The Painter of Souls by Philip Kazan

This is the first of a series of books that will be issued, each imagining a phase in the life of the early Italian Renaissance painter Fra Filippo Lippi.  We know only about some of his artworks and some basic points about his life.  The author imagines the rest, and presents this biography of the artist's early years in great detail, often from the artist's perspective.

In this book you might be deceived by the simple style into thinking this book is written for teens.  When you encounter the first vulgarities in English and in Italian, you'll realize the book is written for adults.  There is even a sex scene.

Lippi self-portrait
 

Historical novels tend to be told in the present tense these days, to bring the past to life in the reader's mind, and this novel is no exception.  Please don't complain about this in the reviews.  I'm very tired of reading people's complaints because they don't want to read more than a few pages written in present tense.

If you read ten pages plus, you won't even realize it is in present tense any more, and you'll just enjoy the intimate closeness the tense creates with the events and the main character.  Give it a try.  You might actually enjoy it, like so many others, especially younger readers who devour whole popular series in the present tense.

Just because it is unfamiliar to you doesn't make it wrong, or deserving of terrible reviews or terrible ratings.  Okay, enough said...

Fra Lippi was not a very good friar, but this first book only covers his life up to his parting with early Renaissance artist Masaccio, his mentor and surrogate father figure.  All the really scandalous things occur later.

The book's Prologue is deceptive, suggesting that the artist's whole life will be covered in the book.  That is not the case.  Future volumes will cover the later periods. 

Each volume will presumable present the artists and local bigwigs from that era, along with some major artworks, just like this first book does.  How those artworks came to be created is covered in quite a bit of detail.

From the book's description:

An extraordinary story of passion, art, and intrigue, this novel journeys to a time and place in Italy where desire reigns supreme—and salvation is found in the strangest of places.

Beauty can be a gift—or a wicked temptation. So it is for Filippo Lippi, growing up in Renaissance Florence. He has a talent—not only can he see the beauty in everything, he can capture it, paint it. But while beauty can seduce you and art can transport you—it cannot always feed you or protect you.

To survive, Pippo Lippi, orphan, street urchin, budding rogue, must first become Fra Filippo Lippi: Carmelite friar, man of God. His life will take him down two paths at once.

He will become a gambler, a forger, a seducer of nuns; and at the same time he will be the greatest painter of his time, the teacher of Botticelli and the confidante of the Medicis. So who is he really—lover, believer, father, teacher, artist? Is anything true except the paintings?

Here is a direct link to the book at Amazon.com:

Please visit the author's website/blog.

For those who would like to know more about Lippi:

Fra Filippo Lippi at Wikipedia.

Fra Filippo Lippi in Vasari's Lives of Artists (free e-book,and free to read on-line).

Fra Filippo Lippi actually has his own website.

Moonlight in Tuscany by Kate Fitzroy

Moonlight in Tuscany is a Goldilocks story of a woman who, after three tries, finds the love of her life.  Along the way, she also develops to her emotional, professional and sexual peak.  There are many titillating sex scenes, but the author includes nothing vulgar or explicit.

This is a novel that would appeal most to so-called new adult women, giving them a vicarious experience with three lovers and some idea of what to expect when looking for a mate who will fit well with a modern professional woman's lifestyle.

I'm not a new adult, so my review may be a bit skewed for many potential readers.  As a mature woman, I found that the relationships Lily had during the course of the story brought back too many bittersweet, and sometimes outright painful, memories from my own relationships.  That limited my enjoyment of the book.

Dr. Lily Fairfax, a Cambridge University scholar of medieval Italian history (which brings her to Italy in the course of the book), is the protagonist.  She's a Titian beauty with golden-red hair, and intellectual who hides from her emotions by intellectualizing her experiences.  She finds it a struggle to:

...enter real life, not escape into fiction or history...

The third person limited narration puts us deep into Lily's thoughts.  Sometimes I found that a bit stifling, because I didn't always like Lily's thoughts.  She's quietly confident to outsiders, but inside her head that can seem like arrogance and selfishness.  That style of narration is one that many readers have come to expect these days, especially the target reader of female new adults.

