The Magnolia Palace by Fiona Davis

 

What is your favorite museum to visit?  My family loves visiting museums . . . except for my 12-year-old daughter.  She loves living history museums, but not regular museums.  I don’t know if I have one favorite museum as I love learning from all of them.  I have always enjoyed visiting the Kalamazoo Air Zoo with my Dad as I love aviation history.  Visiting the various Little House on the Prairie museums in Minnesota and South Dakota was a thrill.

The Magnolia Palace by Fiona Davis was the April pick for the Page-turners Book Club at the Kewaunee Public Library.  We had a great discussion about it last week.

The Magnolia Palace is a dual narrative historical fiction novel.  In 1919, Lillian Carter is at a crossroads in life.  She is only twenty-one, but she is washed up as the most famous “super model” of the day.  In her teens she had posed for many artists and her sculptures are all over Manhattan.  Now after her manager mother’s death, she is having a hard time getting a job.  When she gets mistakenly wrapped up in her landlord’s murder of his wife, she decides it’s time to try something new.  She goes undercover and becomes the private secretary to Helen Frick, the daughter of the very rich Henry Clay Frick.  His dream is to leave his mansion as an art museum when he dies.  Will Lillian’s past come back to haunt her?

In the 1960’s, Veronica Weber is a model in a photo shoot at the Frick Museum.  When she is mistakenly locked in the museum during a snowstorm, she gets involved in a treasure hunt using clues that are tied to the famous paintings together with Joshua, a young curator and college student.    Will the clues help them to unravel one of the biggest mysteries at the museum?

I greatly enjoyed this novel.  I really liked the mystery and how it was unraveled with both narratives in both timelines.  I also liked the look at how models were treated in 1919 compared to the 1960s.  Lillian was intriguing, and I was even more intrigued in the afterword and through videos we watched at book club to learn more about the tragic real-life figure she was based on.  Helen Frick was very interesting as well.  I was slightly distressed that she was written as an abrasive character.  Was she being written that was because she was a strong woman who accomplished a lot in life?  Then we learned more in book club, I realized how much research Fiona Davis had done to make sure she accurately captured her personality.  The Frick family had such a sad and tragic story.  It has made me really want to visit this museum in New York City.

Book Source:  The Kewaunee Public Library.  Thank you!