True Crime Book Club
"The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher" by Kate Summerscale
Monday, April 21
1:00pm - 2:00pm
Westlake Porter Public Library
Dover RoomA great way to discover and discuss new and classic true crime writing. We meet on the third Monday of each month. New members are always welcome to join us!
In March we will read “The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher: A Shocking Murder and the Undoing of a Great Victorian Detective” by Kate Summerscale
From Amazon
The dramatic story of the real-life murder that inspired the birth of modern detective fiction.
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.
At the time, the detective was a relatively new invention; there were only eight detectives in all of England and rarely were they called out of London, but this crime was so shocking, as Kate Summerscale relates in her scintillating new book, that Scotland Yard sent its best man to investigate, Inspector Jonathan Whicher.
Whicher quickly believed the unbelievable―that someone within the family was responsible for the murder of young Saville Kent. Without sufficient evidence or a confession, though, his case was circumstantial and he returned to London a broken man. Though he would be vindicated five years later, the real legacy of Jonathan Whicher lives on in fiction: the tough, quirky, 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 is a provocative work of nonfiction that reads like a Victorian thriller, and in it Kate Summerscale has fashioned a brilliant, multilayered narrative that is as cleverly constructed as it is beautifully written.
A great way to discover and discuss new and classic true crime writing—from murder, to robbery, heists and arson—we touch on every aspect of humanity's darker instincts.
We meet on the third Monday of every month starting in January. View and print the list of books and check out WPPL's Book Discussion page for more book and movie clubs!
AGE GROUP: | Adults |
EVENT TYPE: | Books and Authors |
Westlake Porter Public Library
Westlake Porter Public Library is an independent public library serving the residents of the city of Westlake, western Cuyahoga County and eastern Lorain County. The library is located at 27333 Center Ridge Road in Westlake, Ohio. Anyone who lives, works, owns property, or goes to school in Ohio can register for a free library card.