In the mid-1600s, Lady Ann Fanshawe kept both a receipt book, filled with her personal recipes for medicines, food, and drinks, and wrote a memoir of her life to pass down to her children. Lucy Moore uses these documents to recreate the life of this woman, who lived through the English Civil war that pitted Charles I against Oliver Cromwell. Ann and her husband, Richard, were staunch Royalists, so their life during this time was full of quick departures, new countries, and uncertainty. Through it all they seem to have maintained a loving and respectful partnership. They had thirteen children together, only five of whom survived to adulthood. Moore reprints a receipt at the beginning of each chapter, mainly medicinal recipes, and then uses the recipe as a jumping off point to talk about what was going on in Ann's life or in the larger English world.

I love this kind of nonfiction, that takes primary source material from long ago to illuminate the life of a woman. Certainly Ann, who was literate and wealthy, did not live an "average" woman's life of the 1600s, but her experience still sheds light on what life was like for the less known and studied people of the era. I really enjoyed this and would recommend to anyone who likes this sort of nonfiction - I think you know who you are!

Original publication date: 2017
Author’s nationality: British
Original language: English
Length: 416 pages
Rating: 4 stars
Format/where I acquired the book: gift
Why I read this: off the shelf, interested in the topic ( )