Firstly, before I read, I have to say: what an intricately gorgeous cover design! I know it’s not a done thing to judge a book by it’s cover, but if I were to do so, I’d be expecting a dark tale of an Eden-like garden that is quietly turning wicked, with the remnants of beauty clinging to a last blossoming flower, a ripe and ageing fruit, while an evil infestation creeps in and takes over… the ominous central raven, and even the careful title give me this premonitory sensation… 

 

But I haven’t cracked this beautiful cover yet, and I haven’t even read the synopsis, and that’s how I plan on going into the reading of this novel—with only the cover to set the stage… 

 

Some Time Later… 

I’ve now read the book. 

 

This is why you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. 

 

While on a global timeless sense, this does have to do with the mutilation of humanity since the perfection of Eden, but it’s not that story, not exactly… 

 

Unexpected suspense creeps across several of these pages, like the gossamer legs of a quiet spider, and the chills and thrills are real. But there’s a social message glaring at us in these difficult stories, behind the herbalist/entomologist veneer. I was for sure creeped out, indignant a few times, but mostly felt the rising sisterhood scream back over centuries and decades and across the pond, clawing for justice. 

 

A beautiful story that kept a steady pace, increasing in intensity in the climax, and delivering all the dark cold Northern chills you want from a creepy cover, but it culminates with a satisfying power. 

 

A lovely debut. 

Code breaking is at the heart of all clues in the chase to recover Alistair Ainsworth, a genius chess-master code-breaker of British Intelligence during the tense years of the first world war. 

 

Another coolly delivered script recounting the latest adventure of most of the adult children found in the original Sherlock Holmes series. 

 

Our clever author has sidestepped the ‘no additional stories to the life of Sherlock’ stipulation of the Doyle Estate copyright by rewriting them anyways, and masking everyone in faces of the next generation. And he’s not strayed far from the characters, contexts, and clue-hunting strategies of the deceased Sherlock. The trouble in doing so, is that we are waiting for the astounding genius employed by Doyle—and it is yet forthcoming. Well, we can hope. Goldberg might need to stray a bit more with these promising new characters for my interest to be fully engaged. Genetics can’t be that overpowering so as the child is entirely absorbed in the idiosyncrasies and personality of the parent. 

 

There is entertainment here, and the plot is well constructed—it’s the use of carbon-copy replicas of the original characters (albeit, the continuing story of Dr. John Watson is interesting) that lacks imagination and sense of depth in relationship. I’d like to see more of their own personalities in the stories, not only the unravelling of mysteries and stellar medical analyses. 

 

That said, the accurate medical terms, descriptions of injuries, surgical procedures, and pathological insights to causes of death are the indisputable highlight on this neutral canvas of rather bland characters. 

 

Joanna Blalock (nee Holmes now Watson) smokes so much all I can smell off the page is cigarettes—it’s reminiscent of my childhood in the 70s & 80s, but then, Turkish cigarettes in the early 1900s weren’t stuffed with tar and carcinogens (still aren’t), which makes me wonder: why the blue smoke? I’m not wondering to the extent I’ll go out and experiment (though, I’m tempted)—all the talk of cigarette smoke and haze was giving me eye-burn and lung-clog. Is Joanna’s chain-smoking really necessary? But I suppose it’s 1915 and as the American Surgeon General had put his stamp of approval on fags in America... I admit, even my own grandmother, a product of the 1930s, was a prolific chain-smoker and could dangle a five-centimetre hook of burnt ash off a glowing snout, light her next off the previous, have three going at the once in different rooms of the house, and I, by some miracle, never once suffered a burn… 

 

But, if I have to hear one more time about this pretentiously intelligent woman’s ‘Mona Lisa smile’ I might throw the book… 

 

Discrepancies: I notice the ‘pants’ slip has been remedied in the 3rd novel from previous instalments in the series, and we now have proper English people calling trousers by their proper name, lest we believe grown men to be traipsing round the streets of London in their undergarments. Whew. 

 

My last beef: ‘gotten’ … never. You’ll never have heard any Brit worth his Sunday Carvery with a pint of Ale utter this word in the last millennium. We might have some young people in this new generation who have been inundated by American literature and television use the Americanised version of the past participle, but not educated upper-middle class Londoners in 1915… 

 

Other than that, I was adequately entertained for four and a half hours while cooking and cleaning. 

