Crime Writer Margot Kinberg

When people have power and money, they tend to try to keep that privilege. One way they do that is through banding together with other very wealthy people to keep each other’s secrets and help each other stay out of trouble. So, when there’s crime among the very wealthy and powerful, it can be very difficult for the police or private detectives to find out the truth. They’re not going to get much co-operation from a very wealthy suspect’s friends and relatives. There are plenty of stories of how this works in real-life news; it’s also there in crime fiction.

For instance, in Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express, American businessman Samuel Ratchett is murdered on the second night of a three-night train journey on the famous Orient Express. The only possible suspects are the other passengers on the same coach. Hercule Poirot is on the train, and he is asked to solve the murder. It turns out that that sort of loyalty plays an important role in the case. In fact, one of the suspects, Princess Natalia Dragomiroff, has this to say:

I believe, Messieurs, in loyalty – to one’s friends and one’s family and one’s caste.

She takes that belief very, very seriously.

Gail Bowen’s The Endless Knot features investigative reporter Kathryn Morrissey. She’s written an exposé about the way some very wealthy and celebrated Canadians treat their children. Although the people interviewed for the work gave their consent, there are plenty of people who are upset at the revelations. It turns out that Morrissey revealed a lot more in her piece than any of her subjects expected.  In fact, one person, Sam Parker, is so upset that he shoots Morrissey, wounding but not killing her. He’s arrested and wants to hire expert lawyer Zack Shreve to defend him. It’s not going to be easy, because there is no question as to whether he was responsible for the shooting. As that plot thread plays out, we get a look at the lives of the very wealthy elites, and at what happens when they feel threatened.

The focus of Brannavan Gnanalingam’s Sprigs is a group of boys who attend St. Luke’s, an exclusive New Zealand boys school. One Saturday, the school’s rugby team wins an important victory, so the members of the First XV decide to have a party that night to celebrate. Word gets around, and the party attracts all the young people in the area. One of the partygoers is a Year Eleven student, Priya Gaianan. While she’s there, she has more than she should to drink and ends up being gang-raped by four of the St. Luke’s rugby players. Worse still, the incident is recorded and passed around. In one plot thread, there is an investigation of what happened, but it’s not going to reveal much. For one thing, the boys and their families – almost all of them wealthy and privileged – stick together to try to keep the boys out of trouble, despite what they’ve done. For another, the St. Luke’s school officials don’t want to sully the school’s reputation, so they stick together, too, and do what they can to prevent a wholesale investigation of the crime. Among other things, it’s a clear example of the wealthy elite standing together in order to keep their privilege.

Persia Walker’s Goodfellowe House takes place in 1926 Harlem, during the years of the Harlem Renaissance. Lanie Price is a former crime reporter who now works as a society columnist. She is approached by Ruth Todd, who wants her to re-investigate the three-year-old disappearance of Ruth’s sister Esther. At the time, not much was done about the case. For one thing, it was perfectly possible that Esther left of her own will. For another, it’s not a priority case: it’s ‘just another Black woman.’ Still, Lanie promises that she’ll look into the matter again and begins to do just that. Part of the trail leads to the home of wealthy philanthropist Katherine Goodfellowe, where Esther had been hired as a singer for a party. That was the last place she was seen, and Lanie tries to follow up with some of the people at the party. It’s going to be hard (and dangerous) for Lanie, though. Several of those people are wealthy and powerful, and eager not to have their secrets come out. What’s more, the reputation of the Black community is an important antidote to the racism of the era. If it gets out that there was a murder after a Black society party, this could cause a lot of problems. In the end, though, Lanie gets to the truth.

And then there’s Lawrence Osborne’s On Java Road. Journalist Adrian Gyle has been living and working in Hong Kong since the 1997 handover to China. He has to walk a very delicate line to do his job. On the one hand, there are several activist groups that protest China’s policy towards Hong Kong. That’s news. On the other, Gyle has friends among Hong Kong’s wealthy elite, who benefit from getting along with the new political order.  They may privately disagree with China’s policy, but they protect each other, and publicly go along with the new way of doing things. One of Gyle’s friends is Jimmy Tang, a member of one of Hong Kong’s wealthiest and most powerful families. And that’s the problem. Tang is in a relationship with a young activist, Rebecca To. Then, she goes missing shortly after she and Tang break up. Soon after that, Tang himself goes missing. When a woman’s body is pulled out Victoria Harbor, Gyle thinks it may be Rebecca To. If so, did his friend Jimmy have something to do with her death? It’s a major story, but it’s also very dangerous to go up against a group of wealthy people who are determined to keep their secrets and their privilege. I know, fans of Qiu Xiaolong’s Inspector Chen series. We see this sort of thing a lot in those novels.

Money and power can be addictive. At the very least, the privileged life gives people a sense of security that many don’t want to give up. So it’s little wonder that a group of the elite will stand together and protect each other if that’s what it take. There are a lot of examples of this sort of plot point in the genre. These are only a few. Your turn.

*NOTE: The title of this post is a line from Paul Simon’s The Boy in the Bubble