The Seventh Unicorn (Berkley Fiction) [Mass Market Paperback]

Kelly Jones (Author)

Book Description

Series: Berkley Fiction | Publication Date: October 4, 2005

In her quest to discover a medieval treasure, curator Alex Pellier visits a convent in Lyon, but its storehouse of items dating back to the thirteenth century turns up little. Then, Alex discovers a centuries-old poem and sketches. These suggest to her that there may be a seventh, yet undiscovered tapestry in the world-renowned Lady and the Unicorn series.

Now a journey of mystery begins that could lead Alex to a career-making find--and to the man she thought she had lost forever.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A beautiful, ambitious 30-something widow searches for a lost (and possibly apocryphal) medieval tapestry—and, with a little less self-awareness, for true love—in Jones's absorbing, thoroughly satisfying debut. Outside Lyon, France, a convent is slated to become a hotel, its nuns shipped off to a nursing home. But might the ancient convent's contents fetch enough at auction to save the nuns' way of life? American-born Alex Pellier, a curator at Paris's Cluny Museum, is doubtful, until she discovers two drawings that seem to point to the existence of a seventh medieval unicorn tapestry to join the set of six in the Cluny. Enlisting the help of an old art school flame, Jake Bowman, Alex tracks the tapestry down and agrees to help the nuns sell it. The legend behind the tapestries—a star-crossed love between a rich young woman and a lowly tapissier—fascinates Alex, whose marriage to rich Thierry was never happy. Jake fascinates Alex, too, and she fascinates him. With all this longing and tension—professional, romantic, sexual—how could the story go wrong? It doesn't.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author

Kelly Jones grew up in Twin Falls, Idaho. She graduated from Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington, with a degree in English and an art minor. She enjoys traveling with her husband Jim, visiting art galleries, exploring cities and learning more about the local history. She is the author of THE LOST MADONNA, THE SEVENTH UNICORN, and THE WOMAN WHO HEARD COLOR. She lives in Boise. Please visit her website at kellyjonesbooks.com.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  
• Mass Market Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Berkley (October 4, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0425206254
• ISBN-13: 978-0425206256
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #871,658 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Kelly Jones grew up in Twin Falls, Idaho. She attended Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington, graduating magna cum laude with a degree in English and an art minor. She spent her junior year in Italy at the Gonzaga-in-Florence program and developed a love for travel, a passion she now shares with her husband, Jim. An art history class in Florence fueled a love for the history of art, which has become an integral part of her writing.
Her latest release, The Woman Who Heard Color (Berkley Books, October, 2011), is a historical novel set in Munich, Berlin, and New York. A story of family loyalty, banned art, and creative freedom, it spans a period of over a century.
Her previous novels include The Seventh Unicorn (Berkley Books, 2005), inspired by The Lady and the Unicorn Tapestries in the Cluny Museum in Paris, France, and The Lost Madonna (Berkley Books, 2007), set in Florence, Italy.
She is a mother and grandmother and is married to former Idaho Attorney General Jim Jones, who now serves on Idaho's Supreme Court. They live in Boise.
Visit Kelly at www.kellyjonesbooks.com

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Transparent, January 20, 2006

By 

Linda Pagliuco "katknit" (CT, United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Seventh Unicorn (Berkley Fiction) (Mass Market Paperback)

This book is no DaVinci Code. Rather, The Seventh Unicorn is part soap opera, part cozy mystery. The premise upon which it's based is intriguing, and well founded in art history, the most engimatic medieval tapestries being the Unicorn series in Paris and the other in NYC. What is disappointing about this plot is the ease with which everything falls into the heroine's lap, the transparency of the other characters, and the total absence of suspence. What's valuable and enjoyable about the plot is the information provided about the tapestries, their iconography and symbolism, and their possible provenance, as well as the glimpse into the art and museum world.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Lush, Sensual, Artful,and Highly Enjoyable, December 26, 2005

By 

Debra Morse (Southern California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Seventh Unicorn (Berkley Fiction) (Mass Market Paperback)

Above all, this is a delicious, pretty little love story. Actually, parallel love stories. One in the 15th century; one in the 21st.

In the lush tradition of art history mysteries, author Kelly Jones sets her evocative and sensually narrated tale amidst the cloistered world of museums and convents, specifically Paris' Musée National du Moyen Age (formerly the Cluny), and its exquisite set of six tapestries jointly known as The Lady and the Unicorn. And museums/nunneries is not the first set of mirrored circumstances in her debut novel. The entire story is full of wonderful reflective plot lines separated by hundreds of years.

Weaving established facts and accepted speculation as to the origin and meaning of the tapestries, Jones takes her heroine Alex to a Lyon convent, where construction workers have found a 15th century tapestry in the ancient walls. How did the priceless object come to be there? Is it indeed the seventh of the Lady and the Unicorn set? Alex finds herself in a race against time and ill-motivated competitors to establish the authenticity of the tapestry and acquire it for the Cluny. Along the way a former beau, Jake, magically arrives, and provides unexpected help and passion. Their love rekindles, yet remains illusive as Alex considers her roles of curator, mother, daughter, and woman; all of these roles seem mutually exclusive to her. But are they? Should they be compartmentalized?

Jones describes the daily circumstances of her characters with keen attention to the senses of sight, taste, smell, and touch, in homage to the tapestries famous themes. But what, the reader wonders, is "mon seul desir" of Alex? Of Jake? The path to uncover the truth about the seventh tapestry leads to discovery of Alex's own true nature and source of happiness, her own sole desire.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Read, March 15, 2006

By 

Krista B. (United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Seventh Unicorn (Berkley Fiction) (Mass Market Paperback)

I chose this book because it seemed like a nice easy-going read. All in all it was a great read. This book was kind of slow in the beginning but picked up towards the middle. The whole book is set in the fictional world of the undiscovered seventh tapestry of The Lady and the Unicorn.
The book starts in Medeval times with a rich girl named Adele Le Viste who falls in love with a common person. It then morphs into modern day Paris with a museum curator Alex Benoit and her ex boyfriend Jake Bowman. It is a nice love story but somewhat predictable. There are similarities between Adele and modern age Alex.
Even though this book has a slow start it is a great book and I would recommend it for some light easy reading.