The Girls Of Murder City by Douglas Perry

From The Week of July 25, 2010

While Mr. Perry's encapsulation of a particularly violent and glamorous period in Chicago's history leans too heavily on titillation, it hasn't missed its mark in its attempt to entertain us. In many ways, Mr. Perry has captured an early snapshot of the stratospheric rise of celebrity culture as viewed through the lens of a select few women in 1920s Chicago, all of whom found themselves the exemplars of a cultural shift that had been slowly gaining steam ever since the rise of industrialization. Their crimes and the freedoms that resulted from them, are the subject of this glitzy chronicle.

1920s Chicago is very different from any major, 21st century metropolis. Prohibition has driven drinking underground and, in doing so, has only re-enforced the cultural norm of keeping ones problems and ones excesses to oneself. Women bear the particular brunt of this. Having recently earned the vote, they are far from treated as equals to men. Jobs outside a few select vocations are scarce, forcing many into idleness. And with no genuine constraints on male behavior, marital problems persist in a city still adjusting to the anonymizing influence of urban existence. As such, a series of extraordinary crimes, committed by women, almost seem inevitable, as accidents, injustices, and blind rages fuel attacks on boyfriends, husbands and friends. This sharp uptick in murders committed by women is first noticed and then commented upon by one of the city's only female newspaper reporters, a prudish newcomer to the city who deeply disapproves of these violent outbursts. However, these same outbursts make her career as, on a daily basis, she files stories chronicling one of the decade's most famous trials, that of Belva Gaertner, a glamorous society wife who stands accused of murdering the married man she was having an affair with. These and other crimes covered here by Mr. Perry inspire the newspaper reporter, Maurine Watkins, to write the wildly successful musical Chicago.

The Girls Of Murder City glitters, rife as it is with vice, injustice and prejudice. And it's certainly edifying to learn of the origins of Chicago and the pioneering woman who wrote it in 1927. But something here feels a bit too exploitative. All the interested parties are long dead, so there's no harm done here, but I just can't shake the dirty feeling I experienced reading this book. Mr. Perry's tone almost seems to take pleasure in what are calamitous and horrifying events. Good, but it requires the right mood to be properly enjoyed. (3/5 Stars)