Historical fiction can really be hit and miss, but this week I'd like to show you a gem in the genre: Dissolution  by CJ Sansom.

The Plot

I picked up Dissolution as a stab in the dark because it covers what I think is one of the most fascinating events in English history - the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the sixteenth century. It was a very turbulent time, with Henry VIII's bullish religious changes following his divorce and break from the pope. In his quest for reformation (and money!) the entire ecclesiastical landscape of the country would be forever transformed under the direction of Lord Cromwell. This is the same vein of history as the considerably more famous Wolf Hall and also has Cromwell as a significant character, but in the case of dissolution the protagonist is actually his commissioner Matthew Shardlake. I admit that I couldn't get into Wolf Hall despite it's recommendations because the writing style jarred with me, so I hoped that Dissolution might keep the same interest with something more approachable. 

The story is set in 1537 and puts the dissolution of the monasteries at the forefront as Henry uses Cromwell to put in place savage new laws, a network of informants and rigged trials. These all to serve to push forwards a reformist version of Christianity that Cromwell values, and - more importantly to the king - will allow Henry VIII to sure up his power as the new 'supreme head of the church' in England and access previously catholic wealth. Cromwell picks out a loyal lawyer and enthusiastic reformist Matthew Shardlake to assist him in investigating the monastery of Scarnsea where one of Cromwell's other commissioners - Robert Singleton - was found decapitated and the alter desecrated. As winter descends around them, Shardlake finds himself as good as trapped in the monastery walls as he tries to uncover a web of murder, corruption and confusion that will force him to question everything he believes in most.

History and The Murder Mystery

Call this a personal preference, but I find when it comes to more 'hardcore' genres that rely a lot of heavy detail and world-building, that they are always the most successful when they splice into another genre that allows the pace to pick up and for the details to sit within a particular context. For example, I love me some sci-fi films, but I find pure 'hardcore' sci fi books very dull because they are so keen to show off their world-building and detail that they often forget to create a readable story. So (controversially!) I cannot stand many sci-fi classics like Dune because this seems to be all it is. However, when that genre is spliced onto a simpler and more animated genre that demands a tight plot - such as a murder mystery - it becomes a different beast. So for example the excellent Altered Carbon  by Richard K Morgan is for me a brilliant sci-fi story because it is so closely tied to a good old fashioned murder mystery: the world-building and intricate details work to a foundation of a quick moving and always relevant plotline and therefore are more effective and allow the reader a better sense of context and urgency than just hard-sci-fi alone. The same absolutely applies to historical fiction, and Dissolution proves this for me. 

Matthew Shardlake by Hazelfo

Dissolution's  plot is effectively a decent old fashioned closed-door murder mystery. By having this as a base, the intricate world-building required of authentic history is allowed to flourish without detracting from the core story and the pacing of the book. By having the history there as the world, and by including historical characters as the protagonists this becomes a unusual and interesting murder-mystery, and by including the murder mystery this becomes a brilliantly engaging piece of historical fiction that does far more than many books that would have the characters endlessly static and standing in dark rooms wittering on about old politics. Each character has an energy of purpose that carries you through.

Like all good murder mysteries Dissolution has great  pacing that knows when to ebb and flow, when to push up the action and when to allow natural paranoia to seep in. Of course it has twists, the body count is satisfying and the plot deals you quite an entertaining 'bloody hell!' reveal that is nicely foreshadowed so that it alarms you without creating incredulity. What's more, the way the murder mystery plot is handled is perfectly in sync with the time period of the setting.


The Characters

Alice Fewterer by Koppori

For me, the way that Dissolution handles the nuances, passions and controversies of the time period is really something special, and it achieves this in large part due to the quality of the characters. The fascinating thing about the sixteenth century, seen most in the dissolution of the monasteries, was how people's belief systems (and even systems of class) were challenged by the onset of the reformation. The Catholic church, which had reigned supreme for hundreds of years, was in one fell swoop cast aside by an English King supported by reformists. The reformists sought to create a purer religion by getting rid of what they saw as superstitions, corruption and laziness in the church, but to do so they were forcing people to turn their backs on traditions -such as purgatory - that they believed could literally save their immortal souls.What's more, reform asked the public to assert things that, in the past, could have had then burned at the stake as heretics. In a class system that previously demanded unfaltering obedience to the pope how could they now reject him? Yet how could they maintain loyalty to this christian power when it was now treason to do so? To make matters worse religious reform was getting more and more mixed in with greed and personal agendas: monasteries were being dissolved for their lands under pretence of religious reform, and recently the queen herself had been beheaded on false charges while Henry was wooing a new wife. It was a dangerous and confusing time and in Dissolution, each character allows us to see the personal impact of these actions by embodying the different opinions and fears of the day.

Take Shardlake, our protagonist, as an example. He is an enthusiastic reformer - perhaps naive in his belief that, by destroying the papacy and all its pomp, England will lead a new purer religion. He is therefore in awe of Cromwell and eager to please. He is ambitious and loyal, and is very much aware of how tenuous a position it is to be in 'favor' with the powerful man. He has witnessed the Queen's execution first hand and his sense of duty is very much tinged with a certain anxiety. He is, however, a kind man who is very aware of his own talents and his own weaknesses - as a hunchback he is in the end always an outsider, who only has his own wits and reputation to rely on. The grim events in the monastery throughout Dissolution will test his character to its core.


Conclusion

In conclusion, Dissolution was a fantastic read for any history fan, as the historical world of the sixteenth century was so well handled, the characters so colourful, and the murder mystery so entertaining. I'm pleased to see that this is also a series of 5 books and counting and I'm sure to be rooting out the sequels in the future. Definitely give this a look.



