The Poe Shadow - Matthew Pearl

Baltimore, 1849. The body of Edgar Allan Poe has been buried in an unmarked grave. The public, the press, even Poe's family and friends accept the conclusion that Poe was a second-rate writer who died a drunkard. But none of this deters a young Baltimore lawyer named Quentin Clark, an ardent admirer who risks his own career and reputation in a passionate crusade to salvage Poe's.

Clark discovers that Poe's last days are riddled with vital unanswered questions. The police, it seems, may be concealing things. But just when Poe's death seems destined to remain a mystery Quentin realises he must find the one person who can solve this strange case: the real-life model for Poe's brilliant fictional detective character, C. Auguste Dupin, the hero of ingenious tales of crime and detection.

Clark successfully recruits the man he believes to have inspired Poe's Dupin only to be confronted by another claiming to be the true model and a dangerous race between the two master detectives begins, each seeking to prove he is the real 'Dupin' by solving the mystery of Poe's death. In short order, Clark finds himself enmeshed in sinister machinations involving international political agents, a female assassin, the corrupt Baltimore slave trade and the lost secrets of Poe's final hours. With his own future hanging in the balance, he must turn master investigator himself to unchain his now imperiled fate from that of Poe.

The Poe Shadow is a beautifully detailed, ingeniously plotted tale of suspense which opens a thrilling new window on the truth behind Poe's demise, literary history's most persistent enigma.