Most parents want to do their best for their children. But it’s not always easy. In some cases (possibly more common in the past than now), the solution has been to send the young person to live elsewhere, at least temporarily. Whether it was a case of the family ‘black sheep,’ or a young woman who got ‘in trouble,’ or a young person (especially a woman) who couldn’t really live alone, families would sometimes solve the problem by sending their son or daughter away. The reasoning was that doing so would help the child (for instance, a boy apprenticed to someone to learn a trade). It might also save the family’s reputation. Sometimes leaving home worked out well; sometimes it didn’t. Either way, it’s got a long history as a solution to the question: ‘What are we doing to do with him/her?’ And this solution is certainly there in crime fiction.

Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot’s Christmas (AKA A Holiday For Murder and Murder For Christmas) concerns the Lee family. Simeon Lee is an unpleasant, malicious family patriarch. One Christmas, he invites his family to the family home, Gorston Hall, for the holiday. No-one really wants to attend, but no-one dares to refuse. So, Lee’s sons and their wives, and his granddaughter, gather at the house. What they don’t know at first is that Simeon’s also invited his son Harry, the family ‘black sheep.’ Harry’s been more or less exiled because of his reputation and his spendthrift ways. It’s awkward for everyone except Simeon Lee, who’s taking sadistic pleasure in upsetting everyone. On Christmas Eve, Simeon is murdered in his private room. Hercule Poirot is staying nearby, and the local police superintendent persuades him to help investigate. As he does, we see Harry’s status as opposed to that of his siblings and other family members.

In Daphne du Maurier’s Jamaica Inn, we are introduced to twenty-three-year-old Mary Yellan. It’s 1820, and Mary’s mother has recently died. Her last wish was that Mary be sent to live with her Aunt Patience and Uncle Joss Merlyn, who own a place called Jamaica Inn. At that time, young ladies don’t live alone, and Mary has no reputable way of making a living, so she goes along with her mother’s wish. Several people have warned Mary about Jamaica Inn, but she makes the trip anyway. When she gets there, she finds that the inn is cold and unwelcoming, her uncle is crude, boorish, and bad-tempered, and her aunt is cowed and frightened. Mary doesn’t want to stay, but she sees no choice. Little by little, she learns that Jamaica Inn holds its share of dark secrets, and that she could be in grave danger.

One plot thread of Mark Douglas-Home’s The Sea Detective concerns two young girls, Basanti and Preeti, who belong to India’s Bedia group. Their families are desperately poor, and it’s decided that the only solution is for Preeti and Basanti to join the dhanda, a word for India’s sex trade. The idea is that the girls will earn money in that profession, send it back to their families, and in a few years, leave the trade, return to their villages, and marry. Accordingly, both girls are sold and sent away to Scotland, where they will live. They are given to some very nasty people, but Basanti manages to escape. She loses contact with Preeti, though, and worries about her. Her search for Preeti leads her to oceanographer and Ph.D. candidate Caladh ‘Cal’ McGill. She hopes that his knowledge of the ocean might help her find out what happened to her friend, and so it turns out to be.

As Séan Haldane’s The Devil’s Making begins, it’s 1868, and Chad Hobbes is on his way from England to Vancouver. He recently finished his law degree at Oxford, but his choice of profession caused a rift in his family, since his father wanted him to study Divinity. That conflict, plus his natural curiosity about the world, has spurred Chad to spend some time in Canada. The plan is for him to live there for a while and then return to England to marry a ‘proper young lady.’ When he arrives in Vancouver, Chad uses letters of introduction he’s gotten to settle in and get a position as a constable. Most of his job entails settling drunken fights and occasionally clearing one or another area of prostitutes. But things change when the body of Richard McCrory, an American immigrant who billed himself as an ‘alienest,’ a sort of psychologist, is discovered. At first, it looks as though he might have been killed by the jealous partner of an Indigenous woman he’d been seeing. And that’s the explanation Chad’s superiors want. But Chad things it’s not so simple, so he keeps asking questions. And he learns that there’s more to this case than it seems on the surface, and more people had a motive than it might appear.

There’s also C.J. Archer’s Murder at the Mayfair Hotel. In that novel, which takes place in 1899, twenty-three-year-old Cleopatra ‘Cleo’ Fox had been living with her grandmother after the deaths of her parents. When her grandmother passes away, it’s arranged that she will live with her Uncle Ronald and Aunt Lilian Bainbridge, who own the exclusive Mayfair Hotel in London. Cleo has little money, so she doesn’t have the means to live on her own, even if it were socially acceptable. So, although she’s not sure about this arrangement, she sees it as a solid alternative. She’s only been settled in for a short time when Mrs. Warrick, one of the guests, is found dead of what turns out to be poison. Inspector Hobart begins the investigation, and it’s not long before the police suspect one of the staff members. Cleo knows that hotel staff members don’t have a lot of ‘clout,’ so they can be easily blamed for a crime, even if they’re innocent. So, she decides to ask some questions and use her ‘well born’ status to find out the truth. Among other things, the book shows how young, single ladies of the time might be sent to live elsewhere if they no longer have parents.

It used to be common to send one’s sons/daughters away, whether for financial reasons, because of family deaths, or to prevent a scandal. It still happens in plenty of places. It brings a lot of challenges in real life, but it can add an interesting layer in a crime novel.

*NOTE: The title of this post is a line from Supertramp’s The Logical Song.