From Hollywood to Harlem: Three Book Review Recommendations on What To Read Now
I too often read “important” books. By that I mean classics or literary winners. Yet because of (or in spite of?) all the whiplash in the news lately, I’m happy that I’ve fallen in love again with “just” great storytelling, and appreciate the publishers who have offered me these books to review for you. And what could be better than historical fiction featuring strong, successful and plucky Sheroes? Surely, an excellent way to celebrate Women’s History Month. And with old Hollywood as the main thread, the glamour and romance in these three recommended books check all the boxes.
Please enjoy the literary trifecta.
I adore historical fiction ~ I love learning. My dream would be to attend classes endlessly. I claim to be a philomath ~ Its says so right there in my social media bios🧑🎓🤓 FYI, a Philomath is someone who loves learning and studying, a scholar, or a lover of knowledge. The term comes from the Greek words "philos" (meaning "loving") and "manthanein" (meaning "to learn"). So see, we started off with a fun learning snippet.
Back to the books. This first one is chock-a-block with an absorbing history coupled with a love drama. From Harlem to Hollywood. (Wait for it)
By Victoria Christopher Murray
Published February, 2025
A profound telling of the Harlem Renaissance, this historical fiction is a fascinating untold story. So much so that it’s already been picked up to be a Hollywood film!
It’s a love story and also a kind of detective story because we are learning about Jessie Redmon Fauset, the real-life female editor of W.E.B. Du Bois’ The Crisis magazine, and the editor and co-author of the children’s magazine, The Brownies’ Book, while also an author in her own right, and as the beloved and widely recognized “midwife” of the Harlem Renaissance writers.
Jessie Redmon Fauset
W.E.B Du Bois
So why has Ms. Fauset been under wraps for so long? The answer and the discovery is why this novel grabs you.
It’s 1919 and Harlem has become the center of the “New Negro” pride and culture. Music, poetry, painting, fashion, theater, and civil rights are elevating the community and leading the country.
Jessie moves to Harlem with Bella, her white stepmother, to a home provided to them by W.E.B Du Bois, the founder and editor of The Crisis, who was a prominent scholar, international activist, writer, the first negro to earn a PhD from Harvard, and co founder of the NAACP. He was a friend of Jessie’s father and he and Jessie had been having an affair for five years before he moved her closer to him in Harlem.
That Murray shares the nuanced truth about Jessie and W.E.B.’s love affair is a risk she takes with care, respect, and truth. Many knew of the affair but because of W.E.B’s position as the leader of the Negros, no one wanted to besmirch him. The romance was lovingly written and it shows Jessie’s conflict. And it parallels her novel, There is Confusion. Even W.E.B asks her if the book is semi autobiographical.
Jessie feels beholden to Will (W.E.B.) for giving her such an incredible opportunity but he is a married man and neither her stepmother nor her heart want this to continue. The story line is about her romantic conflict and her extraordinary rise to the top of the Harlem arts’ Renaissance, along with her drive to pursue her own career ~ to become the editor of The Crisis and to write her novel about middle class negros (a notion that was shocking at the time!). Throughout her literary career, Jessie’s story lines were also related to "passing" and feminism.
There is no doubt that Jessie is an extraordinary woman. Recognized as the first negro woman to earn a PhD and Phi Beta Kappa, an honorary Delta Sigma Theta member and la Sorbonne and Cornell graduate, she oozes talent and compassion and an unerring drive to elevate the Negros’ cultural status at this time, much in the same way that Will does.
Yet, she has the added burden of being a woman.
Kinda’ like Ginger dancing backwards.
I love historical fiction for so many reasons and Harlem Rhapsody is perhaps one of the best examples of why that is so. Because Murray’s impeccable research is anchored in history, she points us to so many real life figures we are either introduced to or can deep-dive into these iconic characters, including Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, Nella Larson, Georgia Douglas, and Jean Toomer.
I fell in love with Jessie as much, if not more than Will. Her dignified response to life’s challenges, her persistent and pragmatic striving to be better ~ to pursue noteworthy goals for herself and those she nurtured as midwife to Harlem’s literary elites is so very inspiring.
I highly recommend this book.
That said, I am of two minds about Murray’s end-of-book Afterword details. Why? Because I found her explanations so compelling. For example, how she first learned about Jessie from a podcast, her research and challenging decision to include W.E.B’s misogynistic tendencies and proclivity towards adulterous character traits. After all, no one wants to be that author that can be accused of spoiling a historical great and negro icon. But she points out that everyone, even the greats, have their flaws that meld with their virtues ~ that that’s what makes them extraordinary.
