The Muse: A Novel

The Muse explores how life and relationships both inspire and disrupt artists in practicing their craft. It also highlights the fallibility of historical and other records, particularly as a result of human fallibility.I really enjoyed traveling through time and space in this book, visiting a home in Trinidad, traveling with a Trinidadian immigrant to a shoe store and then the art scene in London, traveling back to a Spain on the brink of civil war, and allusions to Hitler's violence in Austria and France. The ties between these places and events were really interesting and well executed, and I enjoyed that the author didn't try to fill in every scene of the story, leaving the edges a little blurry but deepening the color of the central characters, their conflicts and bonds, their secrets.There were a few plot points that felt unnecessary and that I didn't really understand the purpose of in the end.

This is about marketing and recognizing the works of a woman where men are only recognized. As Olive knows she can bring magic to a painting but falls in love with a recognized painter, but helps his revolutionary cause by gaining recognition to him with her painting ability. This story coincides with a beautiful Trinidad-born woman who meets a man with the mysterious painting he requests to be sold by her employer. I really liked this story of characters who strive to be valued in a material world.

I enjoyed reading this novel immensely. The language is exquisite, the characters deep and psychologically complex. In addition the story dramatizes the mystery of art itself and the artist's reasons for doing it, even at the expense of personal loss. The author, Jessie Burton, has her finger on art's attraction and power, as well as its tendency to be overwhelmed by the forces of history and psychology.

THE MINIATURIST, Jessie Burton's first novel, related the tale of a 17th century indigent farm girl, married off to an older Amsterdam merchant. The book contains beautifully written descriptive passages, sections of simple dialogue and multiple plot twists making it a real page turner. THE MUSE is more complicated, perhaps too complicated. The story is set in two different time periods: 1967 England and 1936 Andalusia. The modern heroine is an emigre from Trinidad who speaks with an accent on occasion. The other heroine is an English artist who frequently speaks Spanish with local residents. The onset of the Spanish Civil War adds tension to that part of the story. Burton connects the time periods through the creation, ownership and sale of an artist's oil paintings. The descriptive passages are at times too lengthy and the dialogues frequently seem artificial. The love stories also seem contrived. Burton is a gifted writer. This reader looks forward to her next novel where it is hoped that she chooses to relate less with less.

Even though The Muse has one literary element that has gone stale for me ( a then-and-now construct where a young current-day character unravels a mystery revealed from the past), I found this to be a good read. Burton's characters, although flawed, are likeable and believable. The setting of pre-revolutionary Spain seen through the eyes of a female artist is intriguing; however, the narrative of modern-day Odelle's insecurities and triumphs seems to lack the detail and vitality of 1930s Olive and Teresa. Although not as mesmerizing as Donna Tartt's "The Goldfinch," "The Muse" is worth reading.

I’m not eloquent enough to write a review that expresses how good this book it, how good the writing is. This is the most I’ve enjoyed a book in years. The struggles these women go through is so beautifully conveyed. I was completely enraptured and couldn’t pull away. Their personalities are so different as well as their loves and struggles I’m sure every woman will identify with one of them if not a bit of all them. Yet I can’t imagine the difficulty of the times this is set. Such a breathtakingly beautiful read that I’m certain I will read again one day.

I'm a tough critic. So it's saying something that I liked this book. The writing is good, a definite plus. The characters were good without being overdrawn. They are quirky, interesting people, one of the two main characters trying to subvert the bias against female painters. It took me a few chapters to get to the "I have to know what's going to happen" stage, but I would definitely recommend this book for the story, the characters, and what it has to say. I just wish writers of literary novels would NOT spend the last ten pages tying up all the loose ends. Tie things up with elegant brevity

I heard Jessie interviewed on NPR and started with her first book The Miniaturist. Needless to say, I liked her voice, her style and her characters. As an author she introduced many complexities, about race, gender, class and more. The Spanish Civil War contrasted against London in the 60s post WWII is very interesting. Plus the story is really that of an immigrant, so even more timely with world events. It's obvious that she did a lot of research and I'm a big fan of historical fiction. I really liked both books, so much that I searched for other things she's written, nothing yet, but I will read her next one!

