Second Street Station: A Mary Handley Mystery, by Lawrence H. Levy
Second Street Station: A Mary Handley Mystery, By Lawrence H. Levy. Someday, you will find a brand-new adventure and knowledge by investing more money. But when? Do you believe that you should acquire those all requirements when having much money? Why do not you aim to obtain something basic in the beginning? That's something that will lead you to understand more regarding the world, journey, some places, history, entertainment, and much more? It is your personal time to proceed reviewing behavior. One of guides you could delight in now is Second Street Station: A Mary Handley Mystery, By Lawrence H. Levy right here.
Second Street Station: A Mary Handley Mystery, by Lawrence H. Levy
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A historical mystery featuring the witty and wily Mary Handley, the first woman detective in Brooklyn, as she tries to prove herself in a man's world while solving a high profile murder. Mary Handley is a not your typical late-nineteenth century lady. She's fiery, clever, daring—and she’s not about to conform to the gender norms of the day. Not long after being fired from her job at the hat factory for insubordinate behavior, Mary finds herself at the murder scene of Charles Goodrich, the brother of a prominent alderman and former bookkeeper of Thomas Edison. When Mary proves her acumen as a sleuth, she is hired by the Brooklyn police department—as the city’s first female policewoman—to solve the crime. The top brass of the department expect her to fail, but Mary has other plans. As she delves into the mystery, she finds herself questioning the likes of J. P. Morgan, Thomas Edison, and Nikola Tesla. Mary soon discovers the key to solving the case goes well beyond finding a murderer and depends on her ability to unearth the machinations of the city’s most prominent and respected public figures, men who will go to great lengths to protect their secrets.Much like Mr. Churchill’s Secretary and Maisie Dobbs, Second Street Station presents a portrait of a world plunging into modernity through the eyes of a clever female sleuth. Mary Handley is an unforgettable protagonist whose wit, humor, and charm will delight readers from the very first page.
Second Street Station: A Mary Handley Mystery, by Lawrence H. Levy - Amazon Sales Rank: #51778 in Books
- Brand: Levy, Lawrence H.
- Published on: 2015-06-09
- Released on: 2015-06-09
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 7.95" h x .76" w x 5.17" l, .52 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 336 pages
Second Street Station: A Mary Handley Mystery, by Lawrence H. Levy Review A Library Journal Best Mystery of 2015"Based on an actual incident and featuring real people involved in the case, this stunning debut by Levy, an award-winning TV writer (Seinfeld; Family Ties; Roseanne), offers a thought-provoking look at life for women in the late 19th century as well as a perplexing murder investigation. Mary is an unconventional, unforgettable protagonist who will appeal to readers who enjoy Jacqueline Winspear (Maisie Dobbs), Sarah R. Shaber (Louise's War), or Susan Elia MacNeal (Mr. Churchill's Secretary)."—Library Journal (starred review)“A promising series kickoff that presents a morally strong heroine with a mystery that cleverly intertwines fact and fiction.”—Kirkus Reviews"Mary Handley, an unconventional nineteenth-century female sleuth whom readers are sure to love...overcomes trained killers—using her jujitsu skills and quick wits—and even finds time to take a lover, in defiance of social propriety. Readers won’t expect the surprise denouement as Handley steals the show and guarantees readership for a sequel."—Booklist“Second Street Station is a debut novel and the first, I hope, of many more Mary Handley mysteries. Mary is a fearless young woman, and not someone easily thwarted. There are plenty of suspects in the Goodrich murder, but readers will have difficulty figuring out the true killer. This is a great beginning of a potentially excellent series. I highly recommend Second Street Station.”—Romance Reviews Today“An ingenious story with unforgettable fictional characters, crossing paths with well known historical ones. I learned a lot from this book, the main thing being that I could never write one.” —Larry David“Second Street Station is a great read. Following Mary Handley through this Victorian adventure makes you feel like you’ve found some lost Sherlock Holmes story. It’s impressive that the characters, many based on actual historical figures, are always funny, but the greatest delight is the mystery itself.”—Matthew Weiner, creator of Mad Men“I love books in which the female sleuth defies stereotype without losing her authenticity. This one is even more impressive because Mary Handley is based on a real person. An added delight is the number of well-known historical figures who are intertwined with the story.”