Murder by Tradition

Kate Delafield #4

by Katherine V. Forrest

When a successful gay restaurateur is stabbed to death, Kate Delafield’s investigation puts her in conflict with her own fear of being outed as a lesbian. Can Kate testify for the prosecution with her integrity intact, when the killer’s attorney, the only man who knows the truth about Kate’s -sexuality, prepares a "homosexual panic" defense?

In addition to penning the legendary Kate Delafield mystery series, Katherine V. Forrest has written the lesbian romantic classic Curious Wine and the science fiction novels Daughters of a Coral Dawn and Daughters of an Amber Noon . She lives in San Francisco.

Genres: Mystery, LGBT, Fiction, Crime, Lesbian, Queer, Lesbian Fiction

280 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1991

About the author

Katherine V. Forrest is a Canadian-born American writer, best known for her novels about lesbian police detective Kate Delafield. Her books have won and been finalists for Lambda Literary Award twelve times, as well as other awards. She has been referred to by some "a founding mother of lesbian fiction writing."

Reviews

[Wendy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I almost forgot how much I like Kate Delafield. The first couple books in the series were some of the first lesfics I read. They're definitely the first ones that are not romances. This is an older book, set in the 1980's. Homophobia is prevalent, especially with the AIDs crisis. Kate is called to the murder scene of a gay restaurateur. She is still closeted and her colleagues in the LAPD are not exactly models of tolerance and acceptability. I enjoy the court drama - kind of remind me of Law and Order episodes. We also gradually see Kate work through herself how to handle potentially being outed by defense counsel in court. This book series can definitely be considered a lesfic classic.

[Tory · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely wonderful book. Reminds me of all we went through back in the day. Important book with a subject matter that I think everyone should read.

[Sally · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh this one was absolutely stellar! I love how it was half investigation, then half court-room drama... just like an awesome episode of SVU. Aw man, I miss SVU.

Totally giving this one five stars, because it really is my favourite so far. I've liked each one more than the last, funnily enough! And as incredible as #3 was, it was the fact that this one actually went to court for the second half of the book that made it win.

Btw I love the descriptions of Linda as having stylishly frizzy hair and oversize glasses... like, I'm sure that she really was a trend-setter back in 1989, but NOW it just makes me cringe a little. At least the size of her shoulderpads was left to the imagination ;)

I was super glad to see Aimee and Kate still together as well. For once, Kate didn't have to go and sleep with one of the witnesses! Finally, she has a stable partner to go home to and everything's just nice and normal and not gratuitous. Perhaps that's another reason why this is the first to get five stars. For the first time, she really was just a cop who happens to be gay and KVF didn't need to force that down our throats and constantly remind us. Because duh, we KNOW by now. And there was enough gay already what with the hate murder, that to have Kate finding a new chick to hit on would have been a bit too much. Not to mention really out of place, given the serious nature of this crime and the ensuing trial.

And yes, I totally cheered at the guilty verdict, even though I knew it had to be coming! Linda's closing arguments were absolutely brilliant, and the defense simply never had a leg to stand on. I loved when Pritchard objected to Linda insinuating that the defendant wasn't the only gaybasher present, before realising that either he had to admit he thought she meant him, or just shut up. XD

Also, considering that the defense's case was justifiable homicide in self defense because this GAY MAN was daring to come onto a normal, 100% straight guy, I was surprised that I never once wanted to throw the book across the room in disgust. The lame, bigoted arguments were kept to a minimum and for that I was glad.

Like with Sing You Home, it's extremely clear-cut who is right and who is wrong, without the book being unnaturally biased, and I like that. I love what Jodi Picoult did, and I love what KVF did here. There's no bias here, there's just obvious right and obvious wrong. And luckily, in both cases, the good guys do come out on top.

[Sandra de Helen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I haven’t read all of Forrest’s books, but I know she is well known and respected by the lesbian fiction community. I’ve read a few of the Kate Delafield books, and I’d heard this one was the best. The beginning is typical for a lesbian murder mystery in some ways, with a weary PI, a requisite sex scene, and some info re the PI’s home life. The murder is of a gay man, self-identified as a queen. Is it gaybashing? The book was published in 1991. Times have changed in some ways since then, but we are still plagued by hate crimes. The difference might be the PI wouldn’t have to be in the closet, even if she’s a cop. The story picks up pace (and my interest) when the trial begins. At first, I thought I wouldn’t enjoy the trial, but it turns out to be a great study in how the justice works and doesn’t work in the US. Forrest’s insights into the characters of each member of the jury, the DA, the Prosecutor, even the judge, are well-crafted. I will read more of her work.

