Download And Enjoy The Age Of Light Brought To You By Whitney Scharer Produced In Manuscript

is a romance novel masquerading as historical fiction, Despite my interest in Man Ray and Lee Miller, I truly dont need to read about their steamy sex, Their sexual proclivities aside, there is a lot about this that simply reads false, Lets just cut to the chase: how stunning is this cover! And for a novel that is largely about photographic art, its utterly perfect.
As to the novel itself, The Age of Light is biographical historical fiction, a subgenre I tend to gravitate towards,

For the most part, The Age of Light delivers on what it promises, And its stunningly written in places, truly lyrical, Take this passage about Lees depression, the picture it paints is so vivid its tangible:

Lee has never been very good at being by herself: left to her own devices, she can easily sink into sadness and inactivity.
As the weeks have passed, her loneliness has gained heft and power: it has contours now, almost a physical shape, and she imagines it sitting in the corner of her room, waiting for her, a sucking, spongy thing.


The arrangement of the novel itself was also well thought out, We meet Lee in thes, overweight, depressed, alcoholic, her career in tatters, We then swing back to the lates where Lee is in Paris, determined to break free from modelling and find herself through exploring different forms of art.
We finish up in, nearing the end of Lees life, Thes part of the novel, which forms the bulk, is bracketed by short, gripping chapters that provide a window into Lees experiences covering parts of WWII, including the liberation of Dachau.
For someone who was already prone to depression, these experiences left their mark quite vividly on Lee, I believe she suffered PTS on top of unresolved trauma left over from her childhood, It was little wonder she was in the state she was when we met her in the prologue,

Lees childhood is divulged throughout thes chapters in fits and bursts, Raped when she was only seven by a family friend, and voyeuristically abused by her father throughout her entire childhood right into her teenage years, it was little wonder Lee was afraid of commitment and drawn to selfsabotage.
Her relationship with her father was creepy, She claimed to love him, yet wanted to distance herself while still craving his approval and affection, Her father was a hobby photographer and used to take photos of his daughter nude, He even took photos of her with a friend, both of the girls nude, arranging them in sexualised poses, And this was after Lee had been raped! What a depraved man, No wonder his wife, Lees mother, was a drug addict, I dont know how much of this childhood aspect of the story is truth versus fiction, but it really did go a long way towards explaining who Lee was at the time of her relationship with Man.


Understanding why a person is the way they are doesnt necessarily translate to liking them, Lee really got on my nerves as the novel progressed and I began to feel bogged down by her selfsabotage for the last one hundred pages or so.
Her relationship with Man Ray did so much for her, He taught her a lot about photography and they worked so well together that there was a mutual trading of

ideas that benefited them both.
From my perspective, Man adored Lee, but as soon as he showed her how much, she set out to distance herself and sabotage their relationship.
She really did some crappy things, And while there is a betrayal on Mans part, when taken within the context of the era, and the way their working relationship was set up, I am not convinced he acted with malice.
Im not saying he was in the right, but I dont think that he considered that what hed done was anything other than above board.
Sadly, I think the love affair between Man and Lee was mostly on his side, I think his jealousy paled in comparison to her selfsabotage, in terms of what caused their relationship to flounder,

As far as novels go, The Age of Light provides a window into the life of Lee Miller at the beginning of her career as a photographer, but there is a lot of attention given to her moods and whims, to her alcohol consumption, her relationship with Man, and the many ways she would put people offside and indulge in toxic behaviour.
Theres a lot of gaps in this history, but it does offer a launching pad for further reading on Lee Miller,


Thanks is extended to Pan Macmillan Australia for providing me with a copy of The Age of Light for review, I knew very little about Lee Miller before diving into this delightful debut novel thanks NetGalley and Little, Brown, I was immediately drawn in, not just by the exquisite language and Scharer's gift of storytelling, but also her ability to send you right into the mind of Miller.
Scharer squeezes your heart, and inflames your senses with every move that Miller makes, It was only afterward when I wanted to know more about Man Ray and his enchanting lover that I found Scharer took a few liberties with Miller's history, but all for the good of the story itself.
I devoured this gorgeous book and all of the decadence of Paris in thes, the bohemian lifestyle of these artists and Miller's complex transformation into a woman of her own that underlies it all.
This book left me in tears on the last page, The impression of this novel is one I will carry with me for months and years forward,.rounded up to.

Thanks to Netgalley for an eARC in exchange for an honest review

So having spent time on Google researching about Lee Miller and Man Ray and their outstanding work in surrealist photography and paintings, I was expecting maybe a bit too much from this novel.
Alternating between the couple's chaotic relationship in the's to Lee Miller's work during WWII, the best bits of the story are when the focus is on the art productions.
With a fair bit of rationalizing, I rounded this story up to abecause the war bits are phenomenal and show Lee Miller's lasting legacy as an artist.
No influence on the rating but more of a personal reaction I felt both Lee and Man Ray were very unlikeable, This book is well written but there really is no plot, It's really just willynilly with seemingly no point and I lost interest, The World War II sections were great but unfortunately there's just not enough of them to keep my interest with this one, Lee Miller is a Vogue model turned photographer, She meets and falls in love with the famous Man Ray in' Paris, Haunted by her past Lee is charmed by the remarkable Man Ray, As lee's career starts to rise Man Ray becomes jealous and things take a turn, This is at times very sexually explicit, Very bohemian in nature. I loved it! I was compelled it, The setting being Paris, the whole artsy feel of it, The characters were feelable. Can't say enough how good this is, I just loved it!

