Book Review—The Magnolia Palace by Fiona Davis

I am so excited to review The Magnolia Palace by Fiona Davis. Published on January 25, 2022, this historical fiction novel is also part mystery. In this book,  Ms. Davis has focused on the Frick residence in New York City, which is now the The Frick Collection (of art).

The novel has a dual timeline which begins in 1919 with model/muse Lillian Carter, better known as Angelica, posing for many of New York City’s finest artists and sculptors. After the death of her mother that year to the Spanish flu, Lillian feels lost and some events cause her to stop modeling. She stumbles across the Frick mansion and becomes the personal secretary to Helen Clay Frick, daughter of Henry Clay Frick, a famous industrialist and patron of the arts.

The other timeline begins in 1966 with The Frick Collection serving as the background of a Vogue Magazine shoot. Model Veronica Weber, through a series of events, becomes locked in “The  Magnolia Palace” overnight and meets Joshua Lawrence, an art history major from Brooklyn College who is working there on an internship. 

The two timelines work together in an ingenious plot developed by the author to try to explain the mysterious death that occurred at the Frick Mansion in 1919.

I loved this book because the author created a feel for The Gilded Age in New York City throughout the 1919 sections of the novel. Helen Clay Frick and her father, Henry, came alive in the book through the author’s meticulous research of the Frick family.

I always say that if a book you read makes you want to read and research more about the subject, then the book has more than exceeded its purpose. That’s how I feel about The Magnolia Palace. I am now going to read The Johnstown Flood by David McCullough and Henry Clay Frick: The Man by George Harvey. Also recommended by the author are Helen Clay Frick: Bittersweet Heiress and Henry Clay Frick: An Intimate Portrait both by Martha Frick Symington Sanger, great-granddaughter of Henry Clay Frick.

I highly recommend The Magnolia Palace by Fiona Davis.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5