—Rhys Bowen, New York Times bestselling author of the Molly Murphy and A Royal Spyness historical mysteries“Lawrence H. Levy brings Mary Handley to life with deft hands, giving readers who love strong and capable female sleuths a character bound to be their new favorite. Second Street Station is the perfect combination of wit blended with an engaging and clever plot.”—Tasha Alexander, New York Times bestselling author of And Only to Deceive and The Counterfeit Heiress“What do you do with a young Victorian woman so intelligent, yet so insubordinate that she is sacked from her last position? If you are the Brooklyn Police Department and she happens to be Lawrence H. Levy's delightful heroine, Mary Handley, the only sensible thing is to make her the city's first policewoman. A fun setting, a resourceful heroine, and a plot that combines danger, humor, and proper sleuthing... What more could anyone want?”—Will Thomas, author of Some Danger Involved and Fatal Enquiry
About the Author LAWRENCE H. LEVY is a highly regarded film and TV writer who is a Writers Guild Award winner and two-time Emmy nominee. He has written for various hit TV shows such as Family Ties, Saved by the Bell, Roseanne, and Seinfeld. Second Street Station is his first novel.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. 1 What could Senator Conkling have possibly been thinking? The Blizzard of 1888 struck in March and had brought the entire Eastern Seaboard to a virtual standstill. Telegraph and telephone lines were snapped, public transportation was shut down, and all businesses were closed. Thirty--foot snow drifts piled up against buildings and blocked streets in Brooklyn and New York City, making normal, everyday life almost impossible. Absolutely nothing was untouched by what was dubbed the Great White Hurricane. So, what could have possessed the former New York senator to go for a stroll that had resulted in his falling ill and presently being on his deathbed?Mary Handley couldn’t get this thought out of her mind. It was odd. She knew there had to be some skewed logic behind his illogical behavior, but absolutely no one was questioning it. She didn’t think anything untoward had happened to him. Wondering about it was just a mental exercise, the kind to which she kept gravitating: questioning the inexplicable until it was explained. She had no illusions that anyone would take her musings seriously, no matter what she had concluded. She was a woman and poor, and therefore nothing she said could possibly be of import. As she had been told many times, she should confine her interests to family and children or trivial pursuits such as theater and art.On occasion, when a man would feign interest in her opinion, it usually meant he was flirting. Though her appearance was offbeat, at twenty--four, Mary was quite attractive. Her nose was somewhat long and her chin a bit short, but her thick blond hair and penetrating blue eyes more than compensated for it. But no physical description could do Mary justice. She had a magnetic aura about her, fueled by her strong spirit and her unquenchable thirst for knowledge, that only those purely interested in the superficial could possibly miss. Much to Mary’s chagrin, her mother, Elizabeth, was one of them, and she could often be heard saying, “My Mary falls just short of being pretty.”Looks aside, no one could question Mary’s intelligence, and though being patronized or dismissed by a society that valued individuals based on gender or money infuriated Mary, she had learned to live with it. She knew that the world was governed by many prejudices, and she also knew that if she dwelled on that fact, her anger would prevent her from accomplishing anything.Mary didn’t mind living in a tiny one--room apartment with a minuscule corner kitchen. She didn’t mind that her tenement building was on Elizabeth Street, in one of the worst sections of Brooklyn. Nor did she mind working for slave wages at the Lowry Hat Factory, a death trap where health hazards abounded. What she did mind was her boss, the Widow Lowry, who thought her ability to thrive on the misery of others made her superior. Though often tempted, Mary never challenged the Widow Lowry yet refused to kowtow to her, and thus received fewer working hours than those who did. Still, her continued employment there was a testament to her restraint. She viewed the Lowry Hat Factory as a mere stop on the way to achieving her life’s plan. One day, against all odds and the prevailing wisdom, she would get her opportunity, and she needed to be ready. Her patience and determination were exemplary, for she had harbored this ambition for quite some time, ever since she took the train from Greenport to New York City when she was twelve.•That night, Mary and her family had been returning from a summer weekend at a farm on Long Island owned by the parents of their neighbors and very close friends in Brooklyn, the McNishes. The families had a lot in common: both sets of parents were Irish immigrants, and all the children were first--generation Americans. The weekend was supposed to be a respite from the intense heat of another Brooklyn summer and a chance for the children to experience the country, but thunderstorms and pouring rain had kept them indoors, where Mary was forever under the watchful eye of her extremely critical mother. Elizabeth had known for a while that Mary was “different.” After all, the girl admired such figures as Darwin and that Elizabeth Blackwell woman with her fancy medical degree, and Kierkegaard, whoever that was.