The Lady with the
Dark Hair by Erin Bartels
Esther Markstrom is the curator of an art museum featuring
the work of her famous ancestor, Francisco Vella. She runs the museum and cares for her
mentally ill mother. She wonders if she
is destined to live an uneventful, boring even, life, when she encounters her
former college art professor, who turns her world upside down by a recent
discovery.
Bartels skillfully weaves the two storylines of Esther and
Vivienne, a 19th century artist together to reveal the mystery of
the lady with the dark hair. Not only does
she tell the story skillfully, but she illuminates the process by which artists
paint and how the pigments themselves were created and distributed.
The main point of the story is the struggle that women
painters encountered as they tried to break into an art dominated by men in the
late 1800s. The spiritual content of
this book seemed a little lighter than Bartels’ other works, but Vivienne
especially references Him in her trials.
However, this was a very enjoyable and clean novel and should be
palatable to readers who may be offended by spiritual references. It doesn’t contain pithy life lessons like a
Lynn Austin novel or showcase spiritual growth like a Jamie Langston Turner novel, but
it does contain two women who come to terms with what they want from life and
take action to get it.
I enjoyed this novel and appreciate the arc I received from
the publisher in exchange for this, my honest review.
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