Carolyn Whitzman's Blog - Posts Tagged "true-crime"

Today marks the official publication date of "Clara at the Door with a Revolver". The book is about Clara Ford, a Black tailor and single mother in Toronto who was accused of killing her rich white former neighbour, Frank Westwood, in 1894.

My new book is quite different from my other 4 books, which all were written for an academic audience. I describe this book as a murder mystery-social history. I use the widely publicized arrest and trial to examine racism, misogynoir, and transphobia in Canadian 19th century society. Clara was the first person described as a 'homosexual' in a North American newspaper, as well as the first woman and second accused person to testify on her own behalf in a Canadian trial. Throughout, stereotypes that still persist about gender, race and class determined her treatment by police and media, even as Clara's intelligence and wit allowed her to convince twelve white jurors that she was forced into a false confession. And then she joined the first Black vaudeville troupe... it is quite the story!

I'll post some links once they are up, but this week I'm talking to Matt Galloway from The Current on CBC; 'What's Her Name', a great podcast on women's history; and a book excerpt will be in the Toronto Star this weekend. If you like true crime or are interested in Canadian Black history or women's history, go to your local independent bookstore or library and get a copy. Or go to UBC Press directly: https://www.ubcpress.ca/clara-at-the-...

Thanks in advance!

Clara at the Door with a Revolver: The Scandalous Black Suspect, the Exemplary White Son, and the Murder that Shocked Toronto

I don't know what kind of reception I expected, because I'm new to marketing to a general audience, but WOW! What a week!

Clara at the Door with a Revolver made it to the top of the Toronto's Star's new and notable list:
https://www.thestar.com/entertainment...

And then it got excerpted yesterday (Saturday):
https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2023...

And then there was this wonderful interview on CBC's The Current with Matt Galloway. If you want to know the story before you read it, I recommend this 20 minute interview:
https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/...

If you want a slightly longer version of some of the historical themes behind the story of Clara - more on Toronto's Black history, or gender and sexuality, or crime and punishment, Historia Canadiana's hour long interview with me (I tried to hyperlink all this but total HTML fail: https://sites.libsyn.com/425342/inter...

There is much more to come! I'm rapturous about the media interest. Let me take the opportunity to recommend a few other great Black Canadian history books:
"Policing Black Lives: State Violence in Canada from Slavery to Present", by Robyn Maynard" https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...
"Where Beauty Survived: An Africadian Memoir", by George Elliot Clarke https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5...
"The Hanging of Angelique: the untold story of Canadian slavery and the burning of Montreal", by Afua Cooper
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

What an interesting article in Quill and Quire about Clara Ford's stories and the nature of truth! https://quillandquire.com/authors/in-...