Flautopiccolo

The fourth (and final) book in Evie Dunmore’s A League of Extraordinary Women series became available from Minuteman after being on hold for about 3 months. The Gentleman’s Gambit begins in July, 1882, and is about the suffragist movement and repatriation of stolen antiquities. The main characters are Catriona Campbell, daughter of Alastair Campbell, Earl of Wester Ross, and Elias Khoury, from Mount Lebanon.

Highlights:

• On the mantelpiece sat several large, airtight jars with olives, skinned apricots in sugar syrup, and bright pink pickled turnips in brine. Stowaways in one of his trunks. His family was convinced that there was no food abroad.
• Nassim, while he built a food pyramid on the mantelshelf (Red bell peppers in olive oil; more apricots. A bottle with mulberry juice. At least four pounds of pistachios.): I’m not sure how you’ll eat any of it without proper bread.
• At the Ashmolean, Elias’s mission: Two marble sculptures loomed in the light: twin heads of bulls, thousands of years old, monuments to the ancient Phoenician gods. Each marble was the height and breadth of a small horse.
• MacKenzie: It’s not the chess. It’s whatever else is being played. The gentleman was rather flirtatious.
  Catriona: We discussed the effect of international capitalism on women’s position in society.
  MacKenzie: That’s right. Sweet music to your ears.
• Elias had never heard the name Blackstone during his involvements, and since he was at best an incidental actor in the dark web on the continent, there was no pressing reason to avoid the man.
• Elias to Catriona: I haven’t yet begun to flatter you, habibti.
• Elias, after Catriona asks Elias what he misses about his Eastern clothes: I can wear my boots. The trousers are comfortable. The fabrics are more luxurious, and I can carry my knives in my belt.
• Elias to Catriona: Do you know why the Egyptian pyramids are in Egypt? It’s because they are too big to fit into the British Museum.
• Elias, after Catriona tries to cook tabbouleh (parsley salad) and baba ghanoush (aubergines): Looks delicious. Congratulations. Now I know why you train as a firefighter in Oxford.
• Epilogue, 35 years later: Women finally vote in the general election on December 14th, 1918.
• Author’s Note: Weldon v. Weldon was an actual 1883 divorce court decision.