Portrait of Mrs.Charbuque [Paperback]

Jeffrey Ford (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 2, 2004

New York, 1893, and society portrait painter Piero Piambo feels his artistic ambition waning, even while he immortalizes the city's nouveaux riches in oil paints. But then he receives a bizarre and lucrative commission to paint the mysterious Mrs Charbuque. The catch is that he is not allowed to see her, and so Piambo sits before a screen as his sitter tells him of her life, dreams, and fears - clues from which he must divine her visage. As he works, a series of murders plagues the city - deaths that at first seem accidental. And, as Piambo's masterpiece takes shape, his relationship with Mrs Charbuque grows ever more tangled while her deranged husband becomes hell-bent on some inexplicable vengeance.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Ford expertly created a surreal alternate landscape in his acclaimed fantasies The Physiognomy and Memoranda; here, in his fourth novel, sepia-colored old New York is the fever-dream world. Piero Piambo is the portraitist of choice among New York's nouveau riche in 1893, but his career fills him with self-loathing. When a blind man with uncannily white eyes offers him "a job like no other" painting the mysterious Mrs. Charbuque Piambo quickly accepts, as the hefty commission will allow him to abandon society portraiture. But the terms of the deal are very strange: Mrs. Charbuque insists that she will hide behind a screen; to divine what she looks like, Piambo may ask her questions, but not about her appearance. It soon becomes clear that she will not be interrogated; instead, like a possibly "unhinged" Scheherazade, she mesmerizes Piambo with her story of growing up convinced she possessed psychic powers conferred on her by twin snowflakes. Piambo's opium-addicted friend Shenz convinces him to investigate his mysterious model, leading them to interview a deranged "turdologist" who sheds light on her past. But then Piambo is assaulted by a man identifying himself as Mr. Charbuque, demanding to know why the artist is "seeing my wife." And there are other dangers about, as the city is under attack by a parasite that eats "the soft tissue of the eye" and causes its victims to weep blood. Add dangerously unstable characters speaking with delicious floridity, unexpected bursts of macabre humor and violence, and a gender-bending subplot that subtly picks up steam, and you have a standout literary thriller.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From School Library Journal

Adult/High School-A true literary thriller. In New York City at the turn of the 20th century, Piambo is a young artist earning his bread painting "corrective" portraits of plain society wives, beautifying them for the canvas and their husbands. He has a crisis of conscience when one woman, standing under her portrait, leans close and whispers, "I hope you die." As he restlessly wanders the streets that night, a blind man approaches, claiming to know him by his dishonest smell, and offers him the commission of a lifetime: paint a portrait of his employer and receive compensation so grand that he will never have to paint another wife. The catch? Piambo will not be permitted to see Mrs. Charbuque. She will sit behind a screen, and he may ask her questions; from the answers he is to divine her essence. If he captures her likeness, compensation will triple. From this irresistible premise, Ford devilishly spins his story in prose so controlled-yet so dark with underlying fever and inevitability-that it calls to mind Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. The philosophical and psychological aspects loom large, and Mrs. Charbuque is a near-masterpiece-part sphinx, part hydra, the stuff of the most potent myths. A subplot involving a possible plague adds some hardcore spookiness and, of course, points back to Mrs. Charbuque. This book is smart, spellbinding, and sure to knock any teen's favorite suspense/horror tale from top place to second.
Emily Lloyd, Fairfax County Public Library, VA
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Pan Macmillan (April 2, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 033041318X
• ISBN-13: 978-0330413183
• Product Dimensions: 7.3 x 4.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,277,071 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Lushly written story of old NYand a painter's obsession, April 26, 2003

By 

Richard R. Horton (Webster Groves, MO United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque: A Novel (Hardcover)

Jeffrey Ford's new novel is The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque, something of a departure from his previous novels, though it does share some of the same obsessions and tropes, and of course it features Ford's easily recognizable prose, lush and at times overheated, but enjoyable and effective for the most part. But his earlier novels were set in exotic fantasy landscapes -- this book is set in turn of the 20th Century New York -- though Ford makes it seem exotic enough!

Mrs. Charbuque is a mysterious woman who engages the services of the novel's narrator, Piero Piambo, a portrait painter who wishes he could be something better. Mrs. Charbuque offers to pay him enough money to allow him to pursue his dream, but on one condition: he must attempt to paint her without ever seeing her. Much of the novel is given to Mrs. Charbuque's stories of her strange life: a father who predicted the future by reading snowflakes, an unfaithful mother, her later life telling fortunes, and her unusual relationship with her husband, who is allowed to see her no more than any other person. Piambo's struggles to paint his mysterious patron are complicated by the growing jealousy of both his lover, and of the apparently estranged Mr. Charbuque. At the same time his old friend Shenz, another portrait painter, offers to track down clues to Mrs. Charbuque's identity. And finally a mysterious plague is infesting New York: women are found bleeding to death through their eyes.

The resolution is striking and oddly pulpish. The novel is great fun, mixing outlandish mysteries with sensitive philosophical speculation, and garish adventure with concerns about the character of the artist. These perhaps disparate elements in the end work together quite well: this is a quite satisfying book.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Nice Little Mystery and a Trip Back in Time, April 26, 2004

By 

Jon M Altbergs (Epping, NH) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque: A Novel (Paperback)

I bought "The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque" not knowing quite what to expect, but was quickly captivated by both its premise and its style. I'm not frequently a reader of mystery novels, nor do I read historical fiction very often. I've delved into Dan Brown, Caleb Carr, and Mark Frost--and in all cases I've ultimately come away disappointed. When reading these books I'd felt either that the author thought I was stupid or that he thought his characters were stupid.

Here Ford treats both his readers and his creations with respect. His plot does not rely on amazing coincidence or amazing ineptitude to propel it along; nor does he treat his novel as an opportunity to impress the reader with his research on 19th century New York City or the art of portraiture. Instead, both provide a rich, but not overwrought, backdrop for a satisfying nugget of mystery.

If you're looking for the next great American novel, this is not it. However, if you are looking for a little guilt-free escapist fun that is more substantive than most of what populates the best-seller list, then "The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque" is well worth your time.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars 2/3 of a good book, June 6, 2003

By 

Rachel E. Pollock (Chapel Hill, NC USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque: A Novel (Paperback)

This is almost an amazing book.

The concept is intriguing, and through most of it just the enigma of Mrs. Charbuque kept me reading. I felt that the "subplot" (the mysterious disease that causes ppl to bleed from the eyes) was too sporadic and hamhandedly dealt with, and i felt the entire ending to be a bit of a tidied-up cop-out. I wish that the author had taken another 50-100 pages to flesh out the mystery-disease subplot and to wind up the story in a way that didn't feel so slam-bang. For something that purported to challenge gender and identity, it felt a bit rote.