Grace Humiston and the Vanishing

This novel was chosen as one of three finalists out of 5,000 General Fiction entries in the 2012 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest. Two members of the contest’s expert panel had this to say about Grace Humiston and the Vanishing:

Bestselling thriller writer Linda Fairstein, author of Silent Mercy: Charles Kelly makes a brilliant debut in this entertaining crime novel featuring two characters who engage the reader in the dramatic action—set in 1917—from the very first pages. The narrator is a clever PI named Julius Kron (a Transylvanian who doesn’t like to be crossed) and his well-known employer, Grace Humiston, a lady lawyer who excels at the most unsuitable job of detecting cases (although she eschews all comparisons to Sherlock Holmes). Kelly does a remarkable job capturing the language and style of the period without sounding the least bit dated or trite. The story of the vanishing heiresses and the unusual con suspected by our protagonists takes us throughout Manhattan, introducing police brass who left "toothmarks on gamblers and saloon-owners who didn’t pay tribute," immigrant shopworkers toiling at their craft in Harlem storefronts, and aristocrats living in mansions on the grand avenues. I envied Grace's intelligence and moxie, and wanted to pack my steamer trunk to go aboard the Calpurnia as it steamed to South America, with Grace and Julius aiming to draw the killer—or killers—out. The plot's twists and turns continue to the very end, and though I am not often a fan of historical mysteries, I was ready to step into the pages of this one and apply for a job with Grace Humiston’s firm. This one's my pick for the winner--it's told with such polish and crisp dialogue that I forgot I was reading a debut novel, and look forward to seeing more of this colorful cast.

Top literary agent Donald Maass, author of Writing the Breakout Novel: The clear winner for this reviewer is Kelly’s highly engaging historical mystery set in 1917 New York, featuring the crusading and already-famous female attorney and detective Mrs. Grace Humiston, whose derring-do in a case of abduction and white slavery is narrated by her earthy Transylvanian sidekick, an ex-Federal Department of Justice agent known as Kron. Against the wishes of her social-reformer husband, Mrs. Humiston takes the case of a vanished eighteen-year-old, Ruth Cruger, who may have fallen victim to a nasty Argentinian duo running an abduction scheme called the "Uncle Game." A back-alley murder, a stabbing (foiled by a steel mesh girdle), and a dangerous confrontation aboard an ocean liner do not entirely support Mrs. Humiston’s claim that she is not a Sherlock Holmes. She purports to rely on common sense and persistence, but in fact her bravery, powers of observation, and keen deduction put a feminist twist on Doyle’s master creation. Kron’s sharp observation of the times and his all too apparent infatuation with Mrs. Humiston make for irresistible reading. A simplistic plot and too easily seen solution are disappointing, but no matter: the real surprise here is Mrs. Humiston, whose gumption suggests that she could become an American Amelia Peabody.