I always love a novel with a well researched historical background so this had real appeal for me. The story is multi layered with clues to the final outcome dropped along the way. The characters were very convincing and I felt totally invested in them. Not quite a happy ending but that’s what life is like. I shall certainly search out other books by this author.

The Muse is a fantastic read with well-plotted twists. Odelle Bastien comes to London from Trinidad looking for better life, more chances for success. She's hired by mysterious Majorie Quick to work as a typist in Skelton Institue. Odelle is a writer, and one of her poems is a starting point of her relationship with Lawrie Scott. Lawrie is an owner of a painting that as it turns out was painted by a very promising Spanish author that we don't know much about. Lawrie brings the painting to the Skelton for examination - an event that shakes Quick and excites gallery's owner. All this is happening in 1960s London. In parallel to how we follow Odelle's steps to finding out what is Quick's connection to the painting, we are taken back to 1930s Spain when the painting depicting Saint Rufina was created. It was painted in an uncertain time in Europe but in a somewhat happy time for the artist. Olive Schloss moved to small rural town Arazuelo with her parents, and there she meets Isaac and Teresa Robles. Isaac is a socialist that is passionate about helping workers; Teresa is his half-sister who is hired as a help in Schloss's house. Robles change Schloss lives in many ways, leaving us wondering how the painting ended up in London thirty years later.The story picks up only after some time, and I had troubles at the beginning to engross myself in the story. But when it finally come to a point where I could clearly see how the two stories are connected I was hooked. I wanted to know how the author will fool us into thinking one thing, and later showing us that the clues were directing us in an entirely different direction. It was predictable how the story will go, but it was still enjoyable. Odelle is a great character, she's very smart and has a wit that is elevating the story. She was not overly emotional, even though she could go that way very easily. Luckily Burton kept her away from being a whiny character that will be insufferable to read about. Majorie Quick is a mysterious character and the one that will annoy you the most. Not because she's created badly, but because she is written well and she's just an annoying character that keeps too many secrets and doesn't want to share them.The character I had a problem with is Lawrie. He inherited the painting from his late mother, and he claims that he has no idea how he's mother got that painting. We later learn more about his family, especially his mother. And when I knew all the details I could not think of any reason, and no sufficient reason was provided in the book, for Lawrie to keep some facts to himself. I cannot understand why he reacts or didn't react to some fact he learns during the meetings with the gallery owner who was presenting data he managed to gather on Lawrie's painting. He baffled me, and he's actions didn't always make sense to me.The Spanish part of the story had more irritating characters - Olivia and Sarah, daughter and mother. Oh my... A very unhealthy relationship between those two. The whole family of Schloss has lots of secrets, and the keeper of them all is Teresa. Because of all the secrets, she has a lot of power that she is using in a way that changes the lives of the family. At heart, the Spanish part of the book is a sad tale, with a lot of pain suffered by the family, Teresa and Spanish people.The final chapter is deeply satisfying. It was a perfect end to the story; I got exactly what I was hoping for, nothing more, nothing less. It is a book worth reading; historical fiction fans will love it.

It takes some time to see where this inventively plotted novel is heading, or how its two alternating parts – one set in England in 1967 and the other in the South of Spain in 1936 – connect.In England, Odelle Bastien, an immigrant from Trinidad, has a secretarial job at the Skelton Institute for Art. She has fallen for Lawrence Scott, whose late mother had left him a painting that had meant a lot to her. He knows nothing about it and takes it to the Skelton Institute for their opinion. Edmund Reede, the director of the Institute, and Marjorie Quick, Odelle’s enigmatic immediate superior in different ways (and, as we will see, for different reasons) become very excited by the painting. That is the beginning of an elaborate detective story, full of drama which in one or two places is melodrama.Then we switch to Spain, where we meet the Schloss family: Harold, the Jewish father, had been a Viennese art dealer; Sarah, the non-Jewish and neurotic mother has come from a very wealthy English family; and their daughter Olive. As Nazi influence grows in Austria, they leave the country and spend time in England and, now, in a rented finca in the South of Spain. There are two painters in that part of the story: Olive (whose father believes a woman cannot be a real artist and belittles her work) and Isaac Robles, one of a pair of siblings who works for the family.Back in England, a link is made between the two stories – but it is a misleading one. We will find out later why it is misleading: that strange story is the heart of the novel – an astonishing and almost unbelievable tangle of identities. At one stage I guessed I had untangled it, only to find a very few pages from the end that I was wrong.There is a lot more to the book than the story about the painting: reflections on art, authenticity and fame; a couple of love stories (I thought the description of the women’s initial emotions are on the corny, novelettish side); what it is like to be a West Indian in England; Odelle’s literary ambitions; her friendship with a fellow-Trinidadian, Cynthia; the relationship between Odelle and Marjorie Quick; that between Olive, Isaac and his sister Teresa; the run-up to and then the actual Spanish Civil War (with one truly terrible scene).The book makes for compelling reading. If I give it four stars instead of five, it is because for my taste the story is just a little too contorted.

