A skilled neurosurgeon, Beatrice Trovato must take a sudden sabbatical when her older brother Ben suddenly passes away. She travels to Siena, Italy, where Ben had been researching the Bubonic Plague epidemic of 1347, and despite her heartbreak immediately immerses herself in collecting his research notes and putting his affairs in order. One afternoon, while paging through the journal of a 12th-century Sienese artist, Beatrice is pulled into the past — a past where the Bubonic Plague is mere months away.

This is a creative and engaging story from a period in time I haven't read a lot about. While Winawer handled the writing beautifully, there were a few small things that grated on me. First and most noticeably, the foreshadowing was about as subtle as a brick through a window, and a few plot points felt forced/contrived and therefore unrealistic. I was also irritated by the need to explain to the reader how words were pronounced. (Please do not underestimate the reader's intelligence!) Some plot points were contradictory: for example, Beatrice is purportedly knowledgeable about the Italian language but then is surprised by how a word is pronounced (this was too obviously for the reader's benefit — Italian is such a language that no one with even passing knowledge of it would be surprised by pronunciation). Speaking of language, a native Italian speaker would recognize immediately that Beatrice wasn't a native speaker, not even one "from Lucca." Lastly, and this made me chuckle, I can't help but wonder where an Italian street vendor procured squash in the mid-1300s! I enjoyed this novel more or less via brute force, struggling against the many small irritants throughout. ( )

Too slow of a start and I didn't expect the time travel aspect. ( )

Looong, but very well-done audio version. Fascinating story.

DNF 51%!

I so wanted to like this book since time travel books are a favorite genre of mine. But, the more I read the more I started to get annoyed with the book and at this point, I can't see how it could get any better.

Some thoughts I had about the book:

* I can't see how a modern woman can adjust to Italy in the 14th-century so well. Just understanding the language or being understood should be hard.
* Did she magically transport back in time? No clue since no explanation is given, perhaps it will come at the end of the book, but I'm not really that eager to find out.
* The painter is living in the house Beatrice lived in the future. And, they seem to be fated to be together. Too bad that their romance is lacking all the chemistry needed for it to work. And, that the whole fated thing is bothering me.
* The Medici murder thing and pestilence plot felt unnecessary and boring and the "villain" is so inept that it's laughable. Is she sent back in time to stop this or what? I don't care.
* The author absolute done a great job with the research, but the story is wordy and slow and I failed to connect with the characters. Honestly, as I wrote this little "review" did I have to think for a couple of seconds to remember Beatrice name. Oh, and Beatrice is apparently psychic also. Can feel others feelings and see things.

I want to thank the publisher for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley for an honest review.

For all the Outlander-read-likes I've read over the years, this novel comes the closest to capturing the magic of that beloved novel and it does so in its own unique setting (1300s Italy) and its own mythology. Beatrice is a twenty-first-century neurosurgeon who gets pulled into research on the Black Death in Siena after the death of her brother, who was a historian. Immersed in a 14th-century diary, Beatrice stumbles into time travel, arriving in Siena less than a year before the plague. She finds work as a scribe and begins to create a life for herself in medieval Italy, which includes a handsome painter, but Beatrice also worries what will happen when the plague arrives and rival forces may have their own designs on Siena's future. This book was immersive, engaging, and very enjoyable. I will look for more from this author. ( )