There are many quotable moments within, some memorable characters you can see as they walk into rooms. The author really does captivate in her descriptions: Personally, I’d have like to know more about how she approached creating her characters as well – endowing even relatively minor characters with complex/complicating private hinterlands.

I don’t know where to start with this book, it took my breath away and I feel bereft that it has finished.Berry perfectly captures the role of the press and the tabloids in relation to figureheads and celebrities, and how the media can whip people up into a frenzy, regardless of whether what they print is true.

Most of the novel is set in 1993 when Laura Lazarescu, a young London lawyer of Yanussian descent, travels to Yanussia as part of the legal team called in to defend Marija Popa, wife of the former dictator, Constantin Popa. Marija is charged with money laundering, bribery, fraud and corruption. The story is book-ended by events in 2018, when Marija dies and Laura reflects on earlier events. The story is told in the first person by Laura. Gender roles and stereotypes are a key theme throughout The Dictator's Wife, and the reader is challenged on their own views and beliefs about what limits exist around an individual's gender. To some degree, the reader has to decide what they believe to be true from the conflicting narratives that are presented to them. I loved the idea behind the book, however, I didn’t love its execution. I found the two main characters (especially Marija) very detached from everything and everyone. Marija exploited Laura’s weaknesses to her own advantage. Laura, on the other hand, was gullible and I found her actions very irksome, particularly when concerning her mother. The book follows Laura, a young lawyer, who is part of a team who go to the country of her exiled parents, to defend the wife of the dead former leader, accused of being complicit in his crimes. As her parents escaped the country, and do not want their daughter to go to defend Marija Popa, this leads to a fracture in their already fragile relationship, damaged by a lifetime of secrets. Yet, in reality, Elena's success was a fiction. Her reputation was falsely built up thanks to a fraudulent PhD, appointments to Central Committee positions, and extensive propaganda—all helped along by the intervention of the Securitate, Romania's brutal secret police. The path to prestigeThat said, there are plentiful ingredients in the tale, with questions arising about whether information leaks are happening and whether someone is working against them. Pavel, perhaps, as he was seen making a clandestine visit to the prosecutor's office, even though he may have been one of Marija's former lovers, or Radutu, the team's barrister, who may still be associated with the good old days. Maybe even Ecaterina, Marija's sister, possibly still holding an old family grudge. And then there’s an American investment banker in the picture, a possible dark history involving the mansion they are staying in and questions regarding the relevance of the country's famous sweet manufacturing facility formerly run by Marija's sister. To the broader world, dictators may appear clearly obvious. But local people in Colombia loved Pablo Escobar; some Russian people like Putin and believe he is doing the best for their country etc (maybe not right this second, but generally). Laura Lăzărescu is a lawyer, a junior associate in a law firm that embarks on the biggest case of the century: defending infamous Marija Popa, the wife of the Yanussian dictator, Constantin Popa, accused of many crimes. In her heyday Popa, we are told, introduced an all-female staff to her factory long before “girl power” became a rallying cry. She palled around with Ronald Reagan, Paul Newman and Saddam Hussein, and was a particular favourite of the British queen. She is described as “a hypnotic blend of Joan of Arc and Imelda Marcos; both goddess and she-devil, princess and tyrant, martyr and uber-bitch”. Imelda Marcos talks to the press at the Manila international airport on 10 December 1997. Photograph: Bullit Marquez/AP

This was marketed as an exploration of power and complicity, proving at questions like how guilty is a wife/spouse for the other persons crimes, an idea which I found really intriguing! But it simply wasn’t this at all. The writing style I found immature and the place names, character names and settings unrealistic. Donald and Melania Trump at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on 20 January 2021. Photograph: Stefani Reynolds/EPA My hands down favourite aspect of this book were the characters, they felt so three dimensional and were well done. The Dictator’s wife herself was such a compelling woman to read about, I felt as fascinated by her as the narrator. She had such an alluring energy to her, I was captivated by the way she held herself and the way she spoke. I think she was a great character to study. I’m a little bit obsessed with her, I’d literally love to read more about her in her own book to be honest. The beautiful, enigmatic wife of a feared dictator stands trial for her late husband’s crimes against the people. The world will finally know the truth. But whose? Demands to be devoured in one sitting. S umptuously written... One of the most compelling literary debuts of the year ' GLAMOURHer interest in chemistry arose when she was briefly employed in a laboratory. In her free time, she attended meetings of the Youth Communists' League, where she met her soon-to-be husband Nicolae. She failed nearly every subject that was taught in Romanian schools. Goodreads Librarians are volunteers who help ensure the accuracy of information about books and authors in the Goodreads' catalog. The Goodreads Libra Goodreads Librarians are volunteers who help ensure the accuracy of information about books and authors in the Goodreads' catalog. The Goodreads Librarians Group is the official group for requesting additions or updates to the catalog, including: Set in the fictional country of Yanussia, Marija Popa, wife of the dead former leader, is set to stand trial. She is accused of being complicit in her husband’s actions but declares herself to be innocent of all the charges that are piling up against her. She seeks out a defence team from England comprised of two of her fellow Yanussians. Laura has not stepped foot in her native country since she was a child; her parents never speak of their time in Yanussia and Laura is desperate to find out what happened to them, and specifically to her mother, to make their relationship so strained when she became a teenager. Is Marija telling the truth? Is she as innocent as she proclaims to be? This is very different from most books around at the moment, which makes it a refreshing read. I would thoroughly recommend this book, it will make you really think about the structures of power and how it can, and is, abused.

The author has created an imaginative Eastern European country, and has set the novel in the early 1990s, under the shadow of the fall of communism and the raising of the Iron Curtain. The fictious country of Yanussia was formerly a part of the USSR and now that the doors have been flung open, its populace are gunning for justice against the corruption of the past…or are they? If you want to look at the influence of a first lady’s style, look no further than Vogue, says Berry, , pointing to the image-making moment of Jill Biden’s first cover on the high fashion magazine. The 70-year-old is seen smiling, wearing a floral-patterned blue dress, leaning against a White House balcony – a wholesome contrast to Melania Trump’s opulent couture. The "trial" that sealed the Ceausecus' fate was perhaps the perfect foil for the decades of falsification and fraud that defined Elena's scientific career. Behr calls the proceedings "farcical" and it is clear that the prosecutors were performing an act of restitution that the entire nation desperately needed. This is a brilliant novel, in my opinion, and anyone who has an interest in reading novels about the Cold War, post Cold War, and life in Eastern Europe when it was part of the USSR, should seek this one out. The author may have used a fictious country as her setting, but the experiences and circumstances have been based on actual former Eastern Bloc countries and the people who lived there. Outstanding. All is not what it seems, danger lurks everywhere, webs of lies and deceit unfold, information leaks, murder happens in the most unlikely places, a puppeteer holds all the strings but to what end and just how guilty is the wife of a Dictator?

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First ladies’ fashion choices are scrutinised in ways that would be unthinkable for their besuited husbands beyond their choice of tie colour. Conversely, not much ink has been spilled on the wardrobe choices of Doug Emhoff, second gentleman and spouse of Vice-President Kamala Harris.