Rare Objects

I was pleasantly surprised by this novel set in Depression-era Boston. Maeve, the heroine, has plenty of demons to wrestle - she's run away to New York City before, been institutionalized after a suicide attempt, and manages to get her hands on a lot of alcohol during the Prohibition era. When she takes a position at an antiques shop, she gains entry into the world of the Boston elite, whose members may be facing challenges not all that distant from her own. An excellent book and a compassionate perspective of mental illness.

Telling stories is a form of invention. Stretching or hiding the truth can also be in the service of invention and creating a new persona. We all tell stories every day, intentionally and unintentionally, making them up to create who we are publicly. Some people are quite skilled at it and go through several iterations of themselves to suit their situation until they finally settle in their own skin. The main character in Kathleen Tessaro's newest novel, Rare Objects, is such a person, changing like a chameleon until she finally looks to the core of herself, faces the stories hiding in her past, and becomes a reflection of what is most true about her.

Maeve Fanning is back in Boston and living with her mother after running away to New show more York City. There were many reasons she fled Boston, among others were that she wanted to escape the provincialism and expectations of those around her. New York was not the city she imagined and she found a hard life there, one derailed by random, sometimes dangerous men, bootleg gin, and one almost ended by a suicide attempt. After her mandatory stay at an asylum and now back at home, she is ready to look for a job but it's the midst of the Depression and so there are no jobs to be had, especially for a young, redheaded Irish woman. The only job that presents itself is one that she is not suited for, secretary and sales clerk at a very exclusive antique store. Changing her appearance, Anglicizing her name, and creating a fiction that carefully hides the truth of her less than genteel origins, she intrigues one of the shop's partners and lands the job. It is through the antiques store that she will come to renew her acquaintance with Diana Van der Laar, a wealthy heiress she met briefly during her stay in the asylum. And it it through Diana that she will meet the disturbing but captivating James, Diana's brother. Maeve, now know as May, is caught up in the glittering and false world of the Van der Laars, spending nights at speakeasies, dancing and drinking. She is seduced by the life and the people, sinking ever further into troubles she cannot stop.

May is inquisitive and intelligent. She's resourceful and full of promise, except when her desires, alcohol and the wrong men among them, sabotage her. She is understandably attracted to wealth and to all that it offers, even though she sees that the gilded cage that Diana lives in is no more freeing than the cage of poverty found in the tenements of the North Side. And she comes to understand everyone is just as busy inventing the self as she is, regardless of the price of the cage they live in. The themes of living the truth and the disparity of class would perhaps have been enough to drive the story but Tessaro also includes alcoholism, abortion, promiscuity, homosexuality as mental illness (as it was viewed at the time), the shady origins of the diamond industry in South Africa, religious intolerance, and adultery as well. While the story of May's tempestuous friendship with Diana and obsession with James is page turning, the inclusion of so many other issues cause all of them to be a bit short changed and feel like too many social issues in one story. The characters are all troubled in some way and the ominous tone and sense of foreboding don't ever lessen in the reading. The beginning of the novel, where an older Maeve looks backwards into her past when she steps into a room at the Museum of Fine Arts and sees a black agate ring, doesn't quite come full circle in the end, especially given the painful memories it stirs up. But despite these handful of weaknesses, it's a hard book to put down and the reader will be swept along in May's tale of self-invention, wealth, and deceit. show less

Maeve Fanning is the daughter of an Irish immigrant trying to muddle through Depression era Boston. In an attempt to get away from Boston’s North End, she begins a dangerous downward spiral when she moves to New York and takes the only job she can find as dancing with men at clubs, drinking and eventually landing herself in a psychiatric hospital in upstate New York. While in the hospital, Maeve crosses paths with another young woman who seems as lost as herself. When Maeve returns home to Boston, she feels defeated; in need of a job, Maeve transforms herself to look to part for a salesgirl in an upper-class antiques store. Catering to the wealthiest collectors, the store sells unique and rare pieces. Maeve soon starts to find her show more place among the antiques and their proprietor until one day a familiar face from the psychiatric hospital shows up as a customer. Maeve and the fabulously wealthy Diana Van der Laar join together in their shared unbalanced emotional states; but as Maeve is pulled into Diana’s upper-class world, she must hide her true self even more and risk losing who she is altogether.

From the very opening sentence of Rare Objects, I knew I was hooked. I was immediately entranced by Maeve’s character; she was moving forward, reinventing herself, trying her best to forget an event in the past and doing it all with strength and conviction. From there, Maeve’s story only grew on me. From her tumultuous but loving relationship with her mother, to her desperate time in New York and the psychiatric hospital back to the North end of Boston and the antiques shop, Maeve’s journey is one of high aspirations, friendships and most of all identity. Diana’s character also made my heart break, though unstable, she is constantly doing her best to be herself in a world that won’t let her be. The writing drew me into all of Maeve’s different worlds; I could imagine the hustle and rich scents of Boston’s North end, the glamour and starkness of the Van der Laar household and the hope and peacefulness amid the objects in the antiques shop. Overall, I loved the message that things that have been broken and found their way back together again are all the more beautiful.

