THE GOLDEN GATE by Amy Chua is a compelling and multi-layered historical mystery set in Berkeley, California in 1944. Walter Wilkinson, a wealthy industrialist and former presidential candidate, has been found brutally murdered in his hotel room at the Claremont Hotel. Berkeley Homicide Detective, Al Sullivan, who was having a drink at the Claremont that evening, takes on the murder investigation. It is clear that Wilkinson’s death was a targeted attack, but he is a man with many enemies so the perpetrator and motive are not immediately known. The investigation soon leads to another high-profile death at the Claremont over ten years prior. Seven-year-old Iris Stafford, a member of one of the wealthiest families in San Francisco, the Bainbridges, was found dead at the bottom of a hotel laundry chute. Could there be a connection between the deaths? Do the remaining Bainbridge heiresses - Iris’ sister, her twin cousins and their grandmother, Genevieve, have anything to do with the recent murder? Set against the backdrop of World War II, the internment of Japanese citizens in camps, violent labor strikes and rampant discrimination against Mexicans, Asians and Blacks, the story portrays the turbulent times and the darker side of San Francisco’s past. The historical aspects were seamlessly interwoven with the plot. I enjoyed hearing Genevieve’s point of view through her deposition to the District Attorney. This was a well-crafted and intriguing debut novel from Amy Chua and I look forward to reading more from this author. Thank you to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the chance to read and review an early copy.

Happy pub day to this gem of a novel!

The Golden Gate is Amy Chua’s fiction debut, and let me tell you, all of her experience writing nonfiction really paid off here. This book is exceptionally well-researched. Chua drops her reader into the San Francisco Bay Area during the 1940s and is able to capture not just a host of historical details—Did you know that the First Lady of the Republic of China lived in Berkeley for a while?—but also the vibe of a classic 1940s hard boiled detective novel. The first-person narration of her detective was absolute perfection for someone like me who grew up reading Raymond Chandler and watching films like The Maltese Falcon. I found the historical details absorbing, the mystery compelling, and the addition of an eleven year-old child sidekick quite charming.

A bonus for me: Quite a bit of this novel takes place at the Claremont Hotel, which was recently a topic on @kqed’s Bay Curious podcast (published August 31). To listen to that podcast and subsequently pick up a book set at the historic hotel was delightful kismet.

This ARC was provided by the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

This is a San Francisco noir mystery set towards the end of WWII. A charismatic and volatile industrial presidential candidate is found murdered in the swanky but staid Claremont Hotel. The list of potential assassins seems endless but somehow centered upon a wealthy, dysfunctional family of three beautiful, headstrong women. The family is helmed by the doyenne who knows many secrets but keeps all of them to protect her granddaughters. Other potential leads include hotel employees, a priest, potential Japanese spies and even a Chinese mistress/ political figure. This is quite a lot for Homicide Detective Al Sullivan to sort out. He is also feeling the pressure of dealing with a rebellious niece, his own mixed-race heritage as well as the relentless expectations of his boss. Lastly, there is an historical death of a young girl that may either indicate a pattern or derail whatever progress Al thinks he has made.

This is a juicy book of clues and red herrings for those who enjoy a lot of detail, authentic SF personalities and historic sites. On the other hand, the amount of drama and red herrings was sometimes overwhelming. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing this title.

Thank you NetGalley for an advanced copy of THE GOLDEN GATE by Amy Chua. This was a combination of a lot of cool history—especially since I learned a lot of things I didn't know about where I grew up in the Bay Area—and a dark, twisty murder mystery. Sometimes the history info dumps were random and long and slowed things down, but parts of it were also really interesting. Maybe it just could have used a little more cutting. The mystery did keep me guessing and at about halfway through I really got sucked into it and wanted to find out what happened. The mixed race, white-passing detective was an interesting, different protagonist with a lot of guilt and paradoxes going on inside of him. All around, I enjoyed it.

