Broadway Butterfly

Broadway Butterfly by Sara Divello 432 pages

 

And here’s yet another book that I picked up because of its cover. It is set in Manhattan from 1923-29 and is based on a true cold case that still lingers in the NYC police’s files. Author Divello does not solve the crime, but she brings its sordidness to the page.

 

Divello wastes no time in getting to the murder; it’s the first thing we learn in this juicy tale. Twenty-three-year-old Dot King enjoys life. Although it was never clear if she was a Broadway star, it was clear that she did enjoy the attention of several, shall we say, gentlemen (in the voice of the book.). She also made the papers so often that she became known throughout the city as “The Broadway Butterfly.” One morning when her housekeeper reported for duty, she found Dot dead on her bed with an exceptionally large bottle of chloroform next to her rapidly stiffening body.

 

The cops were called in and the list of possible suspects is rather large but is quickly whittled down to four:  A “volatile a politically connected Philadelphia socialite, Atlantic City bootlegger, Dot’s dicey gigolo lover, a sultry Broadway dancer, and a cagey sugar daddy guarding secrets of his own.” Sometimes it was hard to keep them all straight.

 

In an interesting use of character and structure, Divello uses a girl reporter, Julia Harpman of the Daily News, to cover the case and help keep the reader on what’s happening with the investigation. Julia is the lone woman in an otherwise male-dominated industry, but she is ambitious, strong, and follows the trail…and her suspicions…in the search for justice for Dot King.

 

As I mentioned sometimes it was hard to keep the cast of suspects and Dot’s friends straight, but it makes an interesting read. Also, Divello takes readers behind the scenes of the murder investigation and the world of news reporting that keeps readers glued to the story.

Broadway Butterfly gets 4 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world.

The Show GIrl

The Show Girl by Nicola Harrison  400 pages

Olive McCormick is an extremely ambitious nineteen year old in 1927 with dreams that equal her ambition. She wants to be a “Ziegfeld girl,” no matter what it takes. Her parents are bitterly against her moving to New York from Minnesota. But before she can get her bags packed, an event occurs that sets her plans back, but re-enforces her desires, no matter the cost.

Olive met Flo Ziegfeld once and told her if she was ever in New York to come see him, that she was talented. It took a while, but she finally made it. After she bullies her way into his office, she is stunned that he has no memory of her or her talents. But Olive is tough; she shakes off his rejection and works even harder. Her work pays off, as soon she is a “Ziegfeld girl” in the Ziegfeld Follies, wearing the amazing headdresses that are the show’s trademark.

 Olive makes friends with several of the other girls, and they become a click---partying around Manhattan until the wee small hours of the morning. When her parents come to see her perform, they are disgusted by what she is doing. To their eyes, it’s immoral and disgusting. Olive is happy and won’t let her parents’ influence her, but her father disowns her. Olive does stay in irregular contact with her mother, but only when she is almost at the end of her rope.

Ziegfeld moves Olive from the Follies to a lesser known show, Midnight Frolics. Olive is dismayed at that turn of events but continues to work hard. Soon she is the toast of Manhattan. Then Olive meets Archie Carmichael and falls in love, head over heels in love. As her love deepens, she realizes that some of the decisions that she made in the past were bad decisions, but nothing can change the past. Or can it?

I really enjoyed reading about Olive’s days as a “Ziegfeld girl.” The late 1920s seem to be such a fun time to be young. Another part that I really like was what we call today glamping. Ziegfeld sends Olive and some of the girls to entertain at some of the wealthy’s camps in the Adirondacks. The campers have all the modern conveniences of the day. Imagine wearing evening gowns to dinner in the middle of the forest! 

“The Show Girl” is a fun read and receives 5 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world. 

 

Park Avenue Summer

Park Avenue Summer by Renee Rosen     368 pages

 I first became aware of “Cosmopolitan” magazine when its intrepid editor-in-chief, Helen Gurley Brown, visited “The Tonight Show” with Johnny Carson in the late 1970s. It was on those shows that I learned of her radically feministic book “Sex and the Single Girl,” which was published in 1962.

This story takes place three years later, in 1965 Manhattan. The publishing world is still the old boys’ network and women were supposed to be at home. Alice Weiss (a fictional character) has left her Ohio home for New York, with dreams of becoming a photographer. Thanks to an old friend, she gets an exciting job as the secretary to HGB, a woman who knows what she wants but doesn’t know a thing about publishing a magazine.

