Chumley’s did exist, and as there is some debate about when it actually opened its doors, I have used the creative licence of the fiction writer to have it open by 1922. The Ziegfeld Follies were an essential part of Broadway life for many years, from 1907 to 1931. The column published in The New Yorker under the pseudonym Lipstick on page 184 is genuine, as is the quote from the Ladies’ Home Journal on page 3. And Mrs Vanderbilt was said to have greeted guests at her parties wearing a dress covered in hundreds of electric bulbs, although probably at a slightly earlier time than I have used this incident in the book.
A Playlist
Here is a list of the songs from the 1920s that are referred to in the book. Look them up, load them up and listen while you read!
‘A Good Man Is Hard to Find’, Marion Harris
‘April Showers’, Al Jolson
‘Bugle Call Rag’, New Orleans Rhythm Kings
‘Charleston’, Paul Whiteman and his Orchestra
‘Hot Lips’, Paul Whiteman and his Orchestra
‘I Love You Truly’, Elsie Baker
‘I’ll See You in My Dreams’, Isham Jones with the Ray Miller Orchestra
‘I’m Nobody’s Baby’, Ruth Etting
‘Let Me Call You Sweetheart’, The Peerless Quartet
‘Oh! Boy, What a Girl’, Eddie Cantor
‘Oh, Lady Be Good’, Cliff Edwards
‘Somebody Stole My Gal’, Ted Weems and His Orchestra
‘Sweet Adeline’, Haydn Quartet
‘Tain’t Nobody’s Biz-ness if I Do’, Sara Martin (with Fats Waller on piano)
‘The New York Glide’, Ethel Waters
‘Toot, Toot, Tootsie (Good bye)’, Al Jolson
NATASHA LESTER worked as a marketing executive for ten years, including stints at cosmetic company L’Oréal, managing the Maybelline brand, before returning to university to study creative writing. She completed a Master of Creative Arts as well as her first novel, What Is Left Over, After, which won the T.A.G. Hungerford Award for Fiction. Her second novel, If I Should Lose You, was published by Fremantle Press. The Age described Natasha as ‘a remarkable Australian talent’, and her work has appeared in The Review of Australian Fiction and Overland, and the anthologies Australian Love Stories, The Kid on the Karaoke Stage and Purple Prose. In her spare time Natasha loves to teach writing, is a sought after public speaker and can often be found playing dress-ups with her three children. She lives in Perth.
natashalester.com.au
@Natasha_Lester
/NatashaLesterAuthor
#KissFitz
Copyright
Published in Australia and New Zealand in 2016
by Hachette Australia
(an imprint of Hachette Australia Pty Limited)
Level 17, 207 Kent Street, Sydney NSW 2000
www.hachette.com.au
Copyright © Natasha Lester 2016
This book is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of private study, research, criticism or review permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be stored or reproduced by any process without prior written permission. Enquiries should be made to the publisher.
A CIP catalogue record of this book is available from the National Library of Australia.
978 0 7336 3463 5
978 0 7336 3464 2 (ebook edition)
Cover design by Nada Backovic
Cover images courtesy of Sarah Troester/ImageBrief and Irene Suchocki/Trevillion Images
Author photograph courtesy of Stef King/stefking.com.au
A Kiss From Mr Fitzgerald Page 34
