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The story of a beautiful, talented, intelligent girl who pretends to be something she isn’t in order to reach for a bigger life.Set in Boston and New York in the 1920s, weaving in history and myth through the antiques shop where it’s set, it illuminates the glittering, dangerous fascination of the Prohibition era for a girl who dreams of more.
Mae Fanning overcomes a scandalous year to secure a good job as a sales girl in a tiny antiques shop run by two eccentric men. It is her passport to a better life than the one she leads with her widowed mother in a poor Italian community in Boston, and introduces her to ideas, beautiful objects and history she has never before encountered – it opens her mind and her horizons. But it also introduces her to the dangerously brittle and flawed Van der Laar siblings, Diana and James. For Mae, lacking any kind of family background or fortune, reputation and her job are all – yet like a moth to a flame she keeps being drawn back to the fatally fascinating pair and their hold over her.
402 pages, Kindle Edition
First published April 5, 2016
"The Broederbond. It means 'brotherhood' in Afrikaans. It's actually a private organization. We work on behalf of Afrikaner interests."
I was confused. "You mean for the natives?"
"Good God, no!" He laughed. "Best to leave that to the missionaries! No, Afrikaner. The true African people."
"Oh. I see." I had to conception of what he meant.
He wasn't fooled.
"The Afrikaners have been in South Africa for centuries. Our ancestors came from Holland, France, Norway. We settled this land, made it civilized. Left to their own devices, all the native tribes do is slaughter one another."
I'd always imagined Africa as safari tents, dramatic sunsets, and vast windswept plains teeming with wildlife. "Still, it must be quite exciting, with lots of lions and elephants..."
"Well, there's plenty of good hunting, but don't believe any of that nonsense you read about the noble savage. Mind you," he said darkly, "they're nothing compared to the English. They're completely without a conscience. You see, we understand Africa. It's our destiny and duty to guide and shape it. That's why the Broederbond was formed, to take this country back. We have a responsibility to our homeland - " He stopped himself, smiling apologetically. "I'm on my soapbox again, aren't I? I'm boring you."
He wasn't, actually. It was another world, one I knew nothing about. But that didn't stop me from teasing him. "On the contrary. Naturally I find you utterly fascinating."