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alohaellie 's review for:
The Flames
by Sophie Haydock
Thank you to Netgalley for an ARC of this.
In short - I absolutely loved this book! It follows four of the women attached to Egon Schiele - or, as I should maybe say, four of the women who made him. I knew next to nothing of Schiele before this book, but it's completely ignited me with a passion to learn more and, mostly, go and see some of his work in person!
Sophie brilliantly and powerfully imagines the stories as told by the women, for once. The book is split into 4 sections - Adele, Gertrude, Vally, and Edith - and masterfully time-hops between them. It's an excellent call to arms to always look beneath the surface, and really think about the portraits we see and who they portray. If you're worried that writing about art could possibly be stuffy or pretentious, you've no need to worry: Sophie's prose and characters burst with life, and the energy fizzes off the page.
As the kind of person who always goes onto google how much is fact and how much is fiction - whether it a book or on TV - I also really loved the author's notes afterwards, explaining her inspiration for the book, and which elements are fact and which were fiction.
In short - I absolutely loved this book! It follows four of the women attached to Egon Schiele - or, as I should maybe say, four of the women who made him. I knew next to nothing of Schiele before this book, but it's completely ignited me with a passion to learn more and, mostly, go and see some of his work in person!
Sophie brilliantly and powerfully imagines the stories as told by the women, for once. The book is split into 4 sections - Adele, Gertrude, Vally, and Edith - and masterfully time-hops between them. It's an excellent call to arms to always look beneath the surface, and really think about the portraits we see and who they portray. If you're worried that writing about art could possibly be stuffy or pretentious, you've no need to worry: Sophie's prose and characters burst with life, and the energy fizzes off the page.
As the kind of person who always goes onto google how much is fact and how much is fiction - whether it a book or on TV - I also really loved the author's notes afterwards, explaining her inspiration for the book, and which elements are fact and which were fiction.