“The girl’s gone all loony. She wants to be a scientist or a philosopher or both. Imagine that,” she whispered to her good friend Abigail McNish. Elizabeth sat next to Abigail on the train, their husbands, Jeffrey and Archie, in the seat behind them, and their children in front of them. At thirty--five, Elizabeth’s sensible hairstyle and matronly clothes didn’t entirely obscure her natural good looks. As a young woman, she had allowed herself to be more stylish, and many men had taken notice. But it was Jeffrey who had charmed her and stolen her heart. In hindsight, it had crossed her mind more than once that she should have ignored her emotions and aimed higher, a mistake she hoped to help Mary avoid.“If anyone can do it, it’s your Mary,” replied Abigail. Her daughter, Sarah, and Mary had grown up together and were the best of friends. Sarah would never be as bright as Mary, but she admired Mary’s intelligence. It wasn’t that life hadn’t also blessed Sarah. With her jet--black hair, porcelain skin, and large, soulful eyes, Sarah was more classically pretty, which Elizabeth never hesitated to point out.“The one who’s special is your Sarah,” she responded, again in a low voice. “Mark my words. With her beauty and easy disposition, she’s going to land herself a fine husband one day. A very fine husband.”And that summed up Elizabeth’s attitude. She felt that marriage was the only realistic way a girl could advance herself, and that it was her job as a mother to bring Mary’s two feet down to earth “for her own good.” If it meant belittling her ambitions, so be it. There were precious few opportunities for women and almost none in the lofty fields to which Mary aspired. But her mother’s negativity just made Mary’s resolve stronger. As a result, they were always at odds. Nonetheless, Elizabeth was unprepared for what happened next. Loud and clear, a voice rang out and reverberated throughout the car.“Pick it up, Sean. Pick it up, or I’ll box your ears, you jealous shit!”Elizabeth closed her eyes, hoping she was wrong about the voice’s origin. This would have been an unacceptable exclamation for any man outside of a rowdy saloon, and here it was coming from a twelve--year--old girl.Mary’s expletive was directed at her brother, Sean, and he had done his best to earn it. After losing to Mary in a game of chess, he had thrown a tantrum and had knocked the chess set to the floor. He was a full two years older and a boy, and the prevailing wisdom had taught him that boys were smarter than girls. Yet, with Mary as his sister, he had learned firsthand that the prevailing wisdom was not always correct. Whether it was at chess or anything that required a reasonable level of mental acuity, Mary outwitted him time after time. He kept trying as if his absent male superiority would one day magically appear and help him defeat her, but it never did. He had to settle for being annoying (something at which he excelled) or getting her in trouble. Either one put a smile on his face.None of that mattered to Elizabeth. Avoiding public embarrassment was paramount, and her daughter had just made her bathe in it.Mary had a vast vocabulary for a girl her age and was definitely aware that proper society frowned upon certain words. Because of her mother’s constant scrutiny, she normally kept her true emotions in check, but these pent--up feelings inevitably led to occasional outbursts. What added to the ease with which swear words rolled off her tongue was that society’s obsession with such words didn’t seem logical to her. If they added the appropriate emphasis to what was being said, she saw nothing foul about them. What was foul was using words to lie, to deceive, or to render harm. And what was most certainly foul was the taste of soap. In no time Elizabeth was at Mary’s side with a full bar. She always kept one in her pocketbook for disciplinary reasons.“You know what to do with it, girl, and don’t be stingy,” commanded Elizabeth, her Irish accent more pronounced when she was upset.As Mary took the bar from her, Elizabeth glanced at Sean, who was slouching. He immediately sat up as straight as he could. Then, having done her duty, Elizabeth returned to her seat, holding her head up high as if daring someone to say something about her, her family, or her mothering skills.Mary looked at Sarah, whose large, round eyes were full of empathy for her friend and the daunting task she had ahead. They had always confided in each other, revealing their most personal thoughts and feelings, but now all they could do was exchange looks and shake their heads at the annoying smirk Sean was wearing. Mary soothed herself, though, with the knowledge that any satisfaction he felt over getting her