Book Cover

Shakespeare brings us to know ourselves. Dante, with his dissection of all others, bids us to know one another.

# Review

After reading All the Light We Cannot See, I thought I'd want to read some more historical fiction. This book takes place in mid-1860 Boston; the protagonists are real-life poets and Harvard professors Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, and James Russell Lowell, along with publisher J. T. Fields (the four of them composing the Dante Club) and an outcast police officer, Nicholas Rey. The book focuses on a series of gruesome murders inspired by the works of Dante Alighieri, in which the protagonists are trying to solve with their knowledge of Dante's works. The book also explores subplots such as the first American translation of Dante's Inferno and the political and moral turmoil over said translation.

If I can describe this book with one word, it'd be "intellectual". The language is very thorough, and as a result the pacing of the book is extremely slow, sometimes excruciatingly so. What kept me reading through, however, is the story premise, which I found very both macabre and intriguing. This book is rich with historical details (such as of the American Civil War and of the backgrounds of different Dante Club members) and will appeal to both Dante fans as well as fans of New England poetry from the middle of the 19th century. Unfortunately, I am not sophisticated enough to have appreciated the history of New English poetry and thus did not fully appreciate the many historical details sprinkled throughout the book. Nevertheless, I still enjoyed the story as well as the different interpretations throughout the book of Dante's works.

# Conclusion

A very interesting premise that appeals to a very narrow audience.

# Overall rating: 6.9

What does the rating mean?