3.5 StarsI found myself a little disappointed, overall, in this book. Whilst I enjoyed Odelle's story in particular I found myself becoming increasingly frustrated with Olive and started to skim read her sections. I have read a few books centred around the Spanish Civil War and it just seems to be a period of history that is unable to capture my imagination or hold my interest. It doesn't help that I found Olive to have few redeeming characteristics and, to me, she cam across as completely manipulative, selfish and entitled. Everything I can see (from the words on the page) that we are not supposed to really be feeling about her; nevertheless that is how she made me feel.I was far more interested in Odelle's 1960s London. There was so much left unexplored here that it left me quite frustrated. She is clearly a person of colour, a post-Windrush immigrant that was in a city that was close to embracing segregation and yet this is barely touched on, there are a couple of nods to it but nods are all they are and yet the prevailing attitudes towards the Irish and Coloured (can we use that word now? I use it here because it is contemporary with the setting of the book and less unpalatable than the other most common name bandied about) immigrants were harsh and would have had a major impact on their lives. In some ways Odelle is really just a foil to get Jack's painting seen by the gallery and to expose Olive's story.I also wanted to know much more about the enigmatic, gin swilling, chain smoking Marjorie Quick. Whilst it is true that towards the end of the book we learn much more about her personal history there is so much left unsaid about how she got where she is. Information that I found myself wanting to know, to immerse myself in.Basically, too much time was spent lingering in a parched Spain with Olive, her dissipated mother, distant father, the rebellious Isaac and the disaster zone that was Tere. These were a cast of characters that, whilst I understand their importance to the tale, I learned far too much about and was forced in to the company of. All I really wanted was a swinging Sixties London and the glorious Odelle.

I felt the plot was under developed and like other readers wondered why the protagonist was Trinidadian. It did not enhance or enrich the plot at all and felt like a device to make it contemporary.I became irritated that the internal language of the protagonist did not match the external language with Cynthia. If she spoke patois with her Caribbean friend, then why did she not do so internally? “Ah” externally became “I” internally. And when speaking to Laurie for example she lost her accent. Why did the character not comment on perhaps enjoying speaking Patois with Cynthia because it made her feel at home? A strong editor would have picked that up.I have also noticed, both in The Miniaturist and The Muse, that the author several times tells us about a letter or poem but does not share it with us as if the author was afraid it wouldn’t be good enough. I found that frustrating.This felt like a rushed book done to complete a publishing deal. It required fleshing out more with a more rounded plot and a subplot. I’m afraid it felt very one dimensional and disjointed. Quick was a fascinating character but she was not fleshed out and fell into melodrama which almost seemed out of character. The twist felt contrived rather than clever.Devices such as the First Person perspective can trip up an author, forcing them to make characters do things that alter their character, such as the protagonist listening in on meetings at the keyhole. The author had to do this because she needed to impart certain information which was difficult to do whilst in First Person, but in making her listen through keyholes, or rummage through someone’s drawers, or poke about in someone’s bedroom changed her protagonist’s character in order to achieve it and put me offside as a reader.On the plus side, especially at the beginning,The Muse felt far better written than The Miniaturist, but the plot began to override the quality of the writing. Which was a shame.