I ended up DNFing this book. I could not get into the characters nor the story. I went in blind, having never heard nor read the Golden Bowl, I feel like it may have helped to appreciate this story.

The Prince was a novel that caused me to feel many emotions from disbelief to horror to hope and everything in-between. Had I not been able to emphasize with certain thoughts, beliefs or characters, I would have given up on this book. Ms. Smith's personal retelling of a classic is well worth the read. My best interpretation of this novel were best enjoyed when I ignored the fact that it was a retelling of Henry James’s The Golden Bow (that Ms. Smith's based the story on) . I found myself the most engaged when I focused the novel I was reading. I was able to enjoy the book presented without any expectations of what I was going to read. Instead, there were unexpected twists, turns and surprises. The Prince was easy to get lost in; the ending was priceless...

The Prince is a modern retelling of the Golden Bowl by Henry James, I came into this knowing very little of the original story. I personally couldn’t get into it. The authors prose just wasn’t capturing enough for me. I only got a few chapters into the story before I DNFed. This is probably the perfect book for someone, but not for me.

Thanks to the publisher for a copy of this book. An enjoyable read which I believe is based on a classic novel which I have not read. Well written, while awful, characters drive the story which held my attention to the end.

A beautiful cover and fresh take on a Henry James classic. This would be a great accompaniment to a college course on James and could easily be transformed into a popular television series.

Emily and Federico are looking forward to starting a new life together. She comes from a wealthy family, the Woodfords. Federico is royal. Who wouldn't love that? There was a big deal back in Rome between Prince Fed and Emily's BFF, Christina. Christina reaches out to Emily and asks if she can attend, and Emily says, "Sure, buddy! Looking forward to seeing you. In fact, I'll pay for your flight! ” Christina doesn't mention she just wants a peek at her boy toy. Well, we've got a pickle on our hands when Emily's dad, Henry, decides he likes Christina, too.
Quite the story.
Smith's writing is mostly good. Although the dialogue is flat and forced, which isn't right for a story this juicy.
I liked it, but it could have been so much better.

The Prince - Donitia Smith is the story of an
Italian Prince with a title but without wealth, a very rich American woman and her co-dependent father, plus an old lover make for some interesting situations.
I am told that The Prince is a modern day spin on The Golden Bowl, a classic by Henry James that I have never read.
Many thanks to Meryl Moss Media for the opportunity to read an early copy. I enjoy being able to read the works of authors I’m not familiar with and to read works I might not have otherwise.

The Prince is a modern retelling of Henry James's The Golden Bowl. Though I have yet to read the classic, the book's writing was accessible enough that I was able to grasp the story. Admittedly, the dramatics of the novel came off too much as a soapy telenovela to me, with all its family secrets and twists. With its unlikeable and plain characters, it's a fairly average novel that, like a telenovela, is mildly entertaining and grips you by promising a booming ending - yet falls flat with a lackluster conclusion.

Frederico is an impoverished Italian prince and the book starts with Frederico signing a prenuptial agreement with the Woodford's lawyer. Frederico is set to marry Emily Woodford, the daughter of an extremely wealthy and powerful businessman, Henry Woodford.

Frederico and Emily are married soon but not before they meet Christina - Emily's school friend and Frederico's ex. Christina is at the wedding too and Henry is struck by her beauty and nature. In a twist of fate, Henry ends up marrying Christina. Now Frederico and Christina are in frequent contact as in-laws, but will they be able to overcome their passionate feelings for each other? Frederico, in the meantime, is feeling increasingly emasculated by Emily and Henry. Will his resentment make him take the wrong decision?

This book is based on Henry James' The Golden Bowl which I haven't read. So, I had no point of reference (though I did a quick bit of online research). But I feel the author hit the nail on the head.

I always vehemently oppose infidelity in marriage. But in this book, I couldn't get angry at Frederico and Christina. What they did was wrong but what else could they have done? I found myself justifying their affair and I think this is one of the author's successes.

I also loved the writing. It was reminiscent of the literature of the 20th century (the original book was a classic). The book was a beautiful character study and I love character studies.

A quick read with sensual writing (no erotic scenes), this book will remain in my mind for quite some time.

4.5 stars rounded up to 5

Thanks to Netgalley and Dinitia Smith for the ARC.

In “The Prince”, Dinitia Smith modernizes a Henry James classic, “The Golden Bowl” by moving the setting to modern day and to Long Island. A wealthy daughter marries an impoverished Italian prince. They are happy and have a child, until the daughter’s friend inserts herself into their lives. She is a former lover of the prince, and marries the daughter’s father. Her motivations are unclear. The friend ends up resuming her affair with prince. It was hard to get into the character’s head and understand their actions, but I kept reading to find out what was going to happen, waiting for a big explosive reveal. The ending fell flat for me.

