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The women : a novel
Boyle, T. Coraghessan.
Adult Fiction BOYLE

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From Publishers' Weekly:

The genius of Frank Lloyd Wright was both magnetic and cruel, as evidenced by the succession of failed marriages and hot-blooded affairs depicted in this biographic reimagining that drills into Wright mythology and the dark shadows of the American dream. The narrative moves backwards in time through the accounts of four women in Wright's life: Olgivanna, the steely, grounded dancer from Montenegro; Miriam, the drug-addled narcissist from the South; Kitty, the devoted first wife; and Mamah, the beloved and murdered soul mate and intellectual companion. But the novel's centerpiece is Taliesin, Wright's Oz-like Wisconsin home. The tragedies that befall Taliesin-fires, brutality-serve as proxy for Wright's inner turmoil; his deeper stirrings surface only occasionally from behind Boyle's oft-overbearing depiction of Wright's women. The most engaging person is Tadashi Sato, the Japanese-American apprentice and narrator who emerges via his frequent footnotes as a complex reflection of "Wrieto-san" and, with his inability to remain objective and his evolving view of Wright and Wright's image, becomes the book's most dynamic character. It's a lush, dense and hyperliterate book-in other words, vintage Boyle. (Feb.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

From Library Journal:

In his trademark style, Boyle (www.tcboyle.com) uses a fictional narrator to tell the story of an American original: Frank Lloyd Wright, that flamboyant genius of 20th-century architecture. The tale unfolds through the experiences of four women who loved Wright: the Montenegrin beauty Olgivanna Milanoff, the passionate Maude Miriam Noel, the spirited Mamah Borthwick Cheney, and Wright's devoted first wife, Catherine "Kitty" Tobin. Narrator Grover Gardner, a Publishers Weekly Narrator of the Year (2005), navigates the complicated story line with ease, reading with a distinctive clipped accent that could almost be Japanese (the novel's narrator is Wright apprentice Tadashi Sato, newly arrived from Japan). An excellent choice for fans of popular and literary fiction. [Audio clip available through www.blackstoneaudio.com; the Viking hc was recommended "for most fiction collections," LJ 12/08.-Ed.]-Nann Blaine Hilyard, Zion-Benton P.L., IL (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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