Amy Chua manages to incorporate history, social conditions, racism, and mystery in her debut mystery, The Golden Gate. Set in 1944, Chua was inspired by a ghost story about the Claremont Hotel in Berkeley, California, as well as Madame Chiang Kai-Shek’s year-long residency there. She includes those elements in her complex story.

On March 15, 1944, the prosecutor in a murder trial warns Mrs. Genevieve Bainbridge, a wealthy doyenne of California society, that he knew one of her three granddaughters was a murderer. In her deposition, Mrs. Bainbridge can tell him which young woman killed a presidential candidate, or he can convict all three as coconspirators.

Just five days earlier, Homicide Detective Al Sullivan was having drinks at the Claremont Hotel when he was asked to assist presidential candidate Walter Wilkinson. Although Sullivan insisted that Wilkinson change rooms after shots were fired and the man reported someone was waiting for him, it was too late to stop an ongoing plot. Wilkinson moved, but he was killed later when he returned to the original room. Witnesses described a woman who looked like one of Mrs. Bainbridge’s three granddaughters. In fact, Sullivan was having drinks with one of them at the hotel earlier that evening. Now, as he digs deeper into the events at the Claremont that night, a story continues to crop up. Ten years earlier, seven-year-old Iris Stafford died in the hotel, a fourth Bainbridge granddaughter. Her ghost is said to haunt the fourth floor, and even Al is spooked by a presence.

Everyone seems to be interested in Al’s case. There’s a mysterious reporter, who turns out to be Iris’ sister. Madame Chiang Kai-Shek meets with Sullivan to relate her own suspicions. Stories of Japanese and Communist spies are sprinkled through the investigation in 1944. Sullivan is loathe to follow racist paths because he himself changed his name from his Spanish last name after his father was sent back to Mexico in 1931, “repatriated” although he had lived and worked in the U.S. for twenty years. After the Crash, the U.S. government sent Mexicans back to open jobs for Americans. Al took his mother’s name, and eventually moved up in the Berkeley Police Department.

It’s a complex case. Chua handles San Francisco history, World War II racism, as well as issues in the 1930s. The Mexicans, Chinese, Japanese, and Communists have all come under fire at one time. There are hints of prejudice against lesbians. Despite all the issues, Al never forgets the search for the truth. Who killed a presidential candidate in the Claremont Hotel?

Amy Chua’s website is https://www.amychua.com/

The Golden Gate by Amy Chua. Minotaur Books, 2023. ISBN 9781250903600 (hardcover), 384p.

FTC Full Disclosure – I received a .pdf of the book so I could interview the author for a panel.