Claude Reynaud is a small-town, middle-aged French dressmaker, spending all his days and nights creating stunning attire for the upper-crust women of Paris. Women flock to his small tailor shop as they claim his creations transform their lives. Claude's artistry helps add glamour and excitement to the lives of others, yet his life seems quite subdued in contrast. His wife left him eight years earlier and he never bothered to get a divorce. He had never been in love, so maybe he rationalized he didn't need one.
Enter Valentine de Verlay. Claude is immediately taken aback by her graceful, elegant beauty. He is hired to make her a wedding dress for her upcoming nuptials to a childhood, family friend. Claude falls hopelessly in love with Valentine, who has an unpleasant fiancΓ© and some complicated reasoning for getting married.
THE DRESSMAKER is written in a refreshing, airy tone that is almost poetic in its descriptions of everyday pleasures. It expertly captures the world of haute couture and transports the reader to a world few of us experience in real life. THE DRESSMAKER reads a bit like a modern-day fairy tale.
In this romantic debut novel, a reserved provincial French
tailor falls head over heels in love with a woman who's
hired him to create her wedding dress
Claude Reynaud is a bit of a throwback, an old-fashioned
dressmaker working in a cluttered studio outside modern-day
Paris, quietly designing his famous gowns by hand. Every
spring he ushers pretty young society brides into his
studio, measures them, and designs their dresses without
ever contemplating for himself the sort of romance that
will lead these ladies and their grooms to the altar.
But one afternoon a woman arrives who shatters his
composure: Valentine de Verlay is charming, beautiful, a
lady of society, and, of course, engaged. She comes with no
instructions for her wedding dress, just a beautiful
figure, a long graceful neck, and total faith in her
dressmaker. Claude, forty-six years old, devoted to his
work, and long since deserted by his wife, finds himself
smitten.
As Valentine's wedding approaches, his commitment to her
dress makes it impossible for Claude to keep a safe
distance, and everything he's come to rely on in his small,
focused life looks ready to collapse. Worse still, as he is
welcomed into her circle of friends and family, it appears
that the betrothed Valentine may share his feelings.
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