Project and content management for Contemporary Authors volumes
WORK TITLE: What the Dead Leave Behind
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 1942
WEBSITE: http://rosemarysimpsonbooks.com/
CITY: Tucson
STATE: AZ
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY:
RESEARCHER NOTES:
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|---|---|
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| HEADING: | Simpson, Rosemary |
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PERSONAL
Born 1942, in New York, NY.
EDUCATION:Undergraduate and graduate degrees in French language and literature.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Novelist.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
Born in New York City in 1946, Rosemary Simpson writes historical fiction and mystery novels. With a degree in French language and literature, she has traveled extensively around the world, making a home in France, then finally settling in Tucson, Arizona. In a biography online at Amazon, she says that “Writing historical fiction often means wandering through the most obscure, wonderful, and frightening byways of time and geography.”
The Seven Hills of Paradise
In 1980, Simpson published the historical fiction novel, The Seven Hills of Paradise, a story of the Fourth Crusade told from the point of view of two men who survived the sack of Constantinople, one rich and one poor. Based on actual accounts written by the wealthy historical diplomat Geoffrey of Villehardouin and poor knight Robert of Clari, the book adds fictional character Lady Anne of Nantueil. In 1201, Villehardouin is building ships for France’s campaign to conquer Venice. Spurred by ambition, he next sets his sites on Constantinople and Jerusalem. Villehardouin raises an army that includes poor Robert of Clari, but through defections and intricate plots, Robert begins to question why he is fighting and whether the holy cause is justified.
Meanwhile, Lady Anne has left her troublesome home, finds comfort in Robert, yet even her own ambitions doom her. With its historical accuracy and absorbing nature, the book has been compared to the works of Zoe Oldenbourg and Maurice Druon. In this demanding but admirable first novel, “Simpson gives the tangled complexities of the politics and ethos of the age consistently lively attention; the ambience of carnage and connivance is convincing; the style is crisp and graceful,” according to a writer in Kirkus Reviews.
Dreams of Shadows
Simpson next published Dreams of Shadows in 1986. In the 1920s, the story mixes fact and fiction in its chronicle of love and war. Hungarian Jew Joseph Keleman joined the French Foreign Legion in Algeria and was assigned to Morocco. Although his first love, Rahel, did not get her father’s blessing, she married Joseph anyway and had a son. After Rahel’s murder, Keleman eventually makes his way to Paris during the German occupation where he meets Abby Sullivan, an Irish-American showgirl with whom he falls in love.
Multiple perspectives follow the couple as they get married, join the resistance movement, and work together to stop the Gestapo from stealing art and antiquities. Although the book combines realism and intensity, a Kirkus Reviews contributor felt the book was not a worthy follow-up to Simpson’s first novel. The contributor commented: “The Nazi occupation of France and the heroism of those who fought underground is a story that deserves to be told again and again, but not in such a tired, schmaltzy way. In sum: a disappointment.”
What the Dead Leave Behind
Simpson began her “Gilded Age Mystery” series with the 2017, What the Dead Leave Behind. Set during the Great Blizzard of 1888, young Prudence MacKenzie becomes a new heiress when her father, Judge Thomas MacKenzie dies. She will get her full inheritance when she marries her fiancé, Charles Linwood. But Charles also dies right before the wedding. Prudence suspects her loathsome stepmother Victoria and her money grabbing brother Donald Morley. With the help of Pinkerton agent Geoffrey Hunter, who was a school friend of Charles, Prudence dodges Victoria’s attempts to drug her senseless and steal her money. Prudence also wants to prove that Victoria and Morley killed both Charles and the judge.
Simpson’s mystery debut “features complex characters, a vivid look at old New York in the late 1800s, and a mystery with a twist,” according to a Kirkus Reviews writer. Jen Baker writing in Booklist found Prudence “an admirable teenage heroine who changes from drug-addled to determined and then takes charge.” According to a Publishers Weekly reviewer, Simpson “anchors an appealing detective duo in a colorful and well-researched depiction of period settings.”
Lies That Comfort and Betray
In Simpson’s second “Gilded Age Mystery”, Lies That Comfort and Betray, Prudence MacKenzie is assistant to attorney Geoffrey Hunter. She needs to lay low since women are not admitted to the bar. When Nora Kenny, Prudence’s childhood friend, is violently murdered near her Fifth Avenue home, Hunter takes over the case from the incompetent New York Metropolitan Police. At a time when Jack the Ripper is terrorizing Whitechapel across the Atlantic, New York wonders if it has its own serial killer.
