Sara is the first female employee at the NYPD. She is proof at this time that the 'normal' is changing whether people are prepared or not.When becoming aware of the murders happening she immediately wanted in on the investigation.

Sara Howard is considered a remarkable character. She chooses to remain unmarried, which for a woman of her time period was quite rare and looked down upon. She is a very independent woman who believes in her own beliefs and abilities despite the constant discrimination against her. She graduated from collage, and after spending a summer assisting a vistiting nurse in the Tenth Ward, she went on to become a police secretary in the Police Department at Mulberry Street with hopes of becoming the first female police officer in New York City.

Sara Howard was born and Raised in New York. Her mother wasn't present so it was her fathe that who raised her notably as he would raise a boy. Sara is most known in "The Alienist" for her adventurous spirit and her stubborn and quick to anger personallity especially when she believes that she is being wrong by another. Sara Howard is a highly excitable character and in a quote in the story John Moore states "Her nerves are strung like a piano wire"(92). She is quick to anger against against men who underestimate her which is an understandable feat. Sara is also quite emotionally perceptive, she notices things that at times the others didn't and in an investigation with only men she is a fresh set of insight.

While Sara is a very good character who throughout the story was very useful in the investigation she wasn't perfect. It is her anger that is a bad quality of hers and at times it made situations more diffucult then they needed to be since she is stubborn and doesn't like to give up easily. Another bad quality is her inability to let cetrain situations go. Often times her determination while helpful could have caused her more harm then good. Like when she went through police reports that someone of her status wasn't supposed to touch.

Bad qualities

Even with these qualities she is considered an asset in the investigation for having expirence with the poor parts of town and with a different langauge. She also gives insights to ideas that were not formally adressed by any other member in the group, and without her they wouldn't be able to get a great deal of the information they possed since she was a short time translator in the story.

Overall Sara Howard is an exceptional character with a lot of depth and understanding for even the smallest of things that happen around her.