Synopses & Reviews
The national bestseller, now in paperback. In June of 1860 three-year-old Saville Kent was found at the bottom of an outdoor privy with his throat slit. T he crime horrified all England and led to a national obsession with detection, ironically destroying, in the process, the career of perhaps the greatest detective in the land. I nspector Jonathan Whichers real legacy, however, lives on in fiction: the tough, quirky, all-knowing and all-seeing detective that we know and love today…from the cryptic Sgt. Cuff in Wilkie Collinss The Moonstone to Dashiell Hammetts Sam Spade. The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher reads like the best of Victorian thrillers, and has been nominated for the Samuel Johnson Prize in London.
Review
"A brilliant reconstruction of the obstacles facing detectives long before the advent of forensic technology." L.A. Times Book Review
Review
"The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher combines a thumping good mystery yarn with fine social and literary history." Fresh Air
Review
"[S]he has created an enthralling mystery by overlaying the fictional tools of misdirection and suspense onto a nonfiction narrative that... helped inspire writers to create a new fictional genre..." American Scholar
Review
"This is a great biographical fiction of an interesting real life mid-nineteenth-century detective working a shocking homicide case." Mysterylovers.com
Synopsis
The national bestseller, now in paperback.
In June of 1860 three-year-old Saville Kent was found at the bottom of an outdoor privy with his throat slit. The crime horrified all England and led to a national obsession with detection, ironically destroying, in the process, the career of perhaps the greatest detective in the land. Inspector Jonathan Whicher's real legacy, however, lives on in fiction: the tough, quirky, all-knowing and all-seeing detective that we know and love today…from the cryptic Sgt. Cuff in Wilkie Collins's The Moonstone to Dashiell Hammett's Sam Spade. The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher reads like the best of Victorian thrillers, and has been nominated for the Samuel Johnson Prize in London.
Synopsis
The national bestseller, now in paperback. In June of 1860 three-year-old Saville Kent was found at the bottom of an outdoor privy with his throat slit. The crime horrified all England and led to a national obsession with detection, ironically destroying, in the process, the career of perhaps the greatest detective in the land.
About the Author
Kate Summerscale is the former literary editor for the Daily Telegraph and author of The Queen of Whale Cay, which won the Somerset Maugham Award and was shortlisted for the Whitbread biography award. She lives in London.