[Celina · Rating 4 out of 5]

THE READER WAS TOO STUNNED TO SPEAK

What a book. The whole court episode was very nerve-wrecking but amazing. The betrayal, the character and story development was a step forward. I am almost inclined to think that this book series is about being gay in uniform and being gay out of it. With a conclusion that neither has it either.


Winning that case, felt like a win for love even though it was fiction. I still felt it in my bones, spreading happiness and a sense of justice that the real world needs a dose of.


I hope Taylor gets hit in the head with a hammer but a "real man" while he is on his avocado farm, that son of a gun.

[Gabriela Peña · Rating 5 out of 5]

El mejor que he leído de Katherine Forrest

[Patti · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first read this book years ago when it was published by Naiad. I reread it a couple of years ago (before Trump). I was struck by the difference in attitudes in people who have the power (authorities, DA’s police); then and now. It’s not perfect but it’s better than it was. I loved the passion of Delafield in taking on this case by herself and the ADA especially in her closing argument.

If you haven’t read this please do. It’s based on a true story.

[Scriptmonkey · Rating 3 out of 5]

Murder by Tradition veers off of Forrest's typical attempts at police procedural/detective drama and becomes a courtroom drama. What this entails is the prosecution repeating the facts of the case--and by repeating, I mean making the reader go through the same stuff that was seen or discussed in an earlier chapter. And, since Kate and the DA discuss the defense attorney's tactics, when he gets going, that seems repetitive too.

In many ways Forrest has shown consistent improvement in the writing of this series as she has allowed Kate Delafield to more fully express, what I assume are, the author's feelings and experiences. It helps that this installment is not burdened by Kate pursuing some romance with a murder witness/suspect.

That said, some nuance and subtlety would have been appreciated. The victim was portrayed as a glorious human being and the murderer was a total scumbag. This is not unusual, but it certainly relieves the protagonist from having to think too hard about it. The thing is all the characters are either saints or complete jerks.

For example, typical of stories from a police-POV, the Defense Attorney is a sleazeball despite having been friends with Kate's dead wife. Moreover, he, like most defense attorneys in these types of stories, is portrayed as a jerk for doing his job of "zealously advocating for his client" the way the DA is doing for the victim. It would have been a lot more interesting if he was totally friendly and sympathetic with Kate, but still had to do her job. You know, just like Kate always does regardless of the consequences? Instead, to make sure the reader didn't have any wayward thoughts, he was confirmed as a homophobe as well.

It was good to see that Kate finally was freed from her homophobic, racist partner Ed Taylor. Unfortunately, she doesn't rip him a new one like he deserved, especially after his petulant parting shot. He gets to think it was just a departmental change. Similarly, Kate doesn't get to have a private moment with Pritchard (prickhard anyone?) and let him have it for what can be seen from her POV as a betrayal of her deceased wife Ann, even if he was doing his job.

Now, I know what you're thinking. What about the jurors!? You weren't? Oh, well. There isn't much to say, except that the tearful handholding after the verdict was read. Was the implication that they, or people they knew, were gay? Or, that they knew the momentous nature of their verdict? Or was Forrest getting a little too cheesy? Regardless, Juror 4 wore the same damn sweater the entire trial. What did that thing smell like?

The next book looks like another deviation as she goes to DC. It seems like a miss-able flashback entry that will ramble about Vietnam. But it seems Aimee has a bigger role. (Aimee? This is the trouble with audiobooks. The spelling of names! I guess that's one way to make it clear that Aimee is much younger than Kate. Add a few more vowels onto the name, why don't ya? Parents will name their kids anything! Astute readers of this series will realize this hearkens back--does anyone hearken ahead?--to the first book where names are mocked)

[Jen Mays · Rating 4 out of 5]

I went into this book totally blind as a random pick from my TBR bookstack that I think I originally got through a book exchange, and found myself engaged with an interesting mystery/trial storyline centered around the death of an openly gay man. Written in 1991, the book explores scientific elements like blood spatter and evidence questions, but also the cultural view of homosexuality at the time. And in this current political climate, sadly there are a lot of similarities that show that for some people, not much has changed.

