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The House Girl: A Novel
The House Girl: A Novel
The House Girl: A Novel
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The House Girl: A Novel

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Two remarkable women, separated by more than a century, whose lives unexpectedly intertwine . . .

2004: Lina Sparrow is an ambitious young lawyer working on a historic class-action lawsuit seeking reparations for the descendants of American slaves.

1852: Josephine is a seventeen-year-old house slave who tends to the mistress of a Virginia tobacco farm—an aspiring artist named Lu Anne Bell.

It is through her father, renowned artist Oscar Sparrow, that Lina discovers a controversy rocking the art world: art historians now suspect that the revered paintings of Lu Anne Bell, an antebellum artist known for her humanizing portraits of the slaves who worked her Virginia tobacco farm, were actually the work of her house slave, Josephine.

A descendant of Josephine's would be the perfect face for the lawsuit—if Lina can find one. But nothing is known about Josephine's fate following Lu Anne Bell's death in 1852. In piecing together Josephine's story, Lina embarks on a journey that will lead her to question her own life, including the full story of her mother's mysterious death twenty years before.

Alternating between antebellum Virginia and modern-day New York, this searing tale of art and history, love and secrets explores what it means to repair a wrong, and asks whether truth can be more important than justice.

LanguageEnglish
PublisherHarperCollins
Release dateFeb 12, 2013
ISBN9780062207524
Author

Tara Conklin

Tara Conklin was born on St. Croix in the US Virgin Islands and raised in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. She is the author of the New York Times bestsellers The Last Romantics and The House Girl.  

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  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This is an interesting story combining history, art and the law. It is told in two narratives - Josephine, a 17 year-old house slave and modern day Lina, a young attorney. Gradually their stories intersect and the book becomes more interesting. However, I found Lina's story far more compelling as she searches for the 'perfect' plaintiff to be the face of a class lawsuit for slave reparations. I enjoyed the first few chapters of Josephine's story but then I found her story incomplete. She felt plastic and lacked emotion so I never really connected with her. The ending was also rather disappointing after having spent nearly a week following the lives of Lina and Josephine.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    In 1852 17-year-old Josephine Bell made the decision that she would run north to escape her life as a slave at Bell Manor. Josephine’s day-to-day life was better than that of most slaves but that was only because of Missus LuAnn. Her Missus had secretly taught her to read and allowed Josephine to share LuAnn’s own love of painting. Despite all that, Josephine knew it was time to go. Master Bell was making it a little dangerous for Josephine to stay at Bell Manor. In 2004 New York City, Lina Sparrow hopes the new case she has been asked to work will be the one jump starts her law career and allows her to move away from clients whose names all end in LLC. She is to begin working on a precedent setting class action lawsuit worth millions in reparations for descendents of American slaves. As she begins her research in hopes of finding a living descendent willing to act as lead plaintiff, she stumbles upon Josephine’s story.