Lily can be a struggle to like at times.  She is almost too perfect, with her only seeming flaws being jealousy and intellectual arrogance.  She is gorgeous, successful, smart, confident, with a loving parent, and she's sexy.

The last trait is one that develops during the course of the book as she becomes more comfortable with her sexual nature.  I suppose if a reader is going to fantasize along with the protagonist, she would like to imagine herself so perfect too, so the protagonist fits well with the book's overall concept of new adult fantasy.

The readers follows Lily as she:

entered a new lightweight world of fun

Lily's lightweight world of fun turns serious when she starts breaking hearts.  That is when a mature female character is brought into the story to dish out this advice:

You're a beautiful woman, bellissima, you are certain to break many hearts before you find the right one.

The woman offers Lily a shoulder to cry on, and someone to confide in, especially when she is suffering the painful feeling of loss that comes with the end of a relationship.  The woman also offers the unrealistic idea that:

Somewhere out there would be a man that would be everything she desired.

That lack of realism that recurs throughout the book gives it a strong fantasy feeling.  Even the author admits it through her characters who reflect that their love story is like a sweet film romance that is too good to be true.  Yes, the final lover is too good to be true, but that is part of the fantasy fun for the reader.

On a serious note, I missed a mention of safe birth control, since the lifestyle the book describes for modern woman is not possible with out it, and because in a book for new adults it is responsible to mention it.

Lily is quite open to flings, and that sort of lifestyle brings with it dangers not just of unintended pregnancy, but of disease and violence from putting oneself in an intimate situation with a stranger.  None of those things are even hinted at in the book, despite Lily feeling:

It's as though I am in the real world at last.

All of that makes me consider the book more of a fantasy story, than a character study or a novel about a woman developing her knowledge of herself.  The Goldilocks three lovers adds to the fantasy feeling, too.

In the back of my mature female mind, however, I had my doubts about Lily's final, perfect partner, but I'll keep them to myself, to leave the younger reader a chance to discover those things on her own.  Not everything a new adult needs to know can be found in a novel! 

 

From the book's description:

Clever Doctor Lily Fairfax is the youngest don at Cambridge... beautiful, too.  But does she understand the meaning of love?  Leaving her sheltered academic life for a long summer in Tuscany, she finds passion... but is this love or lust?  Can it endure?  Can she give up everything she has worked for and achieved for a new and different life?  Intelligent enough to analyse her own psyche, she still struggles to find the reality that her inner soul is searching for... the complete happiness that only true love can give?

Here is a direct link to the book at Amazon.com:

The author has another new adult romance set in Tuscany, which I've reviewed on this site:  Dreams of Tuscany.  And she has several romances set in Provence, France.  Please visit her Amazon.com author's page.

 

Voices in the Dark by Lindsay Townsend

This romantic suspense novel draws on Italy's World War II past to explain some mysteries in the present.  The two main protagonists, the man and woman who come to find they are a perfect match, are opera singers:  a bass, and a mezzo-soprano.

There are other interesting characters, all in Italy, where the woman goes to compete in a voice competition that she hopes will launch her career.  Florence and Milan play major parts in the story, one being where the woman's ancestors live, and the latter being where the man lives near his family.

The book is written in British-English and the female protagonist is Anglo-Italian.  There are some scanning errors that are sure to be weeded out soon, as the e-book was created from the print edition that was first released in 1995.  The narrative voice is 3rd person limited, putting us in the head of only one character per section.

The story moves back and forth between 1944 and 1995 with ease and skill.  And the author expertly weaves together the various strands of the story, and all her characters, to unravel a mystery from the past, that helps bring two lonely people together in the present. There is one heated sex scene, but nothing explicit.

This is a romantic suspense novel, so expect an investigation of a mystery, danger and romance.  There are bad guys and good guys, and it is not really clear until the end which are which.  The Italian characters and Italian setting should appeal to Italophiles, and both ring true.  

