A relatively entertaining novel with some sinister set-pieces, but unfortunately the premise is stretched too thinly over the 800-odd pages and consequently the narrative is rendered a halting and stumbling journey between various dramatic events. The author’s hopes of a cinematic adaption are also only thinly disguised, which combines with the repeated Americanisms (such as letters repeatedly being written people, instead of written to people) and anachronisms (such as mentions of “pistol-whipping”) to jarring effect. Ultimately the narrator fails to convince as the historical figure of Wilkie Collins, and the conceit that the famed author is addressing himself through the ages to a future audience seems forced, particularly when he seems suspiciously prescient regarding the details of his and Dickens’ reputations and critical assessments as of the 21st Century. Moreover Simmons’ significantly fails to create a coherent link between the eponymous grotesque of his own creation and the Dickens novel after which he is named, despite dancing around the production of that particular Dickens’ work for some time. The tale is so sprawling and unfocused that any narrative thrust is long since lost by the time of the lacklustre denoument. A more ruthless editing process trimming some of the extraneous material and tiresome repetition of theme and phrase might have earned an extra star. But it didn't. So that's that