For some, these explanations might get in the way of the story line and I get that. But for me, I feel it would enhance the veracity and verisimilitude of the historical discoveries to have it as the Foreword. And further, a foundation and prelude to the excitement of what is to come in the novel.
If I had another wish, it is that the story would have moved along at a brisker pace. While the writing is beautiful, respectful, and the characters are fully explored; I found myself feeling like “Did I just read that?” I loved the details of their affair. It’s a well-lived life and very much a part of not only their interpersonal dynamics but also of the times and the path to the “New Negro” experience. The push and pull of romantic tension ~ does he or doesn’t he love her? What about his other affairs? ~ Breaking up/Getting back together. Guilt of an affair and being enough of a feminist to handle it. Those are things we all can experience in romance. But here, after a while, it seemed that the relationship dynamics caused the story to be burdened with a repetitiveness. I understand Murray was gifted a jewel ~ lightning in a bottle ~ and she didn’t want to crimp its style but I felt “I get it.” Like Jessie, I was over the put-downs, the buried misogyny and the patrimony that “this wasn’t going to work” drama. That said, the author does build a sense of tormented tension that evokes our empathy for her hearstrings’ pull and her brain’s push ~ emotions vs. wisdom. Contemplating the situation, I felt we the reader, need to be mindful to give Jessie grace; not impose today’s standards or norms on her dilemna and life course.
And in the end, when Jessie makes her life journey decision with regard to her relationship to Will ~ it only reinforced my thought that the plot element could have collapsed somewhat of that element without sacrificing the rich, spellbinding narrative.
You’ll bask in Murray’s elegant descriptions of the nightclubs, hair salons, dinner parties, and more of the Harlem Renaissance. It carries you to another world and place while you, the reader, are subtly “learning” about a time that was / is overlooked/erased.
Jessie inspires us with her power; with her pragmatic yet compassionate dedication to progressive civil and women’s rights while battling so many/too many prejudices. Her frisson of love vs. career still carries gravitas today.
Jessie is a joyful, powerful role model and this story is a terrific, enlightening, entertaining read.
A delightful plus is that I found Courtesy is one of the novel’s more potent characters, (and that I haven’t yet seen noted in any other book review.) The overwhelming takeaway is how extraordinarily polite everyone is! Brava, Victoria Murray! I was fascinated by the language of courtesy and manners that held sway in this society. And appreciate how your writing captured that style.
Such a pleasant alternative to today’s use of “No problem” for goodbye or you’re welcome. Or “Hey” for: good morning, good afternoon, or good evening…
Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to receive an ARC for Harlem Rhapsody.
I can’t wait for the movie.
** Footnote I feel I must share with you since I posted this book review. Following my book review postings on NetGalley, Goodreads (please follow me there), Amazon and Barnes & Noble as per ARC review requests, I experienced quite a tussle with BN, who asserted my review ~ the one above ~ contained profanity. What started as a head scratcher, turned into indignation, then astonishment. When I finally got a real person to read the review, it was pointed out in an email that “The review was unable to be placed due to the words Negro and Negros. We do understand your concerns unfortunately we are unable to update the filters as set by a third party review moderation authenticity team. We suggest editing your review and try again.”
While grateful that the mystery was solved, I was astonished that the light shone on a word that I felt was in keeping with the tonality and times of the novel itself. The term Black arose as part of the Black Power Movement in the 1960’s and the term African American didn’t come into colloquial usage until the 1980’s.
Erasure of words that are/were a part of history feels so wrong.
I had a screaming nightmare (that Bill woke me up from) last night where the thought police were chasing me, planning to do me harm because I had used the word “could” in a politically incorrect way…
When I posited the notion of giving a moniker to this emerging erasure phenomenon, one of my sister’s suggested, “No Words.”
It works, don’t you agree?
Author: Megan Chance
Published, February, 2025
I just sooo loved this book. Why? Because it’s historical fiction, the protagonist is a strong, talented woman who is a fashion designer (early in my professional career I worked in fashion after graduating from fashion design school in Switzerland, worked at the Bergdorf Goodman buying office and…) And it’s Glamorous!