From the book's description:

There has always been a mystery in Julia Rochfort's family.  Who killed her grandfather Guy, a member of the Italian resistance movement in World War Two?  When Julia travels to Florence to compete in a singing competition, she meets Roberto Padovano, already an established opera star, and they discover that they have a lot more in common than simple attraction.

Here is a direct link to the book at Amazon.com:

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, the author of the crime-romance novel THE HAGUE, a traditional murder mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

The Shepherdess of Siena by Linda Lafferty

The Shepherdess of Siena:  A Novel of Renaissance Tuscany is actually a saga of Renaissance Tuscany.  This epic saga of nearly 600 pages recounts the popular and scandalizing stories linked to the de' Medici royal family, the Grand Dukes of Tuscany at the beginning of their royal-ness, and how they affect their subjects, with much about one particular subject, a young shepherdess from Siena, in Tuscany. 

 

The de' Medici banking family was raised to royal status over the Tuscany Dutchy under military powerhouse Cosimo de' Medici in the 1500s.  Fictionalized versions of his children are the focus of this book, along with their interactions with artists and subjects under their reign, most importantly with Virginia, a shepherdess with many hidden talents.  Virginia is based on an historical figure, too.  Her story in this book is half fact and half fiction, as the author admits in the Author's Notes.

The de' Medici have long been favorites of historical gossips, many of whom have put the salacious inventions linked to the family down in print, giving them an authority they do not always have in historical fact.  The author makes use of these juicy stories for her novel.  And much historical research has also gone into the development of the story, which will surely please fans of historical epic novels.

There are 102 chapters divided among seven parts in The Shepherdess of Siena:

1. A de' Medici Princess and the Little Shepherdess - 1569-1574
2. The Death of Cosimo de' Medici - 1574-1576
3. Murder in Tuscany - 1576-1578
4. The Heroine of Siena - 1579-1581
5. Ferrara - 1581-1582
6. The Art of Death 1582-1586
7. The Reign of Granduca Ferdinando - 1586-1591

This sweeping saga covers romance, politics, gossip, power, patronage, crime, religion, sports, patriotism, royals, adventure, pathos...  The voice is sometimes first-person, and at other times third-person.  The text is sprinkled with Italian words.   The English is excellent and the editing expert.   

This is one for historical novel fans, those who love to be immersed in another time and place.  Italophiles with a love of Italian history should enjoy the time they can spend in Renaissance Tuscany, hobnobbing with the exciting de' Medici family.

From the book's description:

Raised by her aunt and uncle amidst the rolling hills of the Tuscan countryside, young orphan Virginia Tacci has always harbored a deep love for horses—though she knows she may never have the chance to ride. As a shepherdess in sixteenth-century Italy, Virginia’s possibilities are doubly limited by her peasant class and her gender.

Yet while she tends her flock, Virginia is captivated by the daring equestrian feats of the high-spirited Isabella de’ Medici, who rides with the strength and courage of any man, much to the horror of her brother, the tyrannical Gran Duca Francesco de’ Medici.

Inspired, the young shepherdess keeps one dream close to her heart:  to race in Siena’s Palio. Twenty-six years after Florence captured Siena, Virginia’s defiance will rally the broken spirit of the Senese people and threaten the pernicious reign of the Gran Duca.

Bringing alive the rich history of one of Tuscany’s most famed cities, this lush, captivating saga draws an illuminating portrait of one girl with an unbreakable spirit.

Here is a direct link to the book at Amazon.com:

If you enjoy her historical epic style, you are in luck:  she has more novels out, each set in a different era.  Here is a link to a lovely article in The Aspen Times newspaper about their local author.

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

What Happens in Tuscany by T.A. Williams

Looking for a book to gift to a young woman going out into the world on her own for the first time?  What Happens in Tuscany is a New Adult novel that attempts to teach young women useful life lessons in the guise of a contemporary romance novel. 

