The Girl in the Green Dress

A Mystery Featuring Zelda Fitzgerald

By: Mariah Fredericks

Narrated by: Marnye Young

From the author of The Lindbergh Nanny comes an evocative mystery about the 1920 murder of the gambler Joseph Elwell, featuring New Yorker writer Morris Markey and Zelda Fitzgerald.

At the dawn of the Jazz Age, Morris Markey arrives in New York to become a writer. Having served in France, he needs to be in a place so distracting he cannot hear himself think. New in town, Markey hovers at the edge of the city’s revels, unable to hear the secrets that might give him his first Big Story. Finally one night he spots Joseph Elwell, a man about town known for courting wealthy married women, with a glorious girl in a dress of silver and dollar green.

The next morning, Elwell’s housekeeper runs out into the street screaming that Elwell has been shot. Every door and window in the house is locked. Did the ravishing woman kill her paramour? At last, Morris Markey has his story.

To penetrate the glittering world of Joseph Elwell, Markey turns to the newly famous Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, who met Elwell the same fateful night he night. Bored while Scott is working on his next novel, Zelda offers to help Markey with his investigation.

Together, Markey and Zelda learn that there were many people in Elwell's life who had reason to want him dead. And when a second man is found shot in his home in a very similar way, Markey begins to suspect that the truth may be more complicated―a story so dangerous that after he finishes it three decades later, he himself is found dead in his home, a single bullet through his head.

Mariah Fredericks's third standalone novel based on a true story from New York City's glamorous past, The Girl in the Green Dress is a truly standout historical mystery.

©2025 Mariah Fredericks (P)2025 Dreamscape Media

Excellent!

Engrossing and enjoyable historical mystery. Peopled with (mostly) real-life characters and based around a real-life-- and still unsolved-- murder that kicked off the Roaring Twenties, this was a great read. The early 1920s New York setting comes to life with plenty of names of those who were famous at the time popping up 'hither and yon'. (Well, maybe not yon.) Add the fascinating Zelda Fitzgerald as a main character to the mix, and you have a truly wonderful mystery story. (One character has a small part, but will bring a smile to Philo Vance fans, if any besides me still exist.) The book also explores the dark side of fame and fortune and the too much, too soon lives of Scott and Zelda.

Like The Lindberg Nanny -- another terrific novel by the author -- Ms. Fredericks proposes a solution to the Elwell murder, but leaves plenty of ambiguity, which is a perfect way to end a novel about an unsolved, locked room murder. There's also a surprise at the end -- it was to me, at least. Fine narration by Ms. Young. This one is a bona-fide page-turner. Highly recommended.