Book excerpt: This “relentlessly suspenseful” story of America’s first known kidnapping in nineteenth century Philadelphia is “elegantly told, superbly accomplished” (The Philadelphia Enquirer). In 1874, a little boy named Charley Ross was snatched from his family’s front yard in Philadelphia. A ransom note arrived three days later, demanding twenty thousand dollars for the boy’s return. The city was about to host the America’s Centennial celebration, and the mass panic surrounding the Charley Ross case plunged the nation into hysteria. The desperate search led the police to inspect every building in Philadelphia, set up saloon surveillance in New York’s notorious slums, and begin a national manhunt. With white-knuckle suspense and historical detail, Hagen vividly captures the dark side of an earlier America. Her brilliant portrayal of its criminals, detectives, politicians, spiritualists, and ordinary families will stay with the reader long after the final page. “Hagen skillfully narrates a saga that transcends one kidnapping, a saga tied up with the World’s Fair that was about to open in Philadelphia.” —Kirkus Reviews “As Erik Larson mined the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair for Devil in the White City, Hagen chronicles a tragically more relevant 19th-century story.” —Michael Capuzzo, author of The Murder Room