The King of Ragtime

Larry Karp's The King of Ragtime takes on the double challenge of fictionalizing real historical figures and capturing their time and place with authority. Karp meets both challenges fully, and then hands us a crackling good murder mystery. As a reader who knows more than a little about the book's leading characters, Scott Joplin and Irving Berlin, I thought I'd find myself merely caught up with the author's portrayal of these men. Wrong. It's a murder mystery. Before long he had me exactly where he wanted me: "Who Done It?" Max Morath

I've just finished re-reading Larry Karp's The King Of Ragtime, second in his "Ragtime Mysteries" series, and it's a wonderful sequel to The Ragtime Kid. Like its predecessor, it's a mixture of real historical characters and some fictional folks, and similarly, it's a photograph of the Ragtime era, with its hustle and bustle, and casual racial and religious bias. The book takes place in the summer of 1916, in New York City, and it moves between Harlem and Manhattan, where rival composers Scott Joplin and Irving Berlin live and interact. The characters, both real and imagined, are nicely realized, and there's at least one surprise personality in the mix. We meet Berlin's partners, and his office staff, and Joplin's wife, Lottie, and his old friends from Sedalia, John and Eleanor Stark, now Eleanor Stanley. We get a feel for the Harlem scene, and the subway, and summer in New York City, as the characters move through the heat and sounds and smells of the city, and through the immensity of Penn Station. The research is impeccable, but always transparent. As in The Ragtime Kid, there's a black world and a white world, and they intersect here in Tin Pan Alley, the hub of popular American music. Joplin is now near the end of his life; suffering from dementia and paranoia, he's possessed by the need to complete two musical compositions. Berlin, on the other hand, is riding the popularity train, and equally bent on composing the music for a Ziegfeld musical review, and furthering his own career. Murder intervenes, however, and Joplin will be blamed if his friends don't find the real culprit. So they spirit him away, and his friends from the previous book are joined by a present friend and pupil and his friends, and justice is accomplished. There's lots of papers along the way: Joplin's musical compositions, and some evidence of financial wrong-doing within Berlin's music agency, and even some fake documents to get a witness out of the office. And there's kidnapping, and violence, and impersonation, and young love, and a moving conclusion--all the stuff of opera, in fact. Another, equally absorbing, puzzle overlies the book. Joplin's composition in progress, "If," compares the events of his own life to an alternate, hoped-for life. This book does something similar, posing the perennial author's question, "what if," and examining what might transpire when two men vie for the same musical crown while those about them merely pursue the almighty dollar. The parallels between Joplin and Berlin, two men possessed by their work, are many; small of stature but large of talent, they rage, they threaten, they trust no one, and they are "music-writing machine(s)." So is one of them truly the king of ragtime? Read this book, then read the author's "Last Word," and then listen to the music--and decide for yourself.

Finally, a sequel to The Ragtime Kid and one that does the groundbreaking Kid more than a little justice. The King of Ragtime follows ragtime's king, Scott Joplin, from Sedalia, Missouri to the end of the line, New York City's Harlem of 1916, a time when Joplin, addled and dying, is still writing his extraordinary music. Joplin, in fact, is a man possessed, a man who remains sane enough to be ambitious for his rightful place in the musical pantheon. But also determined to make his mark in the very same way is a now-famous songwriter named Irving Berlin, and Berlin seems unscrupulous enough to... But wait, you'll have to read Larry Karp's meticulously researched and clever mystery to find out. The question here isn't who wrote "Alexander's Ragtime Band" (although that's a controversy still alive today), but who killed the young man found stabbed to death in the offices of Waterson, Berlin, and Snyder Music Publishers--with Joplin himself crouched over the bloody body. This juicy puzzler has a lot going on--characters both black and white interacting in a day and age when racial justice wasn't even a question on most people's minds--young lovers confronted by disapprving parents--gun toting mobsters--a Civil War incident never forgotten, the music business of the day, and not least the little matter of catching a killer. Consider the book a highly recommended read, rife with history, intrigue, and characters that ring true-to-life complex. This latest novel is another example of Karp's multi-layered literary talents and personal devotion to the world of song.

Reviewed by Olivera Baumgartner-Jackson for Reader Views (7/08) From Wikipedia: "The defining characteristic of ragtime music is a specific type of syncopation in which melodic accents occur between metrical beats. This results in a melody that seems to be avoiding some metrical beats of the accompaniment by emphasizing notes that either anticipate or follow the beat. The ultimate (and intended) effect on the listener is actually to accentuate the beat, thereby inducing the listener to move to the music. Scott Joplin, the composer/pianist known as the `King of Ragtime,' called the effect `weird and intoxicating.' . . . Some authorities consider ragtime to be a form of classical music." Quite a mouthful, this partial definition of ragtime, isn't it? Funnily enough, I feel that a similar description could be used for Larry Karp's book "The King of Ragtime." Melodic accents between metrical beats, weird and intoxicating and definitely a classic, all of those very much relate to another excellent book published by The Poisoned Pen Press. And the reader just has to follow the beat of the story, which draws one in quickly and does not let go. Set in 1916, this mystery introduces us to the legendary Scott Joplin in his sunset years. Ravaged by illness and nearly driven into madness by his burning desire to get his latest work, a musical drama, published before he dies, Scott Joplin approaches Irving Berlin. Berlin happens to be one of the employers of Joplin's piano student, Martin Niederhoffer; and Niederhoffer would like Joplin to meet with Berlin, the man who has wronged him before, but who is an incredibly powerful and influential publisher and producer. Upon entering his office, Niederhoffer discovers his mentor in the presence of a lifeless form of an office friend. He decides to hide Joplin, but during their escape, both men are seen and recognized, so the law enforcement is soon on their trail. Will they find the real killer or will Joplin go down for a crime he did not commit? And how come Berlin keeps denying that he received the musical drama from Joplin? Moving with a swift pace, this extremely well-researched book should spark the reader's interest in ragtime in case one has not been a ragtime fan before. The author has created a story with excellent historical background and enough realistic details to keep it believable. At times I had to remind myself that what I was reading was actually fiction and not fact. Smooth writing style, convincing cast of characters - both actual historic figures and the ones invented by the author, as well as the immensely appealing subject of this mystery all contributed to an extremely enjoyable read in "The King of Ragtime." I am definitely looking for the promised third part of the Ragtime trilogy.

Despite two murders, this is not a traditional mystery, and even though it perfectly recreates 1916 New York, it's much more than a historical novel. The story is intricately plotted with colorful characters, including historical figures, who leap to life intent on surprising us. Karp entertains with complex relationships and taut suspense, even as he educates us about the music and mores of the ragtime era.