Raunchy is an understatement. Based on a true story and unsolved murder among San Francisco's underbelly in the 1870's.

We had plenty to talk about! Some of us couldn't decide if we enjoyed the book, but we all agreed that it was masterful storytelling.

Summer of 1876: San Francisco is in the fierce grip of a record-breaking heat wave and a smallpox epidemic. Through the window of a railroad saloon, a young woman named Jenny Bonnet is shot dead.

The survivor, her friend Blanche Beunon, is a French burlesque dancer. Over the next three days, she will risk everything to bring Jenny's murderer to justice—if he doesn't track her down first. The story Blanche struggles to piece together is one of free-love bohemians, desperate paupers, and arrogant millionaires; of jealous men, icy women, and damaged children. It's the secret life of Jenny herself, a notorious character who breaks the law every morning by getting dressed: a charmer as slippery as the frogs she hunts.
I did not care for this book and would agree with the rest of the critical reviewers: dark, tedious, characters totally unlikeable. I only finished it so I could find out who the murderer was.
It is historical fiction and the events in SF did indeed happen at that time. I know a lot of research when into it. But it didn't make me like it any better.
there were some reviewers that DID like it so maybe a good one for book clubs. Certainly a lot of historical issues to discuss