The Light of Paris by Eleanor Brown

Weird Sisters author, Eleanor Brown's Light of Paris is a tale of two women who are bound by the expectations of family, society, and their own personal fears.

Madeleine is in her thirties, stuck in a loveless marriage, and volunteering as a docent at an art museum in Chicago. Youthful dreams of living as an artist are too painful to remember.

Margie is in her twenties and is dispatched to Paris in 1924 to chaperone her cousin. Upon her arrival she is abandoned by her cousin and left to fend for herself. With dreams of becoming a writer and living independently, she gets a job in a library in Paris and falls in love.

The story evolves as the reader switches between characters, decades and cities. Will the women find self actualization or will they conform to the conventions of expectations?

I listened to the book and Cassandra Campbell's narration is excellent.