"Welcome to the electrifying underworld of California’s Depression-era taxi dance halls, where a dance could cost you a dime, a chance at romance, or a bullet in your back.”—Rick Bonus, Professor and Chair at the Dept. of American Ethnic Studies in the Univ. of Washington
Taxi Dancer is a gripping historical novel by Marivi Soliven that illuminates the hidden world of Depression-era Filipino taxi dance halls, weaving a forbidden interracial romance with a high-stakes murder mystery to explore race, desire, survival, and the Filipino American experience in 1930s California.
“If we can’t marry white girls, we can at least dance with them.” In response to Depression-era California laws that criminalized interracial marriage, Filipinos established taxi dance halls where they could mingle with American women. When Filipino farmworker Eli and American taxi dancer Lucinda fall in love, they hope to move to Washington State where they can legally wed. Their plans are derailed when Eli is arrested for the shooting death of a dance hall owner. As Lucinda fights to exonerate Eli, she uncovers a murder conspiracy orchestrated by Mamie Savage, a rival dance hall owner and Sal, her Filipino bartender. The capital punishment trial brings to light abhorrent secrets concealed by the conspirators, the victim, and Lucinda herself. Inspired by true events in San Diego’s Stingaree district.