MixedLitReactorThe Dig presents an interesting topic, but it's unfortunately slow to start. The first chapter walks the reader through Mrs. Pretty interviewing an archaeologist for the excavation, then proceeding to discuss his payment contract and shovel budget. Packed with realistic archaeological details, The Dig isn't clumsily written, it's just very, very straightforward. It's almost as though the author is afraid to get too close with his characters, possibly hesitant to sensationalize historic details. That's an understandable impulse in a narrative based heavily on real events, but it makes for somewhat unrelatable protagonists ... This subdued style has a certain appeal to it as well; The Dig is a comfortable, calming sort of book with the additional merit of a truly intriguing subject. Preston has clearly conducted substantial research on the topic of the Sutton Hoo dig, even as the author admits to making some alterations for dramatic effect. It's an intelligent if occasionally dry evocation of a country on the brink of permanent change.
Danielle Dutton
PositiveLitReactor\"If you aren\'t the sort of reader easily wooed by the usual trappings of historical fiction, Margaret the First might be a good place to reconsider, or at least make a detour. Dutton\'s writing is vivid and honest—she doesn\'t paint the past in all rosy hues, but describes the smell of yeast and mold on city streets, stacks of soldiers\' bodies, \'the birdmen with their leather masks\' stepping between corpses after a bout of plague. But neither is it purely grim. Instead, the people she describes (particularly Margaret herself) feel real. They swat gnats and grow bored and worry about seeming too vain.\
