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

I’ve tried several times to finish this book. The premise is promising, especially for someone who loves Outlander. But the suspense of belief is too great and the writing is a big yawn. Made it a 1/3 of the way through and gave up.

I originally started The Scribe of Siena last September/October, but I just didn’t have the time to get through it all. It’s quite a massive book, and I only had it for two weeks before someone else had their turn, so I remembered my page number, got back on the waiting list, and vowed to get it back. Unfortunately, I never did get the chance to finish reading the book, but I’ve been doing so well with audiobooks that I thought I would give it a shot.

I really got into it, and I loved that it resembled Outlander except in Italy rather than Scotland. Historically speaking, I know barely ANYTHING about medieval Italy (or its separate states, since Italy wasn’t a thing back then) so I loved the history of it all.

Obviously the story can’t just be about a time-traveling woman, so there was an added storyline thrown into the mix. I wasn’t a huge fan of it. I don’t want to get too involved with spoilers and such, but the side storyline wasn’t quite to my taste. There also wasn’t a lot to the love story between Gabriele and Beatrice. It came on very sudden, with almost no warning, and then it felt like it was over. There wasn’t that slow burn I love most about romantic novels. I did get a little uncomfortable during a sex scene as the narrator was painting the picture for me. That was something I’ve never experienced before, and I’m not sure if I want to!

Beatrice ends up traveling from the 21st century all the way back to Siena in the 14th century. That’s quite a distance traveled, and it’s scary to imagine what life would be like for a modern woman in that day. Women typically didn’t hold jobs. They were defenseless without a man present. Once married, they were practically owned by their husbands. I don’t know if anything would keep me rooted in that time.

She shows up during a time just before the great plague marks its beginnings, and she is desperate to either return to her own time or find a way to slow the plague from killing much of Siena’s citizens. As a doctor, she has a lot of knowledge that could be particularly useful, but it’s Beatrice’s ability to read and write that becomes the most valuable asset of the time. So she becomes the scribe of Siena.

I really enjoyed many aspects of this story. The Scribe of Siena came recommended to me by my grandmother, so I thought it would be a knockout read. Unfortunately, there were just too many things about it that I didn’t enjoy. Maybe it’ll be a better read for you! But, trust me, if you enjoyed Outlander, this is definitely a book you should check out!

Loved this book! A beautifully written story with time travel, romance and art.

It was slow to begin But got really interesting when you’re able to get to the heart of the plot.

Magnificent. Just enough of the supernatural to be satisfying without being campy. Scribes, artists, and political intrigue in medieval Italy? Sign me up! I fervently hope to see more from this author.

A book attempting to be in the vein of The Da Vinci Code but with time travel and less action and suspense. The story itself, about a neurosurgeon who inexplicably time travels to XIVth Century Sienna just before the plague and tries to discover the mystery of why Sienna was hit so hard, was interesting but the execution was not what it could have been. .

Since I read an ARC, I hope that the final copy was edited more tightly. Sentences went on running, information dumps happened in every single page, characters spoke for too long. This book could have easily been a third of its size without the plot suffering. Yes, I understand the author did very thorough research, she was proud of said research, and wanted to showcase it. However, it was done clunkily, in ways that did not feel organic. The book was unnecessarily long which made it feel heavy and the story dragged.

I can understand why the author decided to have multiple POVs, but switching from first person to third constantly, was tiresome and off putting. I didn't connect to Beatrice's first person POV any better than to the third person POVs and I think having the other POVs, where you saw sort of behind the scenes of what Beatice knew, took away from the suspense because they didn't just give you hints of what happened but blatantly told you so.

The first half of the book is very slow, the pace feels like it drags. Then, when the plague finally hits Messina, it picks up but surprisingly enough, for a book about a modern doctor who travels back to Italy right before the Black Death, the author chooses to have her character travel back to modern times so that she essentially misses all the plague and her background as a doctor does not come into play. Why make a character a doctor if you're not going to use said profession to enhance your plot? It wasn't even a big part of Beatrice's discovery when she does go back in time.

I enjoyed reading about a time in history of which not many people write fiction novels. However, I think I liked the premise of the book more than the book itself.

Thank you to NetGalley and Touchstone for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review.