    I’m not sure if the writing tool has been around for a long time or if by happenstance I am just picking up more books using the method, but many authors lately are making use of the dual (sometimes triple) time line. For some it succeeds and for others, not so much. In House Girl it definitely adds to the story. I would have found either story fascinating as a stand alone whether it were Josephine’s or Lina’s, but Ms. Conklin weaves them together beautifully, allowing the reader to slowly see the parallels. I was interested enough to check out the two websites the author lists in her acknowledgements and can safely say House Girl is well researched historical fiction.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The House Girl is yet another novel that juxtaposes a contemporary story with a linked plotline from the past. It is a tricky balancing act for the author to ensure that both stories are of equal interest.Lina Sparrow is a first year litigation associate in a high-powered New York City law firm. Although 24 and attractive, she doesn’t have much of a personal life, since her law firm career demands so much of her time. She still lives with her father, Oscar, who is a well-known artist.Josephine Bell, seventeen in 1852 and serving as a house slave in Lynnhurst, Virginia, is also an artist. Her master, Missus Lu, sometimes allows her to paint with her in her studio. Now that Missus is feeling poorly, she even asks Josephine to help complete her own paintings, because her hand has become too unsteady.As the story opens, Lina’s “mentor partner” at Clifton & Harp, Daniel Oliphant III, pulls her into a big new case brought by a wealthy African American client, Ron Dresser. Dresser wants to sue for reparations on behalf of the ancestors of slaves, claiming that trillions of dollars in unpaid wages resulted in unjust enrichment for private companies benefiting from slave labor before the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment. Lina’s assignment is, per Dan, to “get ourselves a great lead plaintiff: "I want something stirring, a new angle, something compelling. And don’t forget photogenic – these people will be on TV, they’ll be in the papers, they’ll be giving interviews. We need some great people, Lina, some great stories.” The lawsuit provides an excuse for Lina to read about (and share with us) the history of slave exploitation of labor.Thanks to her artist dad, Lina discovers the slave Josephine as a potential source for a “colorful” angle, if only she can find a descendant. A series of very unlikely and improbable developments enable her to learn many details that not only advance her case, but also allow her to locate the perfect plaintiff. Everything gets wrapped up in the end, but not neatly, and even somewhat bizarrely. Discussion: In many ways Josephine’s story is infinitely more interesting than Lina’s, but I don’t have a sense of how historically realistic Josephine’s story may have been, nor how authentic her voice seems. On the other hand, Lina’s account of life in a top-ranked, competitive law firm rings very true. I laughed out loud at Lina’s comparison of law firm time to casino time, and at the way she thought of everything she did in six-minute intervals.But some of the coincidences and dei ex machina in the story strained credulity. And some of Lina’s actions seemed markedly inconsistent with her character portrayal. Most perplexing to me, however, was the lawsuit that formed the backbone of the story.I was surprised, maybe astounded even, that the lawsuit for reparations for unjust enrichment was defined as having an end point of 1865. In fact, prior to 1865, slavery was legal. After 1865, on the other hand, slavery continued in the South by surreptitious means, and it is then that companies truly could be culpable for unjust enrichment. [See, for example, the Pulitzer Prize winning book Slavery By Another Name by Douglas A. Blackmon who analyzes why blacks did not rise in American society after emancipation until the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Using extensive documentation, he demonstrates that long past the time of the Civil War, slavery was actually still alive and well in the South in all but name, with active support of the state and federal governments.]Evaluation: The intertwined stories of this book are definitely compelling, even if there are some plausibility issues, especially in the Lina sections of the book.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The House Girl marks Tara Conklin's debut novel.The story is told in two narratives - that of Josephine a 17 yr old house slave in 1850's Virginia and Lina - a class action lawyer in 2004 New York.The opening chapter belonged to Josephine and I was immediately captivated. She is planning to run - and it won't be the first time. “Mister hit Josephine with the palm of his hand across her left cheek and it was then she knew she would run. She heard the whistle of the blow, felt the sting of skin against skin, her head spun and she was looking back over her right shoulder, down to the fields where the few men Mister had left were working the tobacco.” Lina's law firm is looking for the "perfect plaintiff" to be the 'face' of a lawsuit being brought, seeking reparations for descendants of American slaves. She stumbles across Josephine's name through her father's work. He is an artist and there is great controversy concerning who really painted a series of paintings attributed to Josephine's 'Missus' - Lu Anne Bell. Was it Lu Anne or was it the slave Josephine?Lina's narrative follows the search for the descendants and I found this part of the story extremely interesting. Lina is also going through her own personal difficulties - she has her own family issues that have been left untended for many years. I wanted to like Lina more than I did. Although she is a high powered lawyer, she is still a petulant child with her father. And given that she is highly intelligent and quite adept at research, I cannot believe that she never sought to confirm the details of her mother's life and death. By the middle of the book I found myself speed reading through her sections.It was Josephine's story that grabbed my heart and wouldn't let go. I know it's a fictionalization, but Conklin has based her novel on facts. Heartbreaking facts. Additional narrators are introduced through their letters - that of a slave doctor and a young woman whose home was a stop on the Underground Railroad. I enjoyed these sections very much as well. I chose to listen to The House Girl. The reader was Bahni Turpin. She was excellent - her interpretation of Josephine chillingly brought her story to life. The cadence and tone she used for Lina was completely different of course, but I found it matched what I thought of Lina - a bit whiny. The accents used for other characters - especially that of Lu Anne Bell were excellent and believable.This one is poised to be the darling of book clubs everywhere. There is a reading group guide. I did enjoy this debut effort, but there are other books dealing with slavery (and in a deeper manner) that I would recommend ahead of this title. Still, it was an entertaining listen.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I'm not a fan of dual time-period novels. Many authors have to stretch to make the historical and present-day narratives mesh or add a fantasy element. Tara Conklin pulls off this trick with skill and finesse. I was fully invested in both her main characters: the artist-slave Josephine and the modern-day lawyer (salary slave?) Lina. Although, their stories parallel with missing mothers, unrealized potential, and overlap with mysteries, it's always obvious that Josephine's life is tragic and Lina deals with what we call "first-world problems." Both make life-changing choices, but Josephine's are visceral and dangerous.Conklin provides a well-paced poignant story with suspense, detailed settings, and interesting characters. My only complaint is a plot twist involving some too-convenient epistolary evidence which I can't explain without spoilers. A small complaint compared to the overall effort which brings us a wonderful tale addressing a difficult subject. Highly recommended.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Tara Conklin has written a wonderful book about a slave from Virginia and a lawyer in New York City, who was a kind of slave to her law firm. The book flips back and forth from 1853 to 2004. Josephine, the slave, was a house slave whose mistress taught her to read and write and allowed her access to art supplies. Her artwork survived although it was attributed to her mistress, Lu Anne Bell, who died in 1853. Carolina Sparrow (Lina) is an up-and-coming Caucasian lawyer at a large NYC firm who is assigned to work on a slave reparations lawsuit. She is the daughter of two artists although her mother died when Lina was four. Her father has painted a series of paintings featuring her mother, about whom he had refused to say much over the years. The book weaves these stories together pretty seamlessly and ends up as a spell binding read. Highly recommended! I could hardly put it down.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A well crafted novel filled with the history of Virginia. Lena, a present day lawyer seeking descendants for a reparation lawsuit, is the vehicle in which we discover Josephine a house slave in Virginia in the 1850s. Josephine story in itself is riveting. We witness the complex relationships of house slave and owner as Josephine cares for her dying mistress Lu and paints with her. Add Lena's present day stresses being in a huge law firm, her artist father and shadowed past and we have a novel filled with great character, great situations and a dynamic read.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Josephine is a house girl, a slave in 1852 living with the Bells on a dying plantation with a dying mistress, and dreams of running away. In the present day, Lina Sparrow is a young litigation lawyer whose firm is representing a client suing for reparation against big name companies that profited from slavery in the 19th century.I didn't exactly know what to expect when I picked up this debut historical fiction novel for this month's book club book. I was quickly sucked into both Josephine and Lina's stories. In alternating chapters, the story investigates the nearly unimaginable long-term toll that slavery has taken on an entire nation, while illuminating the lives of these two women with their own heartaches. There is plenty for a book club to discuss, and Conklin's writing has a smooth style that makes for compelling reading. I could have used a little more development of secondary characters such as Lina's boss, her father, and the potential love interest that shows up, but overall I really enjoyed this thought-provoking, challenging read.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Skilled slaves were often hired out as craftsmen and women. We know this because their masters and mistresses earned money from their talents. But what about those artistic talents that didn't earn money? What about a highly talented landscape painter and portraitist? Would her work, unsigned by her of course, be attributed wrongly to the not nearly so talented but definitely white mistress of the house who liked to dabble with paint? In Tara Conklin's novel, The House Girl, this question of authorship and art coupled with the themes of family and belonging twine throughout the complex dual narrative plot. Lina Sparrow is a new lawyer. Raised by her charismatic artist father after her artist mother's death when she was small, she has worked hard to get where she is in life, juggling her own drive with taking care of her often times absent minded father. She is an up and coming star for her year at her very high powered law firm and she's just been asked to work on a slavery reparations class action lawsuit against the US government, provided she can find a suitable lead plaintiff to be the poster child for the suit. And this is the point where Lina's two lives, the controlled work life and the bohemian home life collide since she comes up with the idea for a lead plaintiff while at an exhibition with her father. She sees works by antebellum artist Lu Anne Bell who captured life on a southern plantation in her landscapes and portraits but it is the more and more generally accepted suggestion that Bell's best works were in actual fact painted by her house girl Josephine and claimed as Lu Anne's that is most interesting to Lina. And so she sets out to find out the truth about the paintings and if Josephine had any descendants who could possibly be the face of Lina's lawsuit. While Lina's search for Josephine's fate and family goes on in the modern day, the novel also tracks Josephine's life in the pre-war years. She is an accomplished artist but her talent must be sublimated to her duties to her very ill mistress. The master of the plantation is a cruel and hard man, breaking not only his slaves but also his wife. Lina resolves to flee the Lynnhurst plantation right from the opening chapter of the novel although it takes her a long time to acquire the knowledge and the resolve to follow through with her desire to be free. Her tale of slavery is not unusual but that doesn't make the telling any easier. The novel starts off exceedingly slowly and even though the reader knows that the parallel stories must converge, it took quite a while for Lina's search to line up with the goings on in Josephine's life, delaying the revelations that must come in the end. But eventually they did compliment each other better than in the beginning and worked to engage the reader. Josephine's life, although representative of so many slaves, was a fascinating one while Lina's life and work on the lawsuit was less interesting although her own search for the truth about her family as she searched for the truth about Josephine's possible descendants was an interesting parallel. The fact that Lina so easily finds what she is looking for though, where others have failed through the years, makes the ending to the novel unearned and although the trail of letters from both Dorothea and Caleb Harper concludes several plot threads quite tidily, both those instances were too deus ex machine and made for too easy and neat a conclusion. There are interesting themes in the novel, that of the personal and political connections to art, family and truth, the search for self, origins and provenance, and the complications of history to name just some and because of that the book is a good read if not a great one.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The House Girl by Tara Conklin

    Challenges read for: Goodreads, EBook, Historical Fiction

    Book Cover: Simple, pretty, very much the way Josephine would be.