Katie has to teach Victoria about modern life.  That is the premise that allows the author to include all sorts of lessons for young women today.  Katie herself is an example of how to behave, as she tries to recover from a bad romantic breakup, and to set her sights on her future.

The story is set in England (the first third) and in Tuscany, Italy.  The major characters are English, which may have contributed to the one problem I noticed with the life lessons.  The lessons did not warn against excessive alcohol consumption, a major social problem in Britain for the young people, possibly because it is accepted as socially normal.  Be aware that social and cultural references are English, which might confuse some U.S. readers.

So, what life lessons might your young woman receive from this book?  Here goes:

• Managing personal finances
• Personal and social responsibilities
• Moral decisions
• Sexual mores
• Social situations including flirting, dating, physical love, relationships
• Dealing with pain, anger, jealousy, envy, and life's setbacks
• Maintaining a healthy weight
• Educational choices and job prospects
• Acceptance of our parents as flawed
• Dealing with loss, and the death of parents
• Compassion and kindness and tolerance of differences

There is a very thin plot to encompass all those lessons.  To be honest, the plot would not likely be enough to entertain a grown woman; it would be too dull.  But a young woman might find the book engrossing, especially since a new hunky guy enters the picture every few chapters. 

While sometimes promoted as a romantic-comedy, I think that is misleading, and there is very slight humor in the book.  It reads more like a British soap, with the happenings of the young women progressing like episodes.   

Victoria is super-wealthy, so we are treated to the fantasy of what it might be like to have so much money, and to the truth that expensive Italy is so much nicer if you are rich.

It was a magnificent Florentine Villa...huge...ancient grove of trees...balustraded terrace...

You get the idea.  There is also lots of shopping with unlimited debit cards. 

I'm not sure young adults or new adults would buy the book for themselves, but it might make a wonderful gift for a loved one.  If you are worried about the book pushing morality you don't approve of onto your impressionable young reader, you should know that the author goes out of the way to stress that everyone has to choose their own moral road in life. 

With that said, it is true that Katie and Victoria are modern women with money, freedom, and that they are seemingly magnets for hunky men.  The young women have access to reliable birth control but that is something that is skirted around and hinted at, and left to the reader to decide what is right for herself. 

I can't help but think the book is lacking in lessons concerning sexually transmitted diseases, since that is the most valuable lesson a new adult should have, but perhaps the publisher thought that was one lesson too far for this new adult novel disguised as a contemporary romance.

From the book's description:

From rainy England…

Katie never imagined her life was perfect. But when she finds herself on a rainy street, soaked to the bone and with only a cheating boyfriend and a dead-end job keeping her in town, she knows something has to change.  Which is what leads her to Iddlescombe Manor, to be companion to Lady Victoria Chalker-Pyne – the only 25 year old Katie’s ever met who hasn’t heard of Twitter, thinks camisoles are de rigueur, and desperately needs an education in the 21st century!

…to the Tuscan sun!

But it wouldn’t be an education without a summer holiday – and where better than Tuscany? Decamping to Victoria’s family villa, it’s soon clear that the valley really does have it all: sun, sea…and some seriously gorgeous neighbours. The only question is: when the weather’s this hot, the wine is this smooth and the local men are this irresistible…will Katie ever want to make the journey home?

Don’t miss deliciously funny romance What Happens in Tuscany… the perfect escape for fans of Fern Britton and Veronica Henry.

Here is a direct link to the book at Amazon.com:

When Alice Met Danny is a fun book by the same author.

  

Here's the book's description:

What's in a name?

Devastated after losing her job, eternal pragmatist Alice leaves London for a new start in Devon. It’s there that she meets Danny.

Then she meets another Danny.

And then she meets Daniel – Danny to his friends…

In fact, there seems to be a Danny at every turn! Her neighbour’s a Danny; there’s little baby Danny; there’s a vicar, a windsurfer, even a dog called Danny! And whether it’s laughter, comfort, a flutter of romance or a walk along the beach, they each bring something special to Alice’s new life.

