Vancouver is in an uproar over the death by gunshot of a Scottish nanny, Janet Stewart. An almost deliberately ham-handed police investigation has Constable Hook suspecting a cover-up. The powerful United Council of Scottish Societies is demanding an inquiry. The killing has become a political issue with an election not far away.<\/p>\n
The city is buzzing with rumours. Miss Stewart’s fellow nannies have accused the Chinese houseboy of murder, capitalizing on a wave of anti-Chinese propaganda led by the Asian Exclusion League and enthusiastically supported by the sensational press–not to mention the Ku Klux Klan, which has taken up residence in upperclass Shaughnessy.<\/p>\n
The White Angel<\/em> is a work of fiction inspired by the cold case of Janet Smith, who, on July 26, 1924, was found dead in her employer’s posh Shaughnessy Heights mansion. A dubious investigation led to the even more dubious conclusion that Smith died by suicide. After a public outcry, the case was re-examined and it was decided that Smith was in fact murdered; but no one was ever convicted, though suspects abounded–from an infatuated Chinese houseboy to a drug-smuggling ring, devil-worshippers from the United States, or perhaps even the Prince of Wales. For Vancouver, the killing created a situation analogous to lifting a large flat rock to expose the creatures hiding underneath.<\/p>\n An exploration of true crime through a literary lens, The White Angel<\/em> draws an artful portrait of Vancouver in 1924 in all its opium-hazed, smog-choked, rain-soaked glory–accurate, insightful and darkly droll.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Vancouver is in an uproar over the death by gunshot of a Scottish nanny, Janet Stewart. An almost deliberately ham-handed police investigation has Constable Hook…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":14146,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","book_status":[],"book_genre":[],"class_list":["post-14145","book","type-book","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/myriad.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/book\/14145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/myriad.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/book"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/myriad.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/book"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myriad.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14145"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myriad.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/myriad.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"book_status","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myriad.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/book_status?post=14145"},{"taxonomy":"book_genre","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myriad.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/book_genre?post=14145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}