in trouble was the result of flawed logic. Mary had no intention of eating any of the soap.As soon as her parents and Sean weren’t looking, Mary slipped away. Her idea was to carve up the soap to make it look like she had been eating it. The task at hand was to find someone with a pocketknife. With rain pounding against the train, thunder exploding, and lightning occasionally illuminating the darkness, it became an adventure where Mary imagined ghosts and demons popping out of every crevice. She had stopped at a large window to gaze at the foreboding weather when a passenger appeared out of the blackness and startled her. She spun about, and it was then that she noticed the Frenchman’s door ajar for the first time. If Mary hadn’t been so scientifically oriented, she would have thought his contraption magical. There had to be an explanation for it. So on her way back, after an extremely friendly conductor had helped her carve a jagged masterpiece she was sure would fool her mother, she hoped to find his door ajar again. Though he was mostly hidden in shadows, she spied an austere--looking large man wearing a bowler hat exiting the Frenchman’s compartment. They locked eyes for a brief moment, but her attention was more drawn to the door that he had left open. She decided that it was worth risking another sampling of the Frenchman’s bad humor for a second look at the contraption.When she entered the compartment and saw the Frenchman with the noose around his neck, her mind kicked into an analytical mode. She had never seen a dead body before. Her parents had shielded her from going to the wake of her aunt who had died in childbirth, yet Mary behaved as if this experience were a common occurrence. She was sure the Frenchman was dead, but she checked his pulse anyway. Nothing. The poor man was gone all right. There was nothing she could do for him, so she looked around the compartment, taking a visual inventory. She saw the clothes that were hanging to dry and a suitcase, but where was that strange object that made the sound? She had no fear, no emotion, just a desire to find out what had transpired. It was not until the adults arrived that hysteria broke out.“Little girl, you need to get out of here,” a man with a pipe said as he looked wildly down the corridor, but Mary didn’t budge. “Conductor!” he screamed. “Somebody get the conductor!”“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!” the conductor cried upon seeing the Frenchman hanging there. “Someone help me get this poor soul down.”By now a crowd had gathered. Too many rushed forward to help, although more stayed back, frozen by the sight of the dead Frenchman. The noise level and the size of the crowd were multiplying. Taking charge, the conductor pointed to three men.“You, you, and you, help get this man down.” As they promptly jumped to, the conductor turned to the crowd. “Ladies and gentlemen, please go back to your seats. There’s nothing to see here, just a poor fella who killed himself. Let’s give him some of the peace that he obviously did not find in life.”As the passengers dispersed, the conductor felt a tug at his side, and he turned to see the little girl he had helped carve a piece of soap.“This is no place for you, child. Go back to your mother.”“But, Mr. Conductor, sir, this man did not commit suicide.”“You mean, you saw . . .” And the conductor paused for a moment to choose his words carefully. He was talking to a child. But Mary was too quick for him.“Not exactly.” And Mary explained about the man with the bowler hat, whom she hadn’t seen that well, and about the object that made sound, which was no longer there.The conductor realized he was dealing with a little girl who had a big imagination and ordered her once again to return to her mother.“But it makes no sense, Mr. Conductor. Why would a man take off his shoes to hang himself? Why would he hang clothes to dry he wasn’t ever going to wear again?”The conductor had no answer, but he also had no time to deal with a child’s logic. “He was probably crazy.” And he gave Mary a gentle push into the corridor, then closed the door.Word of the Frenchman’s suicide had traveled fast and was already the topic of excited conversation when Mary returned to her car and calmly announced she had actually seen the dead man. Her family and friends were anything but calm. Immediately forgetting the swearing incident and the soap, Elizabeth hugged Mary, doing her best to soothe her young daughter, who really needed no soothing. In this rare burst of warmth from her mother, Mary informed her that she’d had a change of heart.“I no longer wish to be a scientist or philosopher, Mother.”“Really?” said a relieved Elizabeth, thinking this awful incident may have somehow netted a positive result.“I’ve decided I want to be a detective.”Elizabeth flinched. This daughter of hers would never give her peace.Mary spent the rest of the trip trying to think of reasons why the dead man would have taken off his shoes and hung up his clothes before killing himself. There were none. She was sure he had been murdered.
