The Virgin Blue

Tracy Chevalier's first novel, the reader is introduced to two women in France, 400 years apart. Ella Turner, an American recently moved to a small French village, and Isabelle Tournier, a distant relative of Ella's who has a tumultuous life as a Huguenot. The novel flips back and forth between their stories and attempts some suspense, but doesn't do an especially good job of it. Although Ella is a sympathetic character at first, she becomes tedious and I began to become irritated with her. I had not read about France and Switzerland in this way before and found the true historical setting quite interesting. Unfortunately, the story is lacking.