Anne Fortier - Juliet

review by Ro (guru) Bennett on show 10th March
When I started the book I thoroughly enjoyed it. My sister gave it to me with wholehearted recommendations but I was slow to start reading it because it is based on the story of Romeo and Juliet and I still have an allergic reaction to Shakespeare since having it crammed down my throat at school.
However, the author, Anne Fortier (and her mother according to the credits) does know the story inside out and the book did get me researching the history of the play and the different versions of the Romeo and Juliet story, of which Shakespeare’s play became the most famous although, it was not entirely Shakespeare’s own invention.
I found the different versions of the story very interesting. An early version written in 1476 by Masuccio Salernitano is set in Siena, not Verona. Siena is also where the main action in this book takes place. Anne Fortier has a good knowledge of its geography, history, culture and architecture which she puts to good use in the book. She has obviously spent a good deal of time linking Salernitano’s story with places and buildings in Siena, and working them into her plot.


This is an introduction to the book.
Julie Jacobs and her twin sister, Janice, lost their parents in a terrible accident while they were very young. They know they were born in Italy and that their Great-Aunt Rose has been raising them in the U.S. ever since. The rest of their family history is a mystery.
Upon Aunt Rose’s death, the twins discover that Janice has inherited Aunt Rose’s estate while Julie is left with a passport for someone named Giulietta Tolomei, a key, and a cryptic note about treasure awaiting her in Italy. Julie is surprised to discover that she is Giulietta Tolomei and that her aunt changed the twins’ names when she brought them to America. Confused, brokenhearted, flat broke and with nothing to lose, Julie embarks on an Italian adventure.
The story fluctuates between 1340, when their ancestors Giulietta Tolomei and Romeo Marescotti were entwined in a forbidden romance and the modern-day relationship between Julie Jacobs and ??? - who are alive and well and possibly still cursed with the ancient ‘a plague on both thy houses’.
Unfortunately, as it progresses, the story becomes very convoluted and action packed like a mixture of a Dan Brown novel and an Indiana Jones film involving centuries-old family feuds, mistaken identities, stolen artifacts, gangsters and intricate plots which ended up irritating me.
Having said that, I do like her writing style and her humour and she certainly does know her subject inside out.
review by Ro