In a review online at Historical Novel Society, a contributor commented: “There is perhaps an audience among readers who find dark, graphic crime novels appealing. I just found this one morose and clichéd.” On the other hand, “Simpson’s close attention to the details of daily life lends a feeling of real immediacy,” noted a Publishers Weekly reviewer. A Kirkus Reviews writer said that Simpson “further develops an admirable heroine who refuses to take refuge in the vapors but doesn’t see that she’s met a match in her partner—though neither does he.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, April 1, 2017, review of What the Dead Leave Behind, p. 26.
Kirkus Reviews, June 27, 1980, review of The Seven Hills of Paradise; July 28, 1986, review of Dreams of Shadows; February 15, 2017, review of What the Dead Leave Behind; November 1, 2017, review of Lies that Comfort and Betray.
Publishers Weekly, March 27, 2017, review of What the Dead Leave Behind, p. 81; December 4, 2017, review of Lies That Comfort and Betray, p. 48.
ONLINE
Historical Novel Society, https://historicalnovelsociety.org/ (April 1, 2018), review of Lies that Comfort and Betray.
Rosemary Simpson Website, http://rosemarysimpsonbooks.com (April 1, 2018), author profile.
Rosemary Simpson Short Bio.
Rosemary Simpson’s What the Dead Leave Behind is set in Gilded Age New York where the Great Blizzard of 1888 brings both disaster and independence to her wealthy and unconventional heroine. Lies that Comfort and Betray is the second in the Gilded Age Mystery series, to be followed by Final Portraits. Rosemary is also the author of two stand-alone historical novels, The Seven Hills of Paradise and Dreams and Shadows. She is a member of Sisters in Crime, International Thriller Writers, and the Historical Novel Society. Educated in France and the United States, she now lives near Tucson, Arizona.
Longer Bio.
Rosemary Simpson was born in New York City and almost immediately began roaming. By the time she entered college she had traveled extensively throughout the United States, the Far East, and Europe, where she found a second home in France. After she returned to the United States she earned undergraduate and graduate degrees in French language and literature. She currently lives near Tucson, Arizona.
Rosemary’s favorite novel has always been Anya Seton’s classic work of historical fiction, Katherine. (She’s read and reread her way through three editions that were usually held together with tape and rubber bands until another could be bought.) The fascination lies in an inherent conflict between what we know actually happened and the frequent and gaping holes in the historical record. Sometimes there are only a few verifiable facts on which to build a story and recreate a past event. That’s the writer’s greatest and most enjoyable challenge. She can only make up what can’t be proven and cannot violate the integrity of what is known. Writing historical fiction often means wandering through the most obscure, wonderful, and frightening byways of time and geography.
What the Dead Leave Behind is the first mystery in a series set in Gilded Age New York City. It begins with one of many deaths in the Great Blizzard of 1888 and ends with the promise of a uniquely independent future for its wealthy and unconventional heroine. Real life historical figures lend authenticity and a sense of familiarity to this bygone era of extravagant wealth and widespread political corruption. The second volume, Lies That Comfort and Betray, takes protagonists Prudence MacKenzie and ex-Pinkerton Geoffrey Hunter deeper into the underworld that lies beneath society’s glittering facade.
Before turning to the world of historical mysteries, Rosemary wrote two standalone novels of straight historical fiction. The Seven Hills of Paradise is the story of the Fourth Crusade, told from the dual perspectives of two men who survived the sack of Constantinople in 1204 and returned to France to record their epic adventures. Geoffroi de Villehardouin was one of the leaders of the crusade, while Robert de Clari was among the poorest of the knights who took the cross. “Absorbing, convincing, graphic and accurate … this novel belongs alongside those of Maurice Druon and Zoe Oldenbourg.” (The Atlanta Constitution)
Dreams and Shadows is a sweeping historical novel set in colonial Morocco, New York in the Roaring Twenties, and war-torn Paris during the Nazi Occupation. Based on stories told by family members who remained in Paris throughout the war, the novel seamlessly weaves together fact and fiction. Publishers Weekly said, “Simpson’s hauntingly graceful, dignified prose makes this tale unforgettable, as do its unflagging intensity, realism and chilling conclusion.”
