[Cardinal] Rohan believed that Cagliostro exercised occult power: he could cure disease, transform metal into gold, and see into the future. When asked... whether he had any regrets about the life he had led, he replied that he still felt terrible about the assassination of Pompey...
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"The Affair of tbe Diamond Necklace" - reads like fiction, unsurprisingly the talk of Paris in 1785.
Mme du Barry continued to be the favorite target of libellers... A scurrilous biography, Anecdotes secrètes sur Mme la comtesse du Barry, traced her career from the brothel to the royal bed...It became a top best seller in the underground book trade of the 1770s...
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Royal gossip clearly not new.
Image from "her" webpage.
http://www.madamedepompadour.com/_eng_pomp/home.htm
so-soSome of these are so insignificant, and just included so that Montefiore can talk about the context. Sometimes that's interesting, sometimes less so, but honestly I found the letters and choice thereof fairly meh.
Also the organisation is weird. Themes I can get, but chronology within each theme is all jumbled.
so-soThis book was ok as an introduction to or broad overview of Ottoman history. However, it jumped around alot, such as to different time periods, topics, and such. Generally, it seemed to try to cover too much in too short of a book.
bailedI love the idea of this, but I listened to about an hour of the audiobook and it is so dull. I thought maybe it was the format, but I‘m seeing other reviews calling it dry, so nope. So, I won‘t be trying it in print after all.
pick“Without Africa, and the slave plantation agriculture of the Caribbean that derived from it, there would never have been the kind of explosion of wealth that the West enjoyed … nor such early or rapid industrialization.” And French retraces the pathways of the European countries rampaging through the African continent, meanwhile destroying already existing kingdoms. It is a devastating, but necessary overview over the slave trade.
pickThis was a great overview of Scotland. Very to the point of who was king/queen and when. It highlights the major players in Scotland.
Not quite, AI, not quite... (prompt "Rousseau's cold remedy bottle")
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Of course, many earlier books, especially devotional tracts, had brought tears to the eyes of their readers, but La Nouvelle Héloïse released a flood: "tears," "sweet tears," "tears that are sweet," "delicious tears," "tears of tenderness." One reader sobbed so vehemently that he cured himself of a severe cold.
