Soon to be a feature film from the creators of Downton Abbey starring Elizabeth McGovern, The Chaperone is a New York Times-bestselling novel about the woman who chaperoned an irreverent Louise Brooks to New York City in the 1920s and the summer that would change them both.
Only a few years before becoming a famous silent-film star and an icon of her generation, a fifteen-year-old Louise Brooks leaves Wichita, Kansas, to study with the prestigious Denishawn School of Dancing in New York. Much to her annoyance, she is accompanied by a thirty-six-year-old chaperone, who is neither mother nor friend. Cora Carlisle, a complicated but traditional woman with her own reasons for making the trip, has no idea what she's in for. Young Louise, already stunningly beautiful and sporting her famous black bob with blunt bangs, is known for her arrogance and her lack of respect for convention. Ultimately, the five weeks they spend together will transform their lives forever.
For Cora, the city holds the promise of discovery that might answer the question at the core of her being, and even as she does her best to watch over Louise in this strange and bustling place she embarks on a mission of her own. And while what she finds isn't what she anticipated, she is liberated in a way she could not have imagined. Over the course of Cora's relationship with Louise, her eyes are opened to the promise of the twentieth century and a new understanding of the possibilities for being fully alive.
Drawing on the rich history of the 1920s, '30s, and beyond-from the orphan trains to Prohibition, flappers, and the onset of the Great Depression to the burgeoning movement for equal rights and new opportunities for women-Laura Moriarty's The Chaperone illustrates how rapidly everything, from fashion and hemlines to values and attitudes, was changing at this time and what a vast difference it all made for Louise Brooks, Cora Carlisle, and others like them.
Soon to be a feature film from the creators of Downton Abbey starring Elizabeth McGovern, The Chaperone is a New York Times-bestselling novel about the woman who chaperoned an irreverent Louise Brooks to New York City in the 1920s and the summer that would change them both.
Only a few years before becoming a famous silent-film star and an icon of her generation, a fifteen-year-old Louise Brooks leaves Wichita, Kansas, to study with the prestigious Denishawn School of Dancing in New York. Much to her annoyance, she is accompanied by a thirty-six-year-old chaperone, who is neither mother nor friend. Cora Carlisle, a complicated but traditional woman with her own reasons for making the trip, has no idea what she's in for. Young Louise, already stunningly beautiful and sporting her famous black bob with blunt bangs, is known for her arrogance and her lack of respect for convention. Ultimately, the five weeks they spend together will transform their lives forever.
For Cora, the city holds the promise of discovery that might answer the question at the core of her being, and even as she does her best to watch over Louise in this strange and bustling place she embarks on a mission of her own. And while what she finds isn't what she anticipated, she is liberated in a way she could not have imagined. Over the course of Cora's relationship with Louise, her eyes are opened to the promise of the twentieth century and a new understanding of the possibilities for being fully alive.
Drawing on the rich history of the 1920s, '30s, and beyond-from the orphan trains to Prohibition, flappers, and the onset of the Great Depression to the burgeoning movement for equal rights and new opportunities for women-Laura Moriarty's The Chaperone illustrates how rapidly everything, from fashion and hemlines to values and attitudes, was changing at this time and what a vast difference it all made for Louise Brooks, Cora Carlisle, and others like them.
Laura Moriarty is the author of The Center of Everything, The Rest of Her Life, and While I’m Falling. She lives in Kansas.
"The Chaperone is the enthralling story of two women . . . and
how their unlikely relationship changed their lives. . . . In this
layered and inventive story, Moriarty raises profound questions
about family, sexuality, history, and whether it is luck or will—or
a sturdy combination of the two—that makes for a wonderful
life."—O, The Oprah Magazine
"In her new novel, The Chaperone, Laura Moriarty treats this
golden age with an evocative look at the early life of silent-film
icon Louise Brooks, who in 1922 leaves Wichita, Kansas, for New
York City in the company of 36-year-old chaperone, Cora Carlisle. .
. . A mesmerizing take on women in this pivotal era."—Vogue
"With her shiny black bob and milky skin, Louise Brooks epitomized
silent-film glamour. But in Laura Moriarty's engaging new
novel The Chaperone, Brooks is just a hyper-precocious and
bratty 15-year-old, and our protagonist, 36-year-old Cora Carlisle,
has the not-easy mission of keeping the teenager virtuous while on
a trip from their native Kansas to New York City. After a battle of
wills, there's a sudden change of destiny for both women, with
surprising and poignant results."—Entertainment Weekly
"Throughout The Chaperone, her fourth and best novel, Laura
Moriarty mines first-rate fiction from the tension between a
corrupting coastal media and the ideal of heart-of-America
morality. . . . . Brooks's may be the novel's marquee name, but the
story's heart is Cora's. With much sharpness but great empathy,
Moriarty lays bare the settled mindset of this stolid, somewhat
fearful woman—and the new experiences that shake that mindset
up."—San Francisco Weekly
"Film star Louise Brooks was a legend in her time, but the real
lead of The Chaperone is Cora Carlise, Brooks'
36-year-old chaperone for her first visit to New York City in 1922.