    This was a fabulous story, a story of a slave out of the tobacco fields in Virginia who wanted nothing more than to be free--at any cost. A brave girl who could tell us a story of plantation life as she saw it through drawing and painting. The story flows painlessly from present day to late 1840's. We meet Josephine, a house girl to Missus Lu on what had once been a large and prosperous tobacco plantation. The missus has given Josephine exposure to her own studio where Josephine can blossom into quite an accomplished artist. Tragedy occurs, both die in separate incidents and it is assumed that the paintings found were the accomplishments of the Missus. The buyers of the plantation showcase those works as those of Missus Lu. Enter present day and Lina, up and coming attorney in a large firm, slated for partner, who has a reparations suit dropped in her lap--her research brings her into Josephine's extraordinary short life and begins to reveal the truth--could those paintings truly be the work of Josephine? Beautifully woven story--although the core is Josephine, it is the story of Lina's own battles--guess you'll just have to read it for yourself!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Loved Josephine's part of the story, 1852 on a failing tobacco farm in Virgina, but Lina's in the present day, I did not find as enticing. The author did a very credible job in seamlessly weaving the past with the present, but the present day story was a bit of a cliche for me. Young lawyer, taking a case on reparations,ar times I felt a bit minupulated and preached to about this case, and the fact that the main litigant was of course an extremely good looking male. Josephine, who wanted to run away, despite knowing other slaves who had their ankles cut for attempting the same thing, was a very likable character. Lina, and her constant ruminating on billable hours, I think was meant as a reflection that she was a slave to her law firm, and only as valuable to them as the money she coud bill. Good first novel, brought up many interesting aspects of slavery and what our responsiblilty is to a past that we were not part of, will be good for discussion groups. ARC from publisher.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Great story, well written, couldn't put it down!
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Audiobook performed by Bahni Turpin

    In contemporary New York City, attorney Carolina Sparrow is working on an historic class-action lawsuit seeking reparations for the descendants of American slaves. In 1852, Josephine is a house slave who tends to the mistress of a Virginia tobacco plantation; her mistress is the artist Lu Anne Bell. The two stories converge when Lina hears of a controversy rocking the art world: art historians now suspect that the paintings ascribed to Lu Anne Bell may really have been painted by her slave girl, Josephine. A descendant of Josephine would be the perfect “face” for the lawsuit – if Lina can find one.

    I enjoy reading historical fiction set during this period in America. I almost always learn some interesting tidbit of information, and this book was no exception. I loved the sections of the book dealing with Josephine and her struggles. But Conklin alternates chapters and keeps coming back to Lina Sparrow and her efforts to come to grips with her mother’s death and her father’s refusal to talk about her mother. I thought the present-day story weakened the impact of Josephine’s story. Added to that was the fact the despite drawing the reader into the story, it ends rather abruptly with no clear conclusion. Yes, I understand that is the reality of many such personal histories, but this is fiction and I wanted a better ending.

