In her sure-footed second novel, Mutual Interest, Olivia Wolfgang-Smith (Glassworks) immerses readers in the rough-and-tumble capitalist quagmire of turn-of-the-century Manhattan in the aftermath of the Gilded Age. The stakes are incredibly high and safety nets are totally absent. Vivian Lesperance quickly realizes that if she's going to survive, she must rely on her charm and manipulative abilities. Then she meets the awkward, sexually surreptitious, socially ascendent Midwestern transplant Oscar Schmidt and his business rival, Squire Clancy, another misfit, though one from a higher social class. Soon an unconventional three-way alliance yields them enormous benefits, but threats of blackmail, social expectation, and justified labor unrest may just as readily dismantle everything they build together.
Wry and witty, this is a novel of families won and lost, love, envy, and betrayal told in a remarkably fresh and entertaining way, with lavish period detail and compelling emotional stakes. Mutual Interest is essential reading for lovers of well-crafted historical fiction and enthralling novels of manners.