I found this book to be a very interesting read. I really enjoyed the idea of Audenzia (Zia) Di Luca taking matters into her own hands to pursue justice in a world run by fear and violence. The character development of Zia was really interesting and I loved watching her confidence and her knowledge of what she can do expand. The main thing that hooked me in this book was the mystery and how the three view points weaved together to give such a complex view of this time in New York. Unfortunately the characters other than Zia and Sal seemed a little one dimensional and the romance that emerges also seemed to come from no where. I do wish that the mystery was fleshed out a little bit more but overall I really enjoyed this book and am excited to read more by the author.

I received an AD PR copy of this book to read in exchange for an honest review as part of the book tour hosted by Insta Book Tours.

The Orchid Hour is a novel set in the 1920s Prohibition era in New York and we follow Audenzia (Zia) as she navigates life as not only a single parent war widow but also navigating the rules and regulations within the sicilia families she was not only born into but married in to too. I loved seeing Zia develop across the course of the book from a timid librarian into an investigator after her father-in-law and an elderly accuantance she was fond of are killed. Zia had so much strength and courage, especially for the era and her heritage. Her investigation takes her to the Orchid Hour, which is a nightclub owned by a very dangerous gangster. The author did an amazing job of mixing fictional characters with real-life people, and the book really pulls you in! I didn't want this book to end!

Perfect blend of history and mystery, Nancy Bilyeau creates characters that you empathise with. You feel the atmosphere of the 1920s - both the struggle of the Italian immigrants and the underworld of prohibition New York.

A great story.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for allowing me to read The Orchid Hour.

This was a great read. The feeling I had after reading this can only be described as book-hangover. It was interesting, captivating. and the descriptions of New York in the 20s made me want to go back in time and travel there. Since this is historical fiction, there are also mentions of the mafia and their empire at the time, and about the social status of immigrants in the US. The way all of this is written about and described is engaging and it didn’t feel like I was taking a history lesson. All the facts blend perfectly with the murder mystery and Nancy Bilyeau makes it seamlessly.

The mystery kept me reading and guessing until the very end. All the ends get tied up beautifully, creating an perfecting ending to the story. While it started off slow, when it picks up, it picks up. This is definitely a page-turned that will get you hooked and not let go.

The jewel of this book though, is the main character. I fell in love with Audenzia de Luca aka Zia. She’s a strong, independent woman who just started working at the Seward Park branch of the New York Public Library, raising her young son while also helping her late husbands’ parents run their cheese shop in Little Italy. She’s brave, courageous and feisty. She just blossoms throughout the story, and it made me very happy to see her grow.

An absolutely fantastic read. Go read it!

A great read, enjoyable characters, setting and plot that took me into that world. A real page turner.

“I didn’t need an obnoxious reporter to tell me about the Valachi hearings. That … broke the most important rule in front of the entire world last year. “We call it Cosa Nostra,” Valachi said to the senators, lawyers, and reporters in Washington, D.C. … Leave it to Vito Genovese to keep this guy around.”

My thanks to Lume Books for an eARC via NetGalley of ‘The Orchid Hour’ by Nancy Bilyeau.

In recent years I have enjoyed a number of Nancy Bilyeau’s novels and was especially drawn to her latest given the 1920s setting. As the above quote indicates its protagonist is quite a tough cookie.

New York City, 1923. Audenzia (Zia) de Luca had been widowed during the Great War and now lives with her son and in-laws in Little Italy. She works at the public library and while there befriends one of its regular visitors, the quiet Mr. Watkins.

When he is shockingly murdered outside the library, Zia is brought in and questioned by the police. Then there’s another tragedy, even closer to home. One of the police detectives lets slip that both crimes are connected to a new speakeasy in Greenwich Village called The Orchid Hour.

With the police investigation getting nowhere, Zia decides to find her own answers. When she learns that her cousin Salvatore (Sal) is involved with The Orchid Hour, she asks him to help her get a job there. She impresses its manager, David la Costa, with her knowledge of orchids and is hired to assist with the rare orchids used to decorate the club.

Still, undercover work is dangerous and Zia comes into contact with powerful and dangerous men. Will she be able to bring the killers to justice before they learn her secret?

I found this a rich work of historical fiction that drew on the glamour of Manhattan during the Jazz Age when Prohibition led to the rise of bootleggers and organised crime. The 1920s narrative is framed by chapters set in 1963 as Zia reflects upon her colourful life and infamous family connections, including her cousin Sal, who the world came to know as ‘Lucky Luciano’.

In her Author’s Note Nancy Bilyeau clarifies that while characters such as David la Costa, Zia and the de Luca family are fictional, she has placed them in the context of the historical figures of the period, including its notorious crime families, politicians, and of course, J. Edgar Hoover.