But why do you need a professional nose dog if you’re following by sight? Anyways, there are some confounding redundancies in this novel.

Overall, it was better than the first. I found the romantic elements lacking. I know, it’s not a romance, but you’d think this pair would share more than a ‘knowing look’ or two throughout (a brush of fingers?), seeing as they did decide to get married since last we followed them and the old (not that old) John Watson down twisty lanes and dank attics to solve a mystery.

The bumbling antics of nearly every character apart from Joanna—who are all exact replicas (a generation along) of the Doyle lot, including the blood hound—is at times comical. Not sure if it’s meant to be… but maybe…? It's sure one way to get round the Doyle Estate restrictions.

I’d love to see more development of the interpersonal relationships in the stories. So far, all these folk are fairly cool and static and clinical, even the narrator, despite his unabashed worship of the intelligence of his new bride.

The investigative portions are a wee bit predictable, though our guesses all land on the grill stacked with red herrings, and the resolution was little more than a rabbit trick at the end.

A preferable mode of entertainment to many other things, though overall, this fell short of my expectations for a piece like this—can I hope they improve over time?

I’ll keep reading.

I love these people. And the hard part is, they are going to leave me eventually. I don’t want that to happen, but it’s the inevitable, innit?

I think Osman is doing my generation a great service in these stories. We are watching our parents grow into old age with a rare fever to live more and live fully—to squeeze every drop of life granted while they still can. Just like this lot. And with good humour amid the aching hips and knees and failing memories. And we want them around for another few decades please…

There is a deep sadness in the Stephen chapter (Stephen’s perspective). It’s so graciously and respectfully written. I bawled. For anyone experiencing the horrors and emptiness of dementia with a family member, you know what you don’t know, but you see it, and can only imagine. Osman gives us heartbreaking insight, and we see the varied perspectives in human approach to coping personally, and how to keep on in love despite this devastating illness. Overwhelmingly sad, and yet still manages to be hopeful.

Yes, there are murders happening also amid the more serious aspects of ageing and relationships, and the investigative liberties our late-in-life pensioners take guarantee all the giggles we’ve come to expect. 

I can’t wait for the next caper these geriatric geniuses jostle their way into…and I can only hope there are many more ahead. Please. We’ve still got loads of life…

Some fun twists and the overall plot dives deeper into the dank caves of the Magesterium. Darker and scarier, Call and friends have to face the worst kinds of enemies in their third year: giant monsters and deceptive adults. Is there any more frightening team of opponents?

It ends teetering off a cliff with some vital information—so be sure to have The Silver Mask ready to go…

Some damned good storytelling.

Of all the women we want to hear from in the midst of a landscape of vile, voracious warriors and ruthless rulers in the Greek epics, here is the one woman we rarely get to walk with (and I’ve walked twice with her this year as I read Saint’s Elektra just over a month ago). Clytemnestra is the one Spartan always cast in the least favourable light, bound by duty, tempted by fierce jealousy and lust, and embittered by hatred for her perpetual torturer. (It’s a miracle she makes it, honestly. Most of us would be minced brains in a bone-bag, if still alive.) Clytemnestra has become my new favourite in 2023 (well, besides Cassandra, that spiritually-sensitive damaged beauty, who will always hold a special place in my heart. Okay, and Penelope. I’d like to read Penelope as the protagonist by Casati or Haynes or Miller or Saint—as these women seem to really know how to shoot electricity into the old Greek stories—and keep my undivided attention for days).

I loved the pace—there was no hurry, and each delightful morsel turned slowly and unexpectedly bitter as the truths unfolded. I mean, it’s not like we don’t know what’s going to happen, but even knowing, we felt the shock and twist of each agony, sensed the deep satisfying sneer of cold revenge, breathed a sigh of relief in the small releases amid overwhelming tragedy.

Maybe it’s because I love living in this one same story over and over again, like a familiar tale told by a grandmother who in each retelling unveils a new hidden perspective, an emotion previously undisclosed, but this is up there with the best ones. Five whole stars.