You might say it’s a coincidence. Alice certainly would… at first! But when she suddenly risks losing not just one Danny, but all of them, she begins to wonder: might there be more in a name than she ever guessed?

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

Death and the Olive Grove (Inspector Bordelli Mystery) by Marco Vichi

Florence, Italy, in April of 1964 is the backdrop for this historical mystery, which is book two in the Inspector Bordelli Mystery Series.  The first case is mentioned in the book, so it is advisable to read the books in the series in order.  I review the first book in the series here on this site.

Police Inspector Bordelli is still cynical, a smoker (ex-smokers should stay clear of the Bordelli books!), an experienced policeman, victim to intrusive wartime flashbacks, sympathetic to the those on the low end of society, unpredictable, a binge drinker and eater, intuitive, and immature in his relations with women due to abuse in his childhood.  Although in this book Bordelli does spend the night with a woman, a dominatrix, of course, since that is what his past has doomed him to seek out.

Book 1 in the Series, reviewed on this site

Italian post WWII politics continues to leave Bordelli cold:

...the first twenty years of the republic had done more harm to Italy than the Fascists and Nazis combined.

Bordelli laments the materialistic and greedy newly-rich industrialists, the poverty-stricken underclass, the abandoned elderly, and the abandoned countryside.

The translation is missing some punctuation marks, some carriage returns, some subjunctive verbs, just like the first book in the series, which is a translation from Italian.  And it uses the British single quote in place of the double quote, which can be confusing now and then.  There are footnotes explaining some of the references to Italian culture and history, just as in the first book.

Book 3 in the series

There is more of a plotline in Death and the Olive Grove, with two main cases for Bordelli, and lots of bodies, some are very disturbingly children's bodies, but the series is more psychological novels than police procedurals.  We learn more about Bordelli's past:  his wartime experiences, his police work, and how he met certain people in his life.  The reader gets to revisit all the secondary characters from the first novel, one by one, and learn a bit more about them.

1960s Florence, Italy, was very different from today's tourist-swamped town, and the author enjoys pointing that out.  Here are 19 seconds of footage showing the main square with Fiat Cinquecentos and other mini-cars parked and driving about.  Fiat 500s are still to be seen, as a rarity, but cars are not allowed to drive in the main square any more!

 

The themes of the book feel much more important to the author than the police cases:  war reverberates through a society, damaging psyches, bodies and family ties.  You could describe Death and the Olive Grove as a study in the various forms of grief.  If you enjoy your police procedurals with high suspense, you may not enjoy the Inspector Bordelli books.  But if you enjoy getting into the head of a very messed up man who lived through some very interesting times in Italian history, you may enjoy the Bordelli books, like I do.

Book 4 in the series

From the description of Death in an Olive Grove:

The sequel to the critically acclaimed Death in August, which finds Inspector Bordelli facing a nightmarish murder mystery

It is April of 1964, and the cruelest month is breeding bad weather and worse news.  And plenty of disturbing news is coming to Florence detective Inspector Bordelli. Bordelli’s friend, Casimiro, insists he’s discovered the body of a man in a field above Fiesole.  Bordelli races to the scene, but doesn’t find any sign of a corpse.

Only a couple of days later, a little girl is found at Villa Ventaglio.  She has been strangled, and there is a horrible bite mark on her belly.  Then another young girl is found murdered, with the same macabre signature.  And meanwhile, Casimiro has disappeared without a trace.

This new investigation marks the start of one of the darkest periods of Bordelli’s life:  a nightmare without end, as black as the sky above Florence.

These are the books in the Inspector Bordelli Mystery Series so far:

• Death in August (set in summer 1963)
• Death and the Olive Grove (set in April 1964)
• Death in Sardinia (set in December 1965)
• Death in the Tuscan Hills (set in 1967)

Here are direct links at Amazon.com to Marco Vichi's Death and the Olive Grove:

Please visit the author's website. 