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16 of 18 people found the following review helpful. "Thank you for your time, gentlemen." By Biblioholic Beth She's poor, has a mother that insists she "marry up", and is smarter than most people of the period feel comfortable with. And then, in a twist of fate, she ends up as the first paid female policewoman for the Brooklyn Police Department. Mary Handley is clever, strong, and stubborn, and determined to be successful in a job she has dreamed about.I am a huge Maisie Dobbs fan - the series has roped me in, and even if I sometimes think it has gone off the rails a little bit, I still reach for the next book in the series. The Mary Handley books, should they become a series, will not be the same. While I enjoyed the story to a degree, I mostly just finished it because I felt like I should. My biggest problem with the book as a whole was the over-explanation of *everything*. For a mystery, some things should be left for the reader to imagine and to figure out. With "Second Street Station", that wasn't really possible. The back says that the author, Lawrence H. Levy is a film and TV writer, so maybe that is bleeding over into the novel? Whatever it is, it was annoying and showed a distinct lack of trust in the reader.As for the storyline itself, I found myself veering between interest and a complete lack of suspension of disbelief. Levy wanted the book to be historically accurate in whatever ways were possible, but I often found myself distracted by the constant big-name dropping. It just didn't seem as realistic as if it were just a couple of them woven in. It just felt like too much, too often. And honestly, the set up that gets Mary her job didn't seem very realistic either.Honestly, it wasn't a BAD book. But it definitely has its flaws. I wouldn't take the time in the future to read any more of the Mary Handley books unless someone I trusted declared them amazing and I could trust that the issues I mentioned had been fixed (because they are fixable).
16 of 18 people found the following review helpful. Good read but not entirely plausible By Dr. Cathy Goodwin This book inevitably will be compared to the Maisie Dobbs series. However, it's nothing like that series besides being a historical novel with a female who wants to be a detective.The best part of the book is the attention to historical detail: the long train rides, the tenement boarding houses, the limited roles for women and more. Mary Handley was raised in poverty by a family that seemed to resent her talents. She reads extensively and becomes as comfortable with literature as a college English major. She's always been exceptional: we're introduced to her as a child with astonishing, piercing blue eyes.The only work Mary can find is in a hat factory, where her impudence gets her hours reduced. She lives in a tenement where she's lucky to have a sink in her room and a bathroom down the hall. She wants to escape but she doesn't seem to be taking initiative; even back then, some moves would have been possible. She uses all her spare time for reading.By a stroke of luck and coincidence, she's given a chance to do some detective work - heading up a high-profile murder case, no less. Without a team and apparently without training, she wades right in. Despite some mishaps, she seems confident. Somehow she knows what to say and how to handle difficult people, although it's not clear how she developed those skills. There's one scene where a male policeman tries to embarrass her in a grossly suggestive way, yet she cleverly quips her way out and earns the respect of all the men. Her quip suggests an understanding of "guy talk" that wouldn't be expected.Along the way Mary learns some uncomfortable truths about people who will become legendary, such as Thomas Edison and JP Morgan. It seems as though the author could have written a historical nonfiction book but the lines are always blurred in a fiction book. The stories about these men seem entirely plausible.There are some plot twists but also some coincidences. The ending seems to come from left field - completely unpredictable.The first 20-30% of the book was quite good and the author writes well. After I started to write this review, I saw that Mary seems based on a real person. It would be helpful to know where reality ends and fiction begins.Anyway, I'm not sure it matters. By way of comparison, I enjoyed Duchess of Duke Street, which was plausible and which showed the heroine creating her own destiny. That show was based on a real person and featured some historical figures, but would have stood on its own even if we didn't know the history behind the story.
