The Stolen Life of Colette Marceau

The butterfly bracelet gains resonance throughout the book as a symbol of family, tradition, and legacy, representing the bonds that tie people together and the connections that outlive individuals. Uniquely, each half of the bracelet can stand on its own, as the jewels were intended to be an heirloom for each of Salomon Rosman’s twin children. However, what begins as a gift for Hélène Rosman and a way to honor their children becomes a larger symbol of what was stolen from many families by the Nazis in France, representing broken bonds and, for many years, the mystery of what happened to Liliane Marceau.

The design of a single bracelet is described as “look[ing] like two lilies swaying in the breeze. Four golden veins ran through each flower, each made of a constellation of flawless colorless diamonds set on a gold filigree web and tipped with tiny black diamonds” (50). Aviva describes the piece she sees as a “delicate filigree attached to a thick rope of gold” with “a constellation of diamonds that shone like a twinkling spill of stars” (93). Individually, they’re beautiful and valuable, but the two bracelets are meant to be paired, and their combined design resembles the Pieris brassicae butterfly.