Jen J. Danna
is our guest blogger. As a scientist specializing in infectious diseases, Jen
works as part of a dynamic research group at a cutting-edge Canadian
university. Her true passion, however, is indulging her love of the mysterious
through her writing. Together with her partner Ann Vanderlaan, she crafts
suspenseful crime fiction with a realistic scientific edge for Five
Star/Cengage. Jen lives near Toronto, Ontario with her
husband and two daughters, and is a member of the Crime Writers of Canada.
The Killer Days of Prohibition
My writing partner Ann and I love to find
an interesting theme around which to base each of our Abbott and Lowell
Forensic Mysteries. Be it fire, witchcraft or photography, we use the theme as
an overarching concept in our storytelling. From our point of view, it makes
writing the novel more interesting. But, clearly, readers enjoy it also since
that is one of the most noted aspects of our writing in reviews. In TWO PARTS
BLOODY MURDER, the overarching theme is the history of Prohibition that backs
the entire case that Matt, Leigh and the team are investigating.
Prohibition was an interesting time in
American history, and to this day the Eighteenth Amendment remains the only amendment
to the Constitution of the United States to be repealed.
Amendment XVIII, ratified in January 1920, was an attempt to shape social
change: because alcohol was seen as the ‘devil’s brew’ and people were
considered too weak to escape its clutches, temperance was federally
legislated. An interesting aspect of that legislation was that it was only
illegal to produce, transport, store, or sell alcohol. Once in a person’s
possession, it was completely legal for individuals to possess and drink it. Amendment
XXI repealed Amendment XVIII more than a decade later.
Prohibition was doomed from the start for
several reasons. First and foremost, it proved to be impossible to enforce. Not
only were the country’s legislators and enforcers—politicians and law
enforcement at multiple levels—breaking the law themselves by continuing to
imbibe, but the overwhelming majority of people themselves were unhappy with
the law, and went to extreme lengths to circumvent it, sometimes at risk to
their own lives.
But one of the biggest reasons
Prohibition failed was the rise of both the Mob and the black market to fill
the hole left by the removal of legal alcohol sales. When demand for the
product went underground, so did the supply. Alcohol was brought by boat into
ports like Boston and New York, or was carried
overland from border countries Canada and Mexico. Speakeasies—illegal
establishments for the express purpose of selling alcohol—flourished, most run
by the Mob. Some speakeasies were world-class entertainments in major cities
like New York or Chicago, boasting
expensive drinks and elaborate floor shows. Jazz was the music of the day and
many musicians got their start playing in speakeasies. But behind the glitz and
glamour, a war waged between rival mobs and between those same mobs and law
enforcement. Violence skyrocketed as individual mobs fought to corner local markets,
often at the expense of mob and civilian bystanders; gang shootings in the
streets and massacres were not uncommon during the time. Mob bosses rose to
superstardom when they used their amassed riches to open soup kitchens for the
poor during the Depression, further complicating law enforcement’s attempts to
shut them down because they were so well loved by the common man.
This is the fascinating backdrop of TWO
PARTS BLOODY MURDER—the world of clandestine speakeasies, the mob and dirty
politicians:
Prohibition
was a time of clandestine excess—short skirts, drinking, dancing . . . and
death. But a murder committed so many years ago still has the power to
reverberate decades later with deadly consequences.
It’s a
double surprise for Trooper Leigh Abbott as she investigates a cold case and
discovers two murder victims in a historic nineteenth-century building.
Together with forensic anthropologist Matt Lowell and medical examiner Dr.
Edward Rowe, she uncovers the secrets of a long-forgotten, Prohibition-era
speakeasy in the same building. But when the two victims are discovered to be
relatives—their deaths separated by over eighty years—the case deepens, and
suddenly the speakeasy is revealed as ground zero for a cascade of crimes
through the decades. When a murder committed nearly forty years ago comes under
fresh scrutiny, the team realizes that an innocent man was wrongly imprisoned
and the real murderer is still at large. Now they must solve three murders spanning
over eighty years if they hope to set a wronged man free.
Note: Your thoughts
and comments are most welcome here.
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