Matthew Pearl's best-selling The Dante Club (2003) successfully meshed history, literature, and mystery. Though he tries to duplicate this formula and honor a great American writer, The Poe Shadow fails to garner similar interest. First, Pearl's attempt to echo 19th-century prose is fusty and verbose. Second, Clark, though he has his eccentricities, is rather "poor company" (Wall Street Journal). Third, while the subplots offer intrigue, they rarely advance the plot and never attain the macabre tone of Poe's tales. The historical context, however (though weighed down by ponderous if meticulous research), provides new insights into Poe's personal life and literary career. The verdict: for Poe (or Pearl) fans only.

This is an excerpt from a review published in Bookmarks magazine.

One quarter in, I was deciding whether to continue or not because I found neither the protagonist nor anyone else likable nor does the book get rave reviews. Avi's “The Man Who Was Poe” and “In Strange City” by Laura Lippman are more engaging novels regarding Poe. The pace in the first third is also rather slow.

The protagonist narrator is a most frustrating character, He is incredibly obsessive, impetuous and naive, even after several experiences that should wise him up. Having enlisted the help of a man he believes to be the model for and as good at ratiocination as Poe's Dupin, he continually second guesses his actions and questions his thinking. Thus it’s good to remember that he’s grieving his parents, and since he’s fairly young and sheltered, neither his frontal lobe nor his street-smarts are well-developed. With one hundred pages left, I decided he’s definitely an idiot but I’d come too far to quit!

In the end, based on his research, the author presents a plausible explanation of Poe’s last days besides the election cooping one frequently presented (look it up or read chapter 29). If all you want is the alternative explanation, read chapter 35 though you’ll be missing some context. The research and incorporation of actual people, news reports and events is impressive.

I could not get through it

Some weak spots, ending not real strong.

This book attempts to explain the mystery surrounding the death of Edgar Allan Poe in 1849. Having not read or studied all of the theories about his cause of death, this book didn't excite me or whet my appetite to learn more. There was of lot of conjecture, but I would expect after 175, not a lot of new ground. As a result, the book lacked intensity and suspense.

I should have just read more by Poe himself, and skipped this one. I've read other disappointing books that used Poe as a centerpiece to the story, and this one falls right in with them for me. Its set right after Poe's mysterious death, and the main character, a fan, practically devotes his life to finding out the details of Poe's death and trying to restore his reputation as a writer. That was as far as I got, because it was just too unrealistic. He is living and breathing with nothing else in mind, and it gets a little weird. He discovers that a person in Poe's works is based on a real person, so he tries to find the guy and thinks that will help him. Blah blah blah, I can pass. Unfortunately, I have one more Poe-related book on my to-read shelf (by another author, altho one who wrote another of the disappointing ones I've tried already), so I may still give that a chance, but then I think I'll just give up on these. If I want Poe, I'll just read Poe.

The Poe Shadow suffers from several flaws, but what was most unforgivable to me was the devotion of the author to present his own findings in his researching of Poe’s death. This caused the big reveal at the end of the novel to fall completely flat, and render all of the build up to that point meaningless. It is not that the author did not tie up all of the pieces, but the end solution was so simple and underwhelming, that it leaves the reader wanting.

The most interesting reveal in the novel came from a side plot which, up to that point, had been largely in the background, save for a few mentions here and there. I actually did enjoy the reveal of that side plot, as it was an excellent way to reveal the true motivations of one of the primary characters. However, because that side plot had nothing to do with the core mystery of the work, it felt almost gratuitous.

I agree with the assessment of several reviewers that the main character, Quentin, was extremely unlikable for most of the novel. However, one thing I thought the author did well was show Quentin’s metamorphosis through the journey. This is most evident when a flood allows Quentin to escape his current predicament. From that flood, a new, stronger, and wiser Quentin was born. That Quentin is the one that is needed to finally bring a resolution to the mystery of Poe’s death. It would have been much more impactful had the author not brought back the brilliant detective to spoon feed Quentin the lengthy and uninteresting solution and instead allowed Quentin to come to the answers on his own accord.

Overall, there are pieces in the novel that are done well, but they are outnumbered by the pieces that are underdeveloped and underwhelming.

The Poe Shadow by Matthew Pearl took me forever to fully engage. When I borrowed it from the library, I thought it would be nice to read the novel for Edgar Allen Poe's birthday, January 19. That did not happen.
Protagonist Quentin Clark comes upon Poe's funeral as he's pondering marriage and inheritance in a graveyard. A lawyer, Clark is portrayed as someone who maintained a correspondence with Poe. Poe was America's first full-time professional author. What connection might he and Clark have had to take either of them away from the need to earn their livings?
Clark's concern regarding Poe's death in Baltimore doesn't accelerate the action, but it does create many a premise. That includes the Clark's discovery of a real-life version of Poe's investigating character Auguste Dupin.
Americans are quite out of touch with the 1840s. The Whig party was declining. The absence of copyright laws kept the ambition to be professional writers at bay for most people. Slave holders wanted to be in charge. And yet, Pearl does weave these and other elements of the era into his tale.
The freed slave who helps Clark is the best character in the book. Clark's friends, family and enemies are scarcely more than cardboard. Sometimes their 19th Century colloquialisms are entertaining, but the dialogue is more often stilted.
Pearl's bibliography is full of intriguing titles and subjects, but The Poe Shadow inhibits me from checking out more of his books.

