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City of Dreams

City of Dreams

Author(s): Harriet Steel

Location(s): Paris

Genre(s): Fiction, Historical

Era(s): 1860s

Location

Content

After a whirlwind courtship and marriage to dashing Frenchman Emile Daubigny, Anna, the teenage daughter of a Russian furrier, moves to Paris with her new husband, looking forward to a life of gaiety, love and comfortable affluence. The year is 1864: married life and the social scene in the most fashionable city on earth is everything Anna hoped it would be, but when Emile vanishes without trace and she is evicted, her world crumbles. As war with Prussia looms, Anna and the city she loves must struggle to survive.

This coming of age story explores the themes of friendship, love and the fragility of dreams. Nineteenth century Paris is richly evoked, from the opulent ballrooms of high society to the squalid tenements and harsh streets where the shadow of revolution grows ever darker.

City of Dreams is the first in a series of novels that will follow the stories of Anna and her descendants in Paris and further afield.

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Lead Review

A really colourful sense of setting and place of this well researched historic novel.

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