Thank you to Netgally and the author for giving me that oportunity . Unfurtunally this story wasnt for me. Not taking anything away from the story or the author i am sure that others would love it. i just did not!

A Death in Harlem is carefully crafted with delightful characters and intriguing enough to keep you interested until the very end.

a fantastic novel, re-imagining both crime fiction and the literary fiction that inspires it and providing a stellar introduction to the Harlem Renaissance as well as a crackingly good read!

In 1920s Harlem, in the middle of an awards ceremony for Black artists, one of the winners, a beautiful young woman (Black, but light-skinned enough that she could have passed for white, if she'd chosen to) falls out of a window to her death. Did she jump? Was it an accident? Or was she... murdered?!?! Weldon Thomas, the city's first Black policeman, is on the case.

The problem quickly turns out to be not a lack of motive, but too many motives. Almost everyone seems to have a potential reason to kill Olivia: the prominent doctor she was rumored to be having an affair with; the doctor's wife who was seen fighting with Olivia earlier in the day; the wife's best friend (and former lover) who was angry at being spurned when Olivia came on the scene; the white art collector who was present at the awards ceremony but mysteriously disappeared immediately afterwards; Olivia's maid who knew too much; Olivia's former maid who left her for a better job; the wife's maid who is determined to protect her employer; the mayor's son, who was drunk and in Harlem that night; and on and on. Every single character has at least one dangerous secret.

I love stories set during the Harlem Renaissance and I love murder mysteries, so I was very excited for A Death in Harlem. Unfortunately this is Holloway's first time writing fiction, and it really shows. The characters all feel one-dimensional, none of them get an arc or chance to deepen, there's too much switching between different POVs, and much of the dialogue feels stiff and unrealistic. Whenever there's a bad guy, Holloway practically has them twisting their mustaches and cackling evilly as they praise their own villainous deeds. Which... I'm sure plenty of white people in 1920s NYC were horrible racists! But here they come off less as examples of historical accuracy and more like signs around the bad guys' necks so that the audience knows who to boo.

On another note, Olivia's life and death are paralleled with that of a poor, dark-skinned sex worker; they both arrive in NYC on the same day and later die on the same day, but while Olivia is formally mourned and her case investigated, the other woman's death passes unnoticed. This is a nice conceit, but the other woman essentially disappears from the book after the first few chapters, and her plot is never drawn into the main story. I get what Holloway was trying to say with this, but I don't think it worked.

I would read another book by Holloway, because I liked many of her choices and think she has potential, but this one was a bit meh.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3145695883

I loved Holloway's writing style, she was evocative of the time and it was a brilliant time period to set a mystery in, the Harlem Renaissance. I really enjoyed all the characters, the unexpected reveal of sexual diversity, and the vernacular used when writing from certain characters' points of views. Her voice was strong and the mystery was beyond well written, I was not able to figure out what happened until it was revealed, though some other things were easy to discern, they were left that way to perhaps throw us off the scent. I think I just would have wished for more closure on the endings for the characters. Still, a great book and I would recommend it to any mystery/crime fans.

Thanks to NetGalley and the Publisher for the eARC in exchange for my honest review.
3.5/5 Rounded to 4.

A DEATH IN HARLEM is a story of the Roaring Twenties. I haven't read THE GREAT GATSBY since high school, but this book seems to be an excellent view of another slice of life in the same time period. Set in Harlem, as the title implies, it is also the story of how the people most like us, in the case of race for this story, are the ones who are going to be most awful to us.

The story focuses on a death, also as the title implies, which is a murder in the Negro (and I'm using that word because it is what the author uses in the story) community. It happens at a ritzy awards banquet to honor authors, and Zora Neale Hurston even makes a brief appearance, and the only police officer assigned to the event is the only minority officer on the force - Weldon Haynie Thomas.

Weldon takes it upon himself to do what few of the other police officers seem to want him to do and investigate the death of Olivia Frelon as carefully as possible.

Olivia Frelon was first thought to be white, by some, and known to not be white by others in the Harlem community. Vera Scott, a respected doctor's wife in Harlem, is also fair-skinned enough that she can pass for white. This means that suspicion falls immediately upon Vera because... reasons, I guess.

To see, again and not for the last time, how it's not as simple as black and white... how a larger group of humans, humans who call themselves "our people" and "community" and "family", must always find someone that is just that much lesser than they are, even by shades of skin color, is both fascinating and disheartening.

In a good turn for A DEATH IN HARLEM, that makes for excellent storytelling and I really did like story. It's a good, important book and I'm glad I got the chance to read it.

(Except for the random, unfinished side story of the vice-mayor's son Wyckomb.)

(Thanks to NetGalley and Northwestern University Press for giving me the chance to read this book in exchange for an honest and original review. All thoughts are my own.)

Overall I enjoyed this book. I liked that there was diversity in the characters and enjoyed the 1920s time period it was written in. There was nothing glaringly wrong but this felt like a 3 star book for me.

