Reviews for Genio

The average rating for Genio based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2015-02-25 00:00:00 Gian Edwards The title Why She Married Him immediately conjures up memories of books that address you as 'Dear Reader' and involve the long hidden secret of the Duke's real heir. Things that are right up my alley. While those specific elements are not present in this novel by Myriam Chapman there are many of the other conventions of Victorian novels and contemporary historical fiction: immigration, lost wealth, struggles with poverty, racism and the struggle for intellectual and emotional freedom. Unfortunately there is little else. Why She Married Him is the story of Nina Schavranski. Nina is a Russian Jewish immigrant in Belle Epoch Paris. She and her family had to leave their comfortable life in the Ukraine because of the pogroms. Their comfort and community were replaced by poverty and ghettos. When the novel opens it is 1912 and Nina has just married a man she doesn't love. Unhappiness and strife ensue. Chapman does a magnificent job in recreating the place and time of Nina's life. You can feel the fabrics, taste the food, see your way around this world. What you don't find in this novel is any interior life in the characters. Their lives are the events on the page and no more. That's disappointing but what is good about this book has me intrigued enough that I will look for Chapman's next novel.

Review # 2 was written on 2014-09-10 00:00:00 Jamie Kershaw From my personal perspective, this book is an UNSUNG MASTERPIECE. Could it be a dark fable as well? I think so. Hugo must have heard the story during his exile. It clicked for him, Big Time. PERFECT! quoth he - for my disfigured hero will stand for all those who refuse to discontinue - despite the pressuring of authority - their eternal, unabashed public display of a POSITIVE, MORAL ATTITUDE. Just like Victor Hugo himself. So, he had a bit of black-humoured fun. In Paris, as in any modern country, dark deceit and hypocrisy ruled the roost. Time to SHAKE THEM UP A BIT, ya think? So he did. And of course, like the poor hero of Les Misérables, Hugo was none too popular with la crème de la crème. But guess what? His readers (and now his film and musical viewers!) ADORED AND WILL ALWAYS ADORE him. It doesn't hurt his storyline here that he added a bit of a beaut in the way of an innocent story of two simple hearts - WAY beyond the corruption of the 'normal' human heart! And Hugo knew true love's ways RARELY survive the awful and onerous degradation of the jeering world. There but for the Grace of God might have gone I... He was an ethically-sound sort of PRACTICAL man, and hence he was a pessimist. It's sad to lack Faith. So yes - it IS a sad story. Though you can hear the resounding echoes of unworldly Voltairean cackles throughout. But it remains a novel with a Heart... A broken, weeping heart.