Irena Pasvinter's Reviews > The Birth of Venus

Not bad, as modern historical fiction bestsellerisations go. Still, by the end of the book I couldn't get rid of imagining the 21st century's bestselling author's checklist dutifully implemented in "The Birth of Venus":

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1. Feminism, gender equality, women's role in history, oppression of female rights -- the clever, passionate, talented, strong-headed female protagonist who dreams to become a painter; her well-educated mother with mysterious past; her strong, smart and wise female servant; her rather simple-minded sister who sees marriage and childbirth as fulfilment of all her dreams -- check, check, check, check!

2. Racial diversity -- the female servant is a black slave - CHECK!

3. Sexual diversity -- make the protagonist's brother and husband a homosexual couple -- CHECK!

4. A few explicit sex scenes -- one disgusting and disturbing, two or three supposedly beautiful -- CHECK!

5.Gore. Who hasn't heard about the monster of Florence? Well, but that's 20th century. And what if we fantasize about something similar taking place in dark corners of Florence at the time of Savonarola? CHECK!
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On the other side, all the checklist elements mixed together did work as a coherent and entertaining plot culminating at fascinating times of Savonarola's rule over Florence. And although the author occasionally allowed her characters to say things like "What do you think about our rinascimento?" and "She received an education of a renaissance princess" (which would be equivalent to Socrates asking Plato, "What do you think about our Ancient Greek?" and Plato responding, "I much prefer it to their Modern Greek lingo."), most of the time the characters did their best to behave historically. Still, I couldn't get rid of the feeling that they were a cast of 21st century actors reciting their lines in a 21st century costume blockbuster about renaissance Florence.