The Spectacular
Fiona Davis
Dutton
New York City 1956: Nineteen-year-old Marion Brooks lives a comfortable life in the quiet suburb of Bronxville. Her widowed father Simon is a man who rose through sheer hard work to become a top executive with Met Power. Sister Judy is his secretary and totally content with her lot, something that satisfies Simon, who has a firm traditional view of women. Marion knows her father merely tolerates her job as a dance instructor. When she loses the job and her boyfriend, Nathaniel, returns from a European trip with marriage in mind, Simon leaps at the chance to force Marion to become a dutiful housewife. Seeking escape, Marion auditions for and lands a place as one of Radio City Music Hall’s famous Rockettes dance troupe. Her defiance leads to a quarrel with Simon, and Marion moves in with her new Rockette pal, Bunny.
… a beautiful, evocative story of old New York.
Marion works hard to fit her individualistic style of dance into the Rockettes’ regime, but then the infamous Big Apple Bomber strikes, spinning Marion’s world into both tragedy and a strange new direction. Teaming up with Peter Griggs, a young doctor specializing in mental health, they work to identify the Bomber and end his sixteen year campaign of terror. The Bomber has a grudge against Met Power, and Marion is puzzled. How is the company connected to the bombings? What does her father really know? To get answers Marion and Peter have to lay their lives on the line, and they may have to sacrifice more than they bargained for.
In The Spectacular, Fiona Davis has created a beautiful, evocative story of old New York. Marion and her fellow characters are fully alive, feeling individuals, who totally inhabit their world right down to the bittersweet ending.
