Straddling the Centuries

"Pintoff's debut...will remind many of Caleb Carr at his best... The period detail, characterizations and plotting are all top-notch..."

—Publishers Weekly (starred review)





HANK: I love Caleb Carr's mysteries. The Alienist and The Angel of Death. And E.L. Doctorow's The Waterworks. And Ragtime, of course.



From the first moments of Stefanie Pintoff's debut mystery, I was transported to the same places and time. We met at Malice (introduced by the inimitable Vinny O'Neil). I got her book. And I was hooked.

And we're so happy she's visiting Jungle Red.

(Especially since she's often got part of her brain in another century.)

HANK: Tell us a little about your book – what's it about? Where did the idea come from?

STEPHANIE: IN THE SHADOW OF GOTHAM is about Detective Simon Ziele, who leaves NewYork City to rebuild his life in a small Westchester town following the loss of his fiancée in the Slocum steamship disaster (the worst disaster to strike the city prior to 9/11).

But the brutal murder of a young woman draws him right back in – and his investigation isfurther complicated when noted criminologist Alistair Sinclair becomes involved. Alistair is convinced the killer is someone he interviewedin the course of his experimental research into the criminal mind.They make an unlikely pair: Alistair is a high-brow society figure with a consuming passion for understanding criminal violence, and Ziele is a pragmatic investigator with Lower East Side roots and a remarkable affinity for each victim he encounters. Though he remains suspicious that the solution may not be as simple as Alistair thinks, Ziele proves himself more than up to the task of adapting tried-and-true detective methods to the sometimes unorthodox innovations of a new age in forensics.

My idea for the book started with Alistair – who is loosely based on one of my former law professors with a larger-than-life personality! Then I thought: What if … there had been a terrible crime?

And what if … there was a criminologist who believed he knew the killer responsible because he had interviewed him?

And what if … that criminologist had been more involved than he initially let on? Those questions kept coming until I had conceived not only of my dedicated but self-absorbed criminologist, Alistair Sinclair – but also the detective who would more than be his match.

HANK: Lots more questions for Stephanie--but she has such an interesting method of research..and her thought processes are so fascinating. Let's just let her talk...

STEFANIE: I’ve always loved newspapers, and as a historical mystery writer, I read them a lot – but I’m usually a hundred years behind the times. That’s because my new mystery series is set in New York at the turn-of-the-last-century. Today I’d like to give you a glimpse into that world by sharing with you some New York Times front-page stories from this past week – in 1905.

- A ten-foot snake caused a stampede on Fifth Avenue and 18th Street.

- Carbonic acid was thrown into the face of a twenty-five year old Brooklyn girl (the newspaper’s language, not mine) by an unknown assailant.

- A bomb, presumed to be the work of the Black Hand, was thrown into the window of a building in the heart of Little Italy – destroying that building as well as its nearest neighbor.

- John D. Rockefeller just bought his first car – a touring vehicle – for $5,000

- Two ferryboats collided: the New York of the Fulton Line and the Maryland of the New Haven line.

- A man was found dead of opium poisoning in a hansom cab.

- President Teddy Roosevelt garnered high praise for the way he handled a worker’s strike.

Also in 1905, the following advertisements appeared in numerous papers.
One for a toothache remedy:

Another for Bayer’s Heroin, used to treat strong coughs:

Research like the above may never make it to the pages of my novel, but it’s essential – and fun! All historical fiction creates a world that’s part-real and part-invented. In fact, I think that blend –of the true and the imagined – is a huge part of its appeal. I’m often asked how important historical accuracy is to my work.

Of course it’s important, but my primary goal isn’t just to incorporate much that’s true from 1905 into my novel. It’s to capture the spirit of the times in everything I invent. If I do it well, then my readers will always feel grounded in my story’s era – even when what carries them is the flight of my own imagination.

To capture that spirit of the times, I look at many resources, but I find nothing to be more helpful than a contemporary newspaper; it’s a virtual snapshot of the interests and concerns of a particular community. What were the headlines? What made the police blotter? Who was in the society column? What shows were reviewed in the arts column? And what products were advertised regularly? As the headlines from only one week in 1905 suggest, this was a time period full of danger as well as exciting changes. When I read what my characters would have, I can better understand their world-view.

My own research centers on turn-of-the-century New York, but the world-building that results is what all writers do. We each have our favorite resources – maybe a friend at the NYPD who helps us check current police procedure, or a new contact at a hair salon who helps us with our next book involving a stylist, or simply our local coffee shop, where we can observe the mix of personalities on a given day.

As a writer, how do you negotiate the tension of balancing the real and the invented? And as a reader, what do you think is most important in grounding a story and giving it texture and life?

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Stefanie Pintoff became the inaugural winner of the St. Martin's Minotaur/MWA Best First Crime Novel Competition with her novel, In the Shadow of Gotham. A graduate of Columbia Law School, she also has a Ph.D. in literature from New York University. Her second novel, The Darkest Verse, is forthcoming in 2010.