Okay, so, Natalie Haynes, Costanza Casati, Jennifer Saint, or Madeline Miller—Who will write me Cassandra’s story…? Anyone up to explore the gaudy heart-wrenching details of Penelope’s obsessive love and unwarranted desertion by Odysseus…?

 

This is a high adventure; a quest that keeps a steady pace with zero lulls along the way; not as loaded with magic bits as one might expect (more tea-drinking than magic tbh), but this sort of magic has certain limits, so it’s contained and guarded, and it’s behind the scenes (with reason) for most of this book. 

 

Imani and her siblings like to live on the edge, and they can, as privileged members of society, without feeling the same repercussions as most. This is a point driven home hard by the author throughout, and it’s not unjustified, but there is a sort of long-look realisation coming to Imani as she journeys far from home and meets people who suffer pain and poverty and starvation, and die unnecessary deaths. She soon comes to realise that even the people with whom she was raised harbour ill-will towards her and her privilege. But Imani is opening her eyes to these realities. [The framework of this portion of the tale is very like the awakening of Siddhartha Gautama to the realities of the world upon which his pristine castle was propped—though, for the most part, the story is based on Arabic Folk tales, characters and elements.] 

 

Imani has come with her own enemy-to-still-hate scout leader for the journey, and she still hates him (but do we?) as she gets to know all his tender bits and rough edges. But then there’s this djinn also (with hefty emphasis that all the people who matter believe djinn to be evil in nature). He’s introduced and explored from a revisionist perspective, and reasonable sympathy is churned up with a heart-tugging back-story attached to the life of this dark, broody, evil character. Those who like a little triangulated romantic confusion will appreciate the extra-curricular connotations involved. 

 

Despite grumbling impossible-to-defeat mystical monsters lurking beneath the sands (we only get a glimpse), the white people—especially the blonds and the gingers—are the real devils in this clashing of peoples in a fantastical setting (an ancient and mystical desert land that comes wrapped in digestible Western dialogues). There is subtle and chafing acknowledgment of recognising internal classism within the same culture and community, though, so the enemies are coming from all sides, beneath and within, and the war is rumbling as we head to the second book in the series. 

 

Yes, this is only just beginning. A few pathetic rebellions have been squelched because the richest and safest have turned a blind eye to the suffering masses. But the younger generation of the protected privileged class are awakening, throwing off their blissful comforts, and arming themselves against the other oppressors of the lower class citizens whom they’ve well ignored until now while living in their own gated community. 

 

Though this ends on a note you could let linger and not need for more, there is more to come. It promises to be big adventure, with bloody battles, a little magic thrown in, an uprising of caste-defying, warrior-trained teenagers, and maybe some desert monsters, our reformed djinn slayer, and hopefully a powerful djinn will also make an appearance. In this build-up novel, there have been a good many details left out, though tasty morsels have been served to whet the appetite for more. 

 

I enjoyed it. I'll read the next. 

This is horror, Moreno-Garcia style for sure; full of snappy dialogue, comically awkward horrific scenarios, unnecessarily tense relationships, uncertain attractions, dysfunctional families, GenZ/Millennials (I hardly know the difference anymore) kinds of shockingly honest conversations (which initially sits slightly wrong, as the novel is set in 1990s México City, but it’s not off-puttingly out of place as the story progresses), including whippy-fast and jaw-dropping stark language. The story presents some righteously petty men, is laced in morbid sarcasm, features an explosive chemical concoction sitting in an unsuspecting freezer, and the atmosphere is creeping with a curious grey fog of nostalgic suspense seeped in the darkest of historical truth. 

 

Classic Moreno-García. 

 

Imbedded in the setting and plot is a cylinder of interesting information about the inner workings of the film industry and especially the Mexican film scene from the very earliest days up to the multifaceted present (1993). ‘Relocated’ Neo-Nazis and the spread of their anti-Semitism are at the core of the moral dilemma here. 

 

Montserrat is a woman wrapped up in old film reels. The sounds and audio tracks of life fill her ears far beyond the quiet of her sound booth—that is, when she can keep a job in this man’s man’s world of film making. Tristan is an ageing actor with old habits the media can’t seem to leave behind, even if it’s been a decade since he’s popped an upper or sniffed a line.  Between these long-time friends, who endure their world of undeclared need which keeps them bound together and an unseen current of tension that maintains their perpetual fight, they have a serious horror flick addiction. Well, she does, and she drags him into it with her hands over his sensitive eyes. 

