Showing results by author "Michelle Gable" in All Categories

It’s 1961, and for Margo Hightower, everything is about to change. True, her engagement is off, her family has fallen in scandal, and she's completely broke. But she’s just been hired as assistant to photographer Slim Aarons—famous for his vibrant pictures of high society, royalty, and Hollywood stars—and she knows this opportunity is her ticket to something better.

In 1942, London, Nancy Mitford is worried about more than air raids and German spies. Still recovering from a devastating loss, the once sparkling Bright Young Thing is estranged from her husband, her allowance has been cut, and she’s given up her writing career. On top of this, her five beautiful but infamous sisters continue making headlines with their controversial politics. Eager for distraction and desperate for income, Nancy jumps at the chance to manage the Heywood Hill bookshop while the owner is away at war.

When her boss tells her about the discoveries in a cramped, decrepit apartment in the ninth arrondissement, Sotheby' s continental furniture specialist April Vaught does not hear "dust" or "rats" or "shuttered for 70 years". She hears Paris. She hears escape. She cannot board the plane fast enough. When she arrives, April quickly learns the apartment is more than just some rich hoarder' s repository. Beneath the dust and cobwebs and stale perfumed air is a literal goldmine - and not just in terms of actual dollars.

1944, Rome. Newlywed Niki Novotná is recruited by a new American spy agency to establish a secret branch in Italy's capital. One of the OSS's few female operatives abroad and multilingual, she's tasked with crafting fake stories and distributing propaganda to lower the morale of enemy soldiers. Despite limited resources, Niki and a scrappy team of artists, forgers and others—now nicknamed The Lipstick Bureau—find success, forming a bond amid the cobblestoned streets and storied villas of the newly liberated city.

In 1950, a young, beautiful Polish refugee arrives in Hyannisport, Massachusetts, to work as a maid for one of the wealthiest families in America. Alicia is at once dazzled by the large and charismatic family, in particular the oldest son, a rising politician named Jack. Alicia and Jack are soon engaged, but his domineering father forbids the marriage.

Das Leben von April wird sich grundlegend ändern, sie weiß es nur noch nicht. Ihr Chef bei Sotheby's schickt sie nach Paris, um ein Appartement zu begutachten, das 70 Jahre kein Mensch betreten hat. Als Spezialistin für antike Möbel denkt April nicht an Staub oder Plunder, sondern an verborgene Schätze. Was sie dann entdeckt, übertrifft ihre kühnsten Erwartungen. April taucht ein in die faszinierende Welt der Marthe de Florian - eine Pariser Kurtisane - zu deren Kundschaft Würdenträger und Staatschefs gehörten.