The novel’s settings are richly described in the glamour of 1950’s Hollywood and Rome; then there’s the complicated friendship between Lena and Julia, secrets-cum-lies, scandals in an era when folks indeed could be shocked at things and those things could ruin a reputation; along with the American notion that one can reinvent themselves.
The writing is dynamic ~ the author pulls you in with dialogue that makes you feel you’re watching a good film. I can only describe Chance’s writing as “smooth” ~ it just ran over me like a soothing waterfall ~ all natural and bracing.
The locale descriptions allow you to viscerally experience Rome ~ the Via Margutta’s smoky clubs and galleries (made famous by the film Roman Holiday with Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck); and Hollywood ~ the sound stages and grand hotels, the jazz clubs and the Chateau Marmont’s pools and gardens.
In a sign of those times, Smoking is practically a character!
The book sweeps you into the world of Elsie Grumer, who is the daughter of an Ohio dressmaker and pig farmer who gets herself rather charmed by a wanna-be actor who is an itinerant pool hustler on his way to LA. Walter makes Elsie his wife, accomplice, and co-conspirator ~ he marvels at her ability to deceive, exploit, and misdirect.
Traits that come to serve her well.
In LA, she realizes that her husband is a domineering blowhard, drinker, and a loser ~ he’ll never be a star.
They’re poor and need money. After she convinces him she should get a job (wives weren’t supposed to work in that era) ~ in a local coffee shop, he relents, saying he can use the money for acting classes. She wanted to use some of the money for a fashion design school. When two closeted homosexuals and probable communists see her sketches, they become her biggest supporters and confidantes, urging her to go to design school. She escapes Walter; living in secret from him and finally does enroll. At the local fashion school, she sees the opportunity to study in Rome. While she lacks the confidence that she could actually win, she enters the contest and is soon sailing for Rome!
That the daughter of a pig farmer landed in such beauty and high culture is beyond her dreams.
Soon, she is befriended by Julia who exerts such a force of attraction between them that I thought the story was heading to a lesbian kind of “freshman fling.” But no. Part of the powerful gravitational pull has Julia “transforming” Elsie into a new persona. Julia makes Lena into an accomplice, and co-conspirator (sound familiar?); enlisting her help in mysterious deliveries and shadowy meetings that end in murder. And what turns into an international spy vs. spy international plot. She is sent back to Hollywood by the CIA (via her first airline flight).
Soon, she is working in Hollywood as a costume designer ~ a dream job at Lux Pictures styling the stars with her inspired designs. It isn’t long before she meets a handsome screenwriter, Paul. While Lena fervently hopes she’s left her dangerous past behind her, she can’t stop looking over her shoulder. She remains terrified that her lies will catch up to her.
Further fueling her fears is the very real panic of the Red Scare, being Blacklisted, and the MPA that permeated the motion picture industry of the 1950’s. Your livelihood could be ruined with a whisper campaign of mistrust and deception. It was a time of uncertainty and tension. (Sounds eerily contemporary!)
The novel is expertly peppered with real-life actors: Susan Heyward, Debbie Reynolds, Elizabeth Taylor, Robert Mitchum, the all-powerful gossip columnist Hedda Hopper and her red-baiting tabloid Confidential Magazine, and more ~ that gives the story gravitas and more glamour. And also contextualizes how one’s reputation and career were consistently perilous as these stars were always being investigated and pursued.
So too, could Lena’s world be mysterious, fearful and dangerous.
She had been successfully pulling off her charade and new life as head of Costume Design at Lux, but just as she and Paul got engaged and she felt she could live happily ever after, a photograph of her and Paul’s engagement announcement in Hedda Hopper’s tabloid is like an open invitation to her past.
The chickens come home to roost, as we say.
What follows is another murder, subterfuge, betrayal, guile, the power of a strong woman. And love.
The gripping ending reads like a speedy ride along the Pacific Highway ~ with lots of turns and switchbacks.
It was getting so compelling that I found myself reading while brushing my teeth and making tea! I had to know how this was going to turn out for Lena, Paul, and Julia.
You’ll love this book. Fashion, Hollywood, Love, Movie Stars, Rome, Mystery ~ what’s not to like?
I highly recommend this exciting, fun read. (And don’t you just adore that red-hot book jacket?)
Artful Power of Music and Film
In Chance’s Afterword, the author presents more than a justification which is what I felt the Harlem Rhapsody author Murray did. Here, Chance enlightens us further and it’s a whopper. Chance jumps right into what is true historically and heretofore rather obfuscated or downright hidden that she discovered as part of her research and what sparked her historical fiction novel.
