Beneath a Marble Sky - John Shors (****)

A monument to undying love!

A romantic reconstruction of imperial life in 17th century India, "Beneath a Marble Sky" recounts the turbulent story of princess Jahanara, the daughter of the emperor who commissioned the construction of the Taj Mahal as a fabulous testament to the overwhelming love of his wife. Well educated, literate, a wily diplomat, savvy political advisor and a bright, witty conversationalist and companion at a time when Muslim women were held in particularly low esteem, Jahanara has been well taught by her mother who bequeathed the solemn responsibility for the care of her ailing father to Jahanara on her death bed.

Now an elderly woman herself, the story is told in the form of a flashback narrated from Jahanara's point of view as she relates the fascinating, complex, violent and disturbing history of her family to her grand-daughters. Her soft spoken, pacifist eldest brother Dara, the rightful heir to the imperial throne dreams of the day he can see the Muslim community in peaceful co-existence with those professing the majority Hindu faith. In complete contrast, her younger brother, Aurangzeb, is so consumed by jealousy of his brother's position as heir and the deep hatred of Hindus whom he labels godless heretics, that he spends his entire life plotting the coup and the civil war necessary to steal the throne from his father and brother. Jahanara's story, set against the backdrop of the construction of the Taj Mahal also tells of her unrequited impossible love for Isa, architect of the Taj Mahal and a commoner that Jahanara can never marry and the exquisite pain of her arranged, political marriage to Khondamir, an ugly, evil, conniving merchant with some very sleazy, distasteful sexual proclivities.

"Beneath a Marble Sky" is many things for many readers - an accomplished historical fiction with lots of savory details for time and place; a compelling political page-turner loaded with intrigue, violence, passion and pathos; as well as a powerful moving romance that tells of three distinctly different but heart-warming relationships that come to fruition in ways that will draw a sigh and a smile from even the most romance-phobic male readers.

My taste in historical fiction would have enjoyed more time spent on the context of the story - more background, for example, as to the religious tensions that were so central to the story and perhaps a little more detail describing the common man's daily life in a setting which to us is so completely exotic and foreign. But, to his credit, Shors did not overstate his case or overstay his welcome by producing a needlessly padded heavyweight door-stopper which, sadly, is often the case with contemporary historical fiction authors.

Highly recommended.