The Golden Gate is a historical hard-boiled police procedural novel that includes family drama and addresses a lot of buzzy topics like politics, racism, passing, and how the rich are treated differently. The story is set in 1944 in a fashionable hotel where a politician is murdered but has flashbacks to a previous death in the hotel in 1930. Could the two somehow be related?

This is a first novel and like many of those, it tends to veer off into tangents. The historical details are extremely interesting. In 1944, the world was at war. America was busy assuming that every Japanese American was a spy, but the German Americans were not. Casual racism and elitism were rampant. Enter a hard-boiled lead detective investigating a presidential hopeful’s murder in a supposed haunted downtown hotel. The detective is passing for white despite his hidden half Mexican heritage. His background is unusual and intriguing. However, many of the history asides seem to not relate much, if at all, to the main plot. For example, it was interesting to discover that Hearst Castle was designed by a woman but it didn’t add anything to any plot arc.

Overall, I enjoyed reading The Golden Gate. However, all the historical asides may be a bit distracting for true mystery devotees. 4 stars!

Thanks to Minotaur Books and NetGalley for a digital review copy of the book.

I wanted to like this book and it sounded good. However it jumps back and forth and has a deposition stuck in between all that. It was a bit wordy and I just couldn’t get into it.
Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the early copy

This book started out strong and then fell apart. The beginning was interesting: a prominent politician is threatened and eventually murdered and there are so many suspects. But then the story goes in so many directions: social commentary, racial tension, political intrigue, a ghost story with some gothic undercurrents; it was just too much to keep up with. I eventually lost interest as the investigation limped along. And it seemed to go on forever! Add into that, the different subsections by date, I felt like I was always on chapter 4. It was entertaining and I wanted to know how it would end but it really should have been shorter and tightened up.

The setting is Berkley, California. In 1944, in the Claremont Hotel, wealthy industrialist and presidential hopeful William Wilkinson was found murdered. Was this politically motivated or personal? Homicide Detective Al Sullivan is determined to find out. Three granddaughters of the wealthy Genevieve Bainbridge become early suspects: Isabella Stafford and her cousins, Cassie and Nicole Bainbridge. Isabella's younger sister Iris had died ten years before in the same hotel. The death of the seven-year-old was attributed to it being an accident but the actual cause remained a mystery. As Sullivan investigates the murder, clues also lead him to Madame Chiang Kai-shek, who was rumored to be having an affair with Wilkinson. Issues of race and class distinction arise while investigating the case as Sullivan, whose real name is Alejo Gutiérrez, choses to keep his half-Mexican heritage a secret. The war rages overseas as California is placing its Japanese citizens in harsh internment camps presented as country club-like settings, Chinese gangs gain power in the streets and the wealthy class try to distance themselves from it all. And Genevieve Bainbridge may not be able to keep one of her granddaughters out of jail.

The Golden Gate is the fiction debut for author Amy Chua (Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother). The inclusion of real-life historical figures and events add to the appeal of this old-fashioned style detective story. While not a long book at under 400 pages, there were several subplots and so many characters plus the historical background that it was a slower read than normal. But it was worthwhile and very enjoyable. Perhaps Chua will bring Detective Sullivan back in a future book. I'll surely look out for more fiction from this author.

This gorgeous cover perfectly sets the stage for the story.

1944. Berkeley, California. Detective Al Sullivan finds himself the lead detective on a murder case involving former presidential candidate Walter Wilkinson. With the abundance of enemies that Wilkinson has made in his life, the list of suspects is long. But strangely enough, the investigation seems to find its way back to the tragic death ten years prior of seven year old Iris Stafford, a member of the wealthy San Francisco Bainbridge family, at the same hotel. Despite the machinations of the Bainbridge family, the political aspirations of the district attorney, and the interest of Chinese First Lady Madame Chiang Kai-Shek, Sullivan is determined to find the truth and bring a killer into the light.

Holy cow. I don’t think I truly understood what I was getting into when I saw that this was a historical thriller, but I was absolutely blown away. It’s clear that Chua really took care and took the time to do the research about the time period. The historical elements are incorporated so seamlessly and in such an interesting way that it made me want to go out and do some research on my own.