 

A strange murder sets Montserrat on a quest to find a killer who may not even be a living person. Tristan, on the other hand, is the one seeing dead people. And it all goes up in screen-smoke from there—conjuring magic and illusions and haunts of the past. 

 

In my mind, the whole thing played out like an old Black & White film, the edges burnt sepia, with popping 90s fluorescents flashing against my retinas at inappropriately timed moments. 

 

Delightful. 

 

I deem this novel: Neo-Punk Noir. 

 

Other than Moreno-Garcia’s Certain Dark Things this novel is the best of its unique genre. 

Well. Geesh. At least it was a quick read and … entertainingish-like-sorta. 

Mostly a convoluted and bloated faux-feminist (mansplaining, but like out of a woman’s mouth to make it more palatable but still overbearingly pretentious) rehash of Doyle’s far more literary, intellectual, sublime, and delightful work. I mean, I love a revisit to an old wonderful setting and such fond characters—but this is such a mediocre replica; it lacks originality—and just doesn’t feel like, feel… it doesn’t feel like anything. In fact, it flew by in a dreary informational-text blur with a few adolescent admissions of instant infatuation to inject a sense of romance to the plot. I suppose. There’s some sharp banter in a few places. But mostly, I felt I was being given a lesson about things that should have been obvious (duh) by a socially inept know-it-all.

I might look at the rest of the series later on, if I have nothing better to do with my time. Honestly, it’s better than some other crap getting published out there lately. (Like the alien-invasion version of Love Island starring Fabio as Heathcliff-minus-brooding-personality or whatever that was Stacey saw in the library the other day…what in the world? Yes, this is definitely a better option than that…)

These are no simple cosy mysteries. They are full of interpersonal complexities and such vibrant historical settings, and it’s all South East Asia, which wins me EVERY TIME…*sigh*

[Side-note on Narrators: Yay. Griff is back as an actual Welshman. I do love a Welsh accent and am adamant that if you have Welsh characters you must hire a narrator who knows how to do a proper Welsh accent.]

This time, as Harriet distracts herself by joining a musical theatre company, the mystery lies not only in discovering the culprit of these murderous crimes, but also the confounding motive—there are several viable options that point the finger at a handful of worthwhile suspects. And we get hints throughout, and maybe we guess this one easier than the others, but the crimes at the forefront almost take a back seat to the real story developing behind the scenes…

We pull back the curtain on the ongoing not-so-secret life of Curren and Li An. We now know what happened to bring them together, but there’s more to it than what we’ve already learned, and Li An has scores to settle. Meanwhile, old ghosts have come to haunt Curren, and he too is drawn away from his duties and relationships to pressing personal matters we would urge him to pursue.

Harriet’s past has also resurfaced, and though it seems as though she might be able to keep it all under wraps for now, the threat of exposure leers on the next page. And if the façade is lifted, she might not survive the consequences. Not a second time. An alternative has been offered to her, which I don’t want her to take (does anyone?), but I have a feeling she’ll feel trapped and see no other way... although, I have learned that what I think might happen could be the furthest thing from fate (as in the hands of Ms. Stuart) and so I’m kept waiting to see how all these entanglements will be resolved.

There is a delightful labyrinth of shifting relationships behind these open-and-close murder mysteries. But the sun has set on everything cosy, and a heavy darkness has crept into the veins of the story as the underbelly of classist imperialism bares its crooked tea-stained teeth at our beloved cast of characters. We can only imagine that what lies ahead will indeed be terrifying.

With such unpredictable and sophisticated writing to enjoy, I have shamelessly turned into a compulsive and obsessed reader. Thank you, Ms. Stuart, for hours of acutely intelligent and arresting entertainment.

[As soon as the audiobook for Terror in Topaz is released, I’ll be the first to listen on my cloudLibrary app. In the meantime, I’ve placed an order at Indigo for all four beautifully designed books to be delivered in time for Christmas. Even the covers are gorgeous with the steamy humid feel of Singapore stamped in a fading art nouveau print, reminiscent of the pre-war era of the 1910s. I can’t wait to share them with my Dad. He’s going to flipping love them.]