Overall, I enjoyed ‘The Orchid Hour’ very much. I found it an engaging read and feel that Nancy Bilyeau captured the ambiance of the period with ease. So without doubt Jazz Age glamour, gangsters, speakeasies, and a bright young librarian determined to uncover the truth proved a winning combination for me.

Highly recommended.

What a fascinating journey into Jazz Age New York during the roaring 1920s-- prohibition, speakeasies, crime bosses and vengeful murders. Nancy Bilyeau has written a fantastic ensemble of characters that bring this era, the glitz, glamour and the danger, to life! The pacing of the book was perfect. It captivated me right from the first few pages and kept a steady pace right until the end. I particularly enjoyed the author's notes at the end which described in detail some real life individuals and their representation in the story. This was historical fiction as it should be- vivid storytelling intertwining historical accuracy with fictional characters and events.

Thank you to Lume Books and NetGalley for this ARC. I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review.

I always love a good period novel set in 1920’s New York. I loved reading about the speakeasy during the prohibition era. The author did a great job really setting the tone and describing the scene. I will say, I was not invested in the characters as much as I would have liked. But overall this was still a good read!

A well crafted and beautiful story, loved the period and theme. The ending was wrapped up too quickly but overall a LOVELY novel!

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC.

Set in 1920s New York, Zia is trying to make what she can of her life following the death of her husband. Life is turned on its head when, following the death of the Deputy Mayor, Zia is drawn into The Orchid Hour, a brand new speakeasy which is at the heart of the murder.

Whilst I enjoyed the backdrop of prohibition New York and the glamour of the jazz age the lack of real plot was disappointing. I found the characters quite one dimensional and was disappointed with the flatness of the ending. It felt very much style over substance for me.

Thanks Netgalley for the ARC. The views here are entirely my own.

“There is a certain hour, in the dead of night, when the orchid’s scent can put you under a spell.”
1920s New York and Zia De Luca, a young widow is working in a local Public Library.
After she loses her job, she discovers that a library borrower had been murdered outside the library and as she discovers another murder closer to home, she becomes a super sleuth and gets a job at the speakeasy The Orchid Hour as she is convinced the murderer has links to the speakeasy club.
A powerful and evocative read, beautifully layered and utterly seductive.
The roaring 20s is an era that I love and I found the historical details of corruption and prohibition during this period fascinating.
Thanks @tudorscribe @lumebooks & @netgalley for the eARC

I was attracted by the blurb and the novel's truly beautiful cover.

The story starts in 1963 but the protagonist takes the reader back to the heart of the Roaring Twenties and Five Points, Little Italy, - Mulberry Street, - NY, where, despite prohibition, alcohol flows and is traded liberally.

It paints a picture about the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, and anything we associate with all things Italian, and Italy, from pizza to pizzu so to speak.

We meet Zia De Luca, a war widow from a Sicilian family who married into a Neapolitan family. Her husband and brother died during WWI, she later loses her parents to the Spanish flu. She lives with her husband’s family in Little Italy, where they run a cheese shop.

Via Zia De Luca, the reader is taken on a journey through time, starting with an epidemic of a strange disease, - which prevailed for a while but has not really occurred since then- nicknamed 'Nona' , which received worldwide attention through Robert de Niro's film 'Awakenings' - to fascist Italy, travelling further to Pirandello, the Italian Nobel laureate, Puccini, and so much more.

I especially found the piece on orchid mania fascinating to read, as I was previously only familiar with tulipmania. I suspect the writer chose the title because of the orchid.
Worldwide, there are thousands of different (orchid) families, which in turn are divided into subfamilies, there is even an orchid that grows underground; where the writer presumably makes the comparison of godfathers who sometimes have to live underground for years under absurd conditions to stay out of the hands of justice.

The novel gives a good time picture of 1920s New York. I loved reading it, it’s a fun and quick read.
The only downside - but perhaps deliberately so, given the subject matter - is the fact that you don't get to know the main characters, these doors remain closed to the outside world, and as a reader, you are witnessing everything from a distance, since you have not a clue which Rules or agreements are applicable.
it is merely about a name, which you may have read in the newspaper, or that you happened to hear on the street..
That is then also immediately the weakness of the story, it remains a fairly superficial account of a certain time in New York.

While it is a fascinating period, for the general public they remain names from the newspapers, or from the films.. I could not sympathise with Zia for a moment, not even when Mr Watkins and later Papa was shot dead.
and I must confess honestly that I don't like mafia films either, I'm probably one of the few who's never seen The Godfather film and the like. Also not going to. Just really not my thing.

3 stars. Thank you Netgalley and Lume Books for this review copy. I leave this review voluntarily.

