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Struggling with Dorothy Dunnett!

100 replies

667TheNeighbourOfTheBeast · 17/03/2024 20:16

So I have re read Hilary Mantel’s Cromwell trilogy numerous times and I happened to see Dorothy Dunnett recommend if you like Mantel’s historical fiction. I had also finished all of Sharon K. Penmans books.
I have just started Game of Kings and I’m really finding it hard going ! I very rarely fail to finish a book, I read a lot of historical fiction and non fiction books and have read War and Peace three times(!) so I’m not always looking for a light read. I’m just finding the combination of Latin quotes, olde English and references to Greek mythology a bit too much to keep up with, Scottish slang I am fine with have a Scottish husband and spent a lot of time there. Is it worth persevering? I know people rave about her, I couldn’t even find any translations of the old English that prefixes each chapter.

OP posts:
LovelaceBiggWither · 01/04/2024 10:57

I am hoping people read the whole series and we can keep the discussion going.

I'm working my way down my ridiculous TBR pile and then will reread Niccolo from start to finish. I have never done this--I read it as it was published. I didn't like it the way I adore Lymond.

TeaAndStrumpets · 01/04/2024 11:56

No I couldn't get on with Niccolo and never finished the series. The Lymond books were extremely gripping.

mimbleandlittlemy · 01/04/2024 20:00

I don’t like the Nicole books as much, though I read the first two before reading Lymond then read each as it was published. Too long, too many unlikeable people, too ridiculous a motive for the Big Bad.

Abouttimeforanamechange · 02/04/2024 22:07

I steamed through the Lymond books up to Ringed Castle, then had to wait for Checkmate. That is a rollercoaster of a read.

I read the Niccolo books as the were published, but like pp, they didn't grab me like Lymond did, and I didn't read the last one.

I think I discovered Lymond when I was just the right age - late teens/early twenties, old enough to grasp the historical background and follow the complicated plots and understand the various things that went on, but still young enough to love the angst and the romance of it all.

I was older when Niccolo appeared, and while intellectually I appreciated the 15th century setting and the research that had gone into the books, they didn't get to me on an emotional level.

LovelaceBiggWither · 03/04/2024 04:57

Oh Gemini is worth a read when you see how she pulls all the threads together. I got more interested in Niccolo when the links between the sagas become clearer but I never raced through them like Lymond.

TeaAndStrumpets · 03/04/2024 10:23

Abouttimeforanamechange · 02/04/2024 22:07

I steamed through the Lymond books up to Ringed Castle, then had to wait for Checkmate. That is a rollercoaster of a read.

I read the Niccolo books as the were published, but like pp, they didn't grab me like Lymond did, and I didn't read the last one.

I think I discovered Lymond when I was just the right age - late teens/early twenties, old enough to grasp the historical background and follow the complicated plots and understand the various things that went on, but still young enough to love the angst and the romance of it all.

I was older when Niccolo appeared, and while intellectually I appreciated the 15th century setting and the research that had gone into the books, they didn't get to me on an emotional level.

I remember rushing home with my copy of Checkmate when it first came out. Not sure I even took my coat off, just sat down and got stuck in!

I read the Game of Kings aged 15, holed up in my bedroom. By the time Checkmate came out I was married with my own home, a job and no DC to interrupt....

Agree perspective changes with age, but I had hours of enjoyment which I remember fondly.

Even now I prefer a proper book to a Kindle book, so buy my favourite authors in hard copy or (more usually) DH gets me them for birthdays and Christmas. I do the same for him, a fellow book-lover, which is why our house is bursting at the seams!

mimbleandlittlemy · 03/04/2024 18:32

LovelaceBiggWither · 03/04/2024 04:57

Oh Gemini is worth a read when you see how she pulls all the threads together. I got more interested in Niccolo when the links between the sagas become clearer but I never raced through them like Lymond.

