Fictionalising a true story, Stewart finds truths about the current state of female self-defence hiding in the past
A century ago a single woman in America was a dangerous one. She couldn’t vote – that wouldn’t be law until 1920. If she owned property or had money to spend, it was, more likely than not, because of the financial largesse of her husband, brother, or father. Multiply that single woman by three, place them on a farm in rural New Jersey, have them encounter an unpleasant man by means of a collision between their buggy and his car, and the danger and distrust leaps by greater bounds.
The single woman in question is Constance Kopp, the protagonist of Amy Stewart’s marvellous romp of a debut mystery Girl Waits With Gun. Constance was a real person, as were her sisters Norma and Fleurette. And the buggy accident that sets off the book’s action actually happened, caused by the surly, unsavoury Henry Kaufman near Paterson, New Jersey, in the summer of 1914, the year Constance turned 35 and before she served as deputy sheriff of Paterson. Even the book’s title is taken from one of the least sensational news stories that would be written about the sisters as they battled a campaign of terror waged by Kaufman and his henchmen.
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