Rosemary Simpson
Rosemary Simpson's What the Dead Leave Behind is set in Gilded Age New York where the Great Blizzard of 1888 brings both disaster and independence to her wealthy and unconventional heroine. Lies that Comfort and Betray is the second in the Gilded Age Mystery series, to be followed by Final Portraits.
Rosemary is also the author of two stand-alone historical novels, The Seven Hills of Paradise and Dreams and Shadows.
She is a member of Sisters in Crime, International Thriller Writers, and the Historical Novel Society. Educated in France and the United States, she now lives near Tucson, Arizona.
Series
Gilded Age Mystery
Books:
Lies That Comfort and Betray, February 2018
Gilded Age Mystery
Hardcover
What the Dead Leave Behind, January 2018
Trade Size
What the Dead Leave Behind, May 2017
Gilded Age Mystery #1
Hardcover
Lies That Comfort and Betray
Publishers Weekly.
264.49-50 (Dec. 4, 2017): p48+. From Book Review Index Plus. COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Lies That Comfort and Betray
Rosemary Simpson. Kensington, $26 (304p) ISBN 978-1-4967-0911-0
A gruesome crime preoccupies sleuths Prudence MacKenzie, a wealthy heiress, and Geoffrey Hunter, an attorney who was once a Pinkerton detective, in Simpson's solid second Gilded Age mystery (after 2017's What the Dead Leave Behind). Someone brutally murders a young woman of Prudence's acquaintance in the same way as London's notorious Jack the Ripper. Could London's scourge have relocated to New York City, or has America spawned its own copycat killer? The police are quick to arrest the victim's fiance, but Prudence and Geoffrey aren't convinced. The duo begin their own investigation, risking their lives in the process. The well- drawn secondary characters cover a broad spectrum of society, ranging from an urban church rectory to the outlying farming communities of Long Island. Simpson's close attention to the details of daily life lends a feeling of real immediacy and urgency to the quest for the killer. Fans of Anne Perry will find Prudence a worthy American cousin to Charlotte Pitt. Agent: Jessica Faust, BookEnds Literary Agency. (Feb.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Lies That Comfort and Betray." Publishers Weekly, 4 Dec. 2017, p. 48+. Book Review Index
Plus, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A518029495/GPS?u=schlager&sid=GPS& xid=ab7b51e0. Accessed 22 Mar. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A518029495
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Simpson, Rosemary: LIES THAT COMFORT AND BETRAY
Kirkus Reviews.
(Nov. 1, 2017): From Book Review Index Plus. COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Simpson, Rosemary LIES THAT COMFORT AND BETRAY Kensington (Adult Fiction) $26.00 1, 30 ISBN: 978-1-4967-0911-0
A judge's daughter-turned-detective and her reluctant partner seek an American Jack the Ripper.
For the lucky few in the upper tiers of New York society, living the good life 23 years after the end of the Civil War, it's truly the Gilded Age. But Prudence MacKenzie sees a side of the city that most well-bred young women don't. She's recovering from the deaths of her father, with whom she read law, and her fiance as well as from an addiction to the laudanum forced on her by a scheming stepmother. Though physically fragile, she won't let ex-Pinkerton detective Geoffrey Hunter, the other half of Hunter and MacKenzie, Investigative Law, play the Southern gentleman and shield her from the sight of her servant Nora Kenny lying dead in the morgue with a slit throat and carefully removed entrails. Once a childhood playmate of Prudence's, Nora was found, tightly wrapped in burlap, just outside the MacKenzie town house on Fifth Avenue. Despite the efforts of the corrupt police chief to arrest Nora's fiance and make him disappear inside the Tombs, Prudence and Geoffrey won't let the case rest. A second and third murder prove that a Ripper copycat is on the loose. In alliance with a devoted clerk, a former city detective, a saloon owner with a long reach, the madam of a brothel, and a vagrant and his faithful dog (which appears to understand whole sentences in English), Prudence and Geoffrey find a common element in all three deaths: the church of St. Anselm's. Prudence's determination to get justice for Nora and the other victims brings her up against a wealthy scion with a strange fetish, a priest too handsome for his own good, and a mysterious monsignor in a danger-fraught and twist-ridden adventure.
Simpson (What the Dead Leave Behind, 2017) further develops an admirable heroine who refuses to take refuge in the vapors but doesn't see that she's met a match in her partner--though neither does he.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Simpson, Rosemary: LIES THAT COMFORT AND BETRAY." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Nov. 2017.
