Clara and Mr. Tiffany

A Novel

By: Susan Vreeland

Narrated by: Kimberly Farr

Length: 15 hrs and 58 mins

Publisher's summary

Against the unforgettable backdrop of New York near the turn of the twentieth century, from the Gilded Age world of formal balls and opera to the immigrant poverty of the Lower East Side, bestselling author Susan Vreeland again breathes life into a work of art in this extraordinary novel, which brings a woman once lost in the shadows into vivid color.It’s 1893, and at the Chicago World’s Fair, Louis Comfort Tiffany makes his debut with a luminous exhibition of innovative stained-glass windows, which he hopes will honor his family business and earn him a place on the international artistic stage. But behind the scenes in his New York studio is the freethinking Clara Driscoll, head of his women’s division. Publicly unrecognized by Tiffany, Clara conceives of and designs nearly all of the iconic leaded-glass lamps for which he is long remembered.Clara struggles with her desire for artistic recognition and the seemingly insurmountable challenges that she faces as a professional woman, which ultimately force her to protest against the company she has worked so hard to cultivate. She also yearns for love and companionship, and is devoted in different ways to five men, including Tiffany, who enforces to a strict policy: he does not hire married women, and any who do marry while under his employ must resign immediately. Eventually, like many women, Clara must decide what makes her happiest—the professional world of her hands or the personal world of her heart.

©2011 Susan Vreeland (P)2011 Random House

Critic reviews

“The book brims with fascinating information about Tiffany's glassmaking and about New York as its gilded age gives way to a more progressive era. ...Vreeland's ability to make this complex historical novel as luminous as a Tiffany lamp is nothing less than remarkable.” (Washington Post)

“For the first time in my long life of reading novels, Susan Vreeland made me cry over the gloryof women's work. Clara and Mr. Tiffany is a noble and necessary book, lest we allow ourselves tobe ignorant of the struggle, courage, and vision of women who have come before us. Readers will never look at a Tiffany lamp or window in the same way again.” (Sena Jeter Naslund, author of Ahab's Wife and Adam & Eve)

Worst Narration I have ever heard

I am a fanatic for historical fiction about American women. This book is so up my alley. I am abandoning it in Chapter 7 to switch to another book written about the same woman. This one is perfect if you have insomnia. SAVE YOUR MONEY

Too many story lines.

After the first few chapters I thought this would be a good book. The story started to become many. By the end of the book the plots were not only about Clare but women's suffarage, plight of immigrants in the early 1900's, birth of unions, Tiffany glass works, Louis Comfort Tiffany, a love story, personal tragedy, not to mention the tedious cutting, selecting and placing of every shard of glass. There was just too much to call it one story. I finished because the narration was good and I paid for it.