In the 1950s the
Barbizon Hotel was home to young women trying to make it in New York
as models, secretaries, and actresses. At that time, the girls were
subject to strict rules about curfew, and men in the rooms, and
overseen by a house mother. Today, the old hotel has been renovated
as condos, but not all the old residents are gone. Ten of them live
on the fourth floor. In their seventies and eighties, these ladies
know the stories of the Barbizon including the story of a fight
between a maid and one of the residents that ended in a death.
Rose, a former TV
anchor, lives in one of the condos with her recently divorced lover,
Griff. She desperately wants the relationship to work, but he has
ties to his other family, and the relationship is deteriorating. With
Griff away a lot, she becomes fascinated by the older residents. The
story of the fight impels her to learn more about it even if some of
her tactics border on unethical.
The history of the
Barbizon hotel is fascinating reading. The story is told from two
points of view, Darby, a young woman who lived in the hotel in the
50's, and Rose, who lives there in 2016.
I enjoyed the
descriptions of the setting. It made the New York of the 50's come
alive. I was less enthusiastic about the characters. Possibly because
the novel moves back and forth frequently, the characters felt flat
and not well developed. The mystery of what happened in the fatal
accident keeps you reading to know what happened and ends with a
twist.
I received this book
from Penguin for this review.
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