MURDER ON 34th STREET: A Novel, Christmas-season story to scratch you murderous itch

MURDER ON 34th STREET: A Novel
MARIAH FREDERICKS
Minotaur Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: From the author of The Girl in the Green Dress comes a delightful and captivating novel about a fictional murder mystery at the iconic Macy's parade leading up to the holidays in historic New York City.

New York, 1932. Grace Verlander is the secret beating heart of Macy’s. She’s the “assistant to the assistant to the someone who’s in charge”, the go-to person for keeping everything running smoothly behind-the-scenes at the famous, bustling store.

It’s not every day you get a letter from Santa Claus, but three days before the Macy’s annual Thanksgiving Day Parade, Grace arrives at work to find a note from the store Santa Claus in her someone has sent him a death threat. Shocked, Grace promises to look into it and speaks to the store detective about the parade’s security, confident that they’ve found a solution that will keep everyone safe. But on the day of the parade, despite all their precautions, a dead body is found on one of the floats.

Using her wits and deep knowledge of the ways of the place, Grace is determined to find the killer and seek justice―not just for the dead man, but to save the reputation of this iconic store from ruin.

Steeped in glittering glamor and nostalgic wonder, this is a remarkable, unpredictable mystery set in the evocative world of one of New York’s most memorable institutions.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: I'm being only a little disingenuous with my tag "Chrismtas romance" applied to this one. There is a romantic subplot. It exists. It isn't the focus of much action. I want all my fellow Christmas/Yule holiday fans to find this story so I'm baiting my hook.

Grace is one of those women who crop up in fiction so often, the one who knows exactly where the bodies are buried, the one who needs Stuff to be Right because that's how it all works best for people...even the ones who don't do Right. They don't know it yet, but they'll live in a better woeld because Grace and her sisters in crime fiction will make sure Right triumphs. (Of course, they'll be in jail and, if they come out, will forever have a criminal record...)

Why on Earth would a woman in 1932 New York, who works for Macy's in a sort of "minister without portfolio" way, get involved in a murder investigation? She is the only person, three days before the Thanksgiving Parade (which I called "Macy's Day parade" as a kid) who knows to call this giy not that one to fix whatever's gone wrong. That's why a threatening note against this year's Santa results in her involving Frank, head of Security for Macy's, in bringing this weird turn of events to NYPD's attention. How would it make the city look for Santa Claus to be murdered here?

Guess we'll find out, say the cops. Cranks will say anything for attention. Been true since forever, y'all, since people been peoplein'.

So when a shot is fired and someone dies, Grace takes her Rolodex (figurative) and starts flippin'. The police have a lot less institutional knowledge after all...and Author Mariah shows us that by peppering the text with really interesting to me Macy's trivia specific to the flagship store on Herald Square...plus she sees the inner workings of this small town that is the store itself every day, made obvious by the startlingly large cast of characters she interacts with. Seriously, Author Mariah...couldn't a few of them have been cut? I got very confused a couple times, expecting some one-shots to pop back up but someone else showed up instead.

That said, Grace and Frank made an effective team. The resolution to the fatal parade shooting was satisfying, and I failed to assign guilt properly, so there's your half-star gone to reader's petulance. (In truth it got added for that, to what otherwise was a four-star, too-busy story.)

What makes this fourth story by Author Mariah that I've read with pleasure so effective is her eye for the details to use from her prodigious store of facts and factoids and trivia. In days of yore I'd picture her in a huge, book-lined room that's organized by some arcane principle that's entirely her own. Now I picture a browser with umpteen tabs open in two screens worth of windows. Same stuff, different era.

I'm hopeful that y'all will trot right out to the local bookery and procure yourself this enjoyable holiday-set restoration of ma'at. It merits your time and treasure in the season coming especially, pr any time you need a Christmas-holiday story variolated into your bloodstream.