In the tradition of books about strong Jewish women, which includes The Red Tent (1997)and Sarah (2004), comes this story of Ruth, a woman of the Middle Ages who fights against the prejudice that surrounds her gender and religion. The daughter of an influential rabbi in Cologne, 23-year-old Ruth is a highly skilled midwife, but she is also the obsession of Solitario, a Dominican inquisitor. Spurned by Ruth's mother, he is determined to destroy the daughter and uses Ruth's practice of kabbalah--seen as a form of Jewish magic--to launch his attack. Ruth is even more vulnerable to the inquisitor after she falls in love with Detlef von Tennan, a churchman struggling with his loyalty to Catholicism. Fans of sweeping historical dramas will be enthralled by Ruth's story; remarkably, Learner writes with equal power about the intensity of Ruth's spirituality, the passion of her forbidden love for Detlef, and the horror of the torture she suffers at Solitario's hands. This is the kind of all-consuming novel that readers hate to see end. Grade BMy thoughts? From the moment I cracked the cover I was drawn into this amazing story. It was at times erotic, horrifying, and beautifully told. This book was written in third person, which can be somewhat confusing because the narrator changes throughout. I liked that the story is told in present tense, it made the narration fast paced and intense. I stayed up until 4 am in the morning finishing this book. I came to care about and love the main characters; Ruth and Detlef. I had to know how their story ended. It is a great love story set against the age of enlightenment, but I would hesitate to label it a romance novel. It reminds me more of The Red Tent than any true romance. I loved it and was sorry when I reached the end of the book.
It’s not often I fall for a fictional character and it has been a while since the last. The Witch of Cologne is a rich, historical novel named for the adventures of the young Jewish midwife, Ruth bas Elazar Saul. In short, she is charged with heresy by the inquisition and acquitted by the canon Detlef von Tennen. Detlef is introduced slowly to the story in glimpses that in turn paint him as both noble and naïve. But as their tale becomes more tightly bound, it was his character that I fell for. His lust for the female form turns into love as he comes to know Ruth and instead of turning him from his faith, this only strengthens it. He takes all of experiences and applies them directly to his perception of religion in a way I found both brave and moving. Tobsha Learner’s writing style is a little hard to get used to, but once immersed, it sings (or did to me) and I found different phrases repeating over in my head after I put the book down. There is, as other reviewers have noted, violence and sex in this novel. It is not set in a peaceful era, and the horror of the violence is well suited in my opinion. The sex is as strong an element of the novel and only serves to highlight the passionate nature of their love and awareness of themselves. As my attachment to Detlef grew, so did my drive to finish the novel, which did wane during some of the more political sections. There was a point where I had to put the book aside in grief and when I finally turned the last page it was with fresh tears and a sense that this story would find a place on my shelf and so stay with me physically and mentally for a long time.
What do You think about The Witch Of Cologne (2007)?
I really enjoyed the first 400 pages of this book, and then was quite disappointed with the last 50 pages. I just didn't like the end of the book, which was really sad --to spend so much time enjoying a story and characters and then not like the end. I would have given the book 4 stars, but dropped down to 3 stars because of the end of the book. The book has a great story, great characters, and a fascinating time period. You have the love story of 2 unlikely people, Ruth and Detlef. Ruth is a strong female character, a Jewish midwife, educated and crossing religious boundaries. Detlef is a canon, unhappy with his privileged upbringing and the politics inside the Catholic church, wanting more out of life. The book does a GREAT job detailing 17th Century Northern Europe (i.e Germania and the Netherlands), about 20 years after the Thirty Years' War, getting into the philosophers and their ideas of the Age of Enlightenment. The book is a really well-researched historical fiction.
—Kristin
Sex.Brutal Torture.The aforementioned scenes are described in great detail: ". . . eyeballs bulge like reddened hen's eggs then burst out of his head." [p 425:] - Eww!A juicy historical novel, which takes place in 17th Century Northern Europe - Germania and the Netherlands - approximately, 20 years after the Thirty Years' War. It is the early years of the Age of Enlightenment and as the book alludes, it is also a period of political exploitations, hypocrisy and superstition. The novel focuses on the lives of Detlef - an aristocratic Catholic Canon to the Cathedral in Cologne, who eventually converts to a Remonstrant (Calvinist) - and Ruth - a Jewish mid-wife, described as a woman before her time or as Benedict Spinoza refers to her as "a freak of nature: a man's intellect trapped within the form of a woman." [p. 379:], and who is accused of witchcraft. What brings them together is their common desire for a world where man is equal and where there is a freedom of beliefs and thoughts: "To be believe in a God who cannot be bribed, who can exist side by side with knowledge; to dream of other ways of civilizing a nation, to yearn for a democracy in which slave and master no longer exist -" [p. 163:]. Of different backgrounds and faiths, love has no boundaries for Ruth and Detlef.
—Laura
There were elements of this story that I really liked. It managed to pique a latent interest in Kabbalah, and add further fuel to my growing interest in enlightenment history and Holland's role as a world power following the death of Queen Elizabeth I. I also like the emphasis the author placed on intellectual love and the "meeting of true minds" that then fueled the romantic love. That said, there were also rather cliched elements to the story - and I particularly disliked the conceit of telling an historical fiction while making the protagonists both "characters before their times" which to some end then becomes so anachronistic as to remove me from the story.
—Emily Ann Meyer
