Eliot Ness died of a heart attack when he was only fifty-four. He was an interesting figure for me, a man I liked. As so often happens in these historical journeys I take, the sadness of the history often overwhelms me, and I wonder how I’m going to give my readers a happy ending—or even a sense of an ending—when history is messy and hard and often sad. The thing that stands out for me with people like Eliot Ness is that he was good. Not perfect. Not by any stretch. But good. He tried. He wanted to make things better. He wanted to do the right thing, and even though he had his flaws and his selfish ambitions, he was not ruled by them. Maybe that is what makes heroes of regular men and what makes regular men (and women) heroes.
The mystery surrounding the Cleveland Torso Murders of the 1930s dogged Eliot Ness for the rest of his career. As he said in the story, finding the Butcher wasn’t like taking out Al Capone. Ness never talked to the papers or pointed the finger of blame, but I think Eliot Ness knew who the Butcher of Kingsbury Run was, and he did his best to bring the carnage to an end. Many believe those years in Cleveland cost him his health, his first marriage, and his career. I wish him peace.
The mystery surrounding the Cleveland Torso Murders of the 1930s dogged Eliot Ness for the rest of his career. As he said in the story, finding the Butcher wasn’t like taking out Al Capone. Ness never talked to the papers or pointed the finger of blame, but I think Eliot Ness knew who the Butcher of Kingsbury Run was, and he did his best to bring the carnage to an end. Many believe those years in Cleveland cost him his health, his first marriage, and his career. I wish him peace.
Which brings me to Michael Malone. He was a special agent for the Treasury Department, one of the famed T-Men. But he is not at all well known. The rough sketch of his life that I use in my novel does follow the real man. His older sister Molly, a side character in this story, was a constant in his life after he lost his mother at a young age. He and his wife, Irene, were estranged for most of their marriage after losing two children, and Michael spent the rest of his life embedded in big cases, doing work that very few people ever knew about. His friendship with Eliot Ness was not documented, nor did Malone help Ness with the Cleveland Torso Murders, but I have no doubt that the two knew and worked together on the Capone case, where Michael was undercover for eighteen months and pivotal in bringing the organization down.
By all accounts, Michael Malone was a quiet, dedicated, crime fighter who never received or wanted the credit. I learned about him in a documentary on Al Capone and the mob and started digging into his story. As always happens, once you start pulling on threads, one leads to another and another. He became my leading man, mostly because I wanted to give his story an ending I felt he deserved. His love and life with Dani Flanagan is all fiction, but the real Michael Malone earned it, and part of me wonders if Dani and Malone might need to go on a few more adventures together, solve a few more mysteries, and pull a few more secrets from the cloth. I think they make a very good team.
With every book I write, I delve into the people and circumstances that create a setting. Every place has its story, but America, maybe more than any other country, has a patchwork quilt of the world layered over every city and town. It is one of the most fascinating things about writing; you uncover the identity of not only your characters but of every place you write about. Cleveland’s founding was dominated by Eastern European immigrants, mainly Hungarians, Czechs, and Poles, who brought their own flavor and color to the area. The Kos family are fictional, but their Czech heritage is not. The Broadway, East 55th part of town has tried to preserve that history and some of the original Bohemian buildings, but sadly, much of it is gone. That’s why historical fiction is so important. It brings these places, and these people, back to life.
The hardest thing for Dani in The Unknown Beloved was the fact that so many of the Butcher’s victims were never named. They died alone and unknown. The plight of the unknown was the theme of this book. Unknown people, unknown pain, unknown acts of heroism, and unknown acts of horror. Some of the Butcher’s victims were named, most were not, but I tried to make them as real as I could, if only to shine light on the sadness of their stories and the actuality of their lives.
So many of the things in this book are true that detailing them would demand a dozen lists and pages of explanation, but this story has something for everyone. Romance, friendship, courage, and crime, The Unknown Beloved is sure to send you down the rabbit hole by the time you are finished reading. Enjoy!
Amy Harmon
By all accounts, Michael Malone was a quiet, dedicated, crime fighter who never received or wanted the credit. I learned about him in a documentary on Al Capone and the mob and started digging into his story. As always happens, once you start pulling on threads, one leads to another and another. He became my leading man, mostly because I wanted to give his story an ending I felt he deserved. His love and life with Dani Flanagan is all fiction, but the real Michael Malone earned it, and part of me wonders if Dani and Malone might need to go on a few more adventures together, solve a few more mysteries, and pull a few more secrets from the cloth. I think they make a very good team.
With every book I write, I delve into the people and circumstances that create a setting. Every place has its story, but America, maybe more than any other country, has a patchwork quilt of the world layered over every city and town. It is one of the most fascinating things about writing; you uncover the identity of not only your characters but of every place you write about. Cleveland’s founding was dominated by Eastern European immigrants, mainly Hungarians, Czechs, and Poles, who brought their own flavor and color to the area. The Kos family are fictional, but their Czech heritage is not. The Broadway, East 55th part of town has tried to preserve that history and some of the original Bohemian buildings, but sadly, much of it is gone. That’s why historical fiction is so important. It brings these places, and these people, back to life.
The hardest thing for Dani in The Unknown Beloved was the fact that so many of the Butcher’s victims were never named. They died alone and unknown. The plight of the unknown was the theme of this book. Unknown people, unknown pain, unknown acts of heroism, and unknown acts of horror. Some of the Butcher’s victims were named, most were not, but I tried to make them as real as I could, if only to shine light on the sadness of their stories and the actuality of their lives.
So many of the things in this book are true that detailing them would demand a dozen lists and pages of explanation, but this story has something for everyone. Romance, friendship, courage, and crime, The Unknown Beloved is sure to send you down the rabbit hole by the time you are finished reading. Enjoy!
Amy Harmon
