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A novel of art and illusion, doomed love and a tulip bulb...

Amsterdam in the 1630s: considered by some to be the wealthiest city in the world. For do they not possess the riches of art, literature, music and the refinement of society in addition to commercial wealth?

The painters of the time are busy: the city's inhabitants intend to guarantee their immortality with gold. Sitting for such a portrait is Sophia Sandvoort, beside her elderly husband Cornelis. They are surrounded by objects showing her husband's piety, yet he has not been able to resist including a tulip, its petals full and on the point of dropping. For Cornelis, like many of his fellow Dutchmen, has made money from the speculation on this exotic flower and its bulbs.

As the painter, Jan van Loos, starts to capture Sophia's likeness on his canvas so a slow passion begins to burn. And as the execution of the painting unfolds, so a slow dance is begun between the household's inhabitants. Ambitions, desires and dreams breed a grand deception, and as the lies multiply, events move towards a thrilling and tragic climax.

Amazon.com review:

"Deborah Moggach's Tulip Fever takes place in 17th-century Amsterdam, where roguish Rembrandt wannabes like Jan van Loos are just waiting to fall into ticklish situations. In this case, a paunchy merchant named Cornelis Sandvoort wanders into the artist's studio, hoping to impress posterity with a portrait of himself and his young wife. Apart from the fat commission, which van Loos can use, there is the bride to consider. Beautiful and bored, Sophia is easily swayed by his youthful passion--but this time, the raffish van Loos actually falls in love with one of his sexual conquests. The two carry out their affair with increasing doses of rashness and deception, meanwhile becoming dependent on the complicity of a servant, the astonishing gullibility of the old man, and the fast cash to be made on the tulip-bulb exchange.
The plot of Moggach's 13th novel neatly matches the speculative frenzy of the period, careening from one improbable thrill to the next. It was, to be sure, a time of stunning economic lunacy, when a single Semper Augustus bulb could be sold for "six fine horses, three oxheads of wine, a dozen sheep, two dozen silver goblets and a seascape by Esaias van de Velde." The author expertly dabs in this sort of period detail, and her chapter epigraphs quote some charming 17th-century Dutch sources on morals and conventional wisdom. Indeed, it's these quasi-surreal touches--whales washing up on the coast, chimney pots toppling into the street, women rubbing goose fat into their hands--that make the lovers' overheated sentiments so plausible. "For centuries to come," the narrator says, "people will gaze at these paintings and wonder what is about to happen." Tulip Fever gives us the chance to do exactly that. --John Ponyicsanyi

I had this on my shelf waiting to be read; it is now on its way to oppem, winner of the international sweepstakes RABCK. I will get around to reading it one day.

Enjoy.

bookowl1000 - thank you so very much for sending me a book that was on my wishlist but that you had not yet read.... I really appreciate the kindness.

For me this was a disappointing read - I had thought it was going to be more historical and less of a very predictable love story....

You have been tagged - enjoy 'the read'......

This arrived safely in the post today--thank you, Oppem! I look forward to reading this! There's a few on my list ahead of it, but I will get there--it's something I've been wanting to read. Hope you are well and enjoyed your Hawaiian holiday!

Yesterday I had a free morning and the work I had to do in the afternoon involved a lot of waiting in-between times, and this book caught my eye in the morning; I read it all in one day, between the other things I had to do. I've never read anything by this author, but I saw from the inner page that she has written twelve novels, wow. She is a really beautiful writer, I liked her descriptions and way with words and how she brought art--both literally and as metaphor, into the work. It was also very quick and easy to read, and I liked the way the chapters were divided into people and things. It was very easy to read. In the end, it all felt like it ended right, though some parts were predictable there was also bits that pleasantly surprised me, and I like that in a book. The characters were all interesting and believable, except, for some reason, Sophia, who is like the main character, or one of them, so that was a little odd. I just never really felt I was in her head, something the author achieved well with the other characters, so she ended up a little two-dimensional, with me kind of wondering what prompted her decisions. But overall an enjoyable, good quick read.

Today I had to bring my cat to the vet as her eye was inflamed. I brought this, along with some magazines, to leave on the reading table there. I hope that someone who needs something to read finds it and enjoys it.

This has been released as part of Hyphen8's "D for December 2012" release challenge. It's my first release for it, and I hope for many more this month.

Thankfully, eyed drops for five days should be all my kitty needs. Sadly, though, I saw a dog through the open door who was very, very ill. They suspect that he had eaten some poison. I am thinking of the dog as I write this, and hope, miraculously, that he recovers.