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

Lost in the City of Flowers (History of Idan Series) by Maria C. Trujillo

Lost in the City of Flowers is one of those modern young-adult novels in which the only thing young-adult in it is the protagonist.  The writing is complex, and the themes and events are quite grown-up.  The teenaged female protagonist is transported back 544 years to Renaissance Florence, Italy, when young girls were sexual toys for men.

The writing in Lost in the City of Flowers is lyrical and prosaic, but not really convincing as a first person narration by the fourteen-year-old Violet.  The reader just needs to suspend their disbelief and go with it:

With the help of curiosity, clumsiness, and a tunnel, I had lost myself in Italy and in time.

Violet encounters historical personages:  

• Leonardo da Vinci
• Giuliano de' (annoyingly minus the necessary de') Medici
• Lorenzo de' Medici
• Botticelli
• Verrocchio
• Salai (out of his real time)
• Perugino
• Lippi

There is much in the book for fans of historical fiction.  The era's philosophy, geography, politics, customs, fashions, food come to life.  For fans of art history there are references to well-known stories relating to famous Italian Renaissance artists. 

The book is divided into three parts, each part charting a major event for Violet.  As the danger for Violet grows, she gives into temptations of ego and comes face to face with powerful people in the past.  Powerful people wish to control and dominate, and Violet's exciting adventures come because of them.

There are some punctuation and editing errors, but not many.  The map is too small, and does not accurately depict Medieval Florence.  The Prologue, while attention-grabbing, is not about the protagonist, and feels, with hindsight, a writer's trick. 

The first person narration by Violet, is written with some hindsight, when she returns to New York City, after her adventure is over.  This ruins the major suspenseful element in the story:  will Violet be able to return to her time?  We know that she does, from the start, because of the narrative form, so an omniscient narrator or third-person limited might have been a better choice.

Violet encounters romance and adventure in the past.  She also makes friends and experiences great sadness and some trauma.  The ending comes too quickly, so we cannot explore how her experiences have changed her, or how they have helped her grow up.  For a coming-of-age novel, that is strange.  The stage is set at the end for more time-traveling adventures in what the author calls the History of Idan Series, so perhaps we will see Violet's growth in the next book?  I hope so.

From the book's description:

Viola has always felt like she doesn’t belong.  With her mother halfway around the world, her sister away at school, and her father as her only friend, she keeps to herself and only dreams of becoming an artist.  The last thing a lonely fourteen-year-old girl wants for her birthday is to spend time with an old woman she doesn’t even know.  And she certainly doesn’t want to travel 544 years back in time to a place she’s only read about in books.

Armed with Idan, a mysterious pocket watch, she must navigate the perilous city to find a way home before she falls victim to the threats of Lorenzo the Magnificent.  For a girl that has a hard time meeting people, Viola manages to befriend the famous artist Leonardo da Vinci and gain the affections of the handsome Giuliano de' Medici.

To get back home Viola must find her voice and tap into her artistic abilities while she works in an artist’s workshop and encounters the enchanting work of some of the Renaissance’s most amazing artists.

This PBS documentary about the birth of the Italian Renaissance under the Medici family is a bit violet at times, but is an interesting recreation of the era in Lost in the City of Flowers.

Here are direct links to the book at Amazon.com:

Please visit the author's website which includes her blog.

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.

Stargazers by Allan Chapman

The subtitle of Stargazers is Galileo, Copernicus, the Telescope and the Church, but that is a bit deceptive, since the book is really a history of astronomy itself.  The author spends the most time, however, discussing the "Astronomical Renaissance" from the year 1500 to 1700.  I requested a review-copy because of the large section of the book us devoted to Galileo Galilei, the famous Italian astronomer. 

The section on Galileo begins about 29% into the book and goes to about 43% of the book.  The whole book covers:

• Aristotle's universe
• Copernicus's revolution
• Tycho Brahe's earth-sun-centric universe
• Kepler's laws of motion
• Galileo Galilei's telescope and visual proof
• The Jesuits missionaries' telescope based astronomy around the world
• Protestants and science
• Francis Bacon and natural philosophy
• The Royal Society and the International Fellowship of Science
• The heavenly clockwork and the power of the scientific method

There are Notes, Further Reading suggestions, a full Index and illustrations throughout the text.

