From Publishers Weekly
The suffrage cause, embodied by three pretty suffragists (the "trey of pearls" of the title), provides the background for Hall's fourth literate historical (after 2003's Ambrose Bierce and the One-Eyed Jacks), set in San Francisco in 1892. Curmudgeonly journalist Ambrose Bierce and his young sidekick, Tom Redmond, look into the shooting death of popular preacher and notorious ladies' man Henry Devine. A second murder follows, of banker William P. Jaspers, whose wife was a devotee of the Reverend Devine. In between interviewing jealous husbands and trying to locate possibly vengeful offspring, Tom pursues his free-love-advocating cousin Amanda Wilson with mixed success, while Bierce exchanges barbs with novelist Gertrude Atherton and otherwise comments cynically on the proceedings. During one interlude, the author of The Devil's Dictionary cites approvingly examples of Ulysses S. Grant's direct and vigorous prose. Hall's spare, laconic style is of comparable quality. Despite a contrived denouement that allows Redmond to perform some stagy heroics during a suffragist parade and a remote killer who remains little more than a set of motivations, Hall delivers an ingenious twist at the end, with subtle hints along the way, that should catch most readers by surprise.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Robert Stone
Oakley Hall is one of the country’s finest writers.
Richard Ford
Oakley Hall is a novelist who never seems to make a wrong move...
Book Description
Oakley Hall is a modern-day Sir Arthur Conan Doyle whose works have been acclaimed by everybody from Michael Chabon to Diane Johnson. In his latest Ambrose Bierce mystery, three young, beautiful orators known as "The Trey of Pearls" come to San Francisco in 1892 to advocate women’s suffrage, whipping the burly city of pioneers and railroad men into a lather. When the famous women’s advocate Reverend Divine is found murdered, Ambrose and his indomitable sidekick Tom Redmond must navigate the heavy seas of free love, the politics of a minister’s harem, and the secrets of California’s rough and ready frontier past to uncover the truth. Cunningly plotted and rich with period detail, this historical mystery confirms Hall’s reputation as a master of the genre.
About the Author
Oakley Hall is the author of more than twenty works of fiction, including several hard-boiled crime novels published under the pen name Jason Manor, and is general director of the famed Squaw Valley Community of Writers.
Ambrose Bierce and the Trey of Pearls (Ambrose Bierce Series) FROM THE PUBLISHER
When three beautiful young feminists come to San Francisco in 1892 to advocate suffrage for women and temperance for men, the burly city built by miners and railroad men offers them fierce resistance. Known as "The Trey of Pearls," the trio of chaste and pretty suffragettes align themselves with the church of the local super star preacher. But when their famous advocate, Reverend Devine, is found murdered, Ambrose Bierce and his indomitable sidekick Tom Redmond uncover a different kind of "liberation." To discover who killed Devine - and who is threatening the Pearls - Tom and Ambrose must navigate the heavy seas of free love, the politics of a minister's harem, and the secrets of California's rough and ready frontier past. As Tom gets closer to the truth, the murder count builds, and the tension erupts into a standoff between the Trey, a fraternity of saloon toughs, and, from somewhere in the shadows, the murderer.
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
The suffrage cause, embodied by three pretty suffragists (the "trey of pearls" of the title), provides the background for Hall's fourth literate historical (after 2003's Ambrose Bierce and the One-Eyed Jacks), set in San Francisco in 1892. Curmudgeonly journalist Ambrose Bierce and his young sidekick, Tom Redmond, look into the shooting death of popular preacher and notorious ladies' man Henry Devine. A second murder follows, of banker William P. Jaspers, whose wife was a devotee of the Reverend Devine. In between interviewing jealous husbands and trying to locate possibly vengeful offspring, Tom pursues his free-love-advocating cousin Amanda Wilson with mixed success, while Bierce exchanges barbs with novelist Gertrude Atherton and otherwise comments cynically on the proceedings. During one interlude, the author of The Devil's Dictionary cites approvingly examples of Ulysses S. Grant's direct and vigorous prose. Hall's spare, laconic style is of comparable quality. Despite a contrived denouement that allows Redmond to perform some stagy heroics during a suffragist parade and a remote killer who remains little more than a set of motivations, Hall delivers an ingenious twist at the end, with subtle hints along the way, that should catch most readers by surprise. (Jan. 26) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
The course of women's votes never runs smooth in this fourth case for the peerlessly cynical San Francisco Examiner columnist (Ambrose Bierce and the One-Eyed Jacks, 2002, etc.). Suffragist impresario Mrs. Quinan has come to town with three performers she calls the Trey of Pearls: Gloria Robinson, who sings and does bird calls; Emmiline Prout, who lectures the crowds on the slavery of marriage; and Amanda Wilson, another lecturer who's the cousin of Bierce amanuensis Tom Redmond. Local banker William Jaspers, the Noble Grand Humbug of E Clampus Vitas ("formed to protect the widder and the orphin, especially the widder"), has promised to call out hordes of his Clampers to disrupt the parade Mrs. Quinan plans. But this titanic battle is upstaged by the sudden murder of Rev. Henry Devine, the popular preacher who supported women's right to free love and proved it every night with a different postulant. The rumor that Mrs. Jaspers had been experiencing Devine ecstasies and that Jaspers had killed the villain who besmirched his first wife's connubial bed 20 years ago makes the Noble Grand Humbug the obvious suspect-until somebody exonerates him by shooting him as well. Now if only Bierce and Tom could track down Robert Morton, vanished son of that ill-fated first marriage
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