Title: Goddess

Author: Kelly Gardiner

Fourth Estate, 2014

Katherine’s pick

For any reader who has enjoyed Kelly Gardiner‘s Young Adult fiction & poetry,  this new addition to her work is a real treat.

Goddess is very much an adult novel though,  based on the life of Julie d’Aubigny  a  larger than life character who lived in the seventeenth century.   Known as La Maupin, the Goddess of the title embarks on a life of fearless adventure.  Obviously a talented and beguilingly beautiful young  woman, she goes from humble beginnings to become  a star of the famed Paris Opera.  Tempestuous and volatile she blazes a trail across Europe falling love with both men and woman,   Original and witty this is a rollicking read, that doesn’t disappoint.