Book Review Index Plus, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A512028620 /GPS?u=schlager&sid=GPS&xid=1b3b35f5. Accessed 22 Mar. 2018.
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Gale Document Number: GALE|A512028620
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Simpson, Rosemary: WHAT THE DEAD LEAVE BEHIND
Kirkus Reviews.
(Feb. 15, 2017): From Book Review Index Plus. COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Simpson, Rosemary WHAT THE DEAD LEAVE BEHIND Kensington (Adult Fiction) $25.00 4, 25 ISBN: 978-1-4967-0908-0
A daring daughter of the Gilded Age must fight her stepmother for her very survival.The death of Judge Thomas MacKenzie leaves his daughter, Prudence, a wealthy heiress. Between his own talents and those of his friend, attorney and former senator Roscoe Conkling, the judge died certain that he'd left his daughter well provided for despite the rapacious machinations of his second wife, Victoria. Prudence, who's never understood why the judge remarried, loathes Victoria and her slimy brother, Donald Morley, who lives with them. A few short weeks before Prudence is to marry and come into her inheritance, her fiance, Charles Linwood, dies in an apparent accident during a monster snowstorm that nearly claims Conkling too, leaving Prudence a minor under the thumb of her stepmother, who doses her with laudanum to keep her pliable. Realizing that she has only herself to count on in her battle with Victoria, strong-willed Prudence exchanges the laudanum for tea and quietly searches the house for evidence that might free her from Victoria. She gets help from Conkling and Southerner Geoffrey Hunter, a former Pinkerton agent and Charles' best friend since college days. The more closely they investigate, the more it seems likely that both Charles and the judge were murdered. Have Victoria and her brother plotted their way to riches, or does someone else have a grudge against the judge and his family? In an unwilling game of cat and mouse, Prudence struggles to keep herself alive and find the proof that will set her free. Simpson's debut, first in a planned series, features complex characters, a vivid look at old New York in the late 1800s, and a mystery with a twist.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Simpson, Rosemary: WHAT THE DEAD LEAVE BEHIND." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Feb. 2017.
Book Review Index Plus, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A480922072 /GPS?u=schlager&sid=GPS&xid=57db19e4. Accessed 22 Mar. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A480922072
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What the Dead Leave Behind
Jen Baker
Booklist.
113.15 (Apr. 1, 2017): p26. From Book Review Index Plus. COPYRIGHT 2017 American Library Association http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Full Text:
What the Dead Leave Behind.
By Rosemary Simpson.
May 2017. 304p. Kensington, $25 (9781496709080); e-book, $9.99 (9781496709103).
The Great Blizzard of 1888 in New York City provides the perfect cover-up for murder in Simpson's third novel, the first of a historical mystery series set during the Gilded Age. In a short period, Prudence MacKenzie loses her beloved father and her fiance in what could be a murderous plot to steal her inheritance. Luckily, she is taken under the wing of her father's lawyer, as Judge MacKenzie's will is somewhat irregular. Cue the wicked stepmother and her equally repugnant brother. Readers will hope Stepmama is a murderer, but so much happens as the plot unwinds that it's not a foregone conclusion. This is a story to savor, despite a few unlikely coincidences (the fiance's rich attorney friend available at all hours to help Prudence), with an admirable teenage heroine who changes from drug-addled to determined and then takes charge. Prudence is a stubborn, quick-witted American heroine who will remind readers of Tasha Alexander's Lady Emily Ashton and Deanna Raybourn's Lady Julia Grey.--Jen Baker
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Baker, Jen. "What the Dead Leave Behind." Booklist, 1 Apr. 2017, p. 26. Book Review Index
Plus, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A491487878/GPS?u=schlager&sid=GPS& xid=9d0149db. Accessed 22 Mar. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A491487878
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What the Dead Leave Behind
Publishers Weekly.
