Photo courtesy of Alexander Cox.
Katherine Beutner, above, described her new book “Killingly” as a “queer historical crime novel.”
By Jude Barrera ’24
Staff Writer & Copy Editor
Mount Holyoke’s campus in the nineteenth century is the setting for the upcoming book “Killingly” by Katharine Beutner, a professor at the College of Wooster in Ohio. Based loosely on true events, the novel follows the search for missing Mount Holyoke student Bertha Mellish. In an interview with Mount Holyoke News, Beutner described “Killingly” as “a queer historical crime novel … It was a time when there was a lot of anxiety in the culture about women’s roles and this idea about the new woman now as an independent, possibly even financially independent, figure.”
Beutner has based the plot on her findings within the Archives and Special Collections. There, Beutner came across a file with material relating to Bertha, containing records of classes she took at Mount Holyoke, newspaper clippings from her disappearance and letters written by her classmates to their families that mention her. Beyond these documents pertaining to Bertha, Beutner also studied photographs of the campus and dorm life at the time.
One of the sources Beutner referred to in her research was scrapbooks made by students in the era. “It was around the time that people had more access to cameras … So they actually have snapshots, and it’s so recognizable. Here’s a pile of laundry … Here’s the girls having a party and cooking fudge in somebody’s room on a Friday night, or here’s the girls playing softball outside in this one, and things like that. There’s something about the technology of printing at the time that [makes the photos] turquoise,” Beutner noted. These scrapbooks helped to populate the setting of “Killingly,” giving depth and accuracy to the description of college life in the 1800s.
“Killingly” is Beutner’s second novel. Her debut novel “Alcestis” is a retelling of the Greek myth of Alcestis, in which the titular character chooses to die so that her husband will be allowed by the gods to live, but is then brought back from the underworld. “Her voice kind of disappears part way, like she goes to the underworld, and then the story doesn’t follow her there,” Beutner said of the original myth. “It has not escaped to me that both of [these novels] are stories about women who disappear in some fashion … It’s really striking to me that there are just erasures … of women’s voices … and the voices of queer people too.”
Both of Beutner’s published novels have been inspired by her academic career. “Everything I do in the two portions of my life comes together,” she said. “Alcestis” was inspired by her undergraduate studies as a classics major at Smith, as well as a longer interest in Greek mythology. The beginnings of “Killingly” can be traced back to 2009, when Beutner discovered a news article about Mellish’s disappearance within the archives at the University of Texas at Austin that was written three years after the incident. “It was an interview with the family doctor of all people,” Beutner said. “He was describing his ideas because, of course, she was never found … I’m a Smith [graduate] … I was very familiar with … the Pioneer Valley, and so I was like, what? How did I not know about this student who disappeared?” Since then, Beutner has been writing the novel on and off whilst continuing her professorial career.
“It was an interview with the family doctor of all people. He was describing his ideas because, of course, she was never found … I’m a Smith [graduate] … I was very familiar with … the Pioneer Valley, and so I was like, what? How did I not know about this student who disappeared?”
Reflecting on the difference between her academic and fiction writing, Beutner said, “In fiction, you’re creating a feeling … It’s a very embodied kind of writing, and to me, that’s very different from academic writing, which can certainly have a strong voice but … it’s not really in the body.” Being based on a true incident, “Killingly” draws from historical, archival and academic references as well as the emotive, embodied writing that Beutner describes. Beutner has also woven feminist themes into “Killingly.” “I’m also really invested in environmental writing and organizing, and I wasn’t quite sure if I had figured out how to do historical fiction in a way that felt suitably urgent … I do feel like I have now … Reproductive justice is an important element of the book, and that’s something that I care about a lot,” Beutner said.
“Killingly” will be released on June 6, 2023, in both chain and independent bookstores. A digital version of the novel and an audiobook will also be available. Preorders are currently open.