Julianne MacLean (23 page)

T
he heroine of this book, Adele Wilson, is the youngest of three fictional sisters who leave old New York to go husband hunting in London in the late-Victorian period. While these sisters are entirely fictional, I based each of them on a number of real life American heiresses, as well as some fictional characters from the works of some nineteenth-and twentieth-century novelists.

The most obvious models for this trilogy are the Jerome sisters—Jennie, Clara, and Leonie, who according to the book
To Marry an English Lord
, by Gail MacColl and Carol McD. Wallace, came to be known as “the Beautiful, the Good, and the Witty.” My own three fictional sisters I would similarly describe as “the Beau
tiful, the Adventurous, and the Good.”

Jennie Jerome married Lord Randolph Churchill, second son of the seventh Duke of Marlborough, and they became parents to a baby boy who would later lead the nation—Winston Churchill. You can read about Jennie and Randolph in the book,
Jennie: The Life of Lady Randolph Churchill,
by Ralph Martin. Jennie’s two sisters also married Englishmen.

Another real-life American heiress was Consuelo Vanderbilt, who married the ninth Duke of Marlborough in 1895. She is perhaps the most prominent example of an American heiress abroad, partly because she wrote a book about her life—
The Glitter and the Gold.
In it, she describes the hardships and heartbreaks she faced as a young woman who was expected to do her duty to her family by marrying into the British aristocracy. Sophia, the oldest Wilson sister, in my book
To Marry the Duke
, is the closest to Consuelo, as she also marries a duke and experiences much loneliness as an outsider.

In this series, Adele’s mother, Beatrice Wilson, is loosely based on Consuelo’s mother, Alva Vanderbilt, who aggressively fought the social divisions between the old New Yorkers and the nouveaux riches. In March 1883, Alva held a costume ball in honor of her friend Lady Mandeville, a fellow American who had married an English lord in 1876. Alva invited a thousand guests, and all were anxious to see the extravagant mansion Alva and her husband had just built on Fifth Avenue. She neglected to
invite the old New York matriarch, Mrs. Astor, however, because according to protocol, Mrs Astor—being the social superior, who had not acknowledged the Vanderbilts previously—had to call on Alva first. Mrs. Astor finally did have a card delivered to Alva, and was subsequently invited to the Vanderbilt ball.

My fictional heroine Adele describes the Knickerbockers in New York when she’s in the cottage with Damien. If you’re interested in reading about Old New York, try
The Age of Innocence
, by Edith Wharton. Wharton was born into an old New York family, but spent much of her life abroad in Europe. In addition to
The Age of Innocence
, she wrote about American heiresses in London in another of her novels,
The Buccaneers
, which is one of my favorite books of all time and inspired me to write this series.

Edith Wharton became good friends with Henry James, who was also born in New York and chose to live much of his life abroad. He, too, wrote a number of great books about Americans mixing with Europeans. My favorite of his novels is
Washington Square
, set in old New York. This—and the society Edith Wharton writes about in
The Age of Innocence
—is the socially exacting world Adele is so anxious to leave behind.

I hope you enjoyed this trilogy about the Wilson sisters. Lily’s story is coming soon in 2005.