Lilliet enjoys her work, still playing the role of La Muette, and is chosen to accompany the Empress on a lengthy hunt. At an orphanage, she meets the Comtesse, who sponsors Lilliet to work in the household of the Empress. When La Muette dies, Lilliet takes on her identity. Her cellmate at Saint-Lazare this time is a mute woman called La Muette. She engineers an escape from the Tenor by having herself returned to prison. The Tenor has her audition for a famous music school-but the school rejects her application because her Falcon soprano voice might "break" at any moment. Lilliet quickly establishes that neither Euphrosyne or the Tenor have betrayed her, and Lilliet’s thoughts return to her past. The first two suspects are revealed to be Euphrosyne and the Tenor, respectively, but it is not revealed who the latter two suspects are. Lilliet narrows down the possible suspects to four. The story switches back to the present day, where Lilliet feverishly tries to figure out who has betrayed her. The Tenor purchases her from Odile, intending to oversee Lilliet’s training and promote her career.
She meets a fellow singer she calls the Tenor, who falls in love with her and her remarkable voice. Unable to pay her debts from her imprisonment, Lilliet has little choice and so plunges herself into the role of a prostitute. Upon their release, Lilliet is invited to work as a courtesan by a woman named Odile. The two are sent to Saint-Lazare prison where Lilliet registers herself as a courtesan to be able to stay with him. When an angry man threatens Euphrosyne, Lilliet leaps to her friend’s defense. In Paris, she meets a courtesan named Euphrosyne and strikes up a deep friendship. Lilliet leaves the circus to start a new life. Her circus career culminates with a performance in front of French Emperor Napoleon III, and she is rewarded with a priceless ruby brooch. When her family dies of a fever, she travels to New York where she signs up with a traveling circus headed for Europe. Lilliet casts her thoughts back to her youth, growing up in a religious family where her “prideful singing” is considered sinful. The opera is clearly based on her secret life story, meaning she has been betrayed. When one is finally presented, Lilliet is shocked.
#Queen of the night book professional#
Celebrated for her rare Falcon soprano singing range, all Lilliet lacks in her professional career is an opera written just for her. The narrator, a mysterious woman under the alias of Lilliet Berne, is a rising star of the opera in Paris. Set in 19th century Paris, this first person narrative uses the tropes and rhythms of opera itself to tell a life story defined by acting, artificiality, and Gothic flourishes that flirts with the supernatural. The story details the life and adventures of a uniquely talented opera singer calling herself Lilliet Berne. The Queen of the Night is an historical fiction novel by American writer Alexander Chee, published in 2016.
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