement to resolve a tragedy of the past in the present. The author combines historical fiction, suspense, romance, and touch of the supernatural all in one beautifully realized novel. The author writes with the heart of a poet and the soul of a great storyteller, one whose prose is delicately nuanced as she weaves gossamer threads of a tale well told. This is simply a superlative and stunning debut novel that will keep the reader turning its pages until the very last. Bravo!

In Tracy Chevalier's first novel (previously unpublished in the US), she has created a beautiful mystery that seems an intersection of the historical, the romantic, the mysterious, and the artistic. Ella and Isabel are are wonderfully complex characters. It is the similarities and dissimilarities in their charactrization (and in their stories...) that drive the novel to it's mysterious and wonderful conclusion. This is a book that you will want to read again just to see what you missed the first time. The only shortfall in the book is my own lack of skill with the French language. Chevalier often translates through her characters, but there are points in the novel that need clarification.

`The Virgin Blue' was written some years before `Girl with a pearl earring', but was kind of unnotice so far. Not only after the huge success of `Girl' did `Virgin' received its deserved attention. The book tells the story of two women that live centuries apart but with something that ties them together throughout the years. Ella Tourner moves to France with her husband. Alone and with not so many things to do, she decides to investigates her family's origins. Eventually she'll come across Isabelle du Moulin --aka La Rousse. What binds these two woment together?Since the first chapter we are aware that both lives will change drastically, otherwise there wouldn't be a reason for a novel. Ella will face problems in being accepted by French people; while Isabelle will not be accepted the people form her own village. Both women try to find rendenption in love-- but it may not be the right place.Chevalier writes with confidence and brings us believable characters with heart and soul. The structure that she uses can be tricky for some writers, but in her hands it is useful --and she does have a point when she alternates the two stories. `The Virgin Blue' is simple, but at the same time complex. I highly recommend for those who liked `Girl...'.