This is the second book I've read by Ms. Gable, it makes me wonder, in a universe filled with books set in Paris why did I pick two by the same author? Who knows--I expect I was intrigued by the storylines. This novel imagines a tale around the fascinating true story of a treasure stocked Parisian apartment, left abandoned, and only opened for the first time in 70 years. The treasures included a portrait of Marthe de Florian, a famous courtesan, by the Belle Epoch master, Giovanni Boldini, along with love letters, taxidermy, furniture, and a stuffed original Mickey Mouse. You can find pictures of the apartment on line. The real-life story is fascinating enough.
This novel imagines an alternate side story of a young American woman, a specialist in contemporary furniture at Sotheby's who is contracted to determine the provenance and value of the furniture in the apartment. She becomes fascinated with the story of Marthe and gets access to read her "journals". While many letters and documents remained in the apartment there is no reference to journals so I imagine this is the mechanism the author used to imagine a deeper back story out of Marthe de Florian's known past.
This author loves to paint stories out of the lives of famous (infamous) women, in both cases as with Irene N. the truth is a more compelling fascinating story than the fiction. Of Ms. Gable's two books I liked this one better, and yes I did do a lot of extra reading regarding the actual history behind this story. This novel revolves around relationships, romance, the past and the present.
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