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wai's review
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
slow-paced
3.75
I've always had an interest in true crime, and when I was in high school I finally stumbled upon Baron Gilles de Rais. What a horrific person. I think what fascinates me the most is the juxtaposition of his actions as a pedophile, torturer, and murderer, and his faith and obsession with religion/catholicism. Adding in his history with Joan of Arc just further muddles things, to create a very intriguing portrait of a terrible man during a time where things were not recorded well and thus there is a lot that we don't know or only know second hand. Like the fact that there is no portrait of Gilles de Rais made of him during that time (that is surviving) and thus all of the ones we do have are conjecture, based off of how he is described by others and the artist's imagination. Because of this though, we do hear the author's personal opinions a lot more than we normally would with a biography like this, which I did find distracting.
The difficulty as an American reader is following all of the French history and politics that exists throughout his story, due to his status as a French aristocrat. This book does a fairly good job of presenting it in an understandable manner. It is pretty easy to read without getting too bogged down in minutia or overly academic language. It also discusses de Rais' crimes as delicately as is possible.
Ultimately though it is a good overview of Gilles de Rais that gave me a lot more information about him, including his relationship with Joan of Arc, that I wondered about and didn't otherwise know. But definitely it is not a book to recommend widely, only with people interested in this very niche topic.
The difficulty as an American reader is following all of the French history and politics that exists throughout his story, due to his status as a French aristocrat. This book does a fairly good job of presenting it in an understandable manner. It is pretty easy to read without getting too bogged down in minutia or overly academic language. It also discusses de Rais' crimes as delicately as is possible.
Ultimately though it is a good overview of Gilles de Rais that gave me a lot more information about him, including his relationship with Joan of Arc, that I wondered about and didn't otherwise know. But definitely it is not a book to recommend widely, only with people interested in this very niche topic.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Child abuse, Death, Gore, Grief, Kidnapping, Murder, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Trafficking, and Domestic abuse
Moderate: Death of parent, Incest, and Sexism
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