Holland, summer 1672.  Cornelis De Witt is the victim of changes in the political climate, and not that much later he and his brother Johan are the victims of a mob that satisfies its lust for blood on them. 

Just before they are lynched Cornelis De Witt sends his servant to his godson Cornelius Van Baerle, a gentle scholar with a passion for tulips, to bring him a note urging him to burn a bundle of letters De Witt has left at Van Baerle's place some time ago, burn them without reading.  But the distracted Van Baerle forgets both the note and the letters. He's mostly concentrated on his tulips, on his attempts to breed new kinds, and mostly on the race towards being the first to grow a black tulip.  And he might have one next spring! 

His neighbour, the less successful tulip-gardener Isaac Boxtel, suspects Van Baerle will be winning the reward for being the first to grow a black tulip, and enviously reports in an anonymous letter that he saw Van Baerle receive a bundle of papers from the disfavoured De Witt.  The police indeed finds the incriminating letters, and Van Baerle is condamned to death. 

He resigns himself in the fact he won't ever see his black tulip grow, but at the last moment Wilhelm of Orange pardons him and converts the sentence to life-long emprisonment.  Van Baerle's life is suddenly full of perspectives.  Not only has he regained the chance to grown that black tulip, but the love of Rosa, the beautiful daughter of his jailer, brightens up the days he spend between his four walls.  But Van Baerle's enemy, Boxtel, who had hoped to gain the tulip-bulbs after his execution, hasn't given up hope yet to grab those bulbs...  

The story starts with an overview of the final hours of the De Witt brothers, and then slowy shifts from a historical novel to the fictional history of Van Baerle, and his awakening - or should I say budding - love for Rosa.  That makes certainly the first page discouraging, with one of the longest opening sentences I saw so far, and a series of historical facts.  But perseverance will be rewarded with a very entertaining story.  There's not much action, everything happens in just one house and two prison-cells, yet this makes that no big descriptions are needed, we can for example follow that developing love like the two young lovers experience it: via just a few words every day, and that makes everything feel much more authentic. 

The tulip itself is hardly ever present, yet its presence is there all the time.  Van Baerle's life, Boxtel's jealousy, the jailer's anger, Rosa's love, al are colored by the flower.  And it is that same flower that lets both Van Baerle and Rosa see each other in a different light, and makes them learn to accept things they wouldn't otherwise have accepted, or not so easily at least.  

It's not a swirling adventure like Dumas' Three Musketeers or the Count of Monte Christo, in stead it's a short and easy to read charming love story.  Still, even if you expected those swirling adventures, you won't be disappointed.