As Cora struggles to tame Louise's free spirit, she finds herself
moving past the safety of her own personal boundaries. In this
fictional account of Cora and Louise's off-and-on relationship,
Laura Moriarty writes with grace and compassion about life's
infinite possibilities for change and, ultimately,
happiness."—Minneapolis Star Tribune
“When silent film star Louise Brooks was a sexually provocative and
headstrong 15-year-old from Kansas, she traveled with a chaperone
to new York City to attend dance school. In this fascinating
historical novel, her minder, Cora, struggles to keep her charge
within the bounds of propriety but finds herself questioning the
confines of her own life. Thorough Cora the world of early
20th-century America comes alive, and her personal triumphs become
cause for celebration.”—People
"Captivating and wise . . . In The Chaperone, Moriarty gives
us a historically detailed and nuanced portrayal of the social
upheaval that spilled into every corner of American life by 1922. .
. . [An] inventive and lovely Jazz Age story."—Washington Post
"#1 Summer 2012 novel."—The Christian Science Monitor
"A fun romp."—Good Housekeeping
"Devour it."—Marie Claire
"The novel is captivating, and the last lines about Cora (you might
think I’m giving everything away, but I’m not giving anything
away—the story rolls through changes in terrain so subtle that it’s
like a train from Wichita to New York and back) capsulate it all,
revealing the richness of the saga.”—The Daily Beast
"The Chaperone," an enchanting, luminous new novel by Laura
Moriarty, fictionalizes the tale of the very real caretaker who
accompanied a 15-year-old Louise Brooks on the first leg of her
journey to silent-movie stardom. . . . Moriarty is a lovely writer,
warm and wise."—Cleveland Plain Dealer
"It is [Louise Brooks's] endearing and surprising companion Cora
Carlisle—a sharply drawn creating—who is the heart and soul of this
stirring story.”—Family Circle
"Captivating and wise."—Newsday
“While Louise lends The Chaperone a dose of fire, the
novel’s heart is its heroine, who has a tougher time swimming in
the seas of early-20th-century America than her ward does. As the
story carries on, Moriarty’s greatest strength proves to be her
ability to seamlessly weave together Cora’s present, future and
colorful past.”—Time Out
“Set to be the hit of the beach read season.”—Matchbook
“The challenges of historical fiction are plentiful—how to freely
imagine a person who really lived, how to impart modern sensibility
to a bygone era, how to do your research without exactly showing
your research. And yet, when this feat is achieved artfully (we’re
talking Loving Frank or Arthur and
George artfully), it can transport a reader to another time
and place. Laura Moriarty’s new novel,The Chaperone, falls into
this category.”—Bookpage
“It’s impossible not to be completely drawn in by The
Chaperone. Laura Moriarty has delivered the richest and realest
possible heroine in Cora Carlisle, a Wichita housewife who has her
mind and heart blown wide open, and steps—with uncommon
courage—into the fullness of her life. What a beautiful book. I
loved every page.”—Paula McLain, author of The Paris Wife
“What a charming, mesmerizing, transporting novel! The characters
are so fully realized that I felt I was right there alongside them.
A beautiful clarity marks both the style and structure of The
Chaperone.”—Sena Jeter Naslund, author of Ahab's
Wife and Adam & Eve
“The Chaperone is the best kind of historical fiction,
transporting you to another time and place, but even more
importantly delivering a poignant story about people so real,
you'll miss and remember them long after you close the book.”—Jenna
Blum, author of Those Who Save Us and The
Stormchasers
Moriarty's engrossing work of historical fiction centers around Cora Carlisle, a woman selected to accompany aspiring entertainer Louise Brooks to New York City from Wichita, KS. Louise, who would become one of Hollywood's biggest stars in the 1920s and 1930s, here is only 15 years old but already well aware of how to use her beauty to her advantage. For Cora, a traditional, married mother of two who is a stranger to Louise at the beginning of the journey, the trip represents an opportunity to learn more about her own ambiguous past. The book is narrated by actress Elizabeth McGovern, perhaps best known to audiences as Lady Cora from the British period drama Downton Abbey. McGovern deftly provides Moriarty's characters with distinct speech patterns and accents, which will help listeners navigate this work's long stretches of dialog. VERDICT Highly recommended for general and literary fiction collections. ["Moriarty is a wonderful storyteller; it's hard to put this engaging novel down," read the review of the New York Times best--selling Riverhead hc, LJ 3/15/12.-Ed.]-Nicole Williams, Englewood P.L., NJ (c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
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