I had mixed feelings while reading The Poe Shadow. In the end, although seemingly rambling in parts, it is clear that this was a story meant to display some of the leading theories surrounding the mystery of Edgar Allan Poe’s death and the circumstances surrounding it. In the end, it is a brilliant story, one which most lovers of Poe’s work I’m sure would enjoy. Sadly, we never know how or why the great suspense writer died, but this novel explores the mystery thoroughly and Matthew Pearl explains this in his Author’s Note. It reads like a nonfictional treatise wrapped in a fictional story.

Filled with an intriguing cast of characters both great and small, it is an absorbing read, much like most of Pearl’s books, and filled with obvious deep research without ever becoming weighed down by info dumping. The research is integral to the plot and at one with it. Most significant, and a brilliant plot-point, is having a devoted friend and fan of Poe, fictional lawyer Quentin Clark, conceive the idea of finding the original inspiration for Poe’s great French detective, C. Auguste Dupin, investigate the baffling mystery of Poe’s death. But alas, there have been multiple possibilities for the identification of the elusive detective throughout time, as Pearl explains in his Note. So what is an author to do? Why not include two men who both claim to be Poe’s inspiration with motives all their own?! —That in itself was inspirational! And why not have both men be rivals who wish to solve the mystery before the other?! Let the sparks fly and the twisting, turning, deceiving, macabre plot line develop in typical Edgar Allan Poe fashion. It was like having the inspiration behind Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot or Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes walking among the living to find an answer to a real-life murder mystery.

This was, indeed, as I said, a rambling storyline at times—or so it seemed—until all the parts came together in the climax like a puzzle. Set in pre-Civil War Baltimore of 1849-51, it wonderfully evokes the city of that time. (Did you know that herds of pigs still roamed the streets at night in 1851 as a means of garbage disposal?!) In one scene, we even get a possible precursor to the famed Poe Toaster who paid a secretive visit to the grave to pay tribute to the writer. The real Poe Toaster didn’t start his anonymous visitations on the anniversary of Poe’s birth on January 19th until around the 1930s (and continuing until 1998 with his presumed death), but Pearl even added that into the storyline. There is no doubt whatsoever Matthew Pearl knows his Poe. Not just the man, but his famed stories and poems and life. And it shows on every page. Not everyone is fan of Pearl, but I have read several of his novels and have not been disappointed. It is amazing how he has the ability (in this story) to take on the character of the Quentin Clark and make you believe he is actually telling us the story.

So what was the answer to the mystery of Poe’s death? I’m not telling. You’ll have to read The Poe Shadow to find out. Or will you?!

“Wouldn’t you wish to protect something you knew to be great that everyone else sought to desecrate? Wouldn’t you wish to be a part of changing something, even if it meant changing yourself?"

Quentin Clark is a disillusioned attorney living in Baltimore. Although successful in his profession and on the verge of marrying his lifelong sweetheart, after accidentally stumbling upon the very strange and hurried funeral for his literary idol, Edgar Allan Poe, he is willing to sacrifice everything and everyone close to him in order to learn the circumstances behind the writer’s very mysterious death.

One of the first things I noticed about this book was that there were far too many exclamations – almost at the end of every sentence! I understood that Clark was very passionate about Poe and about his quest to learn more about the author’s death, but an exclamation after every other sentence was a bit much! I found it very distracting!

The pace picked up a little once Clark’s inquiries led him to Paris where he attempted to determine the true identity of the man who inspired the investigator Dupin, a character featured in some of Poe's short stories. Once in Paris, Clark realizes there is another puzzle to solve - was Poe’s Inspector inspired by Monsieur Duponte, the renowned but reclusive investigator, or the “Baron” Dupin, a criminal on the run from his creditors? The thief/assassin Bonjour was at least an interesting character, and the use of “ratiocination” reminded me a great deal of the logical investigational technique used by Sherlock Holmes.

Quite honestly, despite the potentially interesting premise, this was a disappointing read. I’m glad I read the Last Dickens first – if I had read Pearl’s books in the order they were written, I might have given up on the Last Dickens since the Poe Shadow wasn’t nearly as captivating a story.

My rating should actually be taken as 3.5 stars.

This is the 2nd book involving Edgar Allan Poe I've read in the past year. The other being "The Beautiful Cigar Girl" a work of non fiction & this being historical fiction. It takes place in mid 19th century Baltimore at the time of Poe's death which the press has leaped upon as an object lesson of the evils of drink. A young lawyer & admirer of Poe becomes incensed at this slander & sets out to make the record straight, but his obsession may cost him everything professionally, materially, romantically, and perhaps even his sanity, if not his life. Baltimore is vividly drawn as that bipolar city just below the Mason-Dixon line that exhibits aspects of the antebellum South & Northern urban society only a decade before the Civil War. The intrigue extends to Paris of Louis Bonaparte and is filled with characters that range as widely as those two cities do geographically & culturally.

Pearl capture the formality & understatement of 19th century prose at times even showing echoes of Poe himself. Often I felt there would be some loose thread that would remain unexplained, but by the end, like a Dickens' novel, all the threads come together in a more or less satisfactory way. The overriding question throughout is how much is historical & how much is fiction. But the Historical Notes after the novel concludes clears that up as well. As it turns out quite a bit is true, but there are enough gaps in the record to give Pearl the room to imagine quite a tale of nearly every intrigue imaginable.

it was uninteresting, i had expected more action and less dialogue. characters have absolutely no depth and the final reveal is quite boring as well... proved my boyfriend right who said i shouldn't be reading this pulp. how disappointing to be wrong.