    Bahni Turpin does a fine job narrating the audio book. She has good pacing and I had no trouble differentiating the characters, despite the many shifts in perspective.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Alternating chapters tell the stories of two women. In 1853, Josephine Bell, a seventeen-year-old slave on a Virginian tobacco plantation, plans her escape to freedom. In New York in 2004, Lina Sparrow, a young attorney, is looking for a good lead plaintiff for a class action suit seeking reparation for the descendants of American slaves. The two stories intersect when Lina hears about a folk artist whose paintings are thought to actually be the work of her house girl Josephine. Lina sets out to do genealogical research to determine if Josephine had any descendants. Josephine’s story - her life and her fierce determination to escape from servitude as a house slave – is compelling. The reader cannot but feel sympathy for her circumstances. Unfortunately, the author’s decision to tell the last part of Josephine’s story using a witness’s letter distances the reader from her and lessens the emotional impact of the narrative. Lina’s story is much less interesting. The reparation case is really far-fetched, and her research is advanced by a series of coincidences that stretch credibility. Just as she seems to reach a dead end, a document lands in her lap which gives clues that have eluded numerous scholars. In the end a letter written by a peripheral character conveniently explains everything. Of course, this crucial document reaches her only at the last minute when an archivist has a change of heart. Lina is not a believable character. She is able to change the minds of the archivist and her candidate for lead plaintiff yet she is totally passive at work and lets her boss walk all over her? She works hard at searching for evidence of Josephine’s descendants, yet she knows virtually nothing about the death of her mother 20 years earlier. Never did she actually conduct a search into her mother though she was an aspiring artist who had received some publicity? The reader is expected to see parallels between Josephine and Lina’s determination, but Lina just comes across as flat next to the house girl. Lina is a naïve, sheltered and unfocused young woman, and her story is bland.The novel would work well as historical fiction if the focus had remained solely on Josephine and her story had been told directly without the inclusion of long missives from witnesses. Removing the Lina narrative would have eliminated most of the many coincidences and a weak character who does not inspire any emotional connection. The adding of the romance element in Lina’s chapters only added to the impression that the author was trying to write a commercial blockbuster which seems to necessitate such an element. This book has strengths but considerable weaknesses. It should have been subjected to considerable revision.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Tara Conklin intertwines the story of two women: Josephine Bell, a Virginia house slave who in 1853 is trying desperately to escape to freedom and Lina Sparrow, a New York attorney looking for a plaintiff to serve as "lead plaintiff" in a class action suit in 2004 to compel the payment of reparations for descendants of slaves. The story is hung together by the discovery of some artwork that is thought to have been painted by Josephine Bell although heretofore attributed to her owner. The slave story is by far the more compelling. We read of harsh treatment, unsuccessful escapes, and finally her "trip" on the Underground Railroad. The characters are well-drawn, believable, and the story hangs together beautifully. The reader is emotionally drawn into the life of Josephine, given insight into the extreme conditions slaves endured both in captivity in the south, and throughout the ordeal of the escapees.Lina's story on the other hand is a bit sparse. I found it difficult to relate to this young woman who seems to have no backbone in her job, whose researching skills are lacking and who seems to be on the receiving end of several fortuitous happenings. I couldn't quite figure out if the plaintiff she was pursuing was also meant to be a romantic interest, and I found the whole reparations story a wee stretch. The story of Josephine and her paintings carried the book. The platform of the reparations case was quite unsteady, and the ending really left me hanging.Overall, the book is still worth reading if for no other reason than for the clear picture of slave life and the hopelessness of their situation. Reparations may be called for. I just wish the author had made a better case for them, and found a more convincing plaintiff and built a more persuasive case.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    2004: Lina Sparrow, an artist's daughter, is an ambitious young lawyer working on a historic class-action lawsuit seeking reparations for the descendants of American slaves. Lina's search to find a plaintiff for her case will introduce her to Josephine, a seventeen-year-old slave in 1852, tends to the mistress of a Virginia tobacco farm - an aspiring artist named Lu Anne Bell. Was Josephine the real talent behind her mistress's now-famous portraits?A very interesting story told in parallel time between 2004 and 1852. At first, it's a slow read, but as the two stories come closer to merging, you will cheer not only for Lina's effort to recognize and reveal Josephine's achievements, but also for her success in finally compensating families of African American slaves.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    THE HOUSE GIRL by Tara ConklinJosephine is a 17 year old slave in anti-bellum Virginia while Lina is a twenty something up and coming lawyer in present day NYC. The lives of these two become entwined when a wealthy Black client of Lina’s law firm starts a “slave reparations” law suit that becomes entangled with an art dealer’s contention that Josephine is the true artist and not her widely acclaimed mistress. Both life in a high powered law firm and life in the slave owning South are presented believably. Lina and Josephine are both sympathetic and well-drawn characters. The story line for both is engaging. While the sub plot involving Lina’s mother is rather thin and too neatly concluded, the artistic element is a link for the two stories.Book groups will have a variety of subjects to discuss; some very superficial and entertaining and others quite serious and profound. Race relations now and then permeate both stories. The question “Who is Caucasian and who is Black?” may form the body of the discussion. The value of a piece of art and how the artist’s name recognition determines price is another point for discussion. Motherless children and how they and their families cope could form another topic.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Lina is a corporate lawyer and is assigned to find descendants of slaves to get reparation for them. She learns of Josephine, a slave who may be the artist of paintings credited to her owner Lu Anne Bell. This book is their story of the current day research and the past of Josephine's life. Some parts of Josephine's life may be hard to read, but you like her and her spirit. I liked the book and both main characters.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    I like the idea of this book and what this book potentially could have been, but I wasn't a huge fan of how it was written nor some of the story line (particularly the mess about Lina's mother). I wouldn't necessarily say it was a waste of my time, I enjoyed it enough, but I probably wouldn't recommend it to others.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I loved the historical stories of Josephine and Dorothea, Lina’s story I could have done without after all her talking about time by billable hours got really boring, then after her trip to Richmond and she got the important letter that she says on the plane she had a hard time not tearing it open then she gets home goes out and gets drunk with Jasper goes to work the next day and still hasn’t opened it?? What?? You would think that would have been the first thing she did before going out. I didn’t like Lina and her story (or her mother’s story) was so predictable, well it was one of three options *no spoilers* and sure enough it was one of those that I had guessed Very early on in her story.I think this would have been a better book without the reparations story, if the modern story had just been the case of the art authentication it would have tied the story together better, I will admit to just scanning through Lina’s story in the last 100 pages or so I just wanted to get back to Josephine. Josephine’s story was great we got to know her and knew her relationship with her Missus and we as a reader knew the truth about the art because the author gave us a detailed look at Josephine’s life. I also liked Dorothea’s story through the letters to her sister but I couldn’t help wondering what if these letters had fallen into the wrong hands they were so detailed with names and dates about what was happening at the family farm for something that needed to be kept in the utmost secrecy Dorothea sure talked a lot about it and that did come back to bite her.I would read more from this author as I did enjoy the historical story in this book.Overall I did enjoy this book I would give the historical part of this book 4 stars and the present day story 3 stars so 3 ½ stars as a whole.3 ½ StarsI received this from Edelweiss and the publisher for a fair and honest review.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    While this book started out a little slow for me, it really picked up steam and ended up being a really good read. I enjoyed it.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I enjoyed the parallel stories of Lina and Josephine, and was intrigued by the idea of artwork being attributed to white artists, that may have actually been done by slaves. The part of the story about Lina's mother, and her relationship with her father, was not as strong as the rest of the book, but that's a small quibble. I kept wanting to find out what happens to Josephine. As a librarian, I also enjoyed the parts dealing with research and archives!
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Two stories, one of a female slave who also was a painter, and a contemporary female lawyer preparing a brief for a lawsuit about the damages of slavery due current descendants. Both women developed into stronger people during the novel. Very worthwhile read.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    A great book, but the ending was missing. Great run up to what should have been a satisfying finish, and you are just left there with more questions.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    From 1852 to 2004....from one artist to another....from a farm in Virginia to the hustle and bustle of New York City.THE HOUSE GIRL flawlessly switches between these two time periods telling of the life of Josephine, a slave girl, Lina, a New York City attorney, and Lina's father, Oscar, an artist. The book leads you through the life of Josephine as she struggles with her decision to "run, it leads you through the life of Lina who is researching families who may benefit from wrong doing during the period of slavery in the United States, and it leads you through the life of Oscar trying to make amends through his artwork. The most significant question, though, along with finding descendants is that of who really did create the paintings found in Lu Anne Bell's home? Was it really Lu Anne or was it Josephine? Corresponding with this painting mystery and the mystery of Josephine's descendants is that of Lina's mother...what really did happen to her when Lina was only four? You will get caught up in both stories because of the great detail Ms. Conklin uses and because of the research. I love "digging" for historical information. As you switch between the two stories, you will ask yourself to choose which life you were more interested in....Lina's or Josephine's....it may be difficult to choose since both were appealing and drew you in, but for me Josephine's story wins hands down for interest.It took a few chapters, but you will become so involved, it becomes difficult to stop reading....you want to know what will become of the characters and the answer to the mysteries.Each character comes alive with the vivid detail Ms. Conklin uses, and she puts their feelings out in the open...you can feel the tension, the pain, the frustration, the longing, and the fleeting happiness they experience. I really enjoyed this book because of the history and the research and of course the detailed descriptions of the characters.The historical aspect and the fact-finding kept me up late. It is very interesting how the farm's kitchen records, crop records, and births and deaths of every person including the slaves was kept. I thoroughly enjoy these types of findings. I also wonder how these records were not destroyed and who would have thought to preserve them. Such foresight....something to be grateful for. Don't miss this book especially if you are a historical fiction buff. This book pulls you in and will cause you to pause and reflect on the human race and have you wondering about the reasons why we do what we do, have you wondering what the reasons are that lead us to make the choices we make, and have you wondering about the reason we turned out to be the person we are. 5/5This book was given to me without compensation by the publisher in return for an honest review.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This was a fine read, with two congruent stories in alternating chapters. That being said, I am a bit tired of that particular format, but that should not reflect badly on this book, I guess, that I grew bored with the "1850s/2010" this-then-that.The stories are of Josephine, a slave with great artistic talent, and Lina, an attorney whose father is an artist. The conceit is a reparations case for slavery itself, which I thought very novel. I must also admit that I had never considered that a slave might be a fine artist. Building furniture, yes, handling animals with great skill, sure, domestic arts, unfortunately. But the story really opened my eyes to how many slaves must have had similar abilities which were never allowed to develop. I think it's a sign of my residual racism. Not that it's a topic for my book review either but...The more I think about this book, the more highly I recommend it. Both major characters, and the minor ones, are very well drawn and the story flows beautifully.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    In Tara Conklin's "The House Girl," lawyer Lina Sparrow is tasked with finding someone to be the face for a class action suit her Manhattan law firm is handling that seeks reparations for descendants of American slaves. Lina is drawn to the story of Josephine, a slave in the home of now-famous artist Lu Anne Bell. There are those in the art world who are disputing the Bell family's claim that the paintings were done by Lu Anne, but instead were the work of her house slave, Josephine.Lina convinces her boss to let her track down what happened to Josephine's possible descendants. Lina is also dealing with the death of her mother, which happened several years ago, but which she and her father never talked about. I really enjoyed author Conklin's "The House Girl," especially Josephine's story and learning what the life of a slave had been like. Conklin's chapters switched between Lina in the current day and the ways of a corporate law firm back in time to the 1850s and Josephine's story of runaway slaves. I highly recommend it.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I absolutely adored this book. It reads flawlessly. While I was incensed at the appalling abuse and torture visited upon African Americans in the south, the rich story of the book is ultimately hopeful. This is a story I won't soon forget.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This is the debut novel for Tara Conklin. It's historical fiction set in two time periods: (1) present day New York City with Attorney Lina who works on a class action case on behalf of the descendants of slaves who were never paid for their work, and (2) mid-1800's Virginia on a failing tobacco plantation where Josephine is a slave house girl. Josephine is artistic and brave and dreams of running away to escape the hard life and abuse she suffers. The chapters switch between the viewpoints of these two protagonists. There are several stories going on making the book too long plus the author writes many detailed descriptions of various settings with information that seems like it's just to make the book longer. There are well-developed characters in Lina and Josephine. I was routing for Josephine to make her escape and for Lina to find the information she needed in all her research to win her case.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Told sometimes from the third person perspective of Josephine, a slave in Virginia in 1852, sometimes from Lina, an attorney in a 2004 reparations case, and sometimes from the letters of a family involved in the Underground Railroad, this is the story of Lina’s attempt to unmask the truth behind artwork that has been passed off as that of Josephine’s mistress, but may in fact be Josephine’s own. The novel is technically well-written and well-paced. Lina’s discovery regarding her own past, as she discovers the truth about Josephine’s, sparked my curiosity. However, I was disappointed at the lack of emotional impact that the novel had. The characters were interesting, but never quite compelling, and I felt detached particularly from Josephine, never really getting the sense of knowing her. At times she felt more like a plot device than a character in her own right. While the unfolding mysteries of the plot kept me reading until the end, this was not a book that stayed with me, as I felt connected to the plot, but never, unfortunately, to the characters.

