Whitcoulls Recommends: My Name is Emilia del Valle and The Pretender

My Name is Emilia del Valle by Isabel Allende. Any new book from the wonderful Isabel Allende is a treat, and this is no exception. It begins in 1866 when an Irish nun becomes pregnant after an encounter with a wealthy Chilean who turns his back on them, and the baby and her mother have to fight for their place in the world. The child, Emilia del Valle, eventually becomes a writer and a journalist, and is eventually sent to cover the Chilean civil war along with a friend and colleague, Eric Whelan. There is history here as well as the romance, which makes it truly fascinating along with the romance. It was an extraordinary time. 

The Pretender by Jo Harkin. Set in 15th Century England at the juncture between the Plantaganets and the Tudors, this is fiction which is fun, bawdy, historically interesting and never takes itself too seriously. It tells the story of a young boy who through his lifetime is known by a series of names. Firstly, he’s John Collett, growing up on a farm from which he’s one day uplifted by a couple of noblemen, becoming known as Lambert Simnel and told that he is in fact the 17th Earl of Warwick and will challenge King Henry 7th for the Crown. I loved it. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudkin
from News Talks AB.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Joe McKenzie is with us now, good morning. Hello, Okay,
what have you got for us today?

Speaker 3 (00:18):
I've got a book historical fiction called The Pretender by
Joe Harkin, which I just loved. It's historical fiction set
in fifteenth century England at the juncture between the Plantagenets
and the Tudors, and it's fun, it's body, it's historically
really interesting, it never takes itself too seriously, and it's
the story of a young boy who, through his lifetime

(00:41):
is known by a series of names. Firstly, when you
first meet him, he's called John Colin and he's growing
up on a farm, from which one day he's uplifted
by some noblemen who take him away and change his
name to Lambert Signal. And some people listening will know
that name from history. My husband said, oh, haven't did
that for a long time, and he's told that in fact,
rather than being a boy on a farm, he is

(01:01):
actually the seventeenth Earl of Warwick and he's going to
challenge King Henry the seventh for the crown and in
order to prepare for that. They send him off to
Oxford where he's educated, to Burgundy where he learns the
etiquette of court, and then to Ireland, where the intrigue
and the rivalry between two factions is at its height,
and he becomes Edward, the challenger to the throne. It's

(01:22):
also where he meets a young girl called Joan, who
is the daughter of one of his patrons in Ireland,
and she becomes his greatest ally. The stories fabulous. The
language is terrific. It's a melding of some of the
old English that you might recognize brought into the modern day.
It's irreverent and it's it's sheer joy in the history.

Speaker 2 (01:42):
I loved it, okay. And the history is accurate, even
though there's all the sort of fun.

Speaker 3 (01:47):
Well, it's a bit of I'm not qualified to know,
but I suspect there's a bit of fun in there.

Speaker 2 (01:51):
I probably wouldn't know where we go. Isabella Linde has
been a I have been a fan of her books
for decades me too, And I had no idea that
she had a new book of coming out.

Speaker 3 (02:02):
Yes she does. It's called My Name is Amelia del Valle.
Her last book was called Via Letter, which some people
may know. And what she's really good at is taking
women and putting them at the heart of the story
and writing about their lives. What she did with Via
Letter and again in this new one. It starts off
in San Francisco in the eighteen sixties and a young
woman who's preparing to become a nun ends up in

(02:24):
a relationship with a guy to whom she becomes pregnant,
and he is very wealthy. He's Chilean, he's very wealthy,
and he abandons this poor woman and eventually her daughter,
and so she needs to make her way, and she
eventually marries somebody who looks after her and becomes a
wonderful stepfather to Amelia. But it's the story of Amelia,

(02:44):
and she is a writer. She starts off earning a
living by writing a series of what you might call
penny dreadfuls, you know, romantic novels under a man's name,
because otherwise they wouldn't get published. But she eventually becomes
a journalist and she and a colleague from the San
Francisco Gazette or I think that's what it's called, a
newspaper in San Francisco. They send her and her college

(03:06):
leg to the Chilean War. There's a civil war going
on there towards the end of the eighteen hundreds, which
really did happen, and she becomes a war correspondent. So
it's the story of her throughout her life which changes.
Is always interesting for a woman essentially on her own
in the world. And again, as with all of Isabella

(03:26):
Lende's books, it's believable and really well done.

Speaker 2 (03:29):
Does it have that magical realism that features in some
of her book No, it's o No, this is straight narrative. Okay, brilliant. Well,
I'm still looking forward to it. The two books don't
mention today. My name is Amelia da Vaal by Isabel
Allende and also The Pretender by Joe Harken. We'll talk
me next week.

Speaker 3 (03:44):
See you then.

Speaker 1 (03:46):
For more from the Sunday session with Francesca Rudkin, listen
live to News Talks It'd be from nine am Sunday,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.