This is a story of essentially two women who lived in time periods one hundred years apart. Sara Smytheâs life begins in 1884 for this novel. She has just landed a job with Theodore Camden, an architect for Dakota apartment in New York, not an easy feat for a servant. Few people understand her as her new employer does. Fast forward into the life of Baily Camden whose cousin, Melinda, lives in this building. Baily's grandfather was a ward of the architect. Baily is just out of rehab recovering from alcoholism and has lost her interior design job. Melinda, a great grand daughter of the architect, comes to her rescue, offering an apartment in the building and the job of renovating her own Dakota apartment.
Baily takes the job even though the remodel will take away the old charm and character of the apartment. It is money which she needs badly with a place to live attached. The architect has lived in this apartment with his wife and three children until he died of stab wounds inflicted by an unhappy employee. Sara Smythe, a former resident of an asylum, was the culprit. Baily sees photos of the woman and notes a startling resemblance to herself. It just couldn't be could it? As she ponders the likeness she begins to think what might have really happened.
The plot is predictable, at least for this reader. As the author set the stage it quickly became obvious. Well written and wonderful characters are an integral part of this novel, which flows well until the climax. Of course there is a lucrative inheritance involved. There was only one factor I did not recognize. Melinda and her twin brother were not related to the architect because the wife had an affair with a poet resulting in pregnancy.
Baily takes the job even though the remodel will take away the old charm and character of the apartment. It is money which she needs badly with a place to live attached. The architect has lived in this apartment with his wife and three children until he died of stab wounds inflicted by an unhappy employee. Sara Smythe, a former resident of an asylum, was the culprit. Baily sees photos of the woman and notes a startling resemblance to herself. It just couldn't be could it? As she ponders the likeness she begins to think what might have really happened.
The plot is predictable, at least for this reader. As the author set the stage it quickly became obvious. Well written and wonderful characters are an integral part of this novel, which flows well until the climax. Of course there is a lucrative inheritance involved. There was only one factor I did not recognize. Melinda and her twin brother were not related to the architect because the wife had an affair with a poet resulting in pregnancy.