I'm not sure she pulled them together that well though - though I do think it's worth reading purely for the fact she rather unexpectedly uses the word cunt!

The trouble with the Niccolo books come, I feel, because she was - she freely admitted - at war with some of her readers by half way through the series. Speculation was absolutely rife in the fan world - Marzipan & Kisses, Whispering Gallery and the online forums - and she was constantly trying to stay ahead of quite a baying pack. She also tied herself to the life & times of Anselme Adorne which made for fascinating journeys and informative stuff about C15th mercantile life across the world, but really far too long a set of books. Who actually cares about stockfish? The salt trade is fascinating, but by the time someone got to dyeing their pubic hair black in Caprice & Rondo I was losing the will to live. I've read Gemini just the once - rather as people say about reading Checkmate - got my copy, inhaled it, thought that the ending was rubbish because I didn't believe in the Big Bad and the (terrible) motive, and that was that. Always back to Lymond, not back to N since then. I did pick up NR last year, planning to reread and couldn't get past the bath and the hennin, whereas Lymond I just sink back into.

I actually disliked the way she joins the books - the epilogue of Gemini is, for me, toe curling. I am part of a group of people who all got together because we read the books and saw each other's names coming up in Whispering Gallery and all lived near enough to each other to start having get-togethers, and we all feel she could have made them a totally stand alone series; there didn't need to be the links and I, personally, would have been happier without. It's nice to go "ooh look" but there's something about the linking and the mysticism in N - the weird bit in the Tyrol for example with the divining - that just doesn't work for me whereas somehow the Dame de Doubtance is so batshit and so baroque in Lymond that it has far more of a place. Perhaps it's to do with the fact that at the start, N is so grounded, the world is so much more human with the dyeing works, trade etc etc that I wasn't expecting it to have a place and I didn't enjoy it when it did.

I've also read King Hereafter, which I find tough going, and all the Johnson Johnson books, which are just horribly dated now, I think.

Summing up my personal feelings - she is at the height of her abilities as an historical novelist with impeccable research in the N series and King Hereafter, but she is at the absolute peak of her romantic historical novelist writing in the last four books of Lymond. "Oh mill, what hast though ground" indeed.

Abouttimeforanamechange · 03/04/2024 19:03

Oh Gemini is worth a read when you see how she pulls all the threads together.

I think I'd have to re-read all the others in the series first, and I don't think I have the stamina! I remember the main characters and settings, but not the details of the plots.

I was on the old Yahoo Marzipan list, and I remember how deeply some of the members went into all the minutiae.

I read some, or all, of the Johnson Johnson books a long time ago. I've never read King Hereafter for the same reason I've never read Wolf Hall - I know what's going to happen!

LovelaceBiggWither · 04/04/2024 00:18

We probably know each other from M&K days!

I like Johnson Johnson, they are silly and when things are grim they are my comfort read. I've actually never finished King Hereafter, not sure whether or not I just don't like it or if I don't want to finish it as there is no more Dunnett.

ETA yes the stockfish were dead boring.

EmpressaurusOfTheScathingTinsel · 16/04/2024 16:36

I’ve just had 2 days in Bruges, which made me think I really ought to reread the Niccolò books.

I thought this thread might enjoy some photos of the Adornes’ chapel, the Jerusalemkirk. (The real life family surname was Adornes, not Adorne). The sculptures on the tomb are Anselm and his wife.

Struggling with Dorothy Dunnett!
Struggling with Dorothy Dunnett!
Struggling with Dorothy Dunnett!
readingmakesmehappy · 16/04/2024 16:40

Viviennemary · 29/03/2024 13:23

I also loved the first few Ouylander novels. But when they went to America they went totally off. And didn't like the daughter very much as a character either.

Like JK Rowling, Gabaldon's editors seem incapable of actually editing her work. I couldn't face the last one even though I'd read all the others, because they got progressively worse. The last 3 I read could all do with 200 pages removed

readingmakesmehappy · 16/04/2024 16:41

I tried the first Lymond book (I think after seeing it recommended on another thread here), but couldn't get into it. I shall have to try again some day.

