Who would want to kill DesCartes? Everyone who knows him. So, how to discover the killer. Now *there* is a story. And this is the story, nicely told. ( )

*I received a free copy of this book from the publisher through LibraryThing’s Early Reviewers in exchange for an honest review.*

I wasn’t feeling the beginning of this–it’s incredibly slow and suffers from a lot of info dumping. I wasn’t really sure what the point of the book was for a good 50 pages of it. Also, the main character seemed too bumbling and clueless for me. I understand why he works for the story to be revealed the way it does, but I just wasn’t feeling it. There’s also way too many suspicious characters who seem super shady for me to have really gotten into the mystery part of it. The way I saw it, it didn’t really matter who killed Descartes since they all seemed pretty guilty.

However, once the story properly got started, I enjoyed myself. There are a lot of twists and reveals that the reader can guess at once more information is given near the middle of the book, and that’s where a lot of the action picks up. The intrigue itself is quite good and there’s quite a twist at the end.

However, the part that shone for me and that I really enjoyed was Rene Descartes’s backstory. Once Pessin goes into the history of France and the area, the context of the time Descartes lived in, and his experience at school, I was hooked. More than anything, this book made me want to pick up biographies of Rene Descartes just to learn more about him. I was a little disappointed to get back to the proper storyline, but that interest in Rene Descartes helped get me to the end, which was quite good.

Overall, Pessin does a good job in connecting true historical events and weaving an interesting tale around Descartes and his murder. While the thriller aspects seemed a bit off to me, I did enjoy the overall story.

Also posted on Purple People Readers. ( )

Interesting blending of history, mystery and intrigue. Pessin has taken the real life debate as to whether Descartes died in 1950 of natural causes and turned it into a mystery novel, tasking the young and inexperienced Jesuit Adrien Baillet with investigating the circumstances surrounding Descartes untimely demise. The fact that the Swedish court's Chancellor expects Baillet's report to confirm natural causes is only one of many hurdles Baillet faces. The story is really two stories in one... the book alternates between following Baillet investigation and portraying Descartes life. The Descartes chapters make for good historical
reading but I have to say I really enjoyed the fast-paced, twisty plot of suspects and events of the Baillet chapters. Filled with everything from swordplay to secret societies and political /religious intrigue, this is quite the packed historical fiction read. Granted, the author has taken some literary license in giving his characters some more contemporary turn of phrase and mannerisms, but I found these helped enhance my reading pleasure and gave the story some entertaining moments, lightening the dark, sinister atmosphere of shadowy figures, long nights and freezing cold of Pessin's Stockholm.

Overall, an entertaining mystery thriller and an informative glimpse into the life of René Descartes. ( )

Historical fiction is unique in several ways. In particular, while all fiction -- at least good fiction -- requires imagination and intelligence, historical fiction, according to bestselling author Alexander Chee, deals with "the plausibly hypothetical" and describes "what might have happened within what happened." The constraints of real events, people and ways of life often mean, to paraphrase Longfellow, that when historical fiction is good, it's very good, but when it's bad it is horrid. Andrew Pessin's The Irrationalist: The Tragic Murder of René Descartes clearly is in the former category.

Built around the Thirty Years War and its surrounding religious conflicts, the book is an intelligent and entertaining contemplation of some "what ifs" in Descartes' life. Pessin, a Connecticut College philosophy professor who's written or edited several books about philosophy, combines fact, speculation and imagination in crafting the two narratives that culminate in an adeptly crafted revelation. One follows Descartes' 1650 death in Sweden, where he moved the year before at the invitation of Christina, the queen of Sweden. The other starts with his birth in 1596 and brings the reader to the beginning of the first narrative.

With the latter, Pessin provides insight into the man rightfully recognized as a philosopher (often called the first modern rationalist) and mathematician (introducing Cartesian geometry, among other things) and scientist. By using and examining almost ordinary points in Descartes' life and his reclusiveness, The Irrationalist humanizes him. "He was," Pessin writes, "a man who could do a half-dozen calculations in his head simultaneously but he had not yet mastered how to navigate a world filled with actual human beings." The book also pursues the lingering conjecture that Descartes was associated with the Brothers of the Rosy Cross, a forerunner of today's Rosicrucians. The secret group sought to synthesize esoteric knowledge and symbols with science and math to gain a complete understanding of nature. Pessin also observes, though, that in those efforts "it was apparently also necessary to say some nasty things about the Pope and occasionally also Luther and Calvin."

The postmortem tale is a mystery (two, actually) coming on the heels of the Peace of Westphalia, which helped make Sweden a great power. It is told from the perspective of Adrien Baillet, the historical figure with whom Pessin takes the most liberty. The real Baillet was a French priest, scholar and librarian who wrote the first biography of Descartes. Here, he is a rather inept errand boy and assistant for the now-retired rector of the Jesuit college in France that Descartes attended years before. For some reason, Baillet, who is not a priest, is sent to Stockholm to represent the Jesuits at a gala being held by Queen Christina. Descartes dies the morning Baillet arrives.

History has it that Descartes died of pneumonia. More recently, there's been suggestions Descartes actually was assassinated. In The Irrationalist rumors to that effect surface immediately. The French ambassador to Sweden asks Baillet to investigate, even though he lacks any relevant experience. Baillet's pursuit of his unwelcome task ultimately provides two twists, one under the surface from the beginning and the other perhaps cognizable only to those with in-depth knowledge of Descartes' life.

The book is generally well-paced, although there are occasionally scenes that seem superfluous. The writing makes the book a pleasure to read and Passin avoids obvious anachronisms. The skilled research and writing, though, makes one gaffe almost painfully conspicuous. In the same sentence, Pessin writes that Baillet got a "vibe" from a window, producing a "creepy" feeling. The latter term didn't come into use for another 140 years while it would be more than 300 years before "vibe" gained the meaning for which it is used.

Regardless, the book is both strong and engaging. Pessin crafts time and place in a fashion that transports readers to and lets them become immersed in the story. His attention to detail in that regard and in drawing the characters -- not just Baillet and Descartes -- exhibits command of elements that create exceptional historical fiction. A reader leaves not only satisfied but understanding more about Descartes and his time.

(Originally posted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)

A slightly odd book.

It opens with the lead character, Baillet, on his way to Stockholm to meet with Descartes. On arrival Baillet finds that Descartes has died, and perhaps not a natural death, and Baillet is shanghaied into investigating his death.

So far so good, a murder mystery set against the exotic half wild background of early modern Sweden. But no, the book swings between a simple murder investigation and long semi fictional biographical passages on Descartes life and ultimately why he ended up dead in house in Stockholm.

It does all hang together to make a quirky book - not quite a mystery and not quite historical fiction. There's a twist at the end of the story as well which you begin to realise in the last few pages. ( )