The Last Tiara

The Last Tiara by M.J. Rose was a captivating book. I would give it 4 out of 5 stars. Rose is a prolific author but I'd only read one other of her novels that I did not care for it but now I'll be seeking out more of her books. I loved Rose's writing technique and ability to make me feel like this was a true story. Yet it is historical fiction in the sense that the tiara of the title did exist and was the last one created for a Romanov Grand Duchess which disappeared (never to be found) during WWI. A photo of the original is contained in the book. The story is written in alternating chapters by a mother (Sophia Moon nee Petrovitch), beginning in 1915 and her daughter, Isobelle Moon, beginning in 1948. Both women had successful careers in NY and somewhat out of the norm for women of their eras. A young Sofia, an art restorer, was a best friend of one of the Tsar's daughters and joined her in nursing wounded soldiers at the Winter Palace which had been turned into a hospital for the war. She attends to a wounded soldier and falls in love with him who never returns from a Siberian prison. After she found out she was pregnant with their child, with help, she manages to flee Bolshevik Russia for the US and is taken in by the relative of her supervisor at the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg.
Isobelle became an architect for a prestigious firm and was sent to Oak Ridge, TN where she spent 5 years working on the construction of an actual city for employees of the Manhattan Project to reside in while they built the atomic bomb. She returned to NYC after the accidental death of her mother.
I don't want to give away too much of this fascinating story that is centered in history. So the book is written in alternating chapters, each woman telling her own story. This is the key to the book because Sophia renounced all things Russian and told her daughter very little about her own past, telling her to look forward, not backward. Sophia's story uncovers the mystery of her past, which Isobelle has been searching for. In moving back to her mother's apartment, Isobelle decides to modernize it and begins by removing the bedroom wallpaper. Early on she uncovers a hidden niche in the wall where a jewel-less tiara is stored, along with a receipt from a NYC jeweler who purchased the jewels. The mystery of the tiara unfolds in Sophia's story and by the end of the novel the two stories meet. I should add that early on a romantic interest slowly develops for Isobelle which I enjoyed though it was a bit trite. I was bothered by the fact that Isobelle lacked self-esteem, the reason for 4 out of 5 stars.