Book preview

The House Girl - Tara Conklin

PART ONE

Josephine

Lina

Josephine

LYNNHURST, VIRGINIA

1852

Mister hit Josephine with the palm of his hand across her left cheek and it was then she knew she would run. She heard the whistle of the blow, felt the sting of skin against skin, her head spun and she was looking back over her right shoulder, down to the fields where the few men Mister had left were working the tobacco. The leaves hung heavy and low on the stalk, ready for picking. She saw a man’s bare back and the new hired man, Nathan, staring up at the house, leaning on a rake. The air tasted sweet, the honeysuckle crawling up the porch railings thick now with flower, and the sweetness mixed with the blood in her mouth.

The blow came without warning, no reason that Josephine could say. She had been sweeping the front porch as she always did first thing, clearing off the dust and leaves blown up by the night wind. A snail had marked a trail across the dew-wet wood of the porch floor and rested its brown shell between the two porch rockers. Josephine had caught that snail with a sharp swoop of the broom, sent it flying out into the yard, and then she heard Mister’s voice behind her, coming from inside the house. He said something she could not make out. It was not a question, there was no uplift in tone, nor was it said in anger. His voice was measured, it had seemed to Josephine then, before he hit her, not urgent, not hurried. She stopped her sweeping, turned around, looked to the house, and he walked out the wide front door, a proud front door Missus Lu always liked to say, and that’s when his hand rose up. She saw his right arm bend, and his lips part just slightly, not to open but just the barest hint of dark space between them. And then his palm, the force of it against her cheek, and the broom dropping from her fingers, the clatter as it fell.

Something shifted in Josephine then, a gathering of disparate desires that before had been scattered. She could not name them all, there were so many, but most were simple things: to eat a meal when hunger struck her, to smile without thinking, to wear a dress that fit her well, to place upon the wall a picture she had made, to love a person of her choosing. These distilled now, perfectly, here on this September morning, her hunger for breakfast sharp in her belly, the sun pink and resplendent in the sky. Today was the last day, there would be no others.

Afterward, she tried but she could not explain it to Caleb, why this moment marked the course of things to come. The snail she remembered, the curve of its shell, and the hot colors of the dawn. What came later—Dr. Vickers, what Missus Lu had done—did not change what Josephine decided then with Mister on the porch. Even if that day had held nothing more, she told Caleb, still she would have run. Yes, she would run.

As Josephine turned her head back around to face Mister, a warbler called from down toward the river, its sweet sweet sweet clear as the brightening day.

Mister said, Look after your Missus. The doctor coming today, don’t you forget.

He stepped off the porch, into the dirt of the front path, and looked up at her, his dark beard dusty from the fields, his eyes shadowed. Last month the curing barn had burned to the ground, and they’d lost some horses too, their screams terrible to hear. The winter before, Mister’s father, Papa Bo, had passed on, and the cow stopped giving milk, and Hap the field hand died from a bee sting. He’d got all puffed up and started scrabbling at the ground, Otis said, like he was digging his own grave, save the others the work. Now Missus Lu and her fits. There was an affliction in Mister, he had cause for sorrow. But Josephine did not pity him.

She nodded, her cheek on fire.

Mister walked in long steps down the sloping back hill of the yard, across the raw furrowed rows they had had no seed to plant. Jackson, the Negro overseer, watched over the others. Picking time, and the field just barely begun. Over at the Stanmores’ they had hundreds of acres, dozens of slaves, and already the first tobacco leaves were finished drying and sent to market, the wagons rumbling by the house, the nut-brown bundles piled high in the back. Mister would always spit when he saw one pass by on the road to town.

Josephine watched Mister go. She wanted to bring her hand to her cheek, but she didn’t. She spat a red streak across the weathered floorboards, rubbed at it with her bare right foot and then picked up her basket, stepped down off the porch, around the side of the house. There was a lightness in her, a giddiness almost. She walked down the slight slope, the grass cool under her feet, the sun a little higher now, the low mist burning off. Run. The word echoed thunderous in her ear and filled her head like a physical, liquid thing. Run.

Josephine had not been born at Bell Creek but she knew no other place. Riverbank, sink, fire pit, field, these had been the four corners of Josephine’s world all seventeen years of her life. Missus Lu kept Josephine close, sent another to run the errands in town, took a hand servant hired from the Stanmores with her back when she used to travel. Josephine stayed behind. She knew the stream that twisted west of the fields, the narrow banks only a few yards across, sycamores and willows overhead, their branches trailing in the water. Here is where she’d do the wash, cool her feet, fish for brown trout and catfish and walleye perch. She knew the twists and turns of the bank, the mossy bits and where a large stone angled its peak out of the water and underneath spread dark and wide. She knew the fields in all seasons, brown and fallow, greening and ripe, and the grown tobacco plants rising nearly to her shoulders, the leaves as wide as her arms outstretched.

She knew the big house, built by Papa Bo’s childless brother Henry back when the state of Virginia seemed blessed by both God and nature in the bounty of her riches. Henry’s barren wife had devoted the fullness of her attentions to keeping a house sparkling and outfitted with the best that her husband’s tobacco dollars could purchase or build. A wraparound porch in front, bedrooms many and large upstairs, full plate-glass windows in the parlor, a horsehair settee for sitting on when sipping from the bone china tea service marked with green ink upon the bottom of each cup. And a library, tucked at the back of the first floor, the books bound in red and brown leather, stamped with gold along their spines. They called the place Bell Creek and once it had been fine.

Now patches of white paint had molded to green, shingles slid down the low sloped roof, windowsills were splintered, the brick chimney cracked along the top rim. In the library, the books were stained with mildew, the pages stuck from moisture let in through a cracked side window that had never been mended. At night Josephine would listen to the scratching and burrowing of mice, squirrels, rats under the floorboards and behind the thin wood of the attic walls. Josephine slept on a thin pallet on the floor, the roof sloping low, the summer nights so hot she’d lie spread-eagle, no two parts of her body touching, her own two legs like strangers in a bed.

Josephine rounded the corner of the house and slowed at the sight of Lottie. She stood knee-deep in the side bed, weeding, picking purple veronia and pink cabbage roses for Missus’ table. All around the house perimeters, sloping down toward the river and, on the east side, toward the fields, spread the flowers: morning glories, spring beauties, irises, purple pokeweed, goldenrod. Whatever design had once attached to the beds had been lost with time and inattention, but the plants themselves seemed none the worse for it. They flourished, encroaching onto the lawn, spreading their pollen down even to the road, where rogue roses bloomed every spring beside the trodden dirt path and latched front gate.

Lottie was bent at the waist, elbows pumping as she pulled and flung the weeds behind her into a heap, the flowers in a tidy pile beside her. A few stems of bluebell, Winton’s favorite, were tucked under her apron strings. Lottie took small things here and there, bacon ends from the smokehouse, eggs from the hens, a sewing needle, a sweet; she never faltered and was never caught.

