Roberta Writes – Halloween Book Festival: From the Drop of Heaven: Legends, Prejudice, and Revenge by Juliette Godot #Halloween #bookcommunity

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What Amazon says

2021 Royal Palm Literary Awards Gold Medal
2022 Historical Fiction Company 5-Star Highly Recommended Award
2022 Readers’ Favorite 5 Star Award
2022 Sunbury Press Sunny Award Winner
2023 Honorable Mention in the Historical Fiction Club Book of the Year Awards

It’s 1582, a time when books are banned, and witches live next door. Citizens of the European principality of Salm are free to pray the way they want. However, both Catholic and Protestant fanatics surrounding them believe theirs is the only truth. Everyone is a heretic to one side or the other.

Martin, an accused seditionist, seeks safety in Salm, and he teaches Nicolas, the mayor’s son, to read. Though Nicolas knows Martin’s books are banned, he cannot resist them.

Catherine Cathillon and her family live in isolation as her father’s mistrust of the church prevents her from joining the community. A chance meeting with Nicolas changes everything. He reads to Catherine, and when she learns what life is like outside their farm, she begs him to teach her to read. But class differences force them to meet in secret. During the lessons, they fall in love, but their romance is exposed, and spurned lovers swear revenge.

Lovelorn vengeance is one thing, but when one of the banned books is found in Nicolas’s shop, Catherine realizes that her father was right. Their true enemy is the man charged with saving their souls, and he will stop at nothing to reinforce his position of power.
Based on real people and events, genealogist Juliette Godot draws upon her own Renaissance-era family to bring you her award-winning debut novel From the Drop of Heaven.

My review

Up front I must stay that this book revolves around the burning of heretics, sorcerers and witches in the Holy Roman Empire during the 16th century and, while not graphic, is still deeply disturbing. Sensitive readers could find these and selected other scenes upsetting.

I am a huge fan of historical fiction and don’t know a lot about this particular period of Holy Roman Empire history although I do know about the Huguenots, Calvinists, and other protestant movements more generally.

The book starts with one of the supporting characters, Martin, watching the burning of his professor from the University of Geneva as a heretic. Martin flees to his parents home in Paris.

Catherine lives with her family on a farm in Salm. Her sister, Anne, and Catherine come across a trio of young men while out for a walk. One of the young men is Martin, cousin the the two sons of the mayor of the closest village. Nicolas, the younger son, is bitten by a snake during this encounter and the reader quickly learns that Catherine’s grandmother is a herbalist or healer. This talent and the fact that she is a foreigner from gypsy origins, make Meme the subject of speculation and gossip by the villagers who fear her as a witch. Meme’s reputation among the villagers has created difficulties for Catherine’s family who don’t attend the local church and don’t socialise much. They also have a bad relationship with the local priest, Father Michel.

This is a love story, but it is more than that because it is based on the real events of the Cathillon and de la Goutte de Paradis families in Salm during the religious persecution that followed the Protestant Revolution in the 16th century. The book is well written and researched and gradually peels back the layers of society at that time, revealing the doctrines and prejudices of society and how people modelled their lives to accommodate the uncertainty and threats surrounding them.

I really enjoyed the character of Catherine who was clearly highly intelligent and questioning by nature. She was a natural target for suspicion and dislike due to her good looks and forthright behaviour and beliefs. The reputation of her grandmother also counted heavily against her. The entire Cathillon family lived carefully and fearfully, always on the defensive. Meme was a skilled healer who had to hide her talents because of the superstitious natures and ignorance of the people around her. This same deception extended to, and impacted the entire family, who all tried to live quietly and not attract any attention to themselves.

Nicolas, his brother, and Martin become embroiled with the Cathillon family, who help them medically a few times. Despite their wealth and position, the de la Goutte de Paradis family become tainted by association and that puts in motion the string of events that form the basis of the plot.

The growth in Nicolas from an impressionable and easily led teenager to a young man of purpose and who knows his own mind is interesting to watch. He was an affable and affectionate character, and despite his failings, was easy to like.

I enjoyed this book and learned a lot through reading it. The story line is interesting and engaging and the characters will drawn. I highly recommend this book.

You can purchase From the Drop of Heaven: Legends, Prejudice, and Revenge from Amazon US here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0BC4LTCT6

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Published by robertawrites235681907

I am a writer of young adult fiction and poetry

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32 thoughts on “Roberta Writes – Halloween Book Festival: From the Drop of Heaven: Legends, Prejudice, and Revenge by Juliette Godot #Halloween #bookcommunity”

  4. Dear Roberta, many thanks for having presented this, for me, very interesting book, from which we can learn what it means to learn how important it is to see further than our oown farm! Also here women, who helped women, with their knowledge of herbs, to get rid of their expecting children, were considered witches. Especially rich widows, who did something the church didn’t approve of, they were considered witches and money was taken from them! All the best:)

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    1. HI Martina, thank you for your visit. This book was fascinating to me. I didn’t know much about the burning of witches in Europe at this time and it was very eye opening and sad. A well researched and well written book.

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  5. Sounds intriguing. I like what you described about painting the world of prejudices and backgrounds which affect actions. It’s easy to write and read something with a present-day mindset and forget what drove people and drives people to their actions.

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    1. Hi Chel, that is right. I’m always trying to explain to my boys that I had a very conservative CAtholic upbringing and attended a convent. It is hard to go from a Dante’s Inferno mindset to a ‘woke’ mindset in 5 minutes flat. I do try and I think I’m open minded given my background but they don’t really understand as they have grown up in the current era.

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  6. Excellent review, Robbie. After my recent trip to Salem and learning about the witch trials in the U.S., I am interested in this book. It does sound like traumatic events, but there are a lot of those in human history.

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