{"id":42459,"date":"2017-10-23T17:20:41","date_gmt":"2017-10-23T23:20:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/?p=42459"},"modified":"2017-10-23T17:20:41","modified_gmt":"2017-10-23T23:20:41","slug":"denise-kiernan-signing-the-last-castle-at-off-square-books-october-25","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/denise-kiernan-signing-the-last-castle-at-off-square-books-october-25\/","title":{"rendered":"Denise Kiernan Signing The Last Castle at Off Square Books October 25"},"content":{"rendered":"

From the author of the New York Times<\/em> bestseller The Girls of Atomic City<\/em> comes the fascinating true story behind the magnificent Gilded Age mansion Biltmore<\/strong>\u2014the largest, grandest residence ever built in the United States<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Orphaned at a young age, Edith Stuyvesant Dresser<\/strong> claimed lineage from one of New York\u2019s best known families. She grew up in Newport and Paris, and her engagement and marriage to George Vanderbilt<\/strong> was one of the most watched events of Gilded Age society. But none of this prepared her to be mistress of Biltmore House.<\/span><\/p>\n

Before their marriage, the wealthy and bookish Vanderbilt had dedicated his life to creating a spectacular European-style estate on 125,000 acres of North Carolina<\/strong> wilderness. He summoned the famous landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted<\/strong> to tame the grounds, collaborated with celebrated architect Richard Morris Hunt<\/strong> to build a 175,000-square-foot chateau, filled it with priceless art and antiques, and erected a charming village beyond the gates. Newlywed Edith was now mistress of an estate nearly three times the size of Washington, DC<\/strong> and benefactress of the village and surrounding rural area. When fortunes shifted and changing times threatened her family, her home, and her community, it was up to Edith to save Biltmore\u2014and secure the future of the region and her husband\u2019s legacy.<\/span><\/p>\n

The story of Biltmore spans World Wars, the Jazz Age, the Depression, and generations of the famous Vanderbilt family, and features a captivating cast of real-life characters including F. Scott Fitzgerald<\/strong>, Thomas Wolfe<\/strong>, Teddy Roosevelt<\/strong>, John Singer Sargent<\/strong>, James Whistler<\/strong>, Henry James<\/strong>, and Edith Wharton<\/strong>. The Last Castle<\/em> is the unique American story of how the largest house in America flourished, faltered, and ultimately endured to this day.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cKiernan\u2019s research is prodigious. Among much else, she tells us who stayed at Biltmore as lucky house guests, what they ate, which phonograph records they played, and what mischief they got up to. In short, she brings the place to life. And she doesn\u2019t leave out the juicy bits from the family history: adultery, bankruptcy, suicide. . . . \u2018The Last Castle,\u2019 with its engaging narrative and array of detail, allows us to pay a visit without discomfort and with all the pleasure of a stroll through one of American history\u2019s more stately pleasure domes.\u201d \u2013Wall Street Journal<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Denise Kiernan<\/strong> will be signing The Last Castle<\/em> at Off Square Books<\/strong> October 25 at 5 pm.\u00a0\"The<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From the author of the New York Times bestseller The Girls of Atomic City comes the fascinating true<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":253,"featured_media":42461,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2239],"tags":[821,11115,10987,5,642,448,4,3,753],"class_list":["post-42459","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-literary-events","tag-book-signing","tag-denise-kiernan","tag-free-event","tag-mississippi","tag-ms","tag-off-square-books","tag-oxford","tag-the-local-voice","tag-tlv"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/2017-10-18-kiernan.jpg?fit=620%2C349&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42459","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/253"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42459"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42459\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}