REVIEW: The Ivory City by Emily Bain Murphy
The Devil in the White City meets Pride and Prejudice in this romantic historical murder mystery set at the 1904 World’s Fair.
The St. Louis World’s Fair, 1904:
A miniature city of palaces and pavilions that becomes a backdrop for romance, betrayal—and murder.
Cousins Grace and Lillie have been best friends since birth, despite Grace’s vastly inferior social status ever since her mother married for love instead of wealth. When Lillie invites Grace to the biggest event of the century—the legendary World’s Fair, also known as “The Ivory City”—Grace hopes her fortunes might be about to change.
But when a member of their party is brutally killed at the fair, and suspicion falls on Lillie’s brother Oliver, Grace must prove Oliver’s innocence before her beloved cousins’ family is ruined forever. Along the way, she’ll discover that the city’s wealthy elite—including Oliver’s handsome but irritable friend Theodore—aren’t quite who they appear to be. And amidst the glitz, glamor, and magic of the Ivory City lurks a danger that just may claim her life.
CW/TW – a secondary character is a drug addict
Dear Emily Bain Murphy,
This looked interesting. The cover is gorgeous, the blurb seemed intriguing, and the stakes appeared to be high. Plus there’s the promise of a romance. I was all in. It took a while before I really got invested though. Once I did, I was hooked until the end.
The dazzling 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis promises to show visitors a grand and glorious future. Change is not only coming, it’s here and for 50 cents a day, you can enter the vast fairgrounds and see it all. In Grace’s world though, old and rigid social rules rule. She’s beholden to her beloved cousins Lillie and Oliver for continuing to include her in their lavish lives even though their mother, a real pip, disdains Grace’s mother’s choice to marry beneath herself for love. At a lavish ball months before the Fair opens, Grace meets a man who seems nice and unfazed by her family’s social fall, only for him to suddenly change his tune – something Grace suspects is due to a waspish young woman who lied and told Theo that Grace needs to marry for money.
At the opening of the Fair, the two are thrown together and begin to snap and snarl at each other. Then the actress whom Oliver adores is murdered and Oliver is accused and arrested. Grace will do anything to solve this mystery as she knows her kind cousin would never kill the woman he wants to marry. But with time running out and suspects piling up, can she and Theo – who might not be who she thinks – catch the real killer?
I’ll be totally upfront and say that this story takes a while to really get going. I can see that a ton of research was done about the setting and it’s all extensively described. Also described in detail are all the fabulous dresses that Grace, Lillie, and the other women wear. After a while, I got bored with this overabundance of detail. It seemed that more time was spent on this than on moving the plot forward. There is a fair amount of repetition about Grace’s family background. Many of the main and secondary characters, who are mostly in their early 20s, also had a distinctly YA feel. There are also quite a few phrases that, even if they aren’t anachronistic, felt anachronistic plus some things, like dialing a telephone call directly from one home to another, that felt wrong.
Grace and Theo now bristle when the other is merely in the same space. When they speak, they toss barbs at each other and some of these go a bit beyond just “banter.” They also both give as good as they get. The shift in their opinions of each other is subtle and not immediate. I actually liked the way this change was handled. It felt believable. Another thing I noticed – and also liked – is that Theo and Grace begin to like each other before the truth behind that first night misunderstanding emerges.
The mystery solving doesn’t go easily or quickly. There’s no quick ‘ah-ha!’ moment and Grace and Co make their fair share of mistakes and detours chasing wrong clues and suspects. This also works for me as none of these people have ever investigated anything in their lives. But Grace is relentless – even eventually in the face of threats – because this is her beloved cousin who along with Lillie embraced her, included her, and stood by her. There are a lot of clues and some red herrings to keep readers guessing. After a while, I just waited until All Was Revealed.
As I mentioned, the first half of the book sauntered along loaded down in overdone, often unneeded description. Once the story focused more on solving the mystery, I enjoyed it much more, liked watching Grace grow in confidence, and ultimately found the romance to be a nice, slow burn HEA. B-/C+
~Jayne
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