From the dust jacket: "For Gaby Cocroft of Wadsworth, Ohio, the world is small-a cocoon of home and family-until the day her husband leaves and she is suddenly alone, without money, without work, without love. Summoning the courage to begin again, she comes to New York-only to discover that for a woman like her, the doors of the city remain firmly closed.
It is then, in a moment of desperate inspiration, that Gaby Cocroft becomes Gabrielle Didier. For cloaked in a borrowed identity, even a housewife from Ohio can be transfomed into a woman of mystery. It is a small lie. But, as Gaby will learn, even small secrets can take on a life of their own...
As Gabrielle Didier, Gaby drawn by a chance encounter, enters a world of breathtaking riches-and heart-stopping risk. For here, beneath the glamour of New York's fabled January Antiques Fair, the glittering exhibitions at London's Grosvenor House, the society soirees, and the suspense-filled auctions, as the dealers who will do anything to gain a coveted piece-or to destroy a competitor's reputation. Here are two historic auction houses-Lafitte et Fils and Castleton's-whose past alliance has turned to a consuming rivalry. Here is the corrosive struggle between brother and sister to gain control of Castleton's, a struggle in which Gaby will become inextricably ensnared.
Here, too, threaded tantalizingly through a sumptuously patterned novel, is the story of the search for a legendary tapestry-a magnificent and priceless model of the medieval weaver's art, long thought destroyed-and of those who will stop at nothing to find and possess it. Above all, here is Maximilian Richard, a man as exciting as he is mysterious, a man Gaby knows may not be what he seems, even as she surrenders to his irresistible charm."
It is then, in a moment of desperate inspiration, that Gaby Cocroft becomes Gabrielle Didier. For cloaked in a borrowed identity, even a housewife from Ohio can be transfomed into a woman of mystery. It is a small lie. But, as Gaby will learn, even small secrets can take on a life of their own...
As Gabrielle Didier, Gaby drawn by a chance encounter, enters a world of breathtaking riches-and heart-stopping risk. For here, beneath the glamour of New York's fabled January Antiques Fair, the glittering exhibitions at London's Grosvenor House, the society soirees, and the suspense-filled auctions, as the dealers who will do anything to gain a coveted piece-or to destroy a competitor's reputation. Here are two historic auction houses-Lafitte et Fils and Castleton's-whose past alliance has turned to a consuming rivalry. Here is the corrosive struggle between brother and sister to gain control of Castleton's, a struggle in which Gaby will become inextricably ensnared.
Here, too, threaded tantalizingly through a sumptuously patterned novel, is the story of the search for a legendary tapestry-a magnificent and priceless model of the medieval weaver's art, long thought destroyed-and of those who will stop at nothing to find and possess it. Above all, here is Maximilian Richard, a man as exciting as he is mysterious, a man Gaby knows may not be what he seems, even as she surrenders to his irresistible charm."
into the lives of the antique dealers...the good and the bad...
Gaby Cocroft is an Ohio homemaker whose husband dumps her. She transforms herself into Gabrielle Didier, a sophisticated, high-end antique dealer. Some fun looks at the world of high-end antiques and auctions in Manhattan. This is one of those great, big fat 80s books jampacked with 80s luxury in settings, clothes, hair.
An entertaining read if you can get past the illogical soap opera twists the plot takes. Doris Mortman is at her best when she\'s rambling on about antiques, art and expensive living. Most of her characters are one-dimensional: Irina Stoddard, the arch-villianess, is a cartoon - she reminds me of Cruella de Ville. A good book to take to the beach and leave there when you\'ve finished.