The Hearst Corporation wants to shutter Cosmo, but HGB wants to bring it into the twentieth century and revitalize its contents and looks. She wants to aim it at young women who want something more before they settle down to a home and a family. It’s HGB’s job to turn the magazine around but not offend old conservatives. Easier said than down when the old boys’ network is sabotaging her every move and decision.

Readers get to see the birth of Cosmo and how HGB raised it from the ashes. Daily life is hectic in the magazine world, and readers get a chance to see what life was really like back in those days: the cigarettes that everyone chain-smoked, the lunchtime drinks, the deals.

Author Rosen was fortunate to meet and talk with Lois Cahall, the woman who probably knew HGB better than anyone else. I’m sure that’s why the story feels so intimate. With Alice as its narrator, modern readers get a glimpse into a storied past. Along the way, Alice finds a way to have everything HGB says she can have, and more.

 “Park Avenue Summer” receives 6 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world.

Hotel de Dream

 

Hotel de Dream by Edmund White  228 pages

I picked up Hotel de Dream because I’d read that it was a great read and that it was a forerunner to the popular woman-behind-the-man novels that are so popular right now (think The Paris

Wife by Paula McClain or The Aviator’s Wife by Melanie Benjamin). Plus it had an extra bonus of having a novel-within-a-novel (Margaret Atwood’s The Assassins). I just love those types of books. 

Hotel de Dream’s featured couple is Stephen and Cora Crane. Stephen is twenty-eight years-old and is dying of tuberculosis. Cora want to go back to England, but fears Stephen is too weak to make the trip. In part, they are trying to escape the gossip mill that swirls around Cora…after all, she is the former owner of a bordello in Florida.

The book jacket says that the Cranes “live riotously, running up bills they ca never pay.” Maybe it 

was because I read only to page 50, but they didn’t seem to be living the high life by any means.

Crane was often visited by his esteemed contemporaries, Henry James and Joseph Conrad. Author White makes a huge mistake when he brings a people like James and Conrad by only using their last names. I had a hard time following when the characters first showed up, trying to figure out who they were.  By the time I reached page 50, I had the style figured out, but it still annoyed me.

Then there is the problem of the novel-within-the-novel. It seems that the Cranes are desperate for money, Stephen, in a rather delirious state, begins to dictate a novel to Cora.

And this is where White really lost me. I read the first excerpt, then the second, but by the time I finished, I was just grossed out. The “new” novel is about a very young male prostitute and his homosexuality. The graphic descriptions are what turned me off.

As a reader, I give Hotel de Dream, one star. The early pages of the story are confusing. As a writer, I give the novel four stars (out of five). Aside from the previously mentioned confusion, once I got past it, the book is well written; it’s just not kind of story though. White’s book has an audience, I’m sure, it’s just not me.

The Hazards of Hunting While Heartbroken

The Hazards of Hunting While Heartbroken by Mari Passananti   267 pages

             Brendan and Zoe were college sweethearts and have been together for 10 years. Yet a month before their big wedding, Brendan decides to come clean with Zoe; he’s gay. Not only is he gay, but he’s found someone else.

            Zoe is heartbroken. How could she not see the signs? How could she not know? She and Brendan were perfect for each other, or so she thought. She dreads the New York City dating scene. Especially after all these years. To top it off, she’s not sure she’s still in love with her job as a headhunter. Her boss, Carol, is psychotic. Zoe and her colleagues have learned to gauge their boss’s moods by her makeup.  The wilder and uneven the makeup, the more out-of-control Carol is.

            With her desk practically in the office’s front window, Zoe tries to function on everyday tasks.  One day, a bouquet of roses arrives with a note: “You’ve been looking sad lately. Drink? P.S. I’m across the street, one floor up from you.”

            Enter Oscar Thornton. He could easily be the guy to pick up the pieces, but Zoe isn’t sure. He sure seems to be the man that all women want: romantic, sensitive, smokin’ hot, drop-dead gorgeous, and rich. But Zoe isn’t sure he really is all those things. There’s no way he could make the money he’s spending working in marketing, even it is in Manhattan. Zoe decides she MUST find out before she gives him her heart. How far will she go to prove to herself that Oscar isn’t what he seems?

            Hazards is a quick read. I think it fits comfortably into the chick lit/romance genres with a toes in women’s lit and contemporary fiction genre. It’s a different take on the boy meets girl plot structure. A great beach read; or stuck in the airport read.