I hated this book despite loving the premise. I felt it was not written well. I couldn’t connect to the story or the characters.

Gold Rush California 1851. In Monterey, young women are going missing. Assumed to be whores, the authorities take no notice. So two prostitutes Eliza and Jean decide to investigate the disappearances. The principal suspects are their clients. ‘A Dangerous Business’ by Jane Smiley is a book I didn’t want to put down, not in the way a thriller makes you want to read one more page but with a curiosity about Eliza’s prospects.
Inspired by Edgar Allen Poe’s fictional detective Dupin – which Jean insists is pronounced ‘DuPANN’ – they begin to look for clues, looking at their surroundings more cautiously than ever before. Eliza re-reads Poe, ‘What struck her the most about Dupin was that he could look at all sorts of injury and destruction and still keep thinking in what you might call a cold and logical way.’ At times they investigate more by instinct than clue, but Smiley keeps us interested in Eliza. She is the heart of the book. She tells the story as she seeks clues in between doing business with her clients.
Life in Monterey is free and wild. People come and go without notice, ships arrive and leave, ranchers build houses in wild country, which means plenty of customers for Eliza at Mrs Parks’ establishment. The two women are unsure how many other girls are presumed to have left town but are really dead. After they find a body hidden beneath bushes, Eliza suspects everyone. The friends explore remote tracks up the hillsides on rented horses and this experience is to prove useful.
Both women are taking in a pause in their lives, rootless, with no reason to return home, they are earning a living while deciding what to do next and where to go. Eliza swings between finding the occasional client attractive and then wondering if he is the murderer. Jean, who works in a brothel for the female trade, occasionally dresses as a man and passes convincingly on the street in her disguise. She toys with the idea of a life on the stage in San Francisco. Smiley is an expert at building character layer on layer. She is also good at letting the girls’ imaginations run wild though this is not a crime story with threat and danger around every corner.
More a historical mystery than a crime novel, ‘A Dangerous Business’ is a different subject for Smiley. But at the heart of the novel are her observations of women’s lives, the experience of women on the edge of civilization in Gold Rush California and what it means to be a woman alone at this time.
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This mixed bag for me. I loved the where and when of it- one of my favourite periods and locations for american historical fiction but I found the writing itself and the mystery unsatisfying and unconvincing.

A vivid and evocative historical novel, with a thrilling mystery at its heart. I loved this tale of female endeavour and friendship set against a backdrop of harsh frontier life.

I have always enjoyed Jane Smiley, and admired her versatility, so I was looking forward to reading her latest: ‘A Dangerous Business’. Unfortunately, I was disappointed with this novel. The premise is great: the story of the Californian Gold Rush from a female angle, and I could certainly smell the heat and dust of fledgeling Monterey, and hear the bustle of this busy young town.

But the main plot – two young prostitutes trying to find a serial killer, inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s innovative detective stories – just didn’t ring true, nor was there any real sense of jeopardy. Some of the details were hard to credit, such as the brothel for female clients (was this really a thing in 1850s America?).

The style can be quite pedestrian at times, literally so: Eliza does a lot of strolling around! It’s more like a series of set scenes: Eliza leaves her boarding house; she goes to the brothel; she services a client; she meets her friend Jean; they go for a horseback excursion into the countryside; she goes back to the boarding house….Rinse and repeat.

As another reviewer has said, apart from the descriptions of ‘professional’ sex, this reads like a young adult novel.

However, as an unchallenging bed-time read, it did its job, and it must be noted that a reviewer in a popular women’s magazine rates it highly, so perhaps it’s just not to my taste.

Another gem from Jane Smiley. Although relatively short in length, A Dangerous Business is crammed full of plot twists, historical flavour and sense of place. Although marketed as a murder mystery, this book is much more focussed on the female experience and specifically the tribulations of Eliza. Never portrayed as a figure of pity, rather Smiley celebrates Eliza's new life in all it's glory, from brothel to sisterhood.

At times perhaps crucial discoveries are too conveniently placed for the avid crime reader, so enjoy this book more for it's historical depiction of a town on the edge of civilisation.

This book was sent to me electronically by Netgalley for review. Thanks to the publisher for the copy. What a gorgeous book! The author has a great gift for characterisation - nuanced, interesting, believable characters and great storytelling.

Not my favourite book of Jane Smiley's I found it unrealistic but it was well written and interesting enough to finish.

This is an historical detective story with a difference! It is set in Monterey in California in 1851, where working girls are going missing and turning up dead. No one seems to be investigating, given the low esteem in which the girls are held in society, that is until fellow prostitutes Eliza and Jean start investigating. The story gives an insight into not just the lives of working girls of the time, but also so much else in a deeply bigoted society, ruled by prejudice and wealth. The story is beautifully written, and if not always entirely plausible is engrossing and entertaining.

The plot is as deep and dark as it gets, multi-layered with 'who knew what when?' as the strands come together and the finer details get filled in. This is an absolutely compelling, gripping book full of mystery and suspense. Only a few authors can write deeply involving psychological drama of the very highest quality.

The E-Book could be improved and more user-friendly, such as links to the chapters, no significant gaps between words some text written has been typed in red and a cover for the book would be better. It is very document-like instead of a book. A star has been deducted because of this.

