Book Review: The Historian [Elizabeth Kostova]

RATING: Now that's great storytelling :)

The book that saved my life :D

This was the book I was reading last year when I had my near-death experience with dengue (second time around!), further complicated by pneumonia and internal bleeding. The doctor proclaimed a 20% chance of survival. A friend of mine, knowing how much of a bookworm I am, later joked that I held on to dear life until I could finish this book. This novel is a long one, and by the time I finished it, I had already made a complete recovery.

The story begins with our heroine finding a bunch of old letters, all addressed, quite melodramatically, to “My Dear and Unfortunate Successor”. Shortly afterwards, her father goes missing and she uses the letters to try and track him down. Her quest takes her to monasteries and libraries all over Europe, and she finds herself being hunted down by a sinister figure – the same being that has haunted both her grandfather and father’s letters, and who may be the cause of her mother’s mysterious death. As she delves deeper, she finds out more about her family history and begins to understand just how truly powerful her adversary is.

The Historian is a lovely piece of work. It blends history and fiction flawlessly, while working with the theory that the inspiration for Bram Stoker’s Dracula is Prince Vlad Tepes. The result is a truly striking, most memorable character. It is bursting with details on 16th century history and brings alive the conquests of Prince Vlad, of the Ottoman Empire and Byzantine Constantinople. Saves you from cracking open that rather boring encyclopedia, in my opinion.

The characters, even the most minor ones, are multidimensional and wholly believable, each with his/her own distinct voice, and this contributes a lot to the beauty of the book. I cannot help but go "Awww" on the relationship husky Professor Bora shares with his tiny wife, and the evil librarian never fails to give me the creeps whenever he appears.

Elizabeth Kostova is a gifted writer. (Well, either that or she has a really, really good editor *grin*) The Historian takes you on a guided tour of Eastern Europe, and unlike Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code, The Historian does not read like a guide book written by an exceptionally descriptive but rather monotonous high-schooler. Instead, it feels like hearing a first-hand account from a talented storyteller who has actually been there, so vivid that you feel like you've been there yourself.

Paying tribute once again to Kostova’s writing skills (and/or her editor’s), the narrative weaves back and forth through three generations of different characters, but it doesn’t muddle up the story flow. I admire that, really I do. The book is over 600 pages long, and I never once had to flip back and check on previous chapters because I missed something or some point got me confused or something like that. The time-traveling narrative rather enhances the story, making it more interesting to read. The Historian is somewhat of a mystery, after all, and I imagine it would be very, very dull if it were told in a linear sequence.

However, the best part about reading The Historian is it made me feel as if I were listening to a grandmother telling her stories while stuck indoors on a rainy day. Yeah, it made me feel cozy, and all warm and fuzzy inside, and only a handful of books have been able to do that.

My only complaint would be I found the first half of the epilogue to be rather uncalled for. (I am a sucker for perfect happy endings.) However, I DID find the latter part of the epilogue (Prince Vlad gazing out, looking as if he has all the world before him) perfect in wrapping the story up.

Overall, I found The Historian to be a well-researched, delightful read. I give it a 4.5-star rating.