The Spring of the Ram: Second Book of the House of Niccolo ANNOTATION
The fifth installment in Dunnett's fascinating saga of audacious, brilliant Flemish adventurer Nicholas van der Poele opens in 1478, as Nicholas, still reeling from the shock of his bride's wedding-night revelation that she is pregnant by his sworn enemy, embarks on building a new empire in Scotland.
FROM THE PUBLISHER
Scotland, 1468: a country at the edge of Europe, a world on the threshold of the modern age. Merchants and musicians, politics and pageantry, children in silks and jewels, fill the court of King James III. In its midst, unpredictable and dangerous, is Nicholas vander Poele - former apprentice, now transformed by his adventures into a wealthy banker and knight. Nicholas is a man of mystery. He has a new wife, but her whereabouts are unknown; wherever she is, she may or may not be carrying a child. Recently returned from a long sojourn in Africa, Nicholas is building a new trading empire in Edinburghto the puzzlement of his partners in Venice. He has new associates and many irons in the fire, but he appears to be haunted by the deaths of old companions. He seems to have made peace with former enemies, but some of his actions tell a different story. Only one thing is certain: Nicholas has the air of a man with a terrible betrayal to avenge. Pursuing vengeance and his elusive wife, Nicholas and his exasperated but loyal companions are soon propelled across a Europe threatened from without by the Turks and internally by the ever-shifting alliance of its princelings. Moving through Flanders, the Tyrol, Venice, Egypt, the Sinai Peninsula, and Cyprus, they find every step fraught with physical danger and emotional peril. For Nicholas, there can be no peace until his goals are reached - and no merriment, except in the company of an irrepressible slip of a girl-child as clever and audacious as he. But urgent though his personal quest may be, Nicholas is also in pursuit of profit. Endowed with intelligence, courage, and a gift - an instinct - for trade, he is ideally suited to his time, an era of exploration, discovery, and ever-expanding commerce. Through the eyes and the exploits of this remarkable man, Dorothy Dunnett shows us a rapidly, changing world of burgeoning possibilities - so different from, and yet so like, our own. The elegant working out of designs historic
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
Praised for her historical novels (King Hereafter, the Francis of Lymond series), the prolific Dunnett continues with this crisp and dashing tale of venture and misadventure, the second volume of a monumental 15th century sequence. In Niccolo Rising, Nicholas married the middle-aged widow Marian Charetty, head of a lucrative dyeworks in Bruges. Now, plucky 19-year-old Nicholas, fleeing his bitter foe Simon de Pol, journeys via Florencewhere he gets funding from the Medicisto the East. There he hopes to trade with the Emperor of Trebizond. Thus, the setting moves to the land of the fabled Golden Fleeceunderscoring the title, which refers to the wool merchant's star sign, Ariesand the plot thickens briskly. Marian's nymphet daughter Catherine is ensnared by sea-prince Pagano Doria, who is working secretly for the formidable Simon in his quest to wrest control of the House of Charetty. Doria and Nicholas race each other's galleys and meet in hasty skirmishes. The invading Turks pose a further threat. But the seductive Princess Violante, in diaphanous deshabille, offers Nicholas protectionand much more. Steeped in Byzantine luxury, pageantry and intrigue, this lengthy, complex narrative shows Dunnett at her dextrous best. History Book Club alternate. (July)
Library Journal
Dunnett's formidable skill shines through in the continuation of her ``House of Niccolo'' series, set in 15th-century Europe. No longer an apprentice although still an enigma, 19-year-old Niccolo is married to the widowed owner of the Charetty company. He has been forced to leave Flanders, and so sails to Trebizond on the Black Sea to establish a trading route for both the Charetty and Medici companies. His enemies' schemes follow him, and his stepdaughter's elopement with a business rival further complicates his life. To sort out this medley of fictional and historical characters and their interplay, it helps to have read Niccol o Rising , but any reader should enjoy this engrossing story. Highly recommended. History Book Club alternate. Ellen Kaye Stoppel, Drake Univ. Law Lib., Des Moines
BookList - Denise Perry Donavin
In the fifth volume of the series begun with "Niccolo Rising" (1986), Dunnett continues her fifteenth-century tale of Nicholas van der Poele (now known as De Fleury), who rises from his lowly clerk's position to become an international trader, the compatriot of kings and dukes. He is also an enemy of his own wife; the enmity that began on their wedding night in the previous novel, "Scales of Gold" (1992), continues in this elaborate story. In Tyrol, looking for metals in the earth, Nicholas discovers that he has divining powers and later tries to use these same powers to track down his son. His adventures take him to Venice and Egypt as well, and Dunnett effectively weaves in the vibrant, dangerous world of the early Renaissance. Historical fiction as only Dunnett can contrive. The final volume awaits.
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