Publication Date: June 11, 2024
Some women won’t be painted out of history . . .
Everybody knows that in 1938, runaway heiress artist Juliette Willoughby perished in an accidental studio fire in Paris, alongside her masterpiece Self Portrait As Sphinx.
Fifty years later, two Cambridge art history students are confounded when they stumble across proof that the fire was no accident but something more sinister. What they uncover threatens the very foundation of Juliette’s aristocratic family and revives rumors of the infamous curse that has haunted the Willoughbys for generations.
But what does their discovery mean? And how is it connected to a brutal murder in present-day Dubai?
A tale of love and madness, obsession and revenge, The Final Act of Juliette Willoughby unravels the riddle posed by a Sphinx who refuses to reveal her secrets . . .
Take a trip into the fascinating world of art history brought to life with a fictional tale filled with drama, intrigue, and murder.
Author Ellery Lloyd serves up a tale featuring three different time periods, deftly woven together, in The Final Act of Juliette Willoughby.
The story launches in present-day Dubai at a press conference announcing the sale of a Surrealist painting thought to have been destroyed. There’s quite a bit of excitement surrounding the event, especially when the police enter.
From there, it pivots to feature the same characters in 1991 as two Cambridge art history students who discover that a fatal fire claiming the life of the young artist more than 50 years ago was no accident. The artist, Juliette, was a young heiress who ran away to France, leaving her family behind.
Shifting back in time, the storyline features Juliette’s journals, which were also thought to have been destroyed in the fire. There, readers get a deeper look into her character and start to gather various clues. What really happened to the artist? Is there actually a curse? Where has the painting been all these years?
Ultimately, all three timelines are woven together, leading up to a startling conclusion. The Final Act of Juliette Willoughby may start slowly, but it packs a punch.
Ellery Lloyd is the pseudonym for the London-based husband-and-wife writing team of Collette Lyons and Paul Vlitos. Collette is a journalist and editor, the former content director of Elle (UK), and editorial director at Soho House. She has written for the Guardian, the Telegraph, and the Sunday Times. Paul is the author of two previous novels, Welcome to the Working Week and Every Day Is Like Sunday. He is a Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Greenwich. They are the authors of People Like Her and The Club.