Morning, Lottie, Josephine said, and she thought her voice would be steady but it cracked toward the end, the echo of Mister’s blow still in her. Lottie raised her head, her gray hair tied up in a dark cloth, her skin shiny with sweat. A single horizontal line of worry creased her forehead as if a hatchet had been laid there once long ago.

What? Child, what is it? You look like you seen a spirit. Lottie believed the restless dead of Bell Creek lived among the willows lining the river where the morning mist hung. Papa Bo, Lottie’s own boy Hap, all Missus’ dead babies, even Mister’s mother and four sisters, their bodies buried back in Louisiana. Lottie saw them there on a summer’s night, or just before the dawn, she said, dancing, laughing, wailing too, among the branches that trailed like a white woman’s hair into the water.

Lottie dropped the flowers she held and moved toward Josephine. Her skirt hems dragged wet in the grass, and her gaze hardened as she saw the mark of Mister’s blow. Taking Josephine’s face in her hands, she turned it and laid one long finger on the tender spot. Ah girl, she said. You’ll be needing chamomile on that. Or something cool.

It’s nothing, Josephine said, though the skin tingled and she felt a rising tenderness. Lottie, it’s nothing. Just a little thing. But she did not pull away. The chill of Lottie’s hand, wet with dew, calmed her. Josephine leaned into Lottie’s warm, tough bulk and she was again a child at night at the cabins, after Lottie and the others had finally returned from the fields, and all the day’s sadness would fall from Josephine and into Lottie’s yielding places: the flesh at her waist; the shoulder’s curved hollow; an ample, muscled calf. Then as now, Lottie’s body seemed sturdy and soft enough to contain all Josephine’s hurts.

Lottie let Josephine fall against her and then she turned Josephine’s face back around and took her in with a level gaze. All right, then. It’s nothing if you say it.

It’s nothing. Josephine shook her head quick, like shaking water from her hair. She squinted at the sky and then turned to Lottie. I saw Nathan down back, she said. He looked to be straining.

He been laid up awhile, so he said. On account of his heels. Couldn’t do nothing, couldn’t stand or walk. They cut him too deep, is how he told it.

Mister had hired Nathan from Mr. Lowden, a neighbor six miles west, just for harvesting time, just to see them through. Nathan had run twice already and twice been caught and brought back to Mr. Lowden, whose tolerance for such goings-on had been sorely tested. Mister had hired him cheap on account of the history and Nathan’s slow pace now that his heels were cut. He was still new to Bell Creek, Josephine had not spoken with him yet; she had not asked him where it was he’d been headed when he ran.

Josephine said, What’s he like, huh?

Lottie paused, tilted her head. He’s fine. Seems fine enough. Got some sense.

Mmm. Puts me in mind of Louis. Something in his person, way he stands. Louis had been sold off three summers past and this was the first time Josephine had spoken of him. It surprised her that her voice did not shake, that no tears came with the sound. Louis. The name hung weighty between them, a hope or a tragedy, neither of them knew which. He was gone, gone.

Louis? I don’t see no Louis in him. Lottie said this with a frown and a slow shake of her head, as if that decided the matter. Josephine, what you want with Nathan?

Just wanted to say hello. Josephine looked down and stepped away, her bare soles marking 2-shapes in the mud. She had never lied to Lottie before and she did not like the feeling it gave her, a shifting underfoot, a drop in her belly. Tonight Josephine would ask Nathan to tell her the route north, tonight she would run. Run. The word still resonated within her and now took on a new pitch. Would Lottie come with her? Lottie and Winton possessed an unremitting belief in a salvation that would be delivered if they mustered faith true enough, if their path remained righteous. Lottie looked for signs of the redemption, like the two-headed frog Otis found by the river last summer, or the night the sky filled with lights falling and they shone so bright that everyone at the house and down by the cabins woke and stood on the front lawn, even Mister and Missus Lu, all of them together side by side, eyes open to that burning sky. These were all markers along the way, Lottie said, signs that Jesus be coming soon. She was waiting for Him. You cannot wait another day, Josephine wanted to say now. Come with me, Lottie, you and Winton should come. Nathan will tell us the way.

But here beside the flowers, the air heavy with their scent, the cool of Lottie’s hand still on Josephine’s cheek, the idea of running seemed too raw to bring out into the morning, into the sunlight, with tasks to be done, hours to be got through. The idea floated, not fixed or certain in its specifics, and she knew how easily an intention might go astray, how a path leading away might twist and return you to the place where you first began.

Josephine had tried before to run, one night some years ago. She had been no more than a child then, twelve, maybe thirteen, years old, with no understanding of the dangers or the true northward route or the way the shadows played tricks on the road. The journey back to Bell Creek had been long. This time she would not turn back. This time she would keep on, across the great Ohio River, all the way up to Philadelphia or Boston or New York, the northern cities that lived in Josephine’s mind like Lottie’s ghosts lived in hers.

Josephine said, I got to be getting on. I’ll come see you tonight, Lottie, at the cabins. We’ll talk then.

You come see me, and Lottie blinked her eyes slow, a softening at the corners of her mouth, the look Josephine knew so well in her, of cautious affection, a caring that Lottie always pulled up short before it went too deep. A muffled, distant kind of love. She’d been this way since Hap passed on, her last son, just twelve years old, proud as a peacock of his fiddling abilities, dead in minutes, with Lottie bent over his body still warm, lips and tongue puffed up, and on his arm a dime-sized redness where the bee had bit.

Josephine continued, down the low slope to the vegetable garden with its tangled rows and a thicket of raspberry and blackberry bushes grown together, fruit mostly for the birds because it reached too high and went too deep for Josephine to collect it all. Josephine thrust her hands into the brambles and pulled blackberries off their white fibrous posts. Last night Missus Lu had asked for berries with her breakfast. The thorns pricked Josephine’s skin but she kept on. Today like any other day. Pick what needs picking, berries with breakfast, greens for Mister’s supper. Do what needs doing. Like any other day.

Josephine gazed west at the small figures in the field, tattered scraps of dark moving against the tobacco green. Jackson alone stood motionless, a cowhide hanging ready at his belt. Even now with so few of them left at Bell Creek, he never flinched when whipping for a row dropped, a slow pace. He’d make a man eat the tobacco worm, Lottie had told her, the thick wriggling body with pincers at its head swallowed straight down. His wife, Calla, was stout and irritable, bought by Papa Bo years back from an itinerant trader. She never spoke of the children she’d left behind or the ones she’d lost at Bell Creek. There was a deep-down meanness in them both. Mister had no backbone for whippings, so Jackson did the work.

A thorn pricked Josephine’s skin deep and she brought the fingertip to her mouth. The first time she ran, fear had seemed a physical presence, tall beside her on the road, and she tried but she could not run out of its shadow. Now the fear seemed different; it crouched and slithered and whispered within the berry bush and the tall grasses all around. It was smaller, trickier, more cunning. The sting of the cowhide. A twisted ankle, a summer storm. Would it thunder tonight, or would the sky be clear? The hounds, the rifles. She thought of Nathan’s crooked walk. They cut the heels with an ax or a long-bladed hunting knife, the legs held fast under the weight of a man or within a vise like the one used for planing the new boards or just tied up with cord, bound as they bound the calves for branding. Two swipes of the blade would hobble both heels, but too deep and the wound would never heal, a leg swelled up and stinking or the foot itself dropped clear off.

A sudden cold descended upon Josephine and it seemed her legs turned dense and heavy, her breath caught deep within her chest. With shaking fingers she took another berry from the bush.

Like any other day. Do what needs doing.