This is a first for me by the author and one I enjoyed and would read more of their work. Thank you very much to the author, publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.

did a memory check two-thirds of the way through this. Was there really a seventies movie called The Happy Hooker. Well yes there was, and this deeply odd novel starts with that idea. Eliza runs away from a stifling family and no-good but dead husband to find stability and some independence in Mrs Parks brothel in Monteray. The men are on the whole polite, there’s a bouncer on hand for any trouble, and Eliza makes a firm friend in Jean who works in a women’s brothel for women. Risks such as unwanted pregnancy or sexual disease are by and large seen as manageable and a price worth paying for independence. All is good, until other prostitutes start disappearing.
What’s good about this novel? The prose is excellent and Smiley can construct a great narrative voice for Eliza, together with snappy dialogue. The historical research has been done and the novel, in the years before the Civil War, inhabits its period very credibly.
What’s not so good? The amateur detectives/disappearing women plot which dominates the second half doesn’t carry conviction, beyond making the point that women could disappear at any time without men being bothered.. There are half-hearted references to slavery and the coming war, but these are never really pursued either. If you’re a historical fiction fan there’s lots to get stuck into here, and Smiley is an assured guide to the Gold Rush California of the mid-nineteenth century. If you’re after a critique of the historical sex industry this is not it, and neither is Smiley an assured writer of a detective novel. Curate’s eggish on the whole.

After the death of her husband Eliza decides not to return to strict family in Kalamazoo, she was married to the wrong man and his death was something of a relief. In order to survive Eliza starts to work in a brothel in Monterey, the town she ended up in. The work is not arduous and the madame looks after her girls. Eliza makes friends with another prostitute, one who caters to women, and they share their hopes. However when women start turning up dead, Eliza and her friend investigate.
I found this book very odd, I have to say. Eliza is a feisty character and I liked a lot of the feminist principles and the consideration of slavery on the brink of the American Civil War. However I found much of it disconcerting and unrealistic - the attitude of the madame at the brothel for a start. The depiction of prostitution as a pleasant and easy enough way to earn money was too much.

'A Dangerous Business' is an unconventional crime novel, set in frontier America in the mid 19th century. The point of view character is Eliza, a sex worker at a brothel. Eliza is content enough with this line of work, thanks to working at a well run place where the women are well cared for, but even her boss admits it is a 'dangerous business' - but as she adds, so is being a woman full stop. And that is proven true as a string of murders and disappearances of young woman occurs in the town. Eliza decides to investigate, with the help of her friend Jean.

Eliza is a sympathetic character and there are good supporting characters too. I found likeable although not loveable - I didn't have that deep bond and anxiety for her wellbeing that can happen with some fictional characters. Smiley writes with a style that flows well and is easy to read, which I know from her previous books. However I found the plotting less well done, and crime/mystery novels often hinge on the plot.

The mystery never seemed cohesive enough - Eliza was never really close enough to the action, with the ability to investigate effectively enough, for it to feel like a true whodunnit. A lot of the identification of suspects was done on Eliza and Jean's 'feelings' or on clues that seem circumstantial and not enough to piece together anything from. For example, the fact that someone has stood in a graveyard where a crime never even took place is hardly evidence they are a murderer. There simply isn't enough to go on for a reader to fathom out the solution themselves from the clues alone. And to me it's essential that a mystery allows the reader the chance to work it out.

Overall it was a pleasant enough read but it didn't really succeed in its purpose as a crime/mystery and it isn't strong enough emotionally to stand up as a non-genre specific piece of literary fiction of particular high quality. I'm giving three stars as it isn't a bad book, but I'm not sure it's good enough to merit reading given the high competition in this genre for readers' time.

This is the first book I read by Jane Smiley and won't surely be the last because I loved the style of writing and the storytelling.
It was love at first read, I loved these strong women who are on the edge, running away from abuse or finding a way to survive.
There's no moral judgement towards these women, they're well rounded and realistic. I loved the historical background and the solid mystery that kept me guessing.
This is one of the best book I read in 2022, a compelling and enthralling novel.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this arc, all opinions are mine

“Everyone knows that this is a dangerous business but between you and me, being a woman is a dangerous business and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise”
It is 1851 and Eliza is taken to the frontier town of Monterey by her abusive newlywed husband Peter, who is caught in the gold fever. He is killed in a bar brawl, however, and Eliza joins a bordello in order to make a living.
Cross-dressing Jean works at another house that caters for women and they become friends.
Jean shares her love of Edgar Allan Poe stories with Eliza and after several prostitutes go missing and bodies are found, the two friends begin an investigation, inspired by Poe’s Murders in the Rue Morgue.
In this world it feels that any man is suspect and potentially a killer, which sadly puts you in the position of many women today. The inspiration for this story may have been the Sarah Everard murder in 2021 and the subsequent highlighted feeling of women feeling at risk, with even the law being complicit.
I was immersed in the world that Jane Smiley created and really enjoyed the characters and story. It was a short read but satisfying with no unnecessary plot or extraneous details.

"Between you and me, being a woman is a dangerous business, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Oh, those men would talk about how they fight Indians and wrestle cattle and climb the masts and look for justice, and indeed they do, but they do it for themselves , if you ask me. And what they want of women, they want for themselves, too."

This is the middle of the 19 century and being a woman is a dangerous business (and still is), after Eliza's husband died, she works in a dangerous business, how possibly one night men could be worse than her husband, she even can saving money and treated well.

This a little dreamy historical fiction in a small town when the first girls disappeared, no one thought a thing of it, then the second one, then the next, and still no one cared.

This is where Eliza and her friend Jean (who works in a less dangerous business for women) planned to catch a suspect!

"Gossiping was like opening a door and leaving it unlocked, you never knew what might happen..."

A short historical mystery set in the USA with dangerous women!

Many thanks to Little, Brown Book Group UK via NetGalley for giving me a chance to read A Dangerous Business by Jane Smiley, I have given my honest review.
Pub Date: 6 Dec 2022