I would compare this book to the old adage of watching a train wreck. You know you shouldn't but you just can't look away. The characters in this book were really not good people. I knew from the beginning where the plot was headed and I read on. I couldn't look away.

This book centers on a wealthy family where the daughter and an impoverished prince from Italy fall in love and marry. Everything might have stayed beautiful and glorious if one of her school friends hadn't been a previous mistress of his. Unable to let him go, Christina keeps showing up in an effort to tempt Federico. She eventually goes so far as to marry his father-in-law, Henry in order to always be around.

The story is basically about the machinations of these four people: Emily, her father, Henry, her husband Federico and his former lover Christina. It's quite juicy and a bit irritating. I was flatly infuriated at some of the blatant disrespect that occurred. That said, it was a book and it had a story to tell. And I read it until the very end because I was mesmerized. That's the sign of a good story....like it or not.

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC. I voluntarily chose to read and review it and the opinions contained within are my own.

The Prince is a modern retelling of The Golden Bowl by Henry James, a novel I have never read. Even without understanding the context of the 1904 novel, the reader can still enjoy modern version. The Prince is a saga full of family secrets. The story alternates between character point-of-views, giving the reader a glimpse of their inner monologue and the past events that come back to haunt their present.

This novel slowly builds to a crescendo but then falls flat after revelations are exposed. This Prince is a quick read full of unlikable characters. Thank you Meryl Moss Media Group for the advance reader copy. Not sure I'd label this novel a romance.

General Fiction (Adult) | Literary Fiction | Romance

This was an average story about people of average emotional depth having an averagely-exciting affair.

The two surviving members of the Woodford family, father Henry and daughter Emily, are rich. Italian Prince Federico is not. The marriage between Federico and Emily Woodford seems ideal — she gets a title, he gets her family money. Between Emily’s attachment to her father and Federico’s dependence on Woodford money, however, their partnership starts to fray. The return of Christina, Emily’s childhood friend and Federico’s secret former lover, only wears even further on a relationship that’s already wearing thin.

A blurb for this book claims that’s it for fans of Sally Rooney; personally, I think the writing style, although minimalistic and quiet, more closely resembles that of mid-1900s classic authors like Hemingway or Steinbeck. There’s something a bit antique about this book, despite it being set in the present, that I don’t think will fit quite right with the Sally Rooney crowd.

That being said, the writing style is close and intimate — the characters are clearly the focus, more than their world or the wealth that surrounds them. To the right reader, this might be appealing. To me, it felt like the characters were walking through blank space.

Additionally, the characters seem distant. There are few emotional moments and no drama at all. Everyone is reserved and withdrawn; if not for the multiple POVs, it would have been impossible to know what anyone was thinking.

Overall, this was a quiet book about remarkable people (a prince, an heiress) engaging in a remarkable activity (cheating) in an unremarkable way. The novel’s writing and atmosphere are coherent and clearly are meant to serve a purpose, but I think suffocated this story a bit too much for my taste. It was not a bad book by any means, but it didn’t hit home for me either. Perhaps fans of 20th century American classic literature will like this better than I did.

As a modern retelling of the Henry James Classic "The Golden Bowl," The Prince reads just like a classic. The writing style really had me feeling like I was transported to a different time, although, the setting is modern day New York and Italy.

Frederico is a prince, in name only. There are no lands, and definitely there is no money. He has connections which lead him to meet Emily, a wealthy American. He has recently recovered from a heated relationship, so rebound has its name all over this. And money does not hurt. The Woodford family, although filthy rich, do not act like the filthy rich. They are kind and very generous, helping Frederico take care of his ailing mother and aunt back in Italy.

Frederico and Emily get along very well, but when his ex shows up for the wedding and reveals that she and Emily are old school buddies, things become tense. The meeting is brief since Christina still lives in Italy, but after a few years of blissful marriage and a child, she returns.

Christina becomes a part of the family. When an affair begins, relationships are strained. The entire family tip toes around each other, trying to keep or deny secrets. Dinitia Smith does an excellent job of bluntly telling the Woodford family saga, triumph and tragedy. The struggles that each character experiences are deftly revealed and makes the reader either love or hate the person. The reader is either rewarded or disappointed with the ending, but either way, it is satisfying.

Thank you to Arcade and NetGalley for the digital ARC. The opinions expressed are my own.