While the story is fictional, the murder was too gruesome and some of the language around homophobia too ugly to make this an "enjoyable" read but I found it interesting and compelling. The female detective in the story is lesbian, and that viewpoint brought some perspectives of the community unique to me as a heterosexual. I don't see myself deliberately seeking additional books from this author but I also wouldn't be opposed to picking up more if I came across them.

[Kat · Rating 3 out of 5]

Personally, I think procedurals are kind of dull, and the copy I got had a pretty misleading cover so I started it thinking it was going to be a gay cozy mystery (which can I just say: I REALLY want a gay cozy mystery) which meant I was a little disappointed. Still, this novel was very forward for its time. There were moments where I thought there may be some "internalized homophobia, closeted gay doing violence" at play which angers me, and I was pleasantly surprised that those elements weren't fleshed out further. I was happy, too, to read this and feel that the author was seeking out justice for all of the victims of hate-crimes whose cases did not receive the justice they deserved because they "chose a high-risk lifestyle."

[Macha · Rating 3 out of 5]

not really a police procedural, though Kate Delafield is a lesbian homicide cop for the LAPD in the 1990s here, investigating the brutal murder of a gay man, but the way this one's structured it becomes as much about the trial that follows. i'd never read any of this series, and though i was sympathetic to the premise of the story, i was too often questioning the setup, which seemed to me rather pat and without nuance. worse, the author's writing was very stiff and stilted, to the point of being uncomfortable to read. i like Kate's point of view and her conviction and doggedness, so i rooted for her, but it was not enough to make me want to read more of this series.

[honor · Rating 5 out of 5]

dissertation reading, #11

i absolutely devoured this book! i went into it thinking it was a little different than the delafields i’ve already read, and believing that a court procedural wouldn’t interest me nearly as much as the investigations i’m used to, but this was beautiful. the solidarity, the character development, and (spoiler) THE FACT THAT TAYLOR HAS FINALLY FUCKED OFF???? I AM OVERJOYED

[Sheri · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent. These mysteries just keep getting better and better! This was definitely more trial focused than solving a mystery, and that was wonderful! How the judicial system, the jury, or even the police, looked at gay people in 1991. Really well done, intelligent and insightful novel. I am off to # 5 in there series!

[Andrea · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have never been more invested in a court case than this one. It was like watching an episode of Law and Order. BUM BUM.

This case was hard to swallow but also reflects so many of the problems we have today. You could compare the killing of Teddie to the killing of Trayvon. Absolutely heartbreaking. I am glad we got justice in this book, so few of us do.

[Jamie (TheRebelliousReader) · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars. Court room scenes in books usually bore me to tears but this one did not. I was enthralled with all of it. This was definitely the best book of the series so far. Wow. I think this was a turning point in this series and I’m excited to see where things are going to go next. I’m also happy that Kate isn’t partnered with Taylor anymore. I never liked that guy so good riddance.

[Tyler · Rating 5 out of 5]

I stumbled upon this and one other at a Goodwill and I’m so glad I found it. I love mysteries and this was the first one I’ve read with predominantly LGBTQ+ people. The writing is easy to read, the characters are tangible (if idealistically written). Good tension building. Gonna read the other one next!

[Jen Keyer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Went into the court room and was great to get a different perspective. Gay bashing is a hate crime. Some states do not have hate crime bills in the year 2023. So if you got upset by this book you need to be really really pushing for that if your state does not have it.

[Cyd · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not so much a mystery as it is a police/courtroom procedural. Forrest skillfully weaves in the gay rights message without sounding preachy.

[Princessccamy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great story exceptionally written. I wish there were more intimate scenes between Kate and Aimee, especially the unburdening mentioned at the end.

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very good read. A horrific murder leads to a riveting court drama.

[Kena · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite of the series so far.

[Olivine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Inspiring, emotional, deep, beautiful.

[DC · Rating 1 out of 5]

The book is the story of the investigation of a crime and the prosecution of the suspect; chiefly the latter, in fact, since the suspect is found very quickly (really, it seemed almost unbelievably quickly — but I suppose most criminals are caught because they are stupid). The crime in question is the horrific slaughter of a gay man in the kitchen of his restaurant (slaughter is the word: 39 stab wounds). Detective Kate Delafield tracks down the suspect, manages to get a confession out of him (although he claims it was self-defence), and assists a DA in preparing for the trial; then we get the trial, and the verdict.