25 of 30 people found the following review helpful. Mary Handley is a wonderful intelligent, snarky, independent female detective who lacks an adept author to write her stories. By Meg Upon reading the description of Second Street Station by Lawrence H. Levy, a mystery in which an amateur-turned-professional-ish young female detective solves a murder case in New York City, I knew it sounded too good to pass up, and I immediately requested a free review copy from Blogging For Books. In Mary Handley, I hoped Levy had created another Veronica Mars. After all, both characters are youthful, intelligent, witty, brash female detectives unafraid to swear or defend themselves--verbally or physically--awash in a sea of social class conflict, sexism, hypocrisy, and corruption, being used to further the agendas of powerful men in a grab for even more power... just set a little over 100 years prior to Rob Thomas' Mars Investigations stories, in 1888.And Mary Handley (though not quite living up to the epic levels of V Mars) is a well-drawn character, to be sure. Her independent streak and her admirable intellectual curiosity contrasting nicely with her outmoded surroundings, Handley is the perfect protagonist to star in a string of detective mysteries... just as long as Levy isn't the one writing them! The problem is not how he writes her character (which is fabulous), but that he does her the great disrespect of not populating her world with similarly well-written even if not half as lovable characters. Instead, the historical figures who are shamelessly trotted out presumably to incite readers' interest (J.P. Morgan, Thomas Edison, Nikola Tesla, Dr. John Pemberton) are drawn with such a heavy hand that their depictions are full of absurd assumptions and take away from the verisimilitude of the book. Going beyond the style of E.L. Doctorow's artful momentary portraits of actual people (Emma Goldman, for example) and sly use of subtle depictions of such prominent folks so as to move the plot of Ragtime (a book also taking place in New York near the same time period and dealing with many similar issues) forward and build characters by having them react to substantiated speeches, behaviors, or personality traits of said historical figures and just completely putting not specific words in their mouths, but whole aspects of their personalities, or imagined events which might even run counter to their very natures--I didn't need a play-by-play of what Lawrence H. Levy imagines J.P. Morgan would do in the private company of a prostitute, for example--took what could've been a clever idea for setting the scene and getting more readers with a historical interest in his chosen time frame interested and basically used it to implode the book with the foolhardy overreaching of an egotistical writer.In short, I'd advise the editor of what is sure to become the Mary Handley detective mystery series if anyone buys this first book and is still willing to read more solely on the basis of such a great protagonist to find someone else to write future volumes, in the hopes that the new author will have more respect for history, the truth about historical personalities used as characters (even if they don't turn out to be respectable), Mary Handley as a protagonist, and readers in general, or you're going to run out of readers despite Mary Handley's compelling personality and keen detective work. Not to worry, Levy, you can still get your name stamped on the cover as the creator, and then readers can avoid the gratuitous rape scenes and revisionist history you felt were required to prop up a character who doesn't need any of that to thrive. Like the rest of the men with whom she crosses paths, all Mary Handley needs you to do to facilitate her success is get out of her way! Oh, and by the way, just a quick note to whomever was in charge of blurbs for this book, you might want to let Matthew Weiner, proudly billed on this book's back cover as creator of Mad Men, know that the Victorian time period took place in England, unlike this story. Americans didn't fight the Revolutionary War and declare independence just to have 1888 New York referred to as a Victorian setting... or, did Weiner even read the book?
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