She explains that in 1945 Lieutenant Daniel McGovern was one of the first Americans to arrive in Hiroshima and Nagasaki as a director of the US Strategic Bomb Survey. I won’t give away the details here because it would be a spoiler.
And Chance has woven such an intriguing, fast-paced mystery thriller that any further explanation will reveal what is a key driver/clue to the plotline.
So too is the focus on jazz in the novel. While I adore jazz and didn’t need any rationale for jazz-as-character, I learned in the Afterword why jazz held such historical significance in the Cold War. Jazz was banned in the Soviet Union ~ the Reds considered it a decadent capitalist campaign intended to destroy the USSR. Jazz is powerful…
Underground jazz and bootleg recordings from radio stations were recorded on x-ray sheets!
While Voice of America and the BBC were jammed, they listened to Radio Iran, Radio Luxembourg and others that featured jazz programs. Red and Hot, by S. Frederick Starr and the website Bone Music are excellent sources of information as cited by the author.
Who knew that jazz was being recorded on x-rays of bones? (It almost begs a musical tribute, no?)
Thank you Amazon First Reads for the opportunity to read and review Glamorous Notions.
By Patricia Meade
Published February, 2025
Evelyn Galloway, a New Yorker, who, seeing that her ability to work in films is drying up in Gotham, heads to Hollywood to take a studio job as a script writer, is the likeable protagonist.
Cliches abound in the story, starting with her dame of a roommate who is a wise-cracking cutie pie. They become instant girlfriends over egg sandwiches and soda pop.
It’s 1939 Hollywood before World War II and the threat of war and its effects on the films and many of the big screen’s British and European ties hangs over the characters and their jobs.
Mystery, and the ambiance of mystery is meant to be heightened by the Alfred Hitchcock set of Rebecca ~ one of my most favorite thriller films
This story is about relationships ~ not a lot of action or scene-setting.
Evelyn solves the mystery of John Margrave, a man she met on the set her first day at the studio. He’d been a silent film matinee idol that Evelyn worshipped growing up, going to the cinema with her father. Margrave impressed Evelyn with his kindness, giving her a feel for the studio’s politics and showing her the ropes, so to speak. He invited her to lunch the next day to discuss a script he was working on, but he doesn’t show up, and later that evening Evelyn unwittingly is a witness to his murder scene when she sees a mysterious man near Margrave’s apartment gazebo and a famous actress fleeing the scene. When the newspaper reports don’t match what she saw, Evelyn inserts herself into the investigation. She feels obligated to figuring out who could have done this to such a good man. Little by little, like constructing a movie sequence, she plots and prods.
Because the characters and the relationships are so engaging, you suspend the realism that the LAPD would even allow/dare I say “entertain” Eveyln to ever pursue her detective work. But again, like a Nancy Drew novel, this is a charming storyline and a determined dame. It’s simply a fun detective story to read. Eveyln relies on her friends to solve the murder mystery the LA cops can’t.
The author pens a real sense of the times especially the fashions, the fear of impending war, and the sense that the world is changing. Death Upon a Star is historical fiction light, with all the Hollywood trimmings: stage moms, studio heads, and the feeling of family that staff personnel on the lot feel for one another. There’s also plenty of behind the scenes drama, with screen personalities that help enliven and give a sense of character. There’s Lawrence Oliver ~(who playfully admonishes: “Call me Larry”) his then wife, Vivien Leigh, who was vying for the Rebecca lead, that instead went to Joan Fontaine, as per Hitchcock’s keen instinct.
Dinner parties and working with Alfred Hitchock and his wife, there are enough of these Easter eggs to provide a plummy gravitas.
There is a wee bit of an attempt to shine a light on cultural prejudice when the Mexican-American studio film archivist confides about how things are in Hollywood for a man like him and how he fears Evelyn’s roommate wouldn’t go for a guy like him but it’s just a hint.. No expository or more in-depth side story.
Death Upon a Star is slated to be a book series. And I can see this as a streaming entertainment series too, because of the opportunity to mine Old Hollywood, glamorous fashions, parties, booze, broads, and a good mystery. It is fun, lighthearted entertainment. You’ll find it great to curl up with this book for a rainy day or a happy beach read. The characters are just swell in a Nancy drew-like way.
Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC read.
I hope you will enjoy these books as much as I did. Please leave your comments and let me know.
