Versailles, 1789. Giselle is one of Marie Antoinette’s wardrobe women and hopes to draw her own dresses one day. But revolution is looming in the streets of Paris and Giselle gets herself involved in a riot. She’s saved by Léon, a young revolutionary, and soon the two of them start to develop an intimate friendship. When things get worse and the king and queen are blamed, Giselle needs to choose between her loyalty to the queen and her revolutionary friends.
I was happy to get a chance to read ‘The queen’s dressmaker‘, a reissue of ‘The wardrobe mistress’, Masterson’s debut novel that already was on my TBR. It tells the story of Giselle, a wardrobe women of Marie Antoinette and is set in the final years of her life during the revolution.
Although I love French history, Marie Antoinette isn’t one of my favourite historical figures. I believe she wouldn’t be that famous without her dreadful end. As a queen she didn’t get a chance to change things. Or rather: she didn’t grab the chance for change.
What I loved about this story is that it also shows the bloody and fearful side of the revolution. The events of 1789 and the coming years are glorified nowadays, but it were uncertain times and the terror that followed the execution of the monarchs made many victims. You walk with Giselle through the street of Paris where no one is quite sure how things will play out as royalists and Jacobins can’t agree on the role of the king in their new regime.
I also enjoyed the portrayal of Marie Antoinette. You feel some sympathy for her, while at the same time she behaves herself as a snob not understanding the real threat of the revolution. But this is Giselle’s story, not Marie Antoinette’s. I liked her character and the fact that she’s constantly in between two conflicting loyalties. There’s also a heavy romance. And as you know, I’m usually not a big fan of those, but I did become quite invested in it this time. But for the wrong reasons. I didn’t think Léon deserved Giselle so I became quite mad at him sometimes 😅.
In the end, this book couldn’t really grip me as much as I would liked it to. The second part is certainly a lot better than the first but the ending is a bit sudden. I had hoped to know a bit more about what happens next to the characters. But this is a good read for anyone interested in the French Revolution and/or Marie Antoinette.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for a copy of this book in return for my honest opinion.
In Another Era 