As recovery from World War II begins, expat American Nora Tours travels from her home in southern France to London in search of her missing daughter. There, she unexpectedly meets up with an old acquaintance, famous model-turned war-photographer Lee Miller. Neither has emerged from the war unscathed. Nora and Lee knew each other in the heady days of late 1920's Paris, but Lee fails to realize that her friendship with Nora is even older, that it goes back to the childhood days when a devastating trauma marked Lee forever.
"evokes the iridescence of 1920's Paris...The Beautiful American takes readers from the giddiness of the flapper era to the grittiness of World War II. It is a brilliant, beautifully written literary masterpiece." - Sandra Dallas, New York Times best-selling author of Fallen Women
Library Journal: “Mackin’s ability to re-create history and to create believable characters and situations makes her new work a transfixing story that is hard to put down. Sure to be loved by fans of Mackin and of the historical novel; very highly recommended.”
"Reading one of Jeanne Mackin's historical novels is the next best thing to having a time machine at your disposal. A Lady of Good Family is so immersive, so captivating, that I devoured it in one sitting." --Jennifer Robson, author of After the War is Over and Somewhere in France
"evokes the iridescence of 1920's Paris...The Beautiful American takes readers from the giddiness of the flapper era to the grittiness of World War II. It is a brilliant, beautifully written literary masterpiece." - Sandra Dallas, New York Times best-selling author of Fallen Women
Library Journal: “Mackin’s ability to re-create history and to create believable characters and situations makes her new work a transfixing story that is hard to put down. Sure to be loved by fans of Mackin and of the historical novel; very highly recommended.”
"Reading one of Jeanne Mackin's historical novels is the next best thing to having a time machine at your disposal. A Lady of Good Family is so immersive, so captivating, that I devoured it in one sitting." --Jennifer Robson, author of After the War is Over and Somewhere in France
A richly imagined novel about Gilded Age historical figure Beatrix Farrand, niece of Edith Wharton and one of the first women landscape designers
Gardens remind us of what is good in life and those quiet minutes in a garden at dawn or dusk, or anytime in between, can allow us to feel like we are the calm center inside a whirling vortex. That's why I wrote this story about the intriguing Beatrix Farrand, the Gilded Age niece of Edith Wharton and friend of Henry James who became one of the most famous garden designers in history. Beatrix defied convention to pursue her passion: the design of gardens where people can find peace and a place to dream, to recover... at a time when ladies of good family were expected to be merely decorative. Hell, no, she would have said. In private, of course.
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The Beautiful American - Excerpt (135.5KB)
Click on the link to read an excerpt from The Beautiful American
Click on the link to read an excerpt from The Beautiful American
WINNER OF THE CNY 2015 AWARD FOR FICTION