Moonrise

by Roberta Gayle

May 1, 1996 · Pinnacle

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Moonrise has a purple cover that includes two protagonists of color and a lot of gold and teal in the background. It lured me with false promises of crazysauce but turned out to be a thoughtful historical about art and commence in 19th century Paris.

The cover, front and back, promises melodrama and general insanity. The plot summary! Pascale is the granddaughter of an African Princess! Her father is a painter who hands out with Edouard Manet and Emile Zola! Jack Devlin is a sea captain charged with smuggling a painting into Spain! I thought for sure most of this book would take place on a boat and there would be pirates. Ooh, maybe Art Pirates! A special, new kind of pirate! But no, there’s very little crazy sauce here, just a lot of dinner parties and discussions, with a smidgen of crazy thrown in near the ending and one really large explosion near the beginning.

The actual plot is this: in the year 1865, Pascale is the daughter of a famous artist. She devotes her life to managing her father’s home and business, so that he can think Artistic Thoughts. Her father paints a portrait that is supposed to be his masterpiece, but not only will he not show it to Pascale, he hires Captain Jack Devlin to take it out of the country. Jack and Pascale instantly have that “I hate you and I want to rip off your clothes and this confuses me” dynamic – if that’s your catnip, then look no further, because these people can’t stand each other at first. Jack takes the painting on his ship and it (the ship, not the painting) explodes so Jack ends up at Pascale’s house where she has to nurse him back to health.

To be candid, while I always had sympathy for Pascale, I couldn’t stand Jack for a good part of the book. He’s sexist, he thinks Pascale is a nag and possibly a woman of loose morals, he alternately seduces her and then vows not to and then does it again. He’s kind of a jerk. However, one of the things I liked about the story was that as we get deeper into Jack’s character, it becomes apparent that his concerns for Pascale aren’t all about sexism. Pascale’s father does not work to protect her reputation or to protect her from discomfort, and this isn’t because he’s a feminist who thinks Pascale should do whatever she wants – it’s because he just doesn’t notice anything. He does care about his daughter, but he’s very happy to let Pascale make life easy for him whether it makes Pascale’s life harder or not. Jack wants Pascale’s father to cherish her instead of taking her for granted. Ironically, Jack is ultimately the one who thinks Pascale should be more focused on her own art rather than domestic matters, because he sees that by setting aside her art to run her father’s household she’s cut off an important part of herself.

Meanwhile Pascale, who thinks she has it all together, comes face to face with the fact that she has allowed her own talents to go by the wayside so that she can support the artists around her who stare into space while she negotiates their business deals. One of the strongest points of the book is that it doesn’t take an easy, predictable route of saying that Pascale was told that she couldn’t do art because she was a girl. Instead, her father encouraged her art, but as time passed (and particularly when she became involved with a lover who was jealous of her talent) she realized that she got more praise for housekeeping and business management than she did for painting. Since she genuinely liked using these skills, and she liked having a higher standard of living than “starving in a garret,” it was easy for her to simply slip into a domestic role.

The ending comes out of nowhere and leaves a lot of loose ends. Throughout the book Jack keeps saying that he can’t marry Pascale because he is but a lowly sea captain. Well, first of all, he’s a pretty rich sea captain, and it’s not like he’s the cabin boy, nor is Pascale the Duchess of All She Surveys. I really didn’t think this was a big problem – but Jack totally does, and his situation doesn’t change, so why does he suddenly forget all about the class barriers? He never says, “Screw class barriers! The heart wants what it wants!” He just seems to forget all about it. Meanwhile, I wanted to know about what Pascale’s married life might look like. I think it’s great that she’s painting again, but she really is good at managing stuff, and Jack is all, “Oh yeah, about your dad, he’ll be fine on his own.” I wanted Pascale to have balance between using her skills as an artist and using her skills as an administrator, and I wasn’t convinced that that would happen.

I think this is a book I’d like better on a second reading. I kept looking so hard forcrazysauce that I missed the rather thoughtful book that I was actually reading. I loved the fairly matter-of-fact focus on characters of color who fit in just fine in the bohemian art culture of France. I liked how the mundane work that Pascale does is valued but so is her artistic ability. I liked that Jack wants Pascale’s father to see her as a priority instead of taking her for granted. I loved all the conversations about the art world (Manet painted a hooker! Scandal!). Still, I had a hard time staying interested in the story. I kept wanting to go read something with art pirates.

I’m telling you, Art Pirates could be the next big thing.