Things in Jars

October 15, 2019
Lady detective Bridie Devine searches for a missing child and finds much more than she bargained for. Bridie Devine is no stranger to the seedy underworld of Victorian London. An accomplished detective with medical training, she sometimes helps the police by examining bodies to determine the cause of death. Bridie recently failed to find a lost child, and when she's approached about another missing child, the daughter of Sir Edmund Berwick, she isn't enthusiastic about taking on the case. But Christabel Berwick is no ordinary child. Sir Edmund has hidden Christabel away her whole life and wants Bridie to believe this is an ordinary kidnapping. Bridie does a little digging and learns that Christabel isn't his daughter so much as his prized specimen. Sir Edmund believes Christabel is a "merrow," a darker and less romanticized version of a mermaid. Bridie is skeptical, but there are reports of Christabel's sharp teeth, color-changing eyes, and ability to drown people on dry land. Given that Bridie's new companion is a ghost who refuses to tell her why he's haunting her, Bridie might want to open her mind a bit. There's a lot going on in this singular novel, and none of it pretty. Bridie's London is soaked with mud and blood, and her past is nightmarish at best. Kidd (Mr. Flood's Last Resort, 2018, etc.) is an expert at setting a supernatural mood perfect for ghosts and merrows, but her human villains make them seem mundane by comparison. With so much detail and so many clever, Dickensian characters, readers might petition Kidd to give Bridie her own series. Creepy, violent, and propulsive; a standout gothic mystery.

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December 16, 2019
Set in 1863 London, this lurid but languid gothic mystery from Kidd (Mr. Flood’s Last Resort) finds eccentric female detective Bridie Devine investigating the disappearance of six-year-old Christabel Berwick, who appears to have been taken in the night by her nurse. Bridie can’t fathom why the child’s widowed father, notorious maritime oddities collector Sir Edmund Berwick, would refuse to involve the police; then she discovers that Christabel’s very existence is a secret, as are her sharp teeth, piercing voice, and propensity for eating snails. Bridie vows to locate the child and bring her home—provided she can determine whether Christabel is truly Berwick’s daughter, or merely part of his collection. Assisting Bridie is the ghost of boxer Ruby Doyle, who recently began haunting Bridie, but refuses to explain why. Vividly sketched, larger-than-life characters and powerful senses of time and place compensate for the glacial pace and the underdeveloped plot. Penny-dreadful fans will delight in this stylish tale, but readers seeking a satisfying puzzle should look elsewhere. Agent: Amelia Atlas, ICM.

January 24, 2020

In 1863, six-year-old Christabel Berwick is abducted. She has eyes that change color, envenomed pike-like teeth, and the ability to read minds, as well as control water. Chapters alternate between following the kidnappers and the redoubtable female detective Bridie Devine, whose nursery education was provided by a grave snatcher. Bridie's assistant is the ghost of a tattooed pugilist, Ruby Doyle, whom only she can see. Kidd's (Himself) prose is a river of detail, metaphor, and jarringly apt turns of phrase, bringing to life all too vividly the grotesque maze of human wickedness that Bridie threads. There are lies and betrayals, blasphemies and injustices, calloused hearts and pus-ridden toes. Rapes, illicit romances, and insanity. The corruption of children, the knocking out of teeth. And murders of all brands: drowning, stabbing, bludgeoning, poisoning, beheading, dismembering, and the killing of babies born and unborn. One woman is even vivisected before the tale of Christabel (and the "collectors" who covet her) is untangled. VERDICT Fans of the macabre will be mesmerized by this horrific gothic tale, but some may be disturbed by the overt, grisly details.--Sara Scoggan, Fishkill, NY

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Starred review from November 1, 2019
Victorian England was a time when both scholars and thrill seekers became obsessed with things in jars. After being hired by Sir Edmund Berwick, whose daughter, Christabel, has been kidnapped, private investigator Bridie Devine follows a labyrinthine trail through a sooty and soggy Dickensian London in pursuit of criminal anatomists. Christabel is no ordinary child. She possesses not just ethereal beauty, but also strong, venomous, pikelike teeth, and she devours the snails that come to her in slimy processions. Bridie is assisted by a seven-foot-tall housemaid, a legendary apothecary, and the ghost of champion boxer Ruby Doyle. Ruby is so seductive that Bridie turns for advice to a tome entitled Spectral Love: When Your Beau Is Deceased. She is pursued by a nefarious surgeon, disgusted by a circus owner who fancies himself Henry VIII, and beset upon by the evil Mrs. Bibby. Kidd has created a captivating cast of characters and delivers a richly woven tapestry of fantasy, folklore, and history. The atmosphere is thick with myriad unpleasant smells on offer, and readers may find themselves wrinkling their noses, but they will keep turning the pages. Recommend to fans of Ruth Hogan's The Keeper of Lost Things (2017) and Sarah Perry's The Essex Serpent (2017).(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)