The spread of the study of astronomy was thanks to the Jesuit schools set up to educate young men in thinking critically, and knowing how to argue and defend a proposition.  They were educated in the seven liberal arts, one of which was astronomy. 

But those teachers would have had nothing to teach without the ancient texts that were preserved by religious monastic societies throughout the middle ages:  the ancient scientists provided many instruments, astronomical tables, calculations and observations.

Galileo's drawings of the phases of the moon

And the ancient texts would not have been available to the teachers and students without the printing press, which from 1500 onward provided affordable texts throughout Europe of books that previously were the domain of mainly churches and princes.

It is the printing of the new ideas of the learned that made the astronomical renaissance possible.  Ideas built upon ideas, observations stimulated more theories, which pushed thinkers to desire proof, which lead to more instruments...

Galileo comes alive through the details provided by the author about Galileo's life, upbringing, his world and his public record of arrogance and cruelty.  The Italian was:

...unmystical, hard-headed, argumentative, and possessed of a powerful personality that did not take easily to being contradicted.

There has been much myth-building surrounding Galileo, many stories that may not be true, lots of anecdotes to show the man's greatness, but few reveal his nastiness. 

Frontispiece of Opere Di Galileo Galilei, Published in Bologna in 1656

Traveling around Venice, Padua and other important Italian city-states, the centers of learning during the Renaissance, the author looks at the advancement of astronomical mathematics, engineering, and astronomical tools that Galileo had a hand in.

Galileo was a mathematician and theoretician who used his applied mathematics and engineering skills to create a refracting telescope with special lenses that allowed him to observe the objects in the sky better than anyone before him, and he wrote about his observations of Jupiter, the moon, Saturn's rings, Venus's transit of the sun, and the milky way's stars.

One of the myth-making stories of Galileo experimenting with gravity from the top of the leaning Bell Tower of Pisa

You have to be something of an astronomy fanatic, or a beginning student of astronomy, to read this book.  It is rich with detail, but since it covers such a long period of time some sections are rather cursory.  The curious reader will want to check out the Further Reading suggestions to flesh out the story of astronomy.  But this is an excellent introductory text!

From the book's description:

Stargazers presents a comprehensive history of how leading astronomers, such as Galileo and Copernicus, mapped the stars from 1500AD to around 1700AD.  Building on the work of the Greek and Arabian astrologers before him, church lawyer Nicholas Copernicus proposed the idea of a sun-centred universe.  It was later popularized by Galileo – a brilliant debater whose abrasive style won him many enemies – who presented new evidence, which suggested that the earth moved.  

This thorough examination of the work of both men explores both their achievements and influences. It then traces the impact of their ideas on those who followed them, including Sir Francis Bacon, Dr John Wilkins, Dr Robert Hooke, Sir Isaac Newton and Reverend Dr James Bradley.  

Chapman investigates the Church’s role and its intriguing relationship with the astronomers of the day, many of whom were churchgoers.  He rebuts the popular view that the Church was opposed to the study of astronomy.  In reality, it led the search to discover more.  In 1728, Copernicus’s theory of the moving earth was finally proven by the young Reverend Dr James Bradley.

Frontispiece of Galileo's 'De Systemate Mundi' Depicting Aristotle, Ptolomy, Copernicus, 1635

Here are direct links to Stargazers at Amazon.com:

This is a sanitized version of Galileo's life and work:

Visit the author's page at Gresham College.

This review is by Candida Martinelli, of Candida Martinelli's Italophile Site, and the author of the cozy-murder-mystery novel AN EXTRA VIRGIN PRESSING MURDER, and the young-adult/adult mystery novel series THE VIOLET STRANGE MYSTERIES the first book of which is VIOLET'S PROBLEM.