British teen Stella Park (known to all as Spark) needs to escape her widowed mother’s constant neediness. Spark’s brother, Dan, has been successful in distancing himself, finding an internship across the pond in New York City. When Spark learns that Dan’s benefactor, John Stone, is seeking a summer assistant to help organize his papers, she jumps at the opportunity.
When Spark arrives at the grand Stone estate in rural Suffolk, she soon realizes that this is hardly an ordinary summer job. Why does Stone possess incredibly detailed firsthand accounts of life in the 17th-century Versailles court? And why are those written in the same handwriting as more contemporary papers? Spark begins to grasp the truth behind Stone’s complicated history—and to suspect that she may have her own role to play in his story.
Linda Buckley-Archer, best known for her acclaimed Gideon trilogy, combines a historical narrative with a modern-day mystery and a liberal dose of fantasy to create a richly textured novel. Readers will enjoy exploring Stone’s papers alongside Spark, developing their own theories and making their own surprising discoveries about past, present and future.
This article was originally published in the November 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.