A sound or a shadow took her away from the berries, and Josephine raised her eyes toward the house. A curtain rippled and she saw Missus Lu’s pale face at the window, staring down to where Josephine stood. Like an apparition, if Josephine hadn’t known better. Hair dark and unsettled as a storm cloud, her eyes just shadows in her head. Missus placed a hand on the glass. Josephine nodded up at her and started back to the house.

A breeze came up and pushed at Josephine’s back as she walked the path. Run, it whispered. Run.

Lina

NEW YORK CITY

2004

WEDNESDAY

The brief was not finished. Lina Sparrow, first-year litigation associate, took another sip of cold coffee. Her eyes flipped from her computer screen to the digital clock glowing red on the wall: 11:58 P.M. Get it to me Wednesday, Dan had said. Counting on you to work your usual magic. Never had Lina been late before, never, and yet here she sat, the last two minutes of Wednesday dangling just out of reach, her office a cave of paper and tented textbooks, the cursor blinking relentlessly on her screen. The brief: 85 pages, 124 perfect citations, the product of 92 frenetic hours billed over five ridiculous days, a document that would go to the judge, be entered into the official court record, be e-mailed to dozens of lawyers, to the client, to the opposing side. But was it good?

Lina’s shoes were off—she always wrote barefoot—and as she stretched her toes, she wondered what precisely was her problem. Last year she had graduated at the top of her law school class, and she was now the highest-billing first-year associate at Clifton & Harp LLP, the preferred legal services provider for Fortune 100 companies and individuals of dizzying wealth. Lina had heard of other people’s performance issues—time management, crises of confidence, exhaustion, depression, collapse—but never, in three successful years of law school and nine prolific months at Clifton, had she frozen like this. She rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands and blinked fast. Her office vibrated in the cold fluorescent glare: beige walls, gray carpet, white particleboard shelving units of the kind found in college dorm rooms, office buildings, prisons. On her second day at the firm, Lina had arranged a careful selection of personal items: on her wall, the law degree and one of her father’s smaller paintings; on her desk, the glass snow globe of a pre-9/11 Manhattan skyline and the photo of her parents circa 1982, both with longish hair and secret smiles. Each item represented a unique stamp on the exchangeable, impersonal nature of this space. I am here, the snow globe said. This is mine.

Lina picked up the snow globe now and shook it. Fake granular flurries settled over the city and she repeated the question again and again: Was the brief good? Was the brief good? Was it? Silently the clock shifted to 11:59. And as the deadline slipped away, Lina felt a rush like skiing, or eating sugar straight, or that icy morning a taxi had careened toward her as she’d waited on the corner of Fifty-first and Fifth and watched helpless, immobile, infused with a wondrous dread as it spun out inches from the curb. An intoxicating, brief adrenaline. 12:00. What was she waiting for? Resolution? Inspiration? The brief said exactly what it had to say: our client wants money and the law says give it to him.

Lina bent her neck hard to the left and heard her spine crack. She slipped her feet back into her high heels. Somewhere down the hall, the night cleaner’s vacuum whined with the insistence of a mosquito. Of course the brief was good. Weren’t her briefs always good? Wasn’t this, the law, what she did? And she did it very, very well. Lina typed a signature line and beneath it: Submitted by, Daniel J. Oliphant III, Partner, Clifton & Harp LLP.

The strip lights burned and keyboards purred as Lina hurried the brief down the hall to Dan’s office. Past the heads of the night-shift secretaries floating above the workspace partitions. Past a blinking, malfunctioning copier that sat abandoned, its various doors and flaps left open, awaiting the arrival of some jumpsuited Joe versed in the fixing of mechanical things. Past the coffee station, with its stinky microwave and humming soda machine. Past the row of half-open office doors through which Lina sensed more than saw caffeine-strung associates staring at computer screens or listening on mute to meetings under way in Hong Kong or Houston or Dubai.

At the corner office, Lina stopped.

Dan? She rapped a knuckle on the half-cracked door and pushed it open.

Dan sat marooned behind the island of his desk, his face glowing bluely from the computer screen. Floor-to-ceiling windows shimmered behind him, dark as a night sea. He was typing. His eyes shifted from the screen as Lina entered the room but his fingers remained in motion.

Dan was Lina’s mentor partner, a designation handed down by the HR department on Lina’s first day at the firm. Lina had heard of him, of course. In the litigation world, Dan was a star. His perfect win record and lack of any obvious social anxiety issues distinguished him from the hordes of aggressively successful litigation partners at Clifton and throughout the city. A photo of two red-haired, pink-cheeked children sat framed in silver on Dan’s desk. Lily and Oliver, Dan had told her. Twins. Lina had never met them, nor the wife (Marion) whose photograph hung behind his desk (tan, wan smile, one-piece).

Sorry the brief is late, Lina said, checking her watch: 12:04. "I got a little carried away with the corporate veil discussion. These facts are just so strong. But here it is."

Dan blinked. With both hands he pushed away his prodigious hair: red, springy, tending to vertical. Some partners cultivated symbols of eccentricity like this, flares sent up from the Island of Same. One wore glasses with thick black plastic frames reminiscent of a Cold War Kissinger. Another practiced meditation in his office every afternoon promptly at four o’clock, the oms echoing down the hall.

Brief? Dan asked. What brief?

The brief in the fraud trial? Lina spoke carefully. Dan often feigned an attitude of happy indifference. He gave the illusion of a laid-back, generally affable person, a person who might, with a smile, service your car and charge you a fair rate or sit on a barstool and buy you a beer. But she had seen him take his blood pressure meds (a colorful assortment, one the size of a horse vitamin), she had seen the throbbing blue vein at his neck. She’d once heard him scream at a paralegal who’d stapled a document in the wrong corner.

Dan paused, then blinked again, faster this time. Oh, yeah. Thanks, Lina. I remember—the brief. You’re a little late. He glanced down at his watch (gold, glistening). Throw it here on my desk. He pointed his chin vaguely toward the left. So how did it come out?

Lina hesitated, remembering those frozen moments in her office, her sense that something remained incomplete, undiscovered. But here, standing on Dan’s expansive carpet, breathing the vaguely fragranced air (mint? licorice?) that seemed to permeate only the partners’ offices, she pushed away any hint of uncertainty. I’m very happy with it, she said. The argument is persuasive. And I’m confident we’ve covered all the relevant case law.

I’m sure it’s great—your work always is. Dan paused, and then half-whispered, You know, I probably shouldn’t be telling you before the others, but we settled yesterday.

Settled? Yesterday? A coolness ran through Lina, starting at her eyebrows and ending at her toes, as though something warm and alive were departing her body.

The client’s been working on a deal for weeks. They signed the papers last night. Dan beamed. No trial, no possibility of defeat. The perfect win record, still intact.

What about …? and Lina circled her hand in the air to indicate the brief she had just completed, the twelve sets of exhibit files copied and bound, the witnesses flown in from L.A. and London, the thirty-odd people working feverishly upstairs, their eyes red, their vacations canceled, their carpals tunneled. What about all of that?

Yeah, I’ll go up soon to share the good news. Got some stuff to finish off down here first. Dan examined a hangnail. You know, it’s always a good idea to wait until the ink is dry before you pull the plug.

But our position was so strong. Lina shifted in place, tucked a restless lick of dark hair behind one ear. So how much was the settlement?

Two-fifty. Dan lowered his gaze to the floor as he said this.

"Two-fifty! Jesus, Dan, that won’t even cover the legal fees. We were right. We would have won."

