Jeffrey Ford: The Portrait Of Mrs. Charbuque

[scooter13]

I recently read "The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque" by Jeffrey Ford and found it very good. It was nominated in 2003 for the World Fantasy Award. I am posting this in the "Fiction" section though, because I think it would be enjoyed by the non-fantasy crowd.

If it is not against forum rules, I would like to cheat and use the synopsis from Publishers Weekly which is found on Amazon.Com:

...... sepia-colored old New York is the fever-dream world. Piero Piambo is the portraitist of choice among New York’s nouveau riche in 1893, but his career fills him with self-loathing. When a blind man with uncannily white eyes offers him “a job like no other” painting the mysterious Mrs. Charbuque Piambo quickly accepts, as the hefty commission will allow him to abandon society portraiture. But the terms of the deal are very strange: Mrs. Charbuque insists that she will hide behind a screen; to divine what she looks like, Piambo may ask her questions, but not about her appearance. It soon becomes clear that she will not be interrogated; instead, like a possibly “unhinged” Scheherazade, she mesmerizes Piambo with her story of growing up convinced she possessed psychic powers conferred on her by twin snowflakes. Piambo’s opium-addicted friend Shenz convinces him to investigate his mysterious model, leading them to interview a deranged “turdologist” who sheds light on her past. But then Piambo is assaulted by a man identifying himself as Mr. Charbuque, demanding to know why the artist is “seeing my wife.” And there are other dangers about, as the city is under attack by a parasite that eats “the soft tissue of the eye” and causes its victims to weep blood.

For a while now I had seen this book pop up on recommendation lists at forums or other web sites, including the recommendations list at Amazon. I was skeptical about it though, based solely on the idea of painting a picture of someone you can’t see. But the more I read the description over and over, and have heard praise for Ford’s writing (his first novel won the World Fantasy Award in 1998), the more this book intrigued me.

Glad I finally gave in and bought it. It was an excellent read. It has bits of fantasy to it, but in many respects is more of a mystery and at times has a feel of being historical fiction. All a good combination though.

The first thing that struck me with reading it was Ford’s writing. His prose is very good: not too much, yet very satisfying. He doesn’t send you to the dictionary like China Miéville does. But her certainly has a vast vocabulary. The other thing that hooked me was the story itself. It pulled me in very quickly. The combination of the real story, and the stories that Mrs. Charbuque tells was very intriguing.

Ford also did a great job in revealing the secrets to the mystery. Nothing was forced. They were brought in at the right time, or didn’t come across as coincidence. And his characters were well written out, too. I could really feel the frustration that was building up in Piambo as he deals with the problems, even trying to get back a little at Mrs. Charbuque’s tricks. Or dealing with the issues between him and his obsession with the painting, and his girlfriend Samantha.

I am not sure I would put this in my top ten books. (That also depends if you put books from a series separately or as "one story.") But it would be awful close. You don’t need to be a fan of mystery or historical fiction to like this book. And you don’t need a vocabulary of a Shakespearean major to understand it. Yet I am not sure why it was nominated for a fantasy award. Regardless, it was a very enjoyable book.