On a sultry night in June 1897, a young Russian by the name of Pyotr Ivanovich Balenov and two young women transport a dead man through the narrow streets of a working class neighborhood in northeastern Paris. They throw the body into the canal and the girls flee to the Latin Quarter to hide with one of the Russian's anarchist "comrades." They do not realize they, too, are being watched. Their subsequent disappearance and the violent acts that follow will set Clarie Martin, a teacher and mother of a toddler, and her husband, magistrate Bernard Martin, on a dangerous quest to rescue them from a vicious killer.
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“Pope plots Clarie's search for the missing girl with precision and restraint. The true draw here is her portait of women—and their not-so-equal rights—at the turn of the last century. Wonderfully engaging. Even in the face of senseless limitations, Clarie proves it is possible to find joy, truth—and even oneself.”
— O, The Oprah Magazine (editor’s pick)
“An unlikely sleuth is drawn into another murder mystery in turn-of-the-century France…Pope's third mystery featuring Clarie (The Blood of Lorraine, 2010, etc.) expertly doles out pieces of its complex plot, a picaresque puzzle with satisfying period flavor.”
— Kirkus Reviews“The musings of Clarie about the wrenching inequity between the pampered women she teaches and those she and Bernard search for in back alleys gives us a window into this glamorous yet perilous time. Engrossing.”
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Barbara Corrado Pope fell in love with the art, landscapes and people of Provence while teaching French, women’s and religious history to American students in Avignon. Among the many places she led lecture-tours were Aix-en-Provence, where she followed in Cézanne’s footsteps, from the hidden depths of the Bibémus Quarry to his sunny studio at Les Lauves on the outskirts of town.
She has a PhD in the Social and Intellectual History of Europe from Columbia University and has taught history and women’s studies in places as diverse as Hungary, Tuscany, the University of New Mexico, and Harvard Divinity School. Her longest stint was at the University of Oregon, where she was the founding director of women’s studies.
Born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio, Barbara resides in Eugene, Oregon, where she is actively pursing a second career as a novelist. Her third, The Missing Italian Girl arrives in February 2013.
Meredith Mitchell is an actress who has performed in such films as Mona Lisa Smile and The Reunion, on stage with Shakespeare & Company and the New Repertory Theatre, and on television on Good Morning America. She received her BA in psychology from Emory University and her MFA in acting from Brandeis University.