The downside to the historically accurate elements presented in the book is that the reader also has to read through the thoughts and feelings of the time. Overt racism and prejudice is present throughout, especially when it comes to the Japanese. Even though it felt icky, I understood the need to include it in this book and it’s also a good reminder of how far we’ve come since then (even though it sometimes doesn’t feel like it).

All the twists and turns kept me on the edge of my seat the entire time. There was never a moment where I was confident what would happen next. At this point, I’m still not sure if the ending is actually the truth of what happened and I love that!

One of the things that I really loved was that Sullivan is mixed race, but he can pass as white. He has to reconcile his actual identity with the one that he presents to the world. In addition to learning to accept his identity, he also has to learn to accept the kind of person he is.

With a full cast of compelling and nuanced characters, Chua brings history to life while still weaving an intricate story that leaves readers guessing through to the end. A bestseller in the non-fiction space already, Chua has penned a dazzling debut fiction novel that leaves me wanting more.

Disclaimer: I received an advanced copy of this book from the publisher for free and have voluntarily written this review.

Thanks to Negalley for the ARC: I really enjoyed this book: it's a mixture of historical fiction and mystery. The premise is a mixed race police detective in Berkeley California during WWII who solves a mystery that exposes class issues, and reveals historical truths. I didn't realize that Chua has written several books until I read the afterward. As an attorney and a professor, she clearly researches carefully and feels deeply about her subjects. A very well written and compelling story with complex characters and seamless history of the Bay Area. Strongly recommended.

An intriguing historical mystery that hits multiple themes of life in California in the 1940s. Detective Al Sullivan has a mess on his hands when politician Walter Wilkinson is first shot at and then killed at the Claremont Hotel. Many secrets in this novel, starting with Al, who changed his name to hide his mixed race heritage but most importantly in the Bainbridge family. Did one of the glamorous Bainbridge girls kill him? Was is Nicole, her sister Cassandra, or their cousin Isabelle? All of them have a connection to the man. What's the connection to the Chinese community, let along the Japanese one? This unfolds carefully until the end (which is a little implausible but, hey). You might think you know what happened (certainly Al keeps thinking he does) but you don't - always the mark of a good mystery. Al's terrific - lots of small details round him out but most of all there's his niece Miriam. Chua packs an afterword with details. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. A very good read.

This is quite the meandering tale! I appreciate the complex main character who rationalizes his position in being both victim and upholder of white supremacy. Without that context, the end makes no sense. The whole crime plot is a red herring. Does it really matter which crazy rich white lady did what? Is that part of the point of them feeling quite a bit interchangeable? What must one compromise to "get ahead" in that society, whatever definition it takes? What does it mean to pass?

That said, this one just felt too long. There seemed to be a fair amount of places where I can imagine the author self-congratulating their wit. If you like to self-congratulate too, this is the one for you. But which story will you decide is central?

(Rounded up from 2.5)

I seriously considered DNF’ing this book but I decided to plow through to the end to learn “whodunit.” The book did get more engaging in the second half but I still found myself skimming a lot. The Golden Gate is partly historical fiction and partly police procedural/mystery, with a large dose of social commentary. The main action takes place in 1944, with some chapters taking place in 1930.

You can tell that Amy Chua has a background in writing nonfiction because several parts of this book feel more like a nonfiction book than a novel. These side trips into history, while interesting, interrupted the flow of the narrative and really slowed things down. The book would have benefited from either eliminating these mini-dissertations or shortening them significantly. There were long sections about the history of California’s Bay Area, including the fur trade, the Gold Rush, opening of the Golden Gate Bridge, and the redwoods, among others.