Papyrophile · 16/04/2024 21:52

I read the Lymond series as they were published, from the age of 14 and arrived on the library shelves. Francis Crawford was my first romantic hero. I really didn't care that most of the literary references passed over my head, but many years later, I was delighted that he realised... [redacted at poster's request to remove spoiler]

Talipesmum · 17/04/2024 11:12

@Papyrophile might be a good idea to ask for your post to be edited - if someone’s got a thread here where they are just embarking on the series, including major later-in-series plot points isn’t a good idea.

Papyrophile · 17/04/2024 12:28

You are quite right @Talipesmum ! I have reported myself.

Papyrophile · 17/04/2024 13:24

I asked for an edit @Talipesmum , but MNHQ pointed out the series was written half a cenrury ago so the outcome is fairly widely known. Apologies to anyone who doesn't avert their eyes to miss the spoiler.

HopeMumsnet · 17/04/2024 14:00

Hi all,
We really don't want this to become A Thing but what about we just tweak Papyrophile's post down to 'when he realised'? Honestly, though, we can't really be protecting spoilers through the decades, and this board is for people do discuss books.

Abouttimeforanamechange · 17/04/2024 14:25

Honestly, though, we can't really be protecting spoilers through the decades, and this board is for people do discuss books.

In general terms, I would agree. But this particular thread was started by someone who is reading the books for the first time, and revealing this particular plot point would have a major impact on her reading of the whole series.

I'd have a different opinion if it was a general thread about Dorothy Dunnett's books: first time readers could choose to avoid it.

Treaclewell · 17/04/2024 15:07

Having just binge re-read the Lymonds, and Francis still wandering about my head, I'm enjoying this thread. I have found resonances with recent history, and other works. For instance, they showed 'Ill met by Moonlight" the other week, and Patrick Leigh Fermor had definite touches of Francis-ery.
And Dunnett's description of the war-torn Low Countries - that poor area where my great uncles died with the shattered trees..
And would you believe, Ben Hur? Wrongly accused and condemned to the galleys, and good at everything. I understood more about the galleys from my reading - loosening the chains of the slaves for example. If I hadn't read Dunnett I wouldn't have looked for that. (I think Francis might have spent more time on the slaves than the Roman officer.)

Talipesmum · 17/04/2024 16:50

HopeMumsnet · 17/04/2024 14:00

Hi all,
We really don't want this to become A Thing but what about we just tweak Papyrophile's post down to 'when he realised'? Honestly, though, we can't really be protecting spoilers through the decades, and this board is for people do discuss books.

Thank you, perfect redaction!

667TheNeighbourOfTheBeast · 19/04/2024 22:37

I’m the OP just thought I would update you all, I am now about a quarter of the way through Queens Play. I’m finding this a lot easier to read than the first book. However just finished a rather long description of a hunt that involves hares and wolfhounds, really found this very hard to read as it was at times quite graphic and I found it quite upsetting. I get it’s fiction !
Thank you for editing the spoilers btw. Thought I’d post a pic of my 1980s paperback version too and I think Lymond is looking a little bit Lord Flashart without the moustache lol or maybe 80s New Romantic ? 😊

Struggling with Dorothy Dunnett!
OP posts:
Copperas · 20/04/2024 05:26

Loved the covers - thank you!

667TheNeighbourOfTheBeast · 20/04/2024 09:43

@LovelaceBiggWither thank you for posting those! I realised who Lymond looks like on my paperback version, a very young Rupert Everett plus peroxide(eyebrows don’t match lol I had the same problem when I went blonde in my teens)
I meant to also mention that I’m really enjoying the Irishmen at the French court, very entertaining.

OP posts:
LovelaceBiggWither · 20/04/2024 09:56

Lymond certainly cuts a swathe through the court!