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Saturday, 10 December 2011

Bedlam Detective first review

Thanks to Bill Schafer at Subterranean Press for forwarding this Publishers Weekly starred review:
Fiction
The Bedlam Detective
Stephen Gallagher. Crown, $25 (256p) ISBN 978-0-307-40664-4

Set in England in 1912, this masterful whodunit from Gallagher (Red, Red Robin) introduces Sebastian Becker, a former policeman and Pinkerton agent who now works as the special investigator to the Masters of Lunacy, looking into cases involving any “man of property” whose sanity is under question. His latest assignment takes him to the small town of Arnmouth to determine whether Sir Owain Lancaster has gone around the bend. Lancaster returned from a disastrous trip to the Amazon, which claimed the life of his wife and son, only to attribute the catastrophe to mysterious animals straight out of Doyle’s The Lost World. Lancaster believes that the creatures that plagued him in South America have followed him home, and are responsible for the deaths of two young girls, a theory supported by a local legend of a beast of the moor. Gallagher’s superior storytelling talents bode well for future adventures starring the well-rounded Becker. Agent: Howard Morhaim. (Feb.)
Yeah. What he said.

1 comment:

Good Dog said...

Excellent review. It sounds like an absolute corker. And wouldn't you know it, I just have space on one of the hardback shelves suitable for a 320-page novel. Off to Amazon I go... Er... a different Amazon, obviously...