Tulip Fever: A Captivating Historical Novel Set in 1630s Amsterdam
Tulip Fever by Deborah Moggach is a richly imagined historical novel that transports readers to Amsterdam during the height of tulipomania. This international bestseller combines sumptuous prose with thriller-like pacing, creating a story that is both literary and compulsively readable.
Plot Summary
In 1630s Amsterdam, the exotic tulip has seized the populace in a frenzy of speculation and desire. Wealthy merchant Cornelis Sandvoort commissions talented young painter Jan van Loos to create a portrait of himself and his beautiful young wife, Sophia. Cornelis yearns for an heir and hopes this portrait will serve as his legacy. However, as Van Loos captures Sophia's likeness on canvas, a forbidden passion ignites between the artist and his subject.
What begins as innocent sittings evolves into a dangerous liaison. As the portrait unfolds, so does a complex dance of ambitions, desires, and dreams among the household's inhabitants. The characters weave a grand deception, and as lies multiply, events accelerate toward a thrilling and tragic climax.
Critical Acclaim
The New York Times Book Review praised the novel's "sumptuous prose" and noted it "reads like a thriller." Los Angeles Times called it "an artful novel in every sense of the word" that "deftly evokes seventeenth-century Amsterdam's vibrant atmosphere." Entertainment Weekly described it as "taut with suspense and unexpected revelations," while The Philadelphia Inquirer found it "elegantly absorbing."
Major Motion Picture Adaptation
This sensual tale of art, lust, and deception has been adapted into a major motion picture, bringing Moggach's vivid recreation of Dutch Golden Age Amsterdam to the screen.
