This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Jeanne will award a $25 Amazon OR Barnes and Noble Gift Card (Winner's Choice!!!) to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.
EXCERPT TWO:
You know Pablo Picasso. Now meet the women behind the masterpieces. The women of Picasso's life are glamorous and elusive, existing in the shadow of his fame - until, in the 1950's, aspiring journalist Alana Olsen determines to bring one into the light and discovers a past complicated by secrets and intrique.
I have a photo, faded and torn, of two women on a terrace. Their black jersey bathing costumes reach modestly down their thighs and up to their collarbones. Their hair is cut short in a flapper bob of the 1920’s. The women gaze straight into the camera with a hint of defiance.
Beyond the terrace is a calm sea. Even in this black-and-white photo, the blueness of the water shimmers. Sailboats are caught forever on that sea, as are the women, ambered into eternal youth and beauty. Between the terrace and the sea are palm trees with fringed tops and grainy trunks.
If you look long enough at the photo, you can feel the Mediterranean sunshine…
There is a secret folded into the shadows of the photo.
In the bottom right hand corner, there is a third woman, blurred in motion rather than posing. The camera has caught her unaware. She wears a print dress, not a bathing costume, and her is long and braided. The sun, directly behind her, backlighting her, makes her face impossible to see. The light halos the shape of her head so that she is everyone and no one.
AUTHOR BIO:Jeanne Mackin is the author of several historical novels, including The Last Collection, which has been translated into five languages, and The Beautiful American, which won a CNY award for fiction. She has taught in the MFA Creative Writing program at Goddard College and won journalism awards, and is currently at work on her next novel.
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This book has been on my TBR list a long time - cannot wait to read it.
ReplyDeletethanks, Michele. Hope you enjoy reading it as much I enjoyed writing it. Picasso is fascinating....and his women perhaps even more so.
Deletethanks so much for hosting me!
ReplyDeleteSounds like an interesting story.
ReplyDeleteKim, as I did the research I grew more and more fascinated by Picasso and his many passions....a fascinating time with
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