264.13 (Mar. 27, 2017): p81. From Book Review Index Plus. COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
What the Dead Leave Behind
Rosemary Simpson. Kensington, $25 (304p) ISBN 978-1-4967-0908-0
The Great Blizzard of March 1888 provides the backdrop for Simpson's richly plotted series launch set in Gilded Age Manhattan. Wealthy 19-year-old Prudence MacKenzie is stunned by the death of her father, judge Thomas MacKenzie, who trained her in logic and deduction after her mother's early demise. Three months after her father's funeral, she anxiously scans Fifth Avenue for signs of her fiance, Charles Linwood, amid the massive snowstorm paralyzing the city. Instead, he's counted among those who perished in the blizzard, despite an unlikely wound and the playing card clutched in his hand. Under her father's will, Charles's death puts Prudence and her inheritance under the control of her malicious young stepmother, Victoria. With Charles's friend, former Pinkerton agent Geoffrey Hunter, Prudence investigates Victoria's checkered past, seeking information she hopes will free her from her stepmother. Simpson (Dreams and Shadows) anchors an appealing detective duo in a colorful and well-researched depiction of period settings and personalities. Agent: Jessica Faust, BookEnds Literary Agency. (May)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"What the Dead Leave Behind." Publishers Weekly, 27 Mar. 2017, p. 81. Book Review Index
Plus, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A487928119/GPS?u=schlager&sid=GPS& xid=0d9ab768. Accessed 22 Mar. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A487928119
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redstarSimpson, Rosemary. What the Dead Leave Behind: A Guilded Age Mystery. Kensington. Apr. 2017. 304p. ISBN 9781496709080. $25; ebk. ISBN 9781496709103. M
The blizzard that hit New York City in March 1888 killed 200 people. Lawyer Charles Linwood is found frozen to death with a playing card, the ace of spades, clutched in his hand, and his head crushed by a branch. He and heiress Prudence MacKenzie were to marry in less than a month. With Charles dead, Prudence’s stepmother, Victoria, becomes the trustee of Prudence’s inheritance. After discovering Victoria trying to slip her laudanum, the intrepid Prudence pairs up with ex-Pinkerton agent Geoffrey Hunter, Charles’s old school friend, to investigate the woman’s past and find a way to escape her clutches. In their search for answers, they join forces with unusual allies: a hansom driver, a legal secretary, a former police officer with ties to the underworld and the old Confederacy, and a blind code breaker. VERDICT Launching an atmospheric new series set in Gilded Age New York, Simpson (The Seven Hills of Paradise) incorporates historical events and figures to add verisimilitude to this tension-filled story. Suggest for mystery readers who appreciate period detail, including fans of Anne Perry’s “Thomas and Charlotte Pitt” mysteries.—LH
Lies that Comfort and Betray
By Rosemary Simpson
Find & buy on
It’s 1888 in New York City, and young working-class girls are being butchered in a hideous manner reminiscent of London’s Jack the Ripper. The city’s Irish cops and detectives are incompetent and worse. The novel features the obligatory feisty “independent woman,” Prudence MacKenzie, as a private detective along with her male sidekick, a former Pinkerton agent. These two circumvent the bumbling police to conduct their own sleuthing. There is a plethora of depravity, torture, sacrilege, abortion and grisly murder throughout. There is also a lengthy and improbably chatty covert mobile surveillance of a suspect by the intrepid Prudence. The wrong men are seized and imprisoned under horrible conditions. Working their way through the city’s underworld and partnering with some unsavory and pathetic allies, the two investigators eventually close in on the real killer.
The book seems longer and more convoluted than is perhaps necessary. The one Italian character is a Mafiosi, the sole black character is saintly, and the numerous Irish are all deranged, corrupt, or plain stupid, their faith a mockery. The two WASP protagonists are, however, wise and virtuous. With “Hail Marys” and “Glory Be’s,” the author has a good grasp of the lingo, but there is nothing uplifting associated with the liturgical rites sprinkled throughout. Quite the contrary. There is perhaps an audience among readers who find dark, graphic crime novels appealing. I just found this one morose and clichéd.
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What the Dead Leave Behind
By Rosemary Simpson
Find & buy on
A massive, unexpected March snowstorm overwhelms New York City while Prudence MacKenzie desperately awaits the arrival of her fiancé. His sudden death in this 1888 blizzard nullifies the plans that her recently deceased father, a prominent judge, had meticulously laid to ensure her future security and places Prudence under the thumb of her father’s hostile second wife. Initially hindered by a haze of grief and dangerous medication that has kept her docile and vulnerable, she struggles to extricate herself from the situation. Her quest to regain her rightful inheritance and freedom soon includes investigating the strange accident that killed her fiancé, and she enlists the help of his loyal friend, who shares her suspicions.
