Book Five: All This, and Heaven Too by Rachel Field

This was another book sale purchase and another another purchase inspired by a film (like Julie and Julia, Mr. Blanding Builds His Dream House, Ragime, and Laura.) 

The film stars Bette Davis (that's why I watched it) and Charles Boyer. I never did get the charm of Charles Boyer. Now, I can't watch him without thinking of Car 54 and Sylvia Schnauzer. ("I'm so glad I'm married to Leo Schnauzer and not Charles Boyer.") 

I thought the book might be just a soapy melodrama. I second-guessed my purchase. I resigned myself to putting it aside if it wasn't any good. Instead, I enjoyed this book much more than I expected. 

Rachel Field is a vivid writer. 

Here are a few lines from A Letter of Introduction from the book's author to its protagonist:

"Fragments of your wit and sagacity have survived, like chips of flint left where arrowheads were once sharpened."

From Chapter Nine:

"The sky showed brilliantly blue and polished in gaps between yellow and bronze overhead, but for all its clearness a faint, bitter blue haze drifted. One was always losing and finding it again, like fragments of an old tune."

Rachel Field is telling the story of her great aunt Henriette Desportes in three parts. Part I details Henriette's life as a governess to the Praslin family and her involvement in a scandalous murder.  In Part II, Henriette is teaching at a girl's school in New York City. Part III focuses on Henriette's married life as Mrs Henry M. Field. 

Part I is the most dramatically interesting section and is the basis for the Bette Davis film. But Henriette had a rich life beyond the Praslin scandal in Part III. I keep coming back to the idea of Henriette as a kind of Forest Gump who witnesses and participates in key moments in American history. 

I was particularly intrigued by Henriette's reaction to first seeing Edwin Booth on stage. She recognized him, in his New York debut, as a great actor. The Field family was also involved in creating a commercial telegraph cable across the Atlantic Ocean. I'm interested in reading more about the telegraph as it relates to the growth of the railroads. 

I love when I find connections between seemingly different things I am interested in.