Spotlight on the new release A Lady of Good Family by Jeanne Mackin. A great historical fiction novel. Don't forget to enter the drawing for a $15 Gift Card for Amazon or B&N. The link is below!
Publisher & Release Date: NAL,
June 2, 2015
Time
and setting: 1895-1920, Europe & America
Genre:
Historical Fiction
Length:
352 pages
Heat
Level: 1 Scorching Hot Flame
Rating: 3.5 Gold Crowns
Book Description:
Raised among wealth and
privilege during America’s fabled Gilded Age, a niece of famous novelist Edith
Wharton and a friend to literary great Henry James, Beatrix Farrand is expected
to marry, and marry well. But as a young woman traveling through Europe
with her mother and aunt, she already knows that gardens are her true passion.
How this
highborn woman with unconventional views escapes the dictates of society to
become the most celebrated female landscape designer in the country is the
story of her unique determination to create beauty and serenity while remaining
true to herself.
Beatrix’s
journey begins at the age of twenty-three in the Borghese Gardens of Rome,
where she meets beguiling Amerigo Massimo, an Italian gentleman of sensitivity
and charm—a man unlike any she has known before....
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Vikki’s
Musings
I accepted this book from the publisher via
Net-Galley in exchange for an honest review. A Lady of Good Family is
a glimpse of what the later days of the Gilded Age must have been like in
Europe and America. A time of privilege for member of society and the beginnings
of the “Nouveau Riche” told in third person narrative by a fictional character
to a group of friends in Massachusetts. It is the story of a remarkable woman,
Beatrix Jones Farrand, a renowned landscape artist. It covers a visit to the
continent to view the famous gardens in the various countries in 1895 and ends
in 1920.
While Beatrix explores Borghese Gardens of Rome, she meets Amarigo Massimo, a man
different from any other gentleman of her acquaintance. She is drawn to him,
but knows he is not the man for her. However, she is young and wants to fall in
love, so she encourages a relationship. Will the mystic of this man prove her
downfall, or will reason win out?
Beatrix is a fascinating woman who did not let the
dictates of society rule her choices or her life. She chose a path very few women
in her time would ever follow. She did not marry as a young woman, just to
conform to the times where women were not supposed to work outside the home. While
she did marry in her mid-life, she chose a man for the reason of mutual
companionship and someone who would not expect her to change the way she lived
her life. She is well-known for her incredible work designing Abby Aldrich
Rockefeller Garden, the Beatrix Farrand Garden at Bellefield in Hyde Park, New
York and Dumbarton Oaks, Washington D.C. to name a few.
While a fictional romantic thread runs through the
story, which is very enjoyable and one that could have easily happened during
this period of history, it is not the main focus of the book. This is definitely
not a romance, even though it does tell of a love story. This story delves into
the typical marriages of the times and many of them were not happy ones. It
deals with divorce when the dissolution of a marriage created a huge scandal
and was always the woman’s fault. It is no wonder Beatrix chose to avoid
marriage for so long.
What I struggled with while reading this book was
the lack of any explanation of some of the characters in the story. Since it is
told through the eyes of Daisy Winters, I also did not become invested in the
characters and at times had a hard time following along with the story. While
the description of the various gardens is vivid, I did not become enraptured
with them either. However, that is because I am not a gardener. I am sure
anyone who loves gardening and gardens will enjoy the descriptions greatly.
While I did not find this book to my tastes, it is
beautifully written and gave me a marvelous look into an age long past. Anyone
who loves history and learning about an era that has not had a lot of attention
will enjoy A Lady of Good Family. Happy reading!
Excerpt:
I will never marry, Beatrix thought. Never
She had passed through the first heady years of womanhood,
the first balls, first waltzes, first dancing card and house party invitations,
quickly discouraging any serious suitor. “My mother,” she had simply explained
when any young man tried to call on her a little too frequently. Now that most
of those young men had already wed, she felt she could easily avoid the issue
permanently.
She jumped up, eager to be away from the table. “I need to
walk,” she said to the others.
Still, they might never have met, the Italian and the
American.
Beatrix could have walked in the opposite direction, away
from the temple. She could have strolled through the rose garden or gone into
the casina. But she chose the temple, that eerie replica of pagan passion.
The gardens were full of Americans; the young man who had
just been soundly berated by his family lawyer disliked the sounds of their
voices, so full of German consonants, not at all soft like his own Italian. The
sounds of conquerors, he thought, laden with wealth and greed and taking much
of his homeland back with them when they returned to New York and Boston and
Chicago. That’s what the visit to his lawyer had been about: selling
artworks.
Empires rise and fall.
He lived in a land of fallen empire. Ahead of him, on the path, was an
example of the fall of empire, a group of boys, begging, grimy hands snaking
into folds and pockets of passing men and women. They had surrounded a young
woman and were practicing their street skills on her. He saw her face, the terror behind the forced
calmness of a tight smile. He changed
direction and headed toward her.
Still, they might never have met. He could have waved from a
distance, yelled a threat, driven the boys off with words. But he kept walking toward her.
Author Bio:
Jeanne Mackin ‘s latest novel, A Lady of Good Family, explores the
secret life of gilded age Beatrix Jones
Farrand, niece of Edith Wharton and the first woman professional landscape
design in America. Her previous novel, The
Beautiful American, based on the life of model turned war correspondent and
photographer, Lee Miller won the CNY 2015 prize for fiction. She has published
in American Letters and Commentary and SNReview and other publications and is
the author of the Cornell Book of Herbs and Edible Flowers. She was the recipient of a creative writing
fellowship from the American Antiquarian Society and her journalism has won
awards from the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education. She lives with her husband, Steve Poleskie, in Ithaca.
A Lady of Good Family is available at Barnes and Nobles, Amazon,
and other bookstores.
Links:
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