I received this from Netgalley.com for a review.

"A Death in Harlem is a mystery set in the midst of the 1920s Harlem elite."

A so-so read, with some very slow moving parts.

2.5☆

Weldon Haynie Thomas is Harlem’s first black policeman. He knows he carries a great burden on his shoulders to be the best he can be so others can follow him into the police force, but it’s not easy for him when there is so much racism all around him. He is assigned to ensure none of the riff-raff of the neighborhood gain entry to a large gala to honor the city’s authors. Much to his chagrin, a woman falls or is pushed out of a window and lands on the sidewalk just outside the front door. Initially, her death is judged to be “death by misadventure.” Nothing about this death is what it seems. Add to that is another woman’s death just a block away. The investigation into the white woman’s death is given to detectives with scant knowledge of Harlem and Thomas goes back to being a beat cop. At the urging of a young woman who works for one of the suspects, Thomas begins investigating on his own.

Karla Holloway has produced a well-written historical novel about an era we’ve all heard about, but know almost nothing of life in Harlem on the streets, so to speak. Her main character is well drawn and is just quirky enough to be interesting and likable. Her descriptions of the era and city streets are so good that you can almost feel a part of the Jazz Age in NYC. Holloway does not flinch at describing the everyday violence and particularly the violence against women – she isn’t as graphic as she could have been – but the reader becomes well aware that women, especially African-American women, are low on society’s totem pole.

This is not your typical historical mystery because the mystery is not the focus of the book. Yes, people die and yes the deaths are investigated, but there’s so much more going on in the book.

There is humor in the book, characters to like and dislike, a main character that you’d like to see again, a setting drawn by Holloway’s able hand that is unique to the genre, and a mystery. So, if you like historical novels set in or around the 1920s, this is the book for you and you probably will want to put it at or near the top of your to-be-read pile.

Thanks to Triquarterly and NetGalley for an e-ARC.

3.5 stars

The best thing about this debut novel is its setting: Harlem in the late 20s during the Harlem Renaissance. Young Weldon Thomas is the first black police officer in Harlem and happens to be doing basic crowd control at a high-toned soiree when a death occurs. A woman falls - or jumps - or is pushed - from an upper story window and dies on the pavement below. Although the victim appears to be a white woman, she is actually black and a lot of cultural context is provided to explain the importance of that.

There are many complexities, including the pretensions and skin-color bias of the black elite. Thomas is an interesting character. The relationships in the novel are sometimes complicated. Of course Thomas meets with much bigotry from the white police officers and walks a thin line between standing up for himself and getting along in order to be able to do his job and make a difference.

An interesting glimpse into a not-often written about period and place. Thanks to the publisher and to Net Galley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I really enjoyed this book! I'm not too much of a who done it girl but this drew me in because it take place in Harlem. I grew up near Spanish Harlem in the 90s and Harlem was a mecca for Black people in NYC. This story is during the Harlem Renaissance era. Harlem's first Blsck police officer is roped into Black high society when a seemingly white woman falls to her death during a party. The police officer uses Sherlock Holmes methods to try to figure iut what happened to this woman. At first it seems like she was killed over an alleged affair but when the officer digs deepers,he uncovers a couple skeletons in the the closet of the victim and her social circle.
I enjoyed seeing how Officer Weldon Thomas asked carefully thought out questions of potential suspects. I enjoyed the explanation of how the Black elite became the Black elite. I would never have guessed who the killer was and to me that was the best part! Would definitely read this author again!

I picked this book up because of its link to Passing by Nella Larsen, which I read and adored last year. The mystery aspect was a bonus. However, I cannot say that I loved it but I think it was more me than the book or rather more the nature of the Advance Copy I got than the book. Unedited proofs are fab and I love them, but at times, I wish I had waited for the finished book. No line breaks for dialogue, so many typos and sometimes they were so confusing that it was hard to make out what was said. So yeah, I found the book a bit of a slog, because of it. Shame really.

This historical fiction book takes place in Harlem, a neighborhood for blacks in NYC, in 1927. At that time there was a flourishing black middle class in that community. Social groups dedicated to “uplifting the race” existed in the upper and lower classes there as well.

The 9th Annual Opportunity Magazine Writing Awards Banquet was taking place at the Hotel Theresa in Harlem. The event was sponsored by the Negro Welfare League and included awards for short fiction, poetry, and non fiction. It was an important social event and many wealthy blacks were in attendance. When the prize for short fiction was announced the author, Olivia Freon, did not come forward. Then another winner came on stage to tell the assembled group that Olivia was lying dead on the ground outside the hotel.

Weldon Thomas, Harlem’s only black policeman, had been assigned for crowd control at the function. He called the local precinct, the investigation into the death was taken over by white detectives and he was no longer involved.

The official police investigation turned up evidence implicating Vera Scott, the wife of a prominent black doctor. She was indicted by the Grand Jury and let out on bail. Vera’s husband, Reynolds, was rumored to have had an affair with Olivia and this was assumed to be the motivation for the murder.