This book was received for free in return for an honest review. show less

The novel Rare Objects, by Kathleen Tessaro, gives us a portrait of an Irish working class girl from Boston’s North End, who has beauty, brains, and an unfortunate predilection for liquor and the wrong sort of men. Yet, in the midst of the Great Depression of the 1930’s, Maeve Fanning (who goes by May) is lucky enough to find a job at an antique dealer’s shop, where she finds herself surrounded by old and rare objects. Possessed of a love of reading and a quick mind, May quickly becomes an asset to the business, especially since she happens to know the daughter of one of Boston’s wealthiest families, Diana Van der Laar. May and Diana become fast friends despite Diana’s mysterious moods and family secrets--and despite May’s show more own love of alcohol in an era of speakeasies. Tessaro dwells lovingly on both the Italian atmosphere of the North End and on the art objects in the antique shop and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Pulled between these two extremes, I was reminded variously of Theodore Dreiser and Henry James.
Narrating in the first person, at times May seems too articulate and too sophisticated in her knowledge of art for someone of her background. Yet the focus on the meaning of objects gives the novel depth. Beyond simply creating a luxurious backdrop, the author offers a philosophy of “things” that runs throughout the book like veins in an agate. For example, the antique dealer, Mr. Kessler, says of collecting: “At its root is an ancient belief, a hope, in the magic of objects. No matter how sophisticated we think we are, we still search for alchemy.” (72) May does indeed seem to be searching for alchemy, first through alcohol, then through the aegis of two mysterious men: Diana’s wealthy brother, James Van der Laar; and Mr. Kessler’s business partner, the British archaeologist Mr. Winshaw. James offers May a seductive glimpse of the high life, playing on her desire for gifts, drink and attention. Mr. Winshaw is mysterious largely because he is off traveling and searching for “rare objects”; and when he does appear, he seems critical of May, which naturally piques her interest.
May’s drinking problem is handled as a moral issue that could tip her life into ruin, depending on how she deals with it. The author hints at reasons behind her drinking, including uncertain parentage and an unhappy love affair; but mostly we are given the sense that May is a decent girl who has lost her way and needs to find her path. In the end we learn perhaps the rarest object is that thing or person which has been repaired, symbolized by May’s broken teacup which Mr. Winshaw mends with gold. show less

Story of an interesting time and place, as well as well interesting characters. So many of the more modern historical stories (i.e. Depression Era rather than Colonial) seem to be set in NYC, so the streets of Mae's Boston, especially the working class/immigrant neighborhoods were a refreshing change. The blending, or rather clash, of cultures within the city, and how Mae slid between her upbringing and the blue-blood world was also well handled, often giving the reader two sides to various situations. The fabric of pretense that swathed through Mae's life was almost a character in itself, but also served to remind the reader that the problems we struggle with today are not necessarily unique to this time period. An added bonus for me, show more was the glimpse into the antiquities trade.

All this is sounding rather stiff, but I really enjoyed the book. show less

In Depression-era Boston, a city divided by privilege and poverty, two unlikely friends are bound by a dangerous secret in this mesmerizing work of historical fiction from the New York Times bestselling author of The Perfume Collector.

Maeve Fanning is a first generation Irish immigrant, born and raised among the poor, industrious Italian families of Boston’s North End by her widowed mother. Clever, capable, and as headstrong as her red hair suggests, she’s determined to better herself despite the overwhelming hardships of the Great Depression.

However, Maeve also has a dangerous fondness for strange men and bootleg gin—a rebellious appetite that soon finds her spiraling downward, leading a double life. When the strain proves too show more much, Maeve becomes an unwilling patient in a psychiatric hospital, where she strikes up a friendship with an enigmatic young woman, who, like Maeve, is unable or unwilling to control her un-lady-like desire for freedom.

Once out, Maeve faces starting over again. Armed with a bottle of bleach and a few white lies, she lands a job at an eccentric antiques shop catering to Boston’s wealthiest and most peculiar collectors. Run by an elusive English archeologist, the shop is a haven of the obscure and incredible, providing rare artifacts as well as unique access to the world of America’s social elite. While delivering a purchase to the wealthy Van der Laar family, Maeve is introduced to beautiful socialite Diana Van der Laar—only to discover she’s the young woman from the hospital.

Reunited with the charming but increasingly unstable Diana and pursued by her attractive brother James, Mae becomes more and more entwined with the Van der Laar family—a connection that pulls her into a world of moral ambiguity and deceit, and ultimately betrayal. Bewitched by their wealth and desperate to leave her past behind, Maeve is forced to unearth her true values and discover how far she’ll to go to reinvent herself. show less

I picked this one up because the synopsis interested me for several reasons. First, it is set in the early thirties, and second, because it appeared to be an immigrant story. I also love the cover! Sadly, I didn’t love the book. I didn’t find the characters likeable, which is not really an issue most of the time. But more than not liking the characters, I just couldn’t make a connection with them. While I loved the cover, and enjoyed the descriptions of the lifestyles, I really did not care what happened to the characters. The story started off well enough, with Maeve getting a job in an antique shop. I really enjoyed the descriptions of the ‘finds’ and the stories that were built around them. But then the story began to drag. show more I am pretty sure that if I hadn’t committed to this review, I would have set the book aside. While it did pick up again at the end, and I ALMOST was happy for the resolution for Diana, it wasn’t enough for me to feel happy that I read the book.

While I did not enjoy the book, if you read through other reviews on the tour, you will find I am clearly in the minority! So please do read through the other reviews (the stops on the tour are listed below), especially if you have read and enjoyed Kathleen Tessaro in the past, before you decide whether or not this is a book you would enjoy!

This book review is included in a tour by TLC Book Tours. I was provided a copy for review purposes. show less