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Although I remember the 1939/1940 New York World's Fair vividly (my favorite was the GE Robot exhibit), whether because I was there as a preschooler or because I remember the home movies my father took of us there, I never knew about the San Francisco World's Fair of 1939 (The Golden Gate Exposition) until I was an adult, so of course I now like to find out everything I can about it, It was built on 'Treasure Island' a man-made island and two bridges were built to service the hordes that were expected to visit San Francisco during that time. MURDER LOVES COMPANY was first published in 1940 and the story revolves around a horticultural expert, Professor James Yeats Biddle, who created the gardens on Treasure Island, and Kay Ritchie, a reporter for a newspaper in San Francisco, and involves murder of both people and ancient olive trees and lost Russian jewels. There are also comments about life in Northern California during the first part of the 20th century. "There was a quality of grassy bleakness about the hills of Berkeley, James ruminated, some subtle lack of accord between man and the outdoors, which made the place a natural setting for a college, a stopping place for restless transient youth." We were a much more naive people in the days before we entered World War II, and Mersereau's book, contemporary with that time, shows it. We see a San Francisco area that still has space and groves where olives or other fruit can be grown. Berkeley is almost empty of people except for the students and faculty, and even a college professor can afford a sports car and a daily woman to come in and clean for him. If the story seems a bit predictable, we must remember when this book was written. It's not a 2004 book set in 1939, it's a 1940 book set the year before. There is a charming love story as well.
Reviewed by Barbara Franchi, July 2004
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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
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