Okay, this was not what I was expecting. You see, for some reason, I thought this was going to be the third book in the Genevieve Planché series, but I guess that’s not coming until next year sometime. That doesn’t mean that this book is disappointing, because it isn’t, it’s just that I thought I was going to be reading something else. This also isn’t to say that the Genevieve Planché series are free of things like intrigue and danger, because they there’s a good deal of all that, and I still enjoyed those books. Mind you, I think my regular readers know that I’m not all that much of a crime thriller or murder mystery reader. But give me an interesting slant on those and I’m willing to give them a try. The whole art world bit that’s in the Genevieve Planché books was just that type of angle you don’t regularly get in those books.

Now, the “roaring 20s” is an era that I find to be absolutely fascinating. The generation of young people coming of age in the aftermath of the Great War, were really fascinating. On the one hand, they understood the devastation and havoc that war wreaks on normalcy, but on the other hand, they weren’t willing to turn back the clock to where they were before that war. They were full steam ahead with trying to repair their lives, and hopefully the world around them. Mind you, as we know, these weren’t all days of sunshine and rainbows, and the baser elements of society took advantage of those trying to get ahead by hook or by crook as well as those wanting to escape from their troubles through artificial means. That’s one reason why gangs of thugs and organized crime became so rampant in the US. With all that fodder for crime and murder, no wonder writers of these genres enjoy placing their historical books during this era.

So, I can’t blame Bilyeau for joining in on this fun, but I was hoping that the creativity of the deceptions inside the art world from her Planché books would carry through to this book as well. Instead, Bilyeau leaned heavily on the bootlegging and mafia themes that plagued that era. However, on the up side, the whole business with the orchids (and yes, these literally are the living, flowering kind) was a stroke of genius. The way that Bilyeau included this interesting aspect of the story were some of the most interesting passages. I’m only sorry she didn’t give us a bit more of that. Our protagonist here is also a member of a family that had a cheese shop, and I would have been happy for a bit more about that, as well.

But most of the story has to do with our protagonist trying to find out who killed a deputy Mayor and who killed our protagonist’s father-in-law. The idea that the two murders might have been connected comes into play, and it leads to a couple twists we don’t see coming. That said, I found that building a new, high-class, prohibition era night club was central here, and sadly felt a bit mundane. That, together with the romantic elements here felt less than convincing for me. Even so, it is still a good thriller, and I can recommend it, but for me, it isn't my favorite by Bilyeau, and I don’t think this can get more than four out of five stars, which is still a pretty good rating. (But I'm still anxiously awaiting the next Planché book!)

The Orchid Hour by Nancy Bilyeau is an enchanting Historical Fiction novel jam packed with atmosphere and originality. Told in multiple points of view, the story is set in New York City during the 1920s, the age of organized crime, speakeasies, jazz, glamour and gangsters. The setting is vivid and the plot drips with suspense. Not only is there murder but also snippets of romance. Talk about a beguiling story to become fully immersed in!

Sicilian immigrant Zia De Luca and her son live with her inlaws in Little Italy. She works as an assistant librarian at the Immigrants' Library in a peaceful calm environment. Murder has a way of changing things and she becomes part of The Orchid Hour. She and Lt. Frank Hudgins inveigle and investigate together. What a team! I really like the orchid and Sicily connections, tight suspense and atmosphere in particular. Do be sure to read the author's notes on her inspiration.

Looking for your next unique and enthralling read? This could very well be what you crave. A brilliant change from the ordinary.

My sincere thank you to Lume Books and NetGalley for providing me with a digital copy of this fabulous book.

4.5 stars
What a fascinating story full of great characters and the vivid setting of New York City in the 1920’s.
Zia is a wonderful heroine. The journey she follows from meek and timid librarian, trying to provide for her son and be a good daughter-in-law, to the brave and courageous investigator in The Orchid Hour mixing with the seedier side of life is so compelling. Her resilience and determination in finding the truth is to admired but of course comes with a cost.
I loved the links to the real life crime world of the 20’s - it really brought home how dangerous it was for Zia. and the details about the orchids were fascinating.
A truly brilliant piece of storytelling.

Nancy Bilyeau offers her readers an immersive experience into the milieu of 1923 New York City with the historical novel “The Orchid Hour”. Set within the insular Italian community called Little Italy, when Prohibition was fuelling organised crime and proliferation of speakeasies (a new word for me), the heroine in this captivating and a poignant tale is Zia De Luca, a young widow who suddenly gets thrust into the centre of a murder investigation. She lives with her son and in-laws above the cheese shop they own while working for a local branch of the New York Public Library.

One day deputy mayor Miles G. Watkins, a frequent library patron, approached Zia to help translate a play by well-known Sicilian author. Shortly after Zia agrees to do so, Watkins is gunned down on the library steps. She becomes the focus of the police investigation led by NYPD Lt. Frank Hudgins. After a second killing much closer to her home, Zia begins to suspect that the crimes are connected to a new speakeasy in Greenwich Village called The Orchid Hour.

When the police investigation nets the murder suspect, Zia knows that the NYPD got the wrong person and decides to do some sleuthing on her own. With the help of her cousin Sal who is close to her and part-owner of The Orchid Hour, she is offered a job to take care of some special orchids in the establishment. Once inside, she eavesdrops into conversations between the racketeers who own the speakeasy. Things start to get heady for Zia as she connects the dots between the murder victims and their killers. She falls in love with an employee there and becomes an assassination target herself.

Zia is running out of time but she knows she must do all it takes to bring the killers to justice before she becomes the third murder victim.

I find this novel to be a very compelling read for many reasons. First, it shines a fascinating spotlight on Prohibition, a socially troubling period in American history when the manufacture, storage, sale, possession and consumption of alcohol was banned. Speakeasies like The Orchid Hour proliferated as prohibition laws were not strictly enforced. Many of these were owned by organised crime syndicates which would do anything to protect their turf. Second, Bilyeau skillfully blends fictional characters with real-life characters and historical details into a narrative that immerses readers into the world of the Roaring 20s, glamorous, tantalising and yet dangerous. Third, the author ingeniously crafts a quiet, unassuming young female library assistant named Zia as the main character in this sinister plot of murder and intrigue, who later takes on a different persona in her quest for answers. Zia becomes charming, self-assertive, bold and possesses true grit and a dogged determination to seek the truth in a dangerous place. I love how this character develops over time. Fourth, Bilyeau’s use of multi-character viewpoints is an excellent literary technique of developing characters. This might seem disjointed and annoying in the narrative flow for some but it all makes sense towards the end. The result is a multi-layered suspenseful narrative of mystery, whodunit, romance and history at its best.

This is the first novel by Bilyeau that I’ve read but I’ll not stop at that as it has whetted my appetite for more of her oeuvre. My thanks to her for the enriching reading experience.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC. I’m leaving this review voluntarily.

Nancy Bileau can write well researched and entertaining historical mysteries that mixes solid plot with a vivid and detailed historical background.
This one, the first in a new series, was entertaining and kept me guessing.
Recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine

This historical story is very atmospheric , reading it made me feel like I was in New York in the early 20s.I loved the descriptions of the city, the people and the secret world of crime families. I was very intrigued by the author’s writing, the way Nancy Bilyeau showed how immigrants were treated and how a young immigrant Italian mother, who lost everyone and everything she loved, managed to become a confident and strong woman.
It is a captivating, dark story that I really enjoyed reading. If you like historical fiction stories you should definitely read this one, and most importantly don’t forget to read the Author’s Note!
Thank you NetGalley and Lume Books for giving me the opportunity to read this ARC.

I am a fan of Nancy’s historical fiction novels and this time around The Orchid Hour takes her readers to the Jazz Age in New York City. Nancy has done her research in capturing the Roaring 20’s in NYC inclusive of organised crime and the secret world of the speakeasy as they all feature prominently in this book. Nancy brings to life the city capturing not only people caught up in events but also the overall mood of the city with all the hopes, dreams, fears and fancies of the era. If the 1920s decade captures your interest - prohibition, organised crime, post World War I life and the evolution of a New York culture - then this is certainly the book for you.

‘How can anyone triumph in New York without becoming cruel themselves?’

Audenzia (Zia) Luciana emigrates with her family from Italy to New York in the early 20th century. They brave the hostile neighbours until they move to the area known as 'Little Italy'. Zia meets Armando De Luca, they get married & have a son, Michael. Armando is killed in WWI alongside Zia's younger brother, & she also loses her parents to the 'flu epidemic so 1923 sees Zia living with her in-laws & working a quiet job at the local library. One day, a regular visitor to the library called Mr Watkins asks Zia to translate a play for him. Their small interaction sets off a chain reaction which completely changes Zia's life, bringing her back into contact with her cousin Salvatore Luciana who runs with a rougher crowd, & is involved with the opening of a speakeasy club named The Orchid Hour. When her father-in-law is shot & killed & all enquiries point to The Orchid Hour as the epicentre of what is going on, & when the police don't seem interested in investigating the killing, Zia manages to get a job at the club to carry out her own investigation.

New York in the 1920s? I am there for that! I'm a big fan of the whole flapper, speakeasy, Louise Brooks era. I really liked Zia, the main character, & seeing her develop from being a quiet woman older than her years & only interested in raising her son, to a more confident modern woman was wonderful. The book starts out at quite a slow pace, but once The Orchid Hour becomes involved, the story picks up. There's highlighting of the xenophobia that Italian-Americans faced in America in the 1920s, & the rise of organised crime via the subverting of Prohibition laws. I swear you can almost hear Humphrey Bogart giving a voice over as you read it. One of the best books I've read this year.

TWs: xenophobia, gun violence, murder.

My thanks to NetGalley & publishers, Lume Books, for the opportunity to read an ARC.