[alert variation=”alert-info”]Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Formats: Hardcover, Paperback, Kindle, eBook, Audible, Audio Book
Purchase: Powell’s | Amazon | IndieBound | Barnes & Noble | iBooks[/alert]
Paris Red is seductive, a sensual read from page one. Meet a young, poor girl in 1862 Paris who wears the “green boots of a whore”. Victorine stumbles upon Edouard Manet during a chance meeting one afternoon. She has no idea who he is but they begin to play a game of cat and mouse. Victorine is so enchanted she leaves her best friend and her job to work for Manet as his model. She is quickly mesmerized by him and his art but also challenges him to take risks. Victorine has a keen, untrained eye for art and Manet trusts her instincts. Manet slowly lets Victorine glimpse into his personal life; but still everything is kept at a distance. At the same time Victorine attempts to figure out where she is going with her love of colors and growing dependence on Manet.
Maureen Gibbon is a talented writer who adeptly sucks the reader in with her period details and alluring, repetitive prose. The reader will not only read her words, but will also actually feel them sticking to their ribs. This reviewer read this book in two days and could think of nothing else while being clutched in its raw beauty.
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