Olivia had arrived in Harlem recently. She had been in Europe for some time. No one knew where Olivia came from originally or what was the source of her extreme wealth. Vera and her husband were among the most prominent people in Harlem. Dr. Scott had a downtown medical practice but also did volunteer work uptown in Harlem.

Vera and Olivia had become close friends and Olivia used Vera’s influence as an entree into exclusive women’s groups in Harlem. Before Olivia had arrived on the scene, Earlene Kinsdale and Vera had been close friends. They met in college and remained friends until Olivia arrived.

Although he was not on the investigation team, Weldon Thomas became involved at the urging of Sadie Mathis, who was convinced that her employer was not a murderer. Weldon’s investigation turned up many leads. However the final lead that lead to the real culprit will be a surprise to all.

This book deals with “passing”, a practice in which light skinned black folks live their lives as whites. This was popular in the earlier part of the 20th century. The author uses vernacular black speech for exchanges between the black characters. The author based the story on another book, Passing by Nella Larsen published in 1929. The book gives an interesting view of life in Harlem in the 20s when many blacks were coming up to NYC from the South. Harlem was also a place where adventurous whites came for entertainment. One of the main characters, Hughes Wellington was a wealthy white man from downtown who often frequented black events like the 9th Annual Opportunity Magazine Writing Awards Banquet.

This ARC was provided by Net Galley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

A Death in Harlem was an interesting debut work from Karla Holloway, set in 1920s Harlem. Two women die one cold winter's night, although the novel is primarily focused on the death of Olivia Frelon, an African-American woman capable of passing as white. The death is investigated by Harlem's first African-American policeman, Weldon Haynie Thomas (in the book's world). Take note, mystery publishers: please continue to look for more diverse voices like this.

While I found the novel a bit uneven in execution, I did really appreciate the author's attention to historical detail, particularly in describing the social structure of Harlem at the time, which I hadn't known much about before. The decisions of characters to "pass" as white - or not - was fascinating, as were the themes around colorism throughout the book. It certainly made me interested to read "Passing," the novel that Holloway drew inspiration from.

I did find that the story meandered a bit, the writing was sometimes overwrought, the romance elements of various characters distracted, and the actions of some of the characters - particularly Olivia herself - seemed somewhat inconsistent and underdeveloped.

Overall: 3 Sherlocks. Many promising elements, and a world that should be further explored.

I received an advance review copy of this novel through NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

What's appealing about this novel especially is the charm of the voice, although at times, its equanimity as he encounters the racism of his world feels contrived .. the first black policeman. The very credible situations where he is pushed aside despite his clever sussing out of people's motives and situations are illuminating about the grinding social mores of those times. But even his superiors have to allow his work because he's so good working out the reasons for a society woman's fall to her death. The interviews with the suspects froon various strata of the local world are often hilarious but also very authentic. The narrative drags partially because the c author wants to reveal the racism! In itself that's valuable.

When I first started this book it had a Gatsby-esque feel, being set in a similar era and focusing on a socialite lifestyle, but in black Harlem.

I re-read the Author's Note once I'd finished the book and was interested in her first point that this is a 'talking book' and that the voices matter as much as they vary.

I actually struggled with the differing POVs and the constant switching from first person to third person - it was very difficult to understand who was speaking and this therefore made the story very disjointed. That, and the relatively large cast of characters, meant that none of them were rounded out, making it difficult to care for them or for their stories and therefore, ultimately, none of the voices in the book resonated with me.

DNF. Was unable to connect with story line or characters. I had high hopes but the writing wasn’t engaging enough to hold my interest

I tried to love it. A story about the first black policeman and a mystery surrounding the death of a woman about to recieve an award told from too many view points. Great premise but I was left often trying to remember whose view point we're on. I gave in about halfway through.

Set in a place and time I know little about....Harlem in the 1920’s....gave me high hopes for this book. It did not disappoint on an historic level. But this book was a bit difficult to follow. The story is told from many differing viewpoints, perspectives and characters and the transition between all of these was not smooth. It may it difficult to keep track of who is who at any given time. I was hoping for more of a mystery (there is a murder) but this is not nor should it be called a mystery. It is however a beautifully written story of a point in time where being black was hard and then harder but allowed for some groundbreaking career choices (a black policeman) that would lead us to where we are today. This book is not for everyone but it was time well spent for me in a genre I don’t often read. Thank you NetGalley for the advanced readers copy for review.

I have not read much about the "Harlem Renaissance" so I was very excited to read this book. Weldon Thomas is the first black police officer and he is in charge of solving a murder. Olivia Frelon, falls from an upstairs window before receiving an award. Was she pushed, did she accidentally fall or did she jump? Watching Weldon try to talk to the upper class made me shake my head wondering why on Earth would someone subject themselves to the upper class attitude. I was rooting for Weldon the whole book.