I could not put this book down, it was so much fun to read, I think mainly because of the drama and the secrets. I never read The Golden Bowl, so I have nothing to compare this to. We meet such different characters, first is Federico, who is a broke prince from Italy, who is about to marry Emily, who comes from a really rich but not too lavish family. Her dad Henry is amazing, I mean, this man comes to NYC because of a job at a bank, and Henry is VERY generous with his gifting to the point that Federico doesn’t even have to work a day in his life. Anyway, things start to get real when his ex Christina comes into the picture and ironically she was childhood friends with his soon to be wife. THE DRAMA!!!!!!!!!!! I was here for all of it! I was on the edge of my seat, because he had a past with this woman and it was a meaningful one at least for her ad clearly for him too. The end left me hanging a little, and I had to reread it, but it was a good read. Thank you Netgalley and the publishers for giving me the opportunity to read this book.

Federico the Italian prince marries into the Woodford family, a stiflingly intimate household of two: 27-yr old Emily and her dad Henry. The Woodford's astounding wealth came from West Virginia town of Woodford founder Ephraim Consider Woodford, who'd built steel mills, coal mines, railroads and ships. The story opens with preparations for Federico and Emily's wedding, attended by Emily's half-Italian friend Christina Verano, so beautiful she ends up marrying her father. I haven't read The Golden Bowl, which this book is a modern adaptation of. So I don't know if I'm mad at Dinitia Smith or Henry James for the two-dimensionality of some of the characters, or the bad choices that they make, or the way Emily is described entirely in small, birdlike, child-sized, short, demure terms whereas Christina is all slender, tall, long-necked, thin, in comparison. There a lot of things that Smith gets right in the re-telling, I like her use of technology, social media and slang in different languages; but then I felt the fact that neither Emily nor Federico work at all just didn't work in a present day context. While parts of this story didn't seem super realistic to me, the ending really did.

The Woodfords, a wealthy family centered around father Henry and daughter Emily, have been each other’s worlds since the death of their matriarch. But when Emily marries Italian prince Federico, all bets are off as Christina, a childhood friend of Emily and former lover of Federico, re-enters the scene and captures Henry’s heart. In a home full of secrets, who can you trust?

I liked this book. While I have never read Henry James’ Golden Bowl (the inspiration for this book), I still felt I could enjoy it without knowing the story in advance. It was a domestic drama filled with secrets. I liked the multiple POVs because you get to hear from each of the main characters (plus a family friend), which keeps you informed of their intentions and inner monologue. It felt that we, more than any other person in the book, had the closest to the full picture.

I will say, I felt it had a slow start, but picks up as the drama heats up. While I was a little frustrated with the ending, I understand why. I think the description is accurate and that folks who like Kate Atkinson will like this book. This could also be a great book club book because I can see this book generating a ton of different opinions.

Thanks to NetGalley and Arcade for sharing this e-arc with me. All opinions my own.

"The Prince" is a modern retelling of Henry James' "The Golden Bowl." In it, our hero marries a woman who is the sole daughter of a man of old family wealth. Unfortunately for the new bride, her old friend, it turns out, had a passionate affair with the groom prior to their marriage--and now being forced to move in the same circles, the old tension is back. There's another layer to the story of adultery here, but I'll not spoil it.

What's good: After a slightly sluggish start, the book moves along rapidly. While I didn't especially love any of the characters, I found myself holding my breath, waiting for the bomb to drop. And that's what the book ultimately is--holding us on the peak, making us wait to find out if the inevitable will happen. Along the way, it does make you think of the different relationships involved and the motivations of some of the characters--in this way, the book is well set for a book club selection.

What's iffier: The book hews fairly closely to the outline of "The Golden Bowl." It's been so long since I read that that, frankly, this book felt very new to me.

Thanks to Netgalley for sharing this ARC with me!

Enter Federico, a penniless Italian prince who is about to marry Emily Woodford, the only child of the family’s widowed patriarch, Henry. When Emily's beautiful, enigmatic childhood friend, Christina.When I started reading I couldn't put it down. Dinitia Smith is magnifysent and amazing writer.I cannot wait to read more of there books.Keep up the great work.You should definitely read this book.Can't wait for the next

I can see why the blurb compared the writing style to that of Sally Rooney. I am a huge Sally Rooney fan so I wouldn’t say it’s quite that good but I definitely enjoyed this story. It started out a little slowly but once I was hooked I couldn’t put it down.

This is supposed to be loosely based on The Golden Bowl by Henry James. I’ve never read The Golden Bowl and I’m no great scholar of Henry James but this read like a Classic, in my opinion (which is a compliment as I’ve always loved Classics). However, the remoteness between the reader and the characters that I always feel when reading a Classic doesn’t work as well for a modern story, or maybe it’s just that it was more noticeable in a contemporary setting.

I think this would make a good book club read as there is a lot to dissect and discuss and I think people could have very strong opinions about the plot.