It really does all proceed exactly like that, from A to Z directly, with no surprises along the way. The book read oddly until I realised that dialogue aside it is almost wholly (more than 90%) pure visual description: this was there, she was wearing that, etc. Very flat visual description, too: none of the scenes have any atmosphere whatever. In fact, it was like reading the prose version of a screenplay, and I realised that in my head, I was seeing it as though it were a Universal TV movie from the Seventies, because not only did it feel like a screenplay manqué, it shared some of the clichés of crime TV movies. For example, there is Delafield's partner. When I picked up the book and saw that the blurb described her as a “lesbian detective” I thought she'd be likely to have a partner who was male, badly dressed and a homophobic bigot. That is exactly what her partner is like.

Oh, yes: Detective Delafield is a lesbian. She has a girlfriend, so there's a gratuitous, unconvincing sex scene. The relationship never seems remotely realistic (but, then, for realistic relationships you need well-rounded characters, and not one of the characters in this book is more than a cardboard puppet for the author to move around as the story demands). At one point, Delafield goes to a bar where she is surrounded by various lesbians (each with their own single defining characteristic, of course): it really does read like a variation on the cringeworthy "hip" scenes you used to get in so many US TV movies and crime series, except that instead of hippies, Delafield is surrounded by happy, smiling, lesbian faces (it really is presented like that). It does not remotely convince as anything that is likely to happen in the real world. Oh, and if you are alert to clichés, you will anticipate that the defence lawyer will be an acquaintance who knows she is a lesbian and try to use it against her at the trial. Oh, yes.

The point of the book is that the killer's defence is that he was defending himself, that he was overcome by fear and disgust at the dead man's gay advances. Apparently, this has actually been used in US courts as a defence (I have no idea if it has been successful), which is pretty shocking. Pointing out that this is a pile of stinking poo is A Good Thing, but the book is woefully badly written, and I don't think it actually helps the case to have the victim so flamboyantly gay that everyone who sets eyes on him knows he is gay (Delafield does when she sees his corpse; OK, her partner doesn't, but he is Stereotypical Homophobic Troglodyte Man...) — what, if he hadn't had the neon gay sign telling everyone what his sexuality was, it might have been OK for him to be killed?

I said this reminded me of US TV movies from the Seventies: specifically, it reminded me of the ones with a message: you know, the tedious ones that were never very good.

The shocking thing is, there's a series of these books; this is the fourth. How do books this bad get published?

[Lexxi Kitty · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every book up until this one involved an investigation into murder. This time it's Law and Order. Opens with murder. Shortly thereafter the police arrest a man for the crime and he confesses. Rest of book is the murder trial.

One of the big points that pop up in both the defense of the defendant and among police officers who are supposed to be investigating the case is the "Homosexual Defense". Two-fold: 1) guy deserved to die because he was gay; 2) defendant deserves to get off due to how a "normal common sense person" would freak out if a homosexual person attempted . . . well, breathing near them.

Oh, and less seen, but this "homosexual element" also impacts the prosecution. None of the male attorneys want the case, so it gets "dumped" onto a female attorney who has never done a murder trial before.

Kate's police partner basically shuts down and wants nothing to do with the case when it turns out that the murder victim is a gay man, and the murderer, during the confession, notes that he freaked out and that's why he killed. Ed wants the guy to get involuntary manslaughter, if that, because gay people are icky. Also, the police officers interviewing neighbors, witnesses, etc., are quite brief as they don't wish to be involved with the case. So Kate has to handle the police side by herself. Mostly.

I wasn't sure how the murder trial would go. How it would be written. I had not read one written by Forrest before. First two witnesses were basically described as "they got up, they gave their testimony, they got off the stand." So, it wasn't looking that thrilling, but then things picked up. In the end, the trial parts were probably among the best scenes I've read.

[Megan]

The fourth novel in the Kate Delafield series is a little bit of a letdown from the third. This is partly because the third was such a classic. In this one, Forrest turns her soap box to the problem of obtaining justice for a gay man in a still-homophobic world. The story: a gay man is found murdered in his own restaurant. Kate and her crew know who did it—he even confesses, but claims it was self defense. It is the word of a macho man against someone who can no longer defend himself.