Dan paused, tilted his head, and in the brief silence Lina read his disapproval, not of the settlement figure but of her outburst, her indignation. Rash. Unprofessional. She gave a chastised little nod.

"Probably we would have won, Dan said. But you know, litigation is messy. It takes a long time. The client just didn’t have the stomach for it. They’re happy, Lina. They’re satisfied. He exhaled long and low. Look, this is what happens. I know, it’s tough. You get caught up in a case, you want to go in there and win. But remember, the client calls the shots. We do their bidding. This isn’t about us, it isn’t about emotion or any sort of absolute … justice, or whatever you want to call it. At the end of the day it’s about the client’s best interest. What does the client want? What’s best for their bottom line?"

As Dan spoke, Lina’s gaze shifted to the darkened glass of his monstrous windows. Her own image reflected back: her blouse flared white, her hair a dark helmet, her face cast in shadow, the features indistinct, her body truncated and shorter (surely) than she actually was. And something in the position of her head, or the way the image seemed poised, hovering, disconnected from any solid ground, reminded Lina of the photo of her mother that sat beside her bed at home: Grace Janney Sparrow, dead when Lina was four, standing with bare arms and a forced smile on the steps of the house where Lina and her father still lived. In that photo, Lina’s mother was square-shouldered, cock-kneed, paused, waiting—Lina had always wondered, what was she waiting for?—in just the way Lina was standing now.

Lina straightened, shifted in place, and her mother’s image vanished. She shrugged her shoulders, settled her face to impassive—the look she so often admired on Dan, of calm reason, of dignified remove.

Of course, the client’s best interest. I’m glad they’re happy. A settlement. That’s great.

Dan nodded with gravity, with finality. Lesson imparted, lesson learned.

And Lina, Dan said. Glad you stopped by. There’s something I want to talk to you about. A new case, something I think you’ll like.

Instantly, the fraud trial and its beleaguered brief receded from Lina’s mind. She needed a new case. There were so many hours in a day, all of them billable to a client, some client, any client. Lina allocated her time in six-minute intervals via a computerized clock that ticked away in the lower left-hand corner of her computer screen, silently reeling off the workday minutes in pie wedges of bright yellow. Another six minutes gone, and another wedge of that small clock flashed. At Clifton, time was an end in itself, the accomplishment of a task not nearly as important as the accurate recording of the minutes consumed by its execution. Lina felt sometimes, with an increasing frequency, that the clock existed inside her, all day, every day, the ticking away of minutes embedded in her brain, pulsing through her bloodstream. The idea of falling behind in her billables filled her with an amorphous dread.

"A new case sounds great," Lina said, and watched without one flicker of an eyelash as Dan picked up her brief and lobbed it into the trash.

It’s an unusual matter, Dan said. We’re taking it on for a big client. Important client. Keep him happy, you know. He’s been threatening to take his business elsewhere so we’re going the extra mile. We’ll talk specifics tomorrow. But it’s big. Historic. Controversial. What do you think about slavery?

"Slavery? What do I think about it?"

Yeah. First thoughts. First words.

Bad. Civil War … umm, not good … As she floundered, an image of Meredith, the six-foot blond litigation associate rumored to be dating a Yankees outfielder, danced through Lina’s tired brain. Meredith sat ramrod straight in meetings; she spoke articulately, rationally, with apparent interest and keen insight, about credit default swaps, about sushi. Lina saw her as a nemesis of sorts, an otherworldly being who provoked Lina’s competitive streak as well as her annoyance (Meredith frequently forgot Lina’s name). Surely Meredith would have had some pithy, intellectual remarks on slavery. Even at one A.M.

Dan leaned forward in his chair. "And Lina, this case could be big for you. You’re young, ambitious. This one has potential. Big potential. You may not know this, but we start associates on partner track pretty early around here. Dan raised his eyebrows. And you are just the kind of person we’d like to encourage."

Partner track? The words pushed a button of delight within Lina’s chest. I won’t let you down.

Okay then. Tomorrow I’ll reassign your caseload. You’ll be full-time on the new matter. Now go home! Dan looked at her and smiled, beatific as Santa Claus.

ONE OF THE FIRM’S CARS ferried Lina to Brooklyn, a silent silver Lexus, the driver fast and efficient down the expansive uncluttered avenues. The Midtown sidewalks were clear, the streets streamed with empty taxis. It struck Lina suddenly that this was the middle of the night. Even here, in the city that never slept, most people now were sleeping. Law firm time was like casino time, only instead of an endless darkened cocktail hour it was always a neon-bright afternoon. The dead center of the workday, all night long.

The car sped onto the Brooklyn Bridge, the river below like the sky above, shimmering constellations of boats and buoys and Lina in the middle, floating within the layers of light. Tonight’s driver was a regular—a massive Russian with a shaved head and meaty knuckles. Igor, Lina vaguely remembered, was his name, an astrophysics professor before he immigrated west. Igor drove solidly, not too fast, and Lina relaxed against the plush interior of the backseat, the day’s stress leaving her in steady increments measured by the distance traveled toward home.

Lina and her father, the artist Oscar Sparrow, lived in a Park Slope brownstone of the kind intensely coveted by a certain type of two-salary New York family. Four stories, a steep stoop, a brief weedy garden out back. The house had one functional (though still smoky, even after the cleaning) fireplace, two kitchens (first floor, fourth floor), three art studios (first, second, fourth), one walk-in closet (Oscar’s), one claw-foot tub (Lina’s). An ageless red oak rose mastlike from the backyard and in the front, nestled within a square of dirt cut from the concrete, grew a linden, the two trees roughly the same height as the brownstone. As a child, Lina often thought of the trees’ roots intermingling beneath the floor of their house, holding herself and Oscar aloft in a living webbed cradle. In a strong wind, when the trees creaked and their branches scratched against the windows, she imagined that the house rocked within its root bed and the motion soothed her like a lullaby.

Oscar had bought the place decades earlier, when Park Slope was home primarily to drug dealers and poor lefty optimists. Throughout Lina’s childhood and adolescence, his finances had seemed always to tilt toward ruin, and he had struggled to cover the mortgage payments. The obvious solution, one that they never discussed, was to rent out a bedroom, some studio space, maybe even the top two floors, themselves a spacious self-contained apartment. But they never did. Somehow—a painting sold, a teaching gig, some carpentry work—Oscar managed. Lina had started waitressing at fourteen, contributing what she could to keep the phone connected and the electricity on, and took over management of the family finances at fifteen, trying in vain to keep Oscar on a strict budget for paint, canvas, brushes, charcoal, and the various oddities (dusty taxidermy, amateur mosaics) he toted home from flea markets and tag sales. Lina questioned Oscar mercilessly about these purchases, cooking only cheap beans and rice for days afterward, but she never pushed him on the tenant question. Lina had spent her entire life here, through elementary and high school, then as an undergrad and law student at NYU. She too wanted the house all to themselves. She couldn’t bear the thought of sharing with tenants. This was where her mother had once slept, cooked, painted, breathed, and Lina’s memories of her seemed tethered to the physical space. The way a wall curved away, a washboard of light thrown by the sun against the bare floor, the sharp clap of a kitchen drawer slamming shut—all these evoked flashes of her mother and early childhood that seemed cast in butter, soft and dreamy, lovely, rich.

Lina held close a handful of these flashes: an image of dark hair falling down a pale back, like a curtain or screen. A smell of pepper and sugar. A quiet, secret laugh. A song with no discernible words and no recognizable tune, a hummed series of notes. Da da dum da, da da dum da. And a pervasive sense of

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