Press
Awards and Press for Sargent's Women:
Winner of a 2019 Victorian Society in America Book Award
Winner of the 2018 Art in Literature: The Mary Lynn Kotz Award
Finalist for Best work of Non-Fiction Library of Virginia Literary Award
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A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice Selection
“A rollicking snow globe version of an almost unimaginable world of wealth … Lucey is a persistent detective and a bemused, sometimes amused, storyteller, attentive to interesting, hilarious, disturbing detail.”
“[Isabella Stewart Gardner] comes across as … a riotous mix of Bette Midler and Dame Maggie Smith’s upper-crust characters.”
–THE NEW YORK TIMES (http://nyti.ms/2iNNlDG)
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“Donna Lucey’s lyrical meditation on life, love, and art in the Gilded Age … Sargent’s Women abounds with dazzling characters in atmospheric settings. Yet because it lacks a natural arc … its success owes entirely to the skills of the author [a] dogged sleuth, a confident stylist and a clever narrative architect. … As rich as these portraits are, the textual evidence in which Ms. Lucey ensnares them is finer still."
–THE WALL STREET JOURNAL (http://on.wsj.com/2nqePAT)
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“[Lucey] delivers the goods, disclosing the unhappy or colorful lives that Sargent sometimes hinted at but didn’t spell out … [B]ehind the illusions of breezy confidence that Sargent created, struggles and losses sometimes prevailed.”
–THE BOSTON GLOBE (http://bit.ly/2vL4WO6)
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"Like characters from the writings of Edith Wharton, these women were smart, passionate, willful, adventurous and striking-looking … Lucey's prose is invitingly conversational and quick-flowing. Her character sketches are colorful and she is not, thank goodness, above conveying some wonderfully catty gossip."
–The Washington Post (http://wapo.st/2AOlQ3U)
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Richmond-Times Dispatch, Richmond, VA: Announcement of the 2018 Library of Virginia Literary Awards and the presentation of The Art in Literature: The Mary Lynn Kotz Award for Sargent’s Women
C’Ville Weekly, Charlottesville, VA: Cover story on Sargent’s Women and my professional career writing about unknown women
Fluvanna Review, Fluvanna County, VA: Feature story on Sargent’s Women book event at the Fluvanna County Public Library
The Herald, Glasgow, Scotland: Review
The Newport Daily News, Newport, RI: Feature story on Sargent's Women book event at The Chanler at Cliff Walk in Newport
Interview with What'sUpNewp Radio, Newport, RI: Listen here (Minutes 10:15 through 26:30)
The Gazette, Colorado Springs, CO: Feature story on the return of John Singer Sargent's painting of Elsie Palmer
Citizen Times, Asheville, North Carolina: Feature story on Sargent's Women book event at Malaprops Books
Hasty Book List: Review and interview
Virginia Living: Profile of Donna Lucey and her husband
Times Literary Supplement: Bawdry in the bloodstream (http://bit.ly/2xdKB4K)
The Times (London): Book review: Sargent’s Women: Four Lives Behind the Canvas by Donna M Lucey (http://bit.ly/2Av1Vo6)
ELLE: Who Were Sargent's Women?: Author Donna Lucey on the stories behind these iconic American faces. (http://bit.ly/2goroGe)
Kirkus Reviews: Perceptive biographies of a quartet of Gilded Age women (http://bit.ly/2ihHCCk)
Publisher’s Weekly: Review (http://bit.ly/2jNW7OJ)
Booklist Online: Starred review (http://bit.ly/2ByqO1F)
The Weekly Standard (London): Water and Light (http://tws.io/2jM8H0Y)
With Good Reason: Radio Interview with Donna Lucey (http://bit.ly/2gPzQOP)
Library Journal: Starred Review (http://bit.ly/2BA1Q1L)
Lit Lovers: Reader’s Guide (http://bit.ly/2AO67Sq)
The Bay Area Reporter: John Singer Sargent's Painted Ladies (http://bit.ly/2BwqgsW)
Antiques and The Arts Weekly: Review (http://bit.ly/2Anxl2t)
Choice, American Library Association, October 2017 (link to PDF)