When the police would rather beat you than help you, who do you call in to solve a murder? The queer communities of 1950s San Francisco are the backdrop to a murder mystery in Lev A.C. Rosen’s latest novel, Lavender House, which came out in October. After being drawn to this book’s gorgeous purple cover every time I passed it, I finally picked it up and it’s been one of my favorite reads of the year!
Life as he knows it is over for Inspector Evander “Andy” Mills when he gets caught by his coworkers in a raid on a gay bar and subsequently thrown off the police force. But Andy’s disgrace is Pearl’s good fortune—she needs someone she can trust with her family’s secrets to investigate her wife’s murder without compromising the rest of their queer household. And who better than a gay former detective? When Andy enters the Lamontaine estate, appropriately nicknamed Lavender House, he is amazed to find multiple sets of queer couples in long-term loving relationships and openly showing affection for each other without shame—at least inside the house. Yet, this paradise is far from perfect, as the murdered matriarch of the household can attest. Irene Lamontaine, head of the family’s nationally renowned soap company was found dead at the bottom of the stairs one stormy night, in the room devoted to her soap-making, and everyone in the house is a prime suspect. Apart from her wife, Pearl, who inherited a majority stake in the company, there’s also her son, Henry, who inherited the rest. Then there’s Henry’s boyfriend Cliff, Henry’s wife Margo (part of an arranged “lavender marriage” to keep up appearances for the public), and Margo’s girlfriend Elsie—each of whom have secrets or stifled ambitions that could be a motive for murder. Lastly, there’s Margo’s mother Alice—the only straight member of the household—and of course, the staff, all of whom are also queer and have found refuge in Lavender House. There is always the possibility, too, that the threat came from outside the house. Andy will have to remain as objective as possible and explore every lead, no matter how uncomfortable, if he wants to truly bring this family peace.
Lavender House is largely an example of what is called, in the world of mystery fiction, a “closed-circle” murder mystery. Wikipedia defines this subgenre as featuring “a situation in which for a given crime (usually a murder), there is a quickly established, limited number of suspects, each with credible means, motive, and opportunity.” Agatha Christie’s debut novel The Mysterious Affair at Styles is one of the earliest examples. In this case, that closed circle of suspects encompasses all the members of Irene’s eclectic family. This adds a significant amount of tension to the story, as neither the reader nor Andy want to believe that anyone inside this house, which seems like such a beautiful sanctuary from the cruel outside world, could have committed murder. After living a life of shame and isolation, Andy discovers the concept of queer community for the first time inside Lavender House, and yet he can’t get too close to anyone he meets there in case they are the killer. This tension gave me a much stronger emotional investment in the outcome of the investigation than I usually feel for these sorts of logic-based detective stories.
Another notable feature of closed-circle mystery stories is that they tend to take place in some sort of isolated setting that helps to limit the number of suspects—traditionally a country estate, but ships, trains, or other moving vehicles are also popular. I love the setting of Lavender House, which borrows setting tropes from both detective fiction and the Gothic while putting a non-traditional spin on them. First of all, like a Gothic novel, this story takes place in a family estate, the evocative name of which serves as the title of the book. Rather than an estate in the British countryside like The Mysterious Affair at Styles, the estate here is located just outside of the city of San Francisco and the 1950s setting adds in a bit of a noir element. The house is less isolated by its location than by the fact that its inhabitants must keep their private lives secret from the outside world, making Lavender House both a fortress and a prison which seldom lets in outsiders. Like any good Gothic estate, Lavender House has an austere portrait of its matriarch in the entryway, though upon exploring Andy finds a group portrait of the loving couples that more accurately reflects the soul of the house. Rather than a well-stocked library filled with leather-bound tomes that one might expect in such a grand estate, Lavender House contains a basement soap library, where Irene stored ingredients for her soap-making business and samples of each soap they’ve made in the past. Traditional class divisions are still in place in this manor, though they are slightly blurred by the fact that the staff are queer, just like the family members, and not only help protect this secret but also benefit from the refuge of the estate. Lastly, the house is haunted not by ghosts but by secrets and by the threat of violence intruding into this safe haven.
If you love traditional detective novels, historical fiction, and queer representation, don’t miss Lavender House! You can find a copy on shelves now at your favorite local retailer or support The Gothic Library and order one online using this Bookshop.org affiliate link. If you’ve read it, let me know your thoughts in the comments—though please avoid spoiling who the murderer is!
Also, last week’s giveaway for a signed copy of A Haunted History of Invisible Women has now concluded. I’ll announce the winner shortly, so keep an eye on this space.