The main narrator is detective Al Sullivan, who was born Alejo Gutiérrez, the son of a half-Jewish Mexican father and a White mother from the midwest. In 1931, when he was seventeen, his father and two half-brothers were deported to Mexico during the “Mexican Repatriation.” (This was actually a historic tidbit I didn’t know anything about.) So he took his mother’s family name when he joined the Berkeley CA police department, hoping to “pass” as white. Discrimination of all sorts was common in those days (and unfortunately still fairly common today), so he felt it would be a career disaster to keep his birth name. I came to really like Sullivan. He has a strong moral center, which was severely tested many times over the course of the story. He also was wonderful with his 11-year-old niece, Miriam, who was a terrific character. No one else interested me much, however.

In addition to the historical side trips, the flow of the narrative is also interrupted by excerpts from a deposition by one of the main characters, Genevieve Bainbridge, but her words are very relevant to the mystery. She tells a long-winded story about her family, meant to convince the police that none of her granddaughters were to blame for the murder at a fancy hotel of a presidential candidate who had been visiting Berkeley.

I bounced between the audiobook and the ebook for this title. (I switched exclusively to the ebook once I decided I needed to skim.) The audiobook has three narrators who all do a wonderful job: Robb Moreira (who does most of the narration as Detective Sullivan), Suzanne Toren, and Tim Campbell.
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Thank you to Minotaur Books and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advance reader copy of this book and to Macmillan Audio and NetGalley for the opportunity to listen to an advance copy of this audiobook. All opinions are my own.

I'm a sucker for a good thriller or hisfic, and this one sounded so good. Plus that cover? *chef's kiss* Despite this being a historical thriller -- best of both worlds -- it was a bit slow in the pacing. There were a lot of characters that we were introduced to, and two plots going on, so at first I was confused as to what was going on. However, once I figured out who everyone was and what was going on, I quickly found myself absorbed in the story and couldn't put it down.

I liked that this was a complex who-dunnit and there is doubt cast on everyone involved. This one was heavily researched and it touches upon topics such as Japanese internment, racial identity, and class disparity.

I would definitely recommend this book to any historical fiction, thriller or mystery readers, and will be on the lookout for other books by Amy Chua.

Thank you to Netgalley and Minotaur for my eArc. All opinions are my own.

Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of The Golden Gate.

I'm not a fan of historical fiction, but I do like history and I requested The Golden Gate based on the intriguing premise, so I went into this with an open mind.

I'm glad my request was approved because I enjoyed this more than I thought I would.

The Golden Gate is a combination of a detective story, racial and societal politics, and history, just to name a few.

It's not a coincidence the detective in charge of the murder investigation at the swanky Claremont Hotel graduated from college with a degree in history.

Each chapter begins with a brief overview of the history or background of the location or area he's driving to.

As Sullivan navigates the tricky threads of the investigation, tangling with the wealthy and notorious Bainbridge family, he unravels their family secrets, while struggling to hold onto his own family, and coming to terms with his own identity as a biracial man, uncle, and detective.

This was well written and well researched, and Ms.. Chua incorporated politics, communism, China, corruption, unions, inequality and social status and class inequality well within the story.

I learned a few facts about this time period, as well as the influential Asian women who lived during these times.

I liked Al Sullivan; he's a good guy, and loyal to his job and his family. I also liked his spunky niece, Miriam, and their bond. She's similar to her uncle, a hard worker and loyal to her family, namely her deadbeat mom.

But, the mystery took a backseat to the political and racial turmoil brewing in San Francisco and California at this time.

My only caveat is that Sullivan figures out whodunnit but the readers are told through an info dump by the killer.

Personally, I prefer it when the detective or whoever is solving the mystery says, "I figured it out!"

I'd like to see Al Sullivan in a series and learn more about Miriam, but with more focus on the mystery rather than history.

I've never been to the Claremont but after reading this, I'm curious to see it for myself.