I was given this advanced read from Net Galley for an honest review,
Dawn RubyBookGypsy
Novels N Latte Book Blog
Novels amp Latte Book Club
Hudson Valley NY , This novel about Lee Millers relationship with Man Ray is in the same vein as The Paris Wife, Z, Loving Frank and Frieda: all of these have sought to rescue a historical woman from the shadow of a celebrated, charismatic male and tell her own fascinating life story.
Scharer captures the bohemian atmosphere ofParis in elegant but accessible prose, Along with the central pair we meet others from the Dada group plus Jean Cocteau, and get a glimpse of Josephine Baker,

Miller was a photographer as well as a model and journalist, and this is an appropriately visual novel thats interested in appearances, lighting and what gets preserved for posterity.
Its also fairly sexually explicit for literary fiction, sometimes unnecessarily so, so keep that in mind if its likely to bother you, Theres one especially erotic scene from before they even become lovers when Man is teaching her to develop film and is guiding her hands in the pitch dark.
I enjoyed the brief flashes of Lee at other points in her life: in London during the Blitz, photographing the aftermath of the war in Germany theres a famous image of her in Hitlers bathtub, and hoping shes more than just a washedup alcoholic in thes.


The novel is nearlypages too long, I think, such that my interest in the politics of the central relationship Man becomes too possessive and Lee starts to act out, longing for freedom again started to wane.
I also think it would be a boon to have a prior interest in or some knowledge of the Surrealists, It was missing a trick to put a stock image on the cover instead of one of Lees photos or a photo of her.
My favorite book so far this year, Absolutely brilliant! I knew nothing about either Lee Miller or Man Ray before I read this book, However, I was absolutely fascinated by this story, Several times during the time I listened to the audio version of the book did I have to take a break to google both Lee Miller Man Ray for their art.


Now, I had an ecopy of this book, but I decided to listen to the audio version during work, However, I couldn't stop listening and start reading when I got home, The narrator, Therese Plummer did such an excellent work that I just couldn't stop listening to her telling the story about Lee and Man.
I have a favorite scene from the narrator, and it's when Lee and Man are in the darkroom for the first time and you can really feel the tension between them.
Listening to the scene and other intense scenes is just, in my opinion, even better than reading them when the narrator does such a good job as with this book.


It's so easy to forget that this is just fiction based on facts when you read this book, The characters come to life in a way that makes you think that this is all true, Like there was a stenographer there all the time writing down everything that happened and was said, That's how I felt listening to the book, Like I was a fly on the way witness all that happened,

In the end, I just want to say that this is an absolutely fantastic book! And I recommend it warmly.
Read it, listen to it, Do what feels best for you! Great and informative read! I was recently sent an ARC of The Age of Light by the publicists at Little, Brown and Company in exchange for an honest review.
This work of historical fiction by Whitney Scharer is expected to be published on February,,

The Age of Light is a captivating and exhilarating narrative that keeps readers emotionally invested up to the very last page, Masquerading as historical fiction, the novel recounts the life of Vogue model turned photographer, Lee Miller and her relationship with Man Ray, one of the most influential figures of the Dada and Surrealists movements ensuing Paris in thes.


In incandescent prose debut writer, Whitney Scharer creates a female empowering tale of a heroines journey away from home to discover her passion, her independence, and her art.
The story unravels under the glamour and melancholy of Paris amidst the changes resulting from World War II and its lingering stench on much of Europe with a young womans determination to transform herself from subject of art to creator of art.


InLee is a middleaged woman who occupies her time preparing elaborate tencourse meals and writing cooking articles for Vogue, She lives on a farm in Sussex, England with her husband, Roland, Day after day, she feels her life droning on with little excitement, Her life is shaken once more when her editor, Audrey wakes Lee up from her dull slumber and requests for her to write a piece for Vogue about her years with Man Ray.
Audrey wants Lees story to be romantic, like a fairy tale, but Lee ultimately decides to tell the real story: “the one where she loved a man and he loved her, but in the end they took everything from each other who can say who was more destroyed” So begins the story of a woman who loved a man and he loved her, but in the end, they took love away from each other and are both left destroyed.


Parisbegins the heart of a vividly detailed chronicle of a professional mentorship and friendship that quickly spirals into a toxic love affair, augmenting a prolific period of creation as Lee and Man Ray become each others whim.
Devoured by the decadence of Paris and the bohemian lifestyle in smoky salons, hidden speakeasies, and dimly lit cafes, the reader is drawn into a tumultuous and provocative period of Lees life.


From Lee, Man finds inspiration in his primary passion as a painter, From Man, Lee learns to become the photographer as opposed to the one being photographed, Surrounded by the money patrons of the elite, the AvantGarde thinkers, and the bourgeois flaneurs, the novels plot is propelled by vignettes sensually detailed, producing a fascinating illustration of Paris during its rise to modernity.


The cast of characters that Lee and Ray cross paths with creates a voyeuristic window through which the sexuality of Lee and Man are revealed and become increasingly questionable.
Haunted by a troubled relationship with her father that leads her to struggle with PTSD, and the introduction of a new male figure in her life, Lees perceptions of this new artsy world become dismantled and reconstructed as she perpetually tries to reconcile an unhealthy past of abuse, rape, depression, and alcoholism.


The Age of Light is an illuminating novel of the hope and effervescence that underlies a young womans journey of selftransformation, Lees life is trapped as a muse behind a camera lens from multiple figures who seek to capitalize on her beauty for personal benefits.
Lee reclaims her essence, and creates her own art, identity and blooming success, This novel is a vivid and raw portrayal of a woman who struggles between art and creating art, and the torturous struggle of achieving both.

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