Prudence Bussey-Chamberlain: Bone Horn [2025] paperback

Gertrude Stein and Alice B Toklas are the most famous married couple of Modernism, icons of literary queer history. But what if Alice had a secret? What if, underneath her thickly cultivated fringe and low brimmed hats, there was something sinister growing? What if, as Picasso claimed, Alice B. Toklas really did have a horn?

This is what the mysterious voice on the phone is asking of her. And she's in no position to hang up; a newly registered Private Investigator, she recently walked away from an exploitative job in academia, is bereaved following the sudden death of her partner, and has a kid to support. The case sounds ridiculous, but she needs the money. Okay, she tells the voice. I'll find the horn. The job takes her from London to Paris to San Francisco, from a Hemingway's kitchen table to a Beat-inspired hotel run by an investment bank. Just when she thinks the case is dead, that no horn exists, she finds herself knee-deep in trouble with someone hot on her heels...

At once a reimagining of the lone wolf detective and a hilarious take down of self-important scholarship, Bone Horn is a smart, hilarious, sexy, and poignant mystery novel about queerness, unbearable grief, and the question of stories, and which are ours to tell.