And in the course of the book, Forrest turns the type of mystery from Investigative to Courtroom Drama. A nimble feat and one that speaks well to the author’s willingness to experiment within sub-genres. But the result is less than perfect. The prosecutor—with Kate’s help—has her work cut out for her but makes a brilliant attempt to prove premeditated murder. Whether the jury was convinced or not, I was not, even though Forrest obviously went through the novel with care in order to make everything seem correct.

The ending was right out of The Color Purple—the movie, not the book Kate’s young lover, Aimee, is still kind of a dud and, sadly, Kat’s partner turns from a fairly sympathetic guy into a homophobic bastard. It’s kind of like Forrest wanted to write about homophobia in the courtroom and was content to cut a few corners to get finished. Like I did for this review. Give this one an O for Okay

Final Rating: 3.5

Note: This review is included in my book The Art of the Lesbian Mystery Novel, along with information on over 930 other lesbian mysteries by over 310 authors..

[Akiva ꙮ · Rating 1 out of 5]

I got this at the Baltimore Free Library. Their LGBT fiction (which is mostly of 1970s-1990s vintage) is split about evenly between gay male romance novels and lesbian detective novels. That phenomenon was much more interesting to me than Murder By Tradition turned out to be.

Murder By Tradition sounds like it should involve secret societies and arcane rituals, but it's actually a very mundane Law and Order episode, set in the 1980s, with a lesbian detective and an out gay murder victim. Extremely forgettable, except the part where it's depressing to what extent an innocent or guilty verdict comes down to nothing more than whose lawyer has better sneaky lawyer tricks.

The main drama comes when the defense lawyer (who turns out to be evil and bungling for no reason beyond author laziness) threatens to out Detective Kate. What'll she do?? Afterward, Kate tells her girlfriend (who is not much more than a cardboard cutout, with an obligatory awkward mid-book sex scene), the badass feminist prosecutor, and her other vaguely characterized lesbian friends she would have refused to answer the question if he'd asked it. This is portrayed as an inspiring stand for gay rights, which does more than any of the frizzy hairstyles to date this novel.

[Kathleen Hagen]

Murder by Tradition, a Kate Delafield Mystery: by Catherine V. Forrest, a-minus, Borrowed from National Library Services for the Blind.

This is an excellent book. In this one, Kate finally comes out, as it were, to her fellow officers. A gay man is killed by someone he takes home with him. There is definitely enough evidence to indict the guy, but his lawyer throws up all kinds of smoke screens-he had to kill the guy in self defense, he didn’t know the guy was gay until he “groped” him, he was so panicked and revolted by being “groped” that he stabbed the victim in a moment of insanity-stabbed him 39 times, etc. Kate convinced the prosecuting attorney to face the crime head on, not to hide the fact that the victim was gay and that he was killed primarily for that reason. Kate investigated the case alone because her partner of several years was very homophobic and she thought he would be of no help. It’s an excellent book, written in the late ‘80’s when criminals were just starting to be held to account by prosecutors for hate crimes against gay victims. Very good.

[Mel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was more court room drama than murder mystery but I still found myself enjoying it immensely. The book focuses on the homophobia in society and how that hate can be used to justify murder by an ordinary straight person. The book is so visually written it's like watching an episode of a tv show. It is a fascinating portrayal. The murder is horrific but as the murderer doesn't divulge from his initial story I was left wondering why he had done it. The answer must have been that he knew the victim was gay and therefore decided to kill him, even though the case they were presenting was murder in the first, I still don't quite think they dealt with how it was premeditated rather than just in the moment. Quibble aside it was very good and the court room scenes were intense and it was all very emotional. I can't wait to read the next one.

[Bett · Rating 5 out of 5]

Arguably the best of the eight Kate Delafield novels, along with Apparition Alley and Murder at the Nightwood bar. If you read The Beverly Malibu first, then these three, that's the core of the Kate Delafield character. Katherine V. Forrest evokes the La scene as no other has since maybe Raymond Chandler.

[Freyja Vanadis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a courtroom drama rather than a mystery; the question of whodunit is never in doubt. Forrest does a pretty good job, although she does let things get too cheesy and emotional at the end when the verdict is read and everyone magically comes together in gay solidarity. That part is too unrealistic, and it's what causes me to give this a 4 out of 5 stars. Still a good book though.