I really enjoyed this book especially the beginning and the end. I learned so much about California's history via the author having the characters provide the information. I feel as though the story really slowed down in the middle but I guess it was unavoidable

Overall I enjoyed the book

The Golden Gate
By Amy Chua

This is ostensibly a murder mystery. But it is also an expose of society in the San Francisco Bay area during World War II. Al Sullivan, a Berkley police detective, is not Irish as his name would indicate – he is actually the son of an American mother and a Mexican father, and his name is Gutierrez. He has inherited his mother's genes and thus appears "white". He is the detective in charge of the investigation of the murder of Walter Wilkinson, a presidential candidate, at the Claremont Hotel. The plotting here is cleverly done, and the perpetrator and the motive aren't exposed until the end.

More significant than the actual murder is the back story of what was going on socially at the time. We find Madame Chiang Kai-Shek living in the area, together with Chinese communist infiltrators and Chinese tongs. Then there are the Japanese, who have been relegated to internment camps after Pearl Harbor. On the other extreme are the social elite whose wealth shields them from the life challenges of those on the lower rungs of society. The Claremont is a perfect reflection of the social order. Add to that the police corruption and the protesting strikers and communists and you have a clear picture of the city of the time.

I enjoyed this book as much for the background information it provides as for the mystery itself.

Thank you to Net Galley and the publisher for an arc of this book.

I think my biggest complaint with this book was that the author didn't know what she wanted to write about. There are the bones of a historical mystery here, but it's completely overtaken by a (frankly boring) history textbook, with a little bit of Gothic paranormal scenes randomly thrown in. I think the author should have chosen one of these routes to pursue and edited everything else out.

The mystery itself wasn't awful. I wasn't actually invested in the outcome because the storyline wasn't mysterious enough for my taste. The writing was just too blunt: the detective went here, he talked to this person, he's sure she did it, now he thinks this other woman did it, but now he's positive this third woman is the culprit. There weren't enough clues or red herrings dropped along the way for me to want to figure out whodunit too. So, the mystery plotline was serviceable, but not engaging.

Honestly, there was just way too much history included in the story. Pages upon pages upon pages of unnecessary history bogged the story down and made reading it a chore. I made at least ten different notes for myself throughout the book when the author goes off on a 5-page tangent when one paragraph would have sufficed. It seemed like she wanted to include every single piece of research she did on the history of California, Mexico, female architects, the migration of blacks to California, the otter trade, native peoples crossing the Bering Straits, etc. I was having flashbacks of my boring high school history textbook for much of the story. The vast majority of this needed to be edited out because it didn't bring anything to the actual murder mystery plot.

Not only did the history lessons need to be cut because they were unnecessary, but also because this book is told in the first person. It was jarring to read multiple pages of detailed California agricultural history and then have the next paragraph start with "I pulled the car over in front of the house." (Just for example.) It was like two different texts were cut and pasted together with different POVs.

As for characters, I wasn't impressed here either. Only the MC was developed to any degree, none of the side characters were more than a couple of adjectives. And I truly didn't like the MC. I didn't enjoy being in his head, and I didn't find him interesting.

The only not bad thing about this book for me was the prose. It was an easy book to read, the sentences were well formed, but that isn't enough for more than one star in my opinion.

4.5 stars
I started this one at work and I’m so glad it ended up being a slow day at the office because I couldn’t put it down! At times I wasn’t really sure which genre this book wanted to be in-historical fiction, murder mystery, police procedural, with a sprinkling of possibly paranormal. Whatever it is, I found it oddly addicting.
I really appreciated every so often the author added a few paragraphs of California history when it ended up being relevant to that part of the story. It flowed into the narrative naturally and never felt like a history textbook.
When you get closer to the end (around 75% or so), you’re going to want to just cancel any other plans you might have so you can finish the book uninterrupted. You’ll have all kinds of twists and turns thrown at you. Don’t bother trying to keep track of them all… just hold on and enjoy the ride!

The Golden Gate is murder mystery that spans several decades. Not only that it is a history lesson woven into the murder mystery.

This starts with the murder of a young girl in a hotel. Next we pick up what is to be the present, a murder of a man that was a political candidate.

There are many characters over the different time periods which were at times difficult to keep track of. While I enjoyed some of the history provided, at times it was too much about the many topics covered. While some might find this enjoyable, for me it was tough to follow.