Relying on lessons her father taught her about the law and how to outmaneuver an adversary, Prudence covertly defies her stepmother’s attempt to control her and concentrates on finding and interpreting a set of abstruse clues the judge left behind. She makes significant progress in sorting through the past misdeeds, deceit, and machinations that have led to her plight, yet she is unaware of the present danger posed by a vengeful foe lurking in plain sight.
This intricate mystery unfolds by exposing layer after layer of hidden facts and surprising connections between the worlds of the Fifth Avenue elite, their servants, and the criminal denizens of the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood. The varied characters are well-drawn, with the protagonist’s mix of emotional depth, canniness, and courage fueling the story. A rich prose style and sweeping glimpse of life during New York’s Gilded Age complement the intriguing plot.
KIRKUS REVIEW
In the early 13th century, a brambly alliance of French barons set out for the Holy Land--a campaign sidetracked by greed and expediency and refocused in the destruction of Constantinople in 1205. This was the Fourth Crusade; and Simpson has given it a full-bodied, critical reconstruction, based largely on accounts by Geoffrey of Villehardouin (a seasoned, influential diplomat) and by Robert of Clari, a poor knight. Simpson's only major fictional character, in fact, is Lady Anne of Nantueil, who has taken flight from a poisonous home and will be loved and protected by Robert, gentler and finer than most of his peers. The chronicle begins in 1201, when Villehardouin, ""at his peak"" of proficiency in gaining ""order and security"" in this world and the next, returns to Champagne from Venice with his mission accomplished--he has arranged for the building of ships of transport from Venice to the East. And after other chores of recruitment, Villehardouin tangles with the ancient Doge of Venice--a virtuoso of delicate manipulations who compels the French armies to conquer a former Venetian city ""on the way"" to the Holy Land. From here on, raging ambitions and sheer momentum lead to more sordid conquests and finally Constantinople; Jerusalem--the intended destination--becomes ""merely a shadow, a pinprick of the soul."" And amid the hacks and thrusts, the defections and plottings, the rulers raised up and horribly extinguished, knight Robert loses the vision of a perfect love--and Anne, pathetically diminished by her own ambition, dies violently. Finally, Robert and his younger brother return home, wondering if they ever believed they would, or wanted to, reach Jerusalem. Simpson gives the tangled complexities of the politics and ethos of the age consistently lively attention; the ambience of carnage and connivance is convincing; the style is crisp and graceful. A demanding but admirable first novel.
Pub Date: June 27th, 1980
Simpson is a talented historical novelist who with her first book (The Seven Hills of Paradise, 1980) brought the Fourth Crusade to full-blooded life. Here, she turns to more recent history with the story of an American woman and her Jewish husband fighting to stay alive in occupied Paris, but fails to evoke the period. The novel begins in the 20's, with the story of Tess and Abby Sullivan, two Irish sisters from a New York slum family who escaped from home by heading to Paris with an all-American chorus show. Dumped by the charismatic entrepreneur, Sammy Rosen, Abby is taken to Long-champs race track one day by rich friends and meets darkly handsome Joseph Keleman, a wealthy gallery-owner. The novel then flashes back to 1912, where it tells Keleman's fascinating story. A Hungarian Jew, he escaped the narrow middle-class existence planned out for him by his doctor father by running away and joining the French Foreign Legion in Algeria; there he helped a rogue Irish priest/legionnaire escape punishment for killing a man and eventually was assigned to Morocco during a time when the locals were running a jihad against the French. He survived that to fall in love with the beautiful Rahel, but her father didn't approve of the match, so Joseph went to the remote and savage Atlas Mountains to find the Irishman, O'Brien, who had become a kind of god to backward tribes there. With O'Brien's help, Keleman stole Rahel away, and together they had a son, but one of O'Brien's jealous wives stole the boy and murdered Rahel, leaving Joseph with nowhere to go but back to Europe, where he worked his way up in the Paris art world. Unfortunately, what was a strong romantic adventure ends halfway through the novel with Joseph and Abby's meeting and marriage. The war soon comes and they conspire with other gallery owners to deny masterpieces to the Gestapo; Joseph and Abby then hang on by the skin of their teeth (with a little help from an enigmatic Gestapo officer who may or may not be Joseph's long-lost son) until the Allies arrive. The Nazi occupation of France and the heroism of those who fought underground is a story that deserves to be told again and again, but not in such a tired, schmaltzy way. In sum: a disappointment, especially after Simpson's admirable first novel.
Pub Date: July 28th, 1986