Publishers Weekly
12/18/2023
Quinn (The Diamond Eye) and Chang (The Porcelain Moon) team up for a stirring story involving opera, prized antiquities, and the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Gemma Garland, a soprano in New York’s Metropolitan Opera, is hoping to revive her lagging career. Shortly after her arrival with the Met’s traveling company in San Francisco, where she’s slated to perform with Enrico Caruso, Gemma meets and falls for charming railroad magnate Henry Thornton. Soon, she’s singing at his house for members of high society. Her affection for Henry curdles, however, after she learns about his dark side from Chinese embroiderer Suling Feng, whom Henry has hired to mend a damaged robe from a Beijing palace. Among his other collectibles is an ornate crown, also taken from the palace. It turns out Suling’s lover Reggie has disappeared, and she tells Gemma that Henry is to blame. The women confront him just as the earthquake hits, after which Henry and the crown disappear. The authors ably develop the two main characters as they discover a shared sense of independence and join in common cause while reckoning with the mixed blessings of a powerful man’s patronage. Readers of historicals with strong female leads will savor this. (Feb.)
From the Publisher
"An irresistible proposition for a gifted operatic soprano. The double lives of a talented young Chinese woman and her artist lover. A tenacious, globe-trotting female botanist. The legendary crown of an Empress. The devastating San Francisco earthquake of 1906 and the ensuing rampant, deadly fire. Brilliant authors Kate Quinn and Janie Chang weave these threads together into seamless, page-turning masterpiece of history and suspense — shot through with women rising up from the margins of society to claim their own singular futures. I could not put this triumphant novel down." — Marie Benedict, New York Times bestselling author of THE FIRST LADIES and THE MITFORD AFFAIR
"Oh my goodness, I couldn’t put this book down! Heart-pounding, gasp-out-loud storytelling—THE PHOENIX CROWN is the best book I've read all year." — Victoria Christopher Murray, New York Times bestselling author of THE FIRST LADIES and THE MITFORD AFFAIR
"When two masters of historical fiction team up, it’s like 1+1=1000. I’m in awe of this impeccably researched, magnificently rendered, and breathlessly paced tale that kept me up late into the night reading, reflecting, and delving into the haunting true stories that inspired this novel. I cannot wait to recommend The Phoenix Crown to my own book club." — Jamie Ford, New York Times bestselling author of The Many Daughters of Afong Moy
“[A] seamless collaboration of two terrific novelists.” — Washington Post
MARCH 2024 - AudioFile
Two accomplished narrators, Saskia Maarleveld and Katharine Chin, set forth this story of the San Francisco earthquake of 1906 and the people caught up in its devastation. Both narrators are skilled at portraying emotions, revving up suspense, and mastering many varieties of accents and dialects. Maarleveld 's urbane and sonorous voice brings to life the ambitious opera ingenue, Gemma, and Chin's pert narration animates Suling, the hardworking, artistic Chinese American embroideress. Two other brave and gifted women make up the quartet of heroines who struggle to survive and to bring justice to a murderer. This is gripping historical fiction, and listeners will also learn about the trauma faced by the residents of Chinatown during that time period. D.L.G. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine
