A Front Page Affair

March 14, 2016
Set in 1915 not long after the sinking of the Lusitania, Vatsal’s spirited debut introduces 19-year-old Capability “Kitty” Weeks, an aspiring journalist who works on the “Ladies’ Page” because that’s the only reporting job open to women at the New York Sentinel. Her first solo assignment takes Kitty north of the city to the Independence Day gala at the Sleepy Hollow Country Club. During the fireworks, someone fatally shoots socially prominent Hunter Cole in the stables. Deferring to her on-the-spot knowledge, her boss at the Sentinel allows Kitty to investigate. She discovers that Cole had chronic money problems, a wife with a seedy past, and mysterious links to a German diplomat. Meanwhile, she’s questioned by Secret Service agents about her affluent father, whose accounts of his background and business dealings apparently don’t add up. Vatsal deftly intertwines the tumult of the era, from emerging women’s rights to spreading international conflict, into this rich historical. Agent: Christina Hogrebe, Jane Rotrosen Agency.

March 1, 2016
A budding journalist fights for her place in a world full of disturbing changes. As the U.S. hovers on the fringes of World War I, Capability "Kitty" Weeks yearns to make her job as a reporter on the Ladies' Page of the New York Sentinel a little more exciting. Her chance comes when a guest is murdered at the society Independence Day gala she's been sent to cover at the Basshor estate. Hunter Cole had never been popular among the elite. Although he came from a good family, his wife is from the wrong side of the tracks. So his death seems remarkable only for where it happened. The police soon arrest a stable worker at the estate, but Kitty, who doubts the man's guilt, snoops around the widow's apartment, where she finds a number of glass vials in a medicine cabinet and takes one with her only to be told by a pharmacist that it's just water. Kitty's mother died when she was very young; she was raised by her father in Europe, where she attended a series of boarding schools. Now that the U.S. requires passports for citizens returning from abroad, Kitty realizes how little she actually knows about her father, who's distressed about the paperwork. After two Secret Service agents approach her to ask about her father's business contacts, she finds herself investigating her own father, whose activities may be somehow involved with German spies, the Cole murder, and that mysterious vial of something that certainly isn't water. Fired from her job for encroaching on the real news side of the paper, she continues to hunt for clues to help her father and solve a murder, a hunt that puts her in grave danger. This first in a planned series is a nice combination of mystery and thriller seasoned by historical facts and a look at women's lives before woman's liberation.

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Starred review from March 1, 2016

Capability "Kitty" Weeks is a well-traveled, Swiss-educated young woman, living with her father and housekeeper in 1915 New York. She dreams of becoming a newspaper reporter but right now is stuck working for Mrs. Busby, editor of the Ladies' Page at the New York Sentinel. When a gentleman is murdered at Mrs. Basshor's annual Fourth of July picnic, which Kitty is covering, the young writer gets her chance for a big scoop. No one has much good to say about Hunter Cole, except his young widow, Aimee, a former burlesque dancer. Europe is at war, the United States is trying to remain neutral, and tycoon J.P. Morgan has just survived an assassination attempt. High society is on high alert. VERDICT This lively and well-researched debut introduces a charming historical series and an appealing fish-out-of-water sleuth who seeks independence and a career in an age when most women are bent on getting married, particularly to titled Englishmen. Devotees of Rhys Bowen's mysteries will enjoy making the acquaintance of Miss Weeks.

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 15, 2016
Kitty Weeks yearns to be a real reporter but is stuck covering society events for the Ladies' Page of the New York Sentinel in 1915. Then, while attending a Fourth of July party, Kitty discovers a guest murdered in the stables. Does the murder connect to a conspiracy related to the sinking of the Lusitania and the war raging in Europe? Soon enough she finds herself the object of a Secret Service investigation involving her father and is summarily fired from the newspaper. She persists, however, in investigating the murder and a subsequent suicide. The fascinating historical details add flair to this thoroughly engaging mystery starring an intelligent amateur sleuth reminiscent of Rhys Bowen's Molly Murphy. Vatsal's debut will leave readers eager for Kitty's next adventure.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)