Interested in what else I'm reading? Got something you'd love to recommend? Then feel free check out my Goodreads account and let me know what book you can't put down today. 

I never thought I was much of a non-fiction person, but nowadays I love my own little library.


It really started when I finished university for good and I found that I was left with a bunch of course books that I couldn't bear to throw away. Some of them were pretty dry, but they were all fascinating and could pull me back into how interesting it was to learn about a whole myriad of different historical eras and topics. After uni I branched out further, nudging into whatever interested me, so nowadays I have a growing group of psychology, philosophy and weird science books joining the shelves. At the end of the day, you should never stop learning and they certainly look impressive all stacked together.


On Monsters and Marvels was a book that I picked up when writing my Master dissertation on how monsters were treated in Early Modern England and I needed access to decent primary sources. I still love it for its bright illustrations and quirky attempt to understand just what monsters really were.


The author, Ambrose Pare, was a contemporary at the time.


He was born about 1510 and his work is considered to be one of the most sustained attempts in the sixteenth century to ‘naturalize’ monsters. It was vitally important because it represents the transition that was happening in europe where monstrous births and other marvels were gradually moving into being regarded as a function of Nature rather than just God’s magical attempts to frighten a sinning public. Collecting together many many different examples of deformed births and ‘monsters’, Pare chronicles them and comments on them, categorising them into causes and anecdotes such as those caused by the female imagination during conception, ‘excess of seed’ and the like. Furthermore in this book it drifts into other examples of his works, such as descriptions of exotic animals (now recognisable as toucans, giraffes, manatees and elephants) and the elusive search for the unicorn.

What is truly interesting and charming to me is that the entire book is just swimming in woodcut illustrations of each monster, which is especially endearing with regards to the exotic animals, and morbidly fascinating when it examples the deformed births.
Pare, as a writer (especially an Early Modern writer) is incredibly approachable and easy to read, keeping a level headed, interested yet mostly neutral approach to his subject matter, and really allows you access into the early modern world view. The translator, Janis L Pallister, also does a fantastic job of bringing Pare’s text to a modern audience with his detailed and engaging introduction and his helpful notes throughout.

 

The book is quite small and the paperback, while it looks a little cheap, is flexible and nicely but together for slipping into your bag. The printing/page quality is crisp and clear too.
I recommend this for anyone interested in history, especially the history of science, medicine or the weird and wonderful. It’s certainly a favourite in my collection of history books.

If you want to, you can read a large chunk of it on Google books.

On the 11th of October 1568, the men of Ipswich were in battle with monsters.


With a great thrashing of waves, fishermen's boats were violently assaulted as they attempted to restrain a vast writhing beast that has no business being in local waters. They gripped on for dear life as the huge creature 'swam awaye with the boat & all the men that were on it, towards the sea at a marvaylous swift pace'. The men were only saved by the multitude of other small vessels that had collected to see the spectacle.

The monster was not alone. In total Timothy Granger - an eyewitness along with other sailors and shipmen in Ipswich- counted sixteen more monstrous fish, both males and females, who seem to have swam into trouble on a low tide. Ipswich wharf was soon bustling with onlookers who 'came together to help and see the taking of them' and they were amazed by what they saw. 

The fish were strange creatures: they were 'white beneath the eyes...else black' with white bellies and with huge jaws. The tail of each 'marvelous fishe' was so strong and large that when ten men stood upon it it was said to have overthrown them all. Strangest of all, Granger commented, 'upon thyr heds were holes, as big that a man might put in both his fistes at once'. From these holes Granger exclaimed that they spurted out so much water that, in their attempt to drag the beast back to Ipswich Wharf, they almost drowned two boatsmen.

The attempt to capture all seventeen animals was arduous and, as per the norm at the time, cruel. After many failed attempts where the boats of the hunters were dragged out to sea, or where cable ropes snapped, the onlookers and sailors managed to wrap cable rope around each fish's tail and drag them to the wharf, where they were each tethered to a tree. With much effort, they managed to heave each animal up, despite the occasional broken 'wyndlace', and granger commented on their sheer 'marvaylous greatness, strength and wayght'. Seeing the fish as a valuable resource, the townspeople instantly went about attempting to slay the creatures for their meat. To their surprise, despite being stricken with axes and other weapons, some of the creatures lay on the wharf for two days and a night before they died. It was said that 'the ryver wherein they weare taken was coloured red', and that three butchers worked a whole day carving up just one fish.

As the butchers worked, Granger marvelled at the anatomy of the beast. The fish was said to be a man's height in thickness 'from the top of the backe to the bones, and his bones hard as stones'. Despite the challenge of the butchery, the meat of the beast was carved up and distributed to the people at the town, 'that did eate of it, and it was verye good meate'.

Credit: Robert L. Pitman, NOAA Fisheries, USA

Nowadays it's perhaps easy for us to identify these whales as killer whales, though at the time they were completely strange and bizarre creatures, unknown by the common person. Certainly Timothy Granger thought it strange enough to justify putting it to print and it, like other sensational texts at the time, was picked up, read and displayed with enthusiasm as proof of the wonders of God's ways. Even now, the sudden arrival of seventeen Orcas on Ipswich's shores wouldn't look out of place in any tabloid paper.


Sources


-Granger,Timothy, A Most True and Marveilous Straunge Wonder, the lyke hath seldom ben seene, of XVII Monstrous Fishes, taken in Suffolke, at Downham brydgem within a myle of Ipswiche The .XI.daye of October. In the yeare of our Lordge God. M.D.LX.VIII. (London, 1568).