Book Details
Title: Madam of My Heart
Author: Gini Grossenbacher
Publication Date: February 6, 2017
Genre: Historical Fiction/Victorian
Series: American Madams #1
Pages: 476
ISBN-13: 978-0998380605
Baltimore, 1849. During a scandalous crisis, the young Irish Brianna Baird flees her home at Fells Point. With little cash and only a seamstress’s trade, she braves the hypnotic streets of New Orleans. The tantalizing Madam DeSalle lures her to her brothel, then sells her to the dashing but questionable gambler, Edward Spina, who falls in love with her. In a tawdry alliance with these two profiteers, Brianna embarks on a journey through the French Quarter’s debauched and glittering Voodoo world. Facing the horrors of slavery, she triumphs by gaining freedom papers for her maid Emma’s enslaved husband and son. Brianna and Edward escape with them to San Francisco. There she becomes one of the most sought after madams in the gold rush parlor house trade. But will her fame and pluck be enough to save Edward from the Vigilante noose? This is the first book in the American Madams series.
“A debut historical novel that chronicles the struggles, loves, and joys of an exceptional madam in 19th-century America. Grossenbacher’s book, the first in a planned series, dramatizes the early life and busy career of a woman named Brianna Baird. Grossenbacher’s prose is both graceful and inventive. She absorbingly limns the various cities Brianna inhabits, from New Orleans and its ‘web of Creole cottages, chaotic marketplaces, and secretive balconies, simmering outside her window, ‘ to the rowdy atmosphere of frontier-era San Francisco. The occasional marvelous metaphor will surprise readers, as when ‘the truth hit Brianna like a badly aimed bowling pin.’ This isn’t just a novel for lovers of history’s more prurient corners; it’s for everyone who likes well-deployed language and intense stories. A seamier side of American history, engagingly told through one woman’s unexpected adventures.” -Kirkus Reviews, A Recommended Review
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Excerpt:
Madam of My Heart: A Novel of Love, Loss and Redemption
Gini Grossenbacher
JGKS Press, ©2017
Chapter Nineteen: Chocolate Cream Filling
New Orleans, Louisiana
May 1850
Brianna devoured the chocolate cream filling while Nancy hooked her elbow, guiding her from the French Market out onto the street. If the woman threatened her, she could always run back to Poet and Love. On the other hand, DeSalle might be a showier version of her idol, Mrs. Whipple. She’d followed Mrs. Whipple’s every move about the Inn, learning from someone in charge, someone to imitate as she’d planned her own seamstress shop. So, she paid attention while Nancy peppered her with the regulations posted in the upstairs rooms at the parlor house.
As they stepped out onto the street, DeSalle said, “Of course, any men visitors will need my approval. My girls drink no alcohol on the premises at any time. You will not have any money in your possession, since your earnings, room, and board are managed by the house.”
Brianna stopped, struggling with uncertainty. “Does that mean I would have to ask you for any spending money?” Would she like that agreement? Her thoughts returned to Baltimore. A few seamstresses at Miss Osborne’s had told her about such arrangements, when they had worked in-house at a hotel or on a private estate.
Nancy faced her. “Of course, of course, although you’ll have very little use for spending money since the house provides for all your needs.”
Brianna chewed her bottom lip. She and Nancy resumed their walk, stepping around a pile of steamy horse droppings. A milk truck rumbled past, followed by a boy driving a flock of sheep down to the loading docks.
She noticed Nancy’s sideways glance as she spoke. “Above all, chérie, do your best to get along with all the girls at the house. Any fighting or discord and I’ll put you back onto the street to fend for yourself.” The woman’s eyes took on a threatening cast. “You wouldn’t want that again, now would you?”
“No, of course not,” Brianna said. She digested the details along with her chocolat, and
her nervousness lessened. She remembered Father throwing the plates. These were hardly rules.
Not compared to Father’s. She felt a bit of hope and reassurance. She’d do her best to get along.
As long as she worked hard and did her part to be agreeable, DeSalle would meet all her needs.
What more did she deserve? She’d fallen to the bottom of a well and she’d have to claw her way back out.
* * *
Brianna and Nancy DeSalle fell into an easy rhythm on their walk together on Chartres
Street. Their footsteps kept time with a Congolese drummer’s beat. White clouds streaked with gray sailed overhead. They passed the tall, creamy façades of the Presbytère Courthouse and St. Louis Cathedral. The Latin call-and-response of the priest and the congregation floated out
through the open doors. Morning mass, Brianna thought. She peered into the vestibule and down the nave. Outside DeSalle guided her onward through a cluster of artists painting the scene. They dipped their brushes on easels, then dabbed paints on canvases.
A hefty Negro crossed their path as they neared the Cabildo, another tall-columned court
building on her right. The man whistled a song; he pushed a large box on a wheelbarrow toward the wharf. Across from the Place D’Armes, sailing and steam ships anchored at an angle, and around them, the brown Mississippi glistened like café au lait. Steamboats and flatboats frothed the waters as they churned upriver.
A hunchback drove a rickety conveyance between them, the horses kicking up dust and
mud on St. Peter Street. Brianna coughed into her sleeve. This wagon, crammed with colored men, women, and children, creaked by on its way from the slave market. Sweat-lined faces
stared at her, blank, unseeing. Chains jangled against the wood floor. She drew back, picturing the scene a few months ago when Mr. Ginn had told her about the human trade in New Orleans.
He’d told her that white and colored men of means examined naked men, women, and children, then dickered on their worth.
Plantation owners retained all rights to these human lives and their generations. Brianna
had not seen such a cruel display since the time she had witnessed a slave whipping on a dock
back in Fells Point. All the same, she closed her eyes. Please God, help those unfortunates and
me. She followed DeSalle’s abrupt right turn at the red brick Pontalba building onto St. Peter
Street, where shoppers were strolling. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted two men in straw hats. They paused to stare at her and DeSalle from across the narrow street.
Accustomed to flaunting her wares, DeSalle bent down to pick up a leaf, gravity tugging
her breasts from her chemise. The taller man elbowed the shorter at the sight of the madam, but the other’s steady gaze found Brianna’s. She worked to maintain what delicate control she had over herself when all she wanted to do was get to DeSalle’s house. She brushed brioche flakes
from her chin.
The same man removed his hat, bowing in her direction. A man had never hailed her in
such a way before, and Brianna blushed. She felt the encouraging press of Nancy’s arm, so she bent her knee and the men tipped their hats. A laugh ricocheted across the street. What kind of
snicker was it? At first she found it mocking, but the next moment, she thought the men were
being playful, entertaining.
Brianna squinted in order to get a better view of them. The shorter man had slim, dark
features. Spanish or Italian? So many cultures mixed here in New Orleans. She looked at hisolive skin and black moustache. His straw hat glowed white against the dingy building behind him. He wore a pressed linen jacket, red cravat, and fine black leather boots. He looked to be a bit older. A troubling thought took hold. Could he be one of the many gamblers in town?
About the Author:
California author Gini Grossenbacher was a successful high school English teacher until she abandoned grades and term papers, choosing to write historical novels instead. Now she leads small writing groups and coaches other writers. She loves researching the history behind her novels, and enjoys traveling to the setting where they take place. Her hobbies include needlepoint, nature walks, and Scrabble. She lives in the Sacramento Valley where she grew up, east of San Francisco.
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