DOLLFACE by Renee Rosen

I’ve been on a historical fiction kick lately, paging through novel after novel stretched out in a chaise these first days of summer.  I discovered author Renee Rosen as a read alike while book browsing online.  A technique tip:  I love to use Minerva’s recommendations when searching books in the library catalog, and the customer also bought suggestions on Amazon and Barnes and Noble.  I began with The Hired Girl, and after a few chapters, thought,  this isn’t bad…a few more chapters and I was hooked.  Dollface and What the Lady Wants had the same effect.  I am saving Windy City Blues for an upcoming vacation!

Dollface is about Vera Abramowitz, a young woman coming into her own in the 1920s. Determined to make a better life for herself, she bobs her hair, makes up her face, and heads to the dance halls after work.  She meets a couple of gentleman, one, a nightclub owner, and one a dashing gambler.  Both become her lovers.  It turns out the dashing gambler belongs to a gang rivaling Al Capone and his henchmen, and the good times inevitably come to an end.  Vera must find a way to survive until the good times return.

I love these books!  All are set in Chicago and all enlist famous, or infamous, characters from history.  They give you a feel for their era and quickly become page turners that keep this reader up late.  Fun well written reads.  Request Dollface via inter-library loan, and look for these titles as well: