★ 06/08/2020
Knecht’s excellent sequel to Who Is Vera Kelley? picks up with ex-CIA agent Vera in 1967 New York City, as she tries to solve a mystery in an era when only men are expected to do the job. Vera’s poetry professor girlfriend, Jane, announces she’s had enough of not feeling wanted, and leaves. Then Vera loses her editing job at a TV station after her boss finds out she’d been dating a woman. She decides to fall back on her old skills and becomes a private detective. When the Ibarra family asks Vera to find their nephew’s child, Félix, who was sent to New York from the Dominican Republic amid political unrest, Vera takes on the case. Meanwhile, Vera balances the emotional consequences of her breakup with a new love interest: the bartender at her favorite, oft-raided, bar. When Vera realizes the Ibarras aren’t who they say they are, her mission becomes a different one: find Félix and his real parents, reunite them, and throw the fake Ibarras off the scent. This leads her to the Dominican Republic, where the police mistake her for a spy. Knecht brilliantly captures Vera’s emotions, and shines with keen observations of the varied settings. This winning literary page-turner gives a strong sense of a smart, queer, and complex person navigating an unfriendly world. (June)
"Sharp. . . the biggest pleasure is how she evokes a not-so-distant time with specific, slightly outdated language (Kelly stores bullets in an empty 'cold cream jar') and period details (Kelly lives in pre-Stonewall Greenwich Village, so her local pub is subject to frequent police raids and her chums get fired because of whom they love)."
"Snappy, gritty, and engaging."
"The Vera books bring to mind some of Highsmith’s work’s murkiness, evasion, and freedom. . . . Where will the next case for Vera come from? . . . I hope we don’t have to wait long to find out."
Los Angeles Review of Books
"Thanks to Rosalie Knecht's clever, hilarious writing, you'll find yourself wanting everyone you know to read it so that you can discuss together the wholly original, brilliantly subversive character that is Vera Kelly."
on Who Is Vera Kelly? NYLON
"Vera Kelly Is Not a Mystery is the perfect sequel, because it’s even better than the first book. . . . Reader, you will love this one. Don’t walk. Run."
"With Vera Kelly, Rosalie Knecht has resurrected the detective novel for the 21st century. Sharp, self-possessed, and with a nuanced, meaningful knowledge of realities and histories well beyond her own, Kelly's take on who's lying and why makes for riveting reading in every scene. I tore through this book. More Vera Kelly, please."
"Sexy, sad and stylish."
"Forget about 007. This heroine has her own brand of spycraft..."
"Rosalie Knecht is an audacious talent, and her latest novel a propulsive, subversive gem. Vera Kelly is Not a Mystery reintroduces us to Vera, one of the most compelling and complex characters in modern fiction, and puts her to the task of unwinding an intriguing mystery that will keep you guessing until the very end."
"A splendid genre-pushing thriller . . . A fractured coming-out in the repressive '50s primed Vera for a life of deception—but in Knecht's expert hands she's smart and complicated, yearning for connection in a tumultuous world.”"
on Who Is Vera Kelly? People
"Gripping, magnificently written . . . This is a cool, strolling boulevardier of a book, worldly, wry, unrushed but never slow, which casts its gaze upon the middle of the last century and forces us to consider how it might be failing us still."
The New York Times Book Review
"The personal is most definitely political in Rosalie Knecht's crisp, lively and subversive second novel, Who Is Vera Kelly? . . . John le Carré and many other writers make hay with the personal repercussions of assuming false identity. Knecht flips the terms artfully, showing us a heroine who discovers her true tough self by going undercover."
"Vera Kelly is Not a Mystery is an intricate mystery featuring love, corruption, and a charming and capable heroine."
"Knecht’s novel is a slow-burn espionage thriller, a complex treatment of queer identity, and an immersive period piece all rolled into one delectable page-turner . . . Vera Kelly introduces a fascinating new spy to literature’s mystery canon."
"Knecht's writing is evocative and spare, stylish and brooding, making this mystery series compulsively readable and offering a refreshing spin on atmospheric noir with a compelling queer historical frame."
"Thanks to Rosalie Knecht's clever, hilarious writing, you'll find yourself wanting everyone you know to read it so that you can discuss together the wholly original, brilliantly subversive character that is Vera Kelly."
on Who Is Vera Kelly? NYLON
"A splendid genre-pushing thriller . . . A fractured coming-out in the repressive '50s primed Vera for a life of deception but in Knecht's expert hands she's smart and complicated, yearning for connection in a tumultuous world.”"
on Who Is Vera Kelly? People
2020-03-30
The welcome sequel to Who Is Vera Kelly? (2018) opens in August 1967, a year after Vera’s last mission for the CIA. Both her personal and professional lives are upended when she's dumped by her girlfriend and loses her job for being a lesbian on the same day. At a loss, Vera decides to use her CIA training to open an office as a private investigator, and when a Dominican couple asks her to find the missing son of a politically endangered family for her first major case, all of Vera’s skills, intuition, and self-reliance will be tested. Vera discovers the boy has run away from foster care after his caretaker died, and her subsequent trip to the Dominican Republic to find the boy’s parents echoes her escape from Argentina in the last book when her investigation reveals her employers are not who they seem and she's taken hostage. In between her undercover obligations, Vera attempts a new relationship with a bartender named Maxine but finds she cannot develop substantial connections with others while keeping all of her secrets. Author Knecht uses this second book to delve more into Vera’s personal life and history while also deftly balancing the host of characters related to the mystery. Knecht’s prose is expansive in Vera’s moments of introspection and lively in moments of action, and she moves easily between Vera’s first-person narration and third-person scenes regarding the missing boy. Readers will be thrilled by Vera Kelly’s return.
A worthy and welcome continuation of a subversive series.
Elisabeth Rodgers gives a low-voiced, pitch-perfect narration of this character-driven mystery set in the 1960s. Vera Kelly is going through a rough patch after losing her girlfriend and her job in the same week. She decides to open her own P.I. firm, and her first case involves the missing child of Dominican exiles. Vera’s search leads her through the New York City foster care system to a glamorous estate in the Dominican Republic. Rodgers’s voice sounds like it was transported right out of the 1960s; she captures all of Vera’s brash determination and cool nonchalance. Her narration is by turns rough and silky, vulnerable and aloof as Vera attempts to put her life back together by solving a mystery and embarking on a new relationship. L.S. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine
