Tag: Pamela Binnings Ewen

Cover image - Emilienne by Pamela Binnings Ewen

Book Review | Émilienne: A Novel of Belle Epoque Paris by Pamela Binnings Ewen

Émilienne is the fictionalised biography of Émilienne d’Alencon, circus performer, dancer, darling of the Paris stage in the late Victorian period … and courtesan.

The story is told in first person and present tense, which is an unusual choice for historical fiction. It gave Émilienne a strong character voice which I think was necessary to enable the reader to understand a woman whose birth, upbringing, and life were so different to mine. It meant I didn’t question many of her most questionable life choices—and there were many—because they were the only choices she could see.

The story starts with teenage Émilienne Montmatre.

She’s the daughter of a prostitute and knows that’s her future if she stays in Montmatre. So she runs away and leverages her beauty, dancing talent, and sheer ambition to land a role as a rabbit trainer in a circus, then propel herself through various roles and lovers to become one of the most famous (and rich) dancers in Paris.

She had more than a few setbacks along the way, and I almost felt sorry for her at some points. She was ambitious but not mean or cruel, and made her fortune without abusing others, which is more than can be said for many men of the time.

The story took us through around twenty years of Émilienne ‘s life.

It feels authentic to the time, the place, and what little is known about Émilienne. It’s a story well told, although it has the inevitable issue of any story about a real-life person: it ends, and real-life endings don’t have the sense of happy completion of (say) a Christian romance.

Pamela Binnings Ewen is also the author of The Queen of Paris: a Novel of Coco Chanel.

Given the relationship between Coco and Émilienne, it’s not surprising Pamela Binnings Ewen has chosen to write about Émilienne. Her previous books include the Amalise Catoir series, about a woman lawyer in the 1970s, which was definitely written from a Christian point of view. She’s also the author of Faith on Trial: Analyze the Evidence for the Death and Resurrection of Jesus, which I haven’t read.

Émilienne  is not Christian fiction.

While there are no on-the-page sex scenes, it’s perfectly clear that Émilienne had intimate relationships with a lot of men she wasn’t married to. She never even considers matters of faith. While that was consistent with the historic Émilienne, it was a departure from the previous Pamela Binnings Ewen novels I’ve read.

There were a handful of typos (although they were at least consistently wrong) e.g. troop instead of troupe, discrete instead of discreet, and (inexplicably) Queen without the Q. While these didn’t detract from my enjoyment, they were od errors in an otherwise excellent story with impeccable research.

If you’re looking for Christian fiction, this is not the book for you. If you’re looking for a fascinating insight into a unique historical figure, you may enjoy Émilienne .

Thanks to Blackstone Publishing and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.

About Pamela Binnings Ewen

Pamela Binnings EwenPAMELA BINNINGS EWEN is the author of one nonfiction book, Faith on Trial, and seven novels, including The Moon in the Mango Tree, awarded the 2012 Eudora Welty Memorial Award, and The Queen of Paris, which has sold over sixty-five thousand copies. After practicing law for many years, she retired to write. She is a founder of the Northshore Literary Society in St. Tammany Parish, Louisiana, in the greater New Orleans area. She’s also served on the boards of the Pirate’s Alley Faulkner Society and Tennessee Williams Festival.

Find Pamela Binnings Ewen online at:

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About Émilienne

From the bestselling author of The Queen of Paris comes a glittering new novel about youth, beauty, and having the courage to carve your own path in a world on the brink of war.

Pamela Binnings Ewen’s newest novel reveals the story of Émilienne, once the most beautiful, sought-after woman in Paris during the Belle Époque, the era of peaceful years just before World War I. As a girl, Émilienne fights her way through poverty in Montmartre, drawn to the lights of Paris below. Soon, she stars at the Folies Bergère, mistress of kings and princes, known as the most beautiful woman in Europe.

But, happiness is elusive, and youth and beauty are fragile. And where is love? As clouds of war begin darkening Europe, Émilienne’s young friend, Coco Chanel, has other ideas of how to survive in a man’s world. Strong ideas. Now, as Émilienne fights to survive, Coco’s star rises.

Find Émilienne online at:

Amazon | BookBub | Goodreads

Book Recommendation: Chasing the Wind by Pamela Binnings Ewen

Chasing the Wind … an exercise in futility?

Amalise Catoir is a second-year associate with the firm of Mangen & Morris in New Orleans in 1977. She has just returned to work after several months recovering from an accident that left her a widow. Amalise is assigned to Project Black Diamond, working for property magnate Bingham Murdoch to develop a new hotel in the city. She has also realised she is in love with Jude, her best friend since childhood, but thinks he is falling for her Rebecca, her co-worker.

There is a vague feeling that all is not as it seems, particularly regarding Bingham, the man behind the deal to build a hotel and casino on a piece of prime New Orleans real estate. Interspersed with the main plot were a series of flashbacks to 1975 Cambodia, chilling scenes with a woman named Samantha Barlow rescuing a small boy and trying to escape Phnom Penh before the Khymer Rouge arrive.

The story is told from several different points of view. The style seems remote at times, but it works. Chasing the Wind is very well-written, with characters that drew me in, and a tightly-woven suspenseful plot with some very interesting twists (one I saw coming, one I did not). This is one of those books that I think would be worth re-reading, as that way you could catch the nuances and clues to the ending.

My one complaint is that between the lawyers, bankers and property tycoons, there were too many male characters with middle class names, and I found it difficult to keep them all straight in my head. Fortunately, the major characters have memorable names, so it didn’t matter that the others all blurred into one.

Chasing the Wind is an interesting insight into women in the professions (and working in general) in the 1970’s. Smoking in the conference room, long lawyer lunches, asking the woman to fetch coffee and donuts, a reference to a single mainframe computer, and research in libraries and on microfiche readers. Other scenes have the secretary clacking away on her typewriter and sending documents down to the typing pool. It reminded me how much working life has changed in a  short time with the introduction of computers and the internet. Recommended.

Thanks to B&H Publishing Group and NetGalley for providing a free book for review.
You can find out more about Pamela Binnings Ewen at her website, and you can read the introduction to Chasing the Wind below:

Edited: I have just been browsing on Amazon, and have found that Chasing the Wind is the sequel to Dancing on Glass, which appears to be the story of Amalises’s marriage. It appears that the stories are quite different: while this is  a romance within a legal thriller, the first book seems to be a story of a disintegrating relationship. Knowing there is an earlier book makes some of the